01. When the Changewinds Blow (33 page)

All three of them were excited by the idea, if a little apprehensive. They were setting off in near total ignorance of their destinations on a trip few generally took who were not in trade, finance, politics, or the military and diplomatic corps, and they hadn't the slightest idea why or what might await them at their destination.

The square in front of the Guildhall looked like a scene from an old western movie in spite of the alienness of the buildings and setting. People scurried here and there, there were a number of wagons laden with who knew what, and men on horseback looking like they were out of an old cowboy movie, hats and all. Somehow, both Sam and Charley had thought of the navigator as a single individual, a guide or something like that, but clearly this was part of a company. The actual navigator was a middle-aged man with thick, long gray hair and a white, neatly trimmed beard dressed in buckskins with fringes and, of all things, a buckskin tan top hat! He gathered all of the people around who would be making the trip other than his "crew"-all apprentices only a few of whom would ever make navigator.

He went around to each in turn, introduced himself as Gallo Jahoort, although his crew and most others addressed him as "Master Jahoort" in respect for his position, checking travel documents, and collecting and counting the money. He didn't blink an eye at Sara and Boday, although he certainly spared one for Charley. She gave him the shy, sweet smile and he almost forgot his count. Charley, for her part, appreciated the reaction. She had learned that power came in a lot of unexpected forms and it was nice to see she had it.

That finished, Jahoort gathered everyone around. "All right-first things first," he bellowed in a loud, booming baritone that could probably be heard through a thunderstorm. "How many folks we got here who never been in the bush before?"

Several, other than just Sam and Boday, raised their hands. Charley, who wasn't supposed to understand this, just kept smiling sweetly.

"All right. Today we're gonna start gettin' some practice and see where the weak links Iie," the navigator went on. "It's a hundred ninety-two leegs to our jumping off point but it'll still be country riding for the most part. We want to average sixty leegs a day minimum, but we should do much better while still in Tubikosa. In three days we'll be at me border, and the next mornin' we're gonna cross into buffer null and make the first sector. I'll tell you more about that when we get mere. For now, we have three days for breakdowns, for findin' out you got clipped, your horses or nargas are all geriatric cases or psychopaths, your food's spoiled, you don't know how to build a campfire, and you forgot to buy toilet paper. Once we cross, it's too late to learn mat. Me and my crew will be checking on everything, seeing that it's all in shape for the trip, teaching you what you don't know, and all that. But once we start this mornin' we ain't gonna stop. If we can't fix it and you can't get it on the way, we're gonna just give you a refund and leave you here."

He paused to let that sink in. Charley found she couldn't follow much of what the man was saying, so she surveyed the others who would be coming along. They were mostly men but there were a few women, too, none it appeared unaccompanied by men. She made it as four wagons and six on horses with pack nargas. The half dozen or so tarp-covered flat wagons were obviously some kind of trade goods going from here to somewhere else on consignment. This was after all a shipping company. There were even a couple of kids in one of the wagons. The boy looked to be thirteen or fourteen, the girl maybe nine or ten-getting close to the time when she'd be putting on white and being segregated. Tubikosans had a certain look about them and most of these people and most of the crew didn't have it. There were almond-eyed Oriental-looking men, although a lot bigger than she thought of Orientals as being, some with brown skin, some with olive skin, all sorts of hair, and lots of different features. Clearly the Akhbreed encompassed a lot more than one race as she understood race.

The crew of about a dozen men looked rather young and even dressed in their cowboy outfits they almost seemed to be boys playing at cowboys rather than the genuine article. Some smoked and a few had beards but that didn't change the impression. Apparently the buckskins were the uniform of navigators; only Jahoort wore them, as Zenchur had.

One fellow who was making the trip on horseback with pack narga looked familiar. For a while she wondered if he hadn't at one time been one of her clients, but it didn't seem like it. She would have remembered that outrageous moustache.

And then she had it. It was a long time ago and almost a lifetime away, or so it seemed. In the tavern in that little town they'd stopped at with Zenchur. He hadn't been wearing a black trail outfit then; he'd been dressed like some kind of rich Shakespearean character, and he'd been talking to Conan the Barbarian with the wristwatch. It had been a short period of time and long ago, but she was dead certain it was the same guy. Both Sam and Zenchur had thought he was making some kind of shady deal with the big Neanderthal in skins. She wondered what he was doing here-and if it was a coincidence. The odds of them ever meeting again, let alone under these circumstances, were pretty damned slim. Of course, if it
was
him it just
had
to be coincidence, no matter how remote. They looked nothing like they did then and if he knew or even suspected that they were the two girls old Horned Head was looking for and knew it well enough to make this wagon train, then he would have known where they were all along and turned them in long before.

Still, he would bear watching.

The train was organized by the crew, and they moved out slowly and carefully, taking the lake front route right past Boday's old loft warehouse and continuing on even as they began to leave the city. Sam looked at the warehouse a bit wistfully and saw that Boday had a slight tear, the first she'd ever shown. "Regrets?" Boday asked, looking at Sam. "Boday can still cut that damned thing off your neck and we can go back, you know."

Sam shook her head. "No. I already had that once. All I got was boredom and two and a half times my weight. Any future I have is straight ahead."

She knew that what she said was true, but there still wasn't much enthusiasm in her for this. After all, Charley really just wanted to stay here and keep at her-trade. She had done it initially because, as the demon had said, it was the only way possible to get home, but now Sam wasn't all that sure Charley wanted to get home. As for her-what was so big about getting to this sorcerer, anyway? Seeing how this world worked, it was just as likely he wanted to use her body in some kind of human sacrifice or something as anything else. She sure wasn't vital enough for him to take no risks. All the risks had been theirs. Back there she had rights now and a name and place, somebody who loved and watched over her while making few demands, and, now, a friend to talk to when need be. The only thing was, she didn't love Boday, although she'd gotten to know the crazy artist so well that she had a lot of affection for her in spite of her treachery and her numerous faults. All she really needed was to take some of Boday's love potion herself and they'd live blissfully ever after.

And she'd been tempted, too, particularly during those terrible months of sloth and drifting. She wondered why Boday hadn't figured that one and slipped her some potion during that time. The demon, probably. Protecting her by putting the thought out of Boday's mind every time it surfaced.

The pace was slow, stately, but deliberate, and men rode up and down keeping everyone and everything at the proper distance and pace. There were a few problems, mostly with the wagons or with improperly tightened cinches or unbalanced loads, but these were quickly and professionally solved.

That night they camped in a farmer's field by prior arrangement. Charley built the campfire expertly and did the cooking and serving and it was probably the best in the train by far. Charley, as was custom, ate apart from them and by herself.

While camped the crew dug a pit toilet that had little modesty but some remoteness. The hole-in-the-wagon approach just wasn't that practical while standing still. It was while Boday was over waiting her turn after dinner that one of the crew came by. He was a good-looking guy, at most in his early twenties, with a full but short-cropped brown beard, long, trimmed curly hair, and built a bit burly but not at all bad. Charley, watching from the other side of the fire, thought he had a cute ass.

"Hello-Madame Boday, isn't it? I'm Crindil. I wanted to check and see if there were any problems today we missed." His voice was a pleasant middle tenor, and his accent was sort of folksy, although not so much as Jahoort's.

Sam smiled at him.
"Sam,
please. It's so much better than Susama or Madame Boday. No, no real problems that I know of, but it's early yet and I'm always the one for problems. Will you have some of this? Shari is a superb cook and if somebody doesn't eat it I will and the last thing I need is more food."

He looked at the dish and smelled it. "Oh, I don't know. I always liked women with some extra paddin'. There's more to look at and like." But he took the rest and started in on it.

Sam knew a line when she heard it but it didn't make it any less effective being exactly what she wanted to be told. She knew he was probably angling for a crack at Charley but she found herself instantly attracted to the man anyway. "You're kind to say it, anyway."

"No, I mean it," he responded between bites. "Uh! That girl of yours is one fine cook and a pretty good rigger, too. That was the best-rigged team we had today and it was taken down just as good. But, gettin' back to the subject. I never met a lady with weight who didn't think she was ugly, and I never met a woman without a weight problem who didn't think she had one. But, uh-you really married to the tall woman? I mean,
married?"

"Yes," she admitted. "But it's not quite how it looks. I was lost, penniless, stuck, in the city through circumstances I'd rather not describe, and I wasn't exactly built for
her
line of work." She gestured to Charley. "Anyway, there was a kind'a freak happening-Boday's both an artist and an alchemist- and Boday accidentally swallowed some love potion she was making for a client. I was the only one around when she came to, and you can guess the rest. I had no place else to go and no other alternatives."

Crindil looked at her with an amused expression on his face. "Well that's the damnedest story I ever heard. Love potion, huh? So you sorta got trapped into it. And you married her to get a new citizenship, a new start. I can see that." He put down the now empty dish and got up and sighed. "Well, that's real interesting. I'd like to talk more but I got more rounds to make and duties to perform. Maybe we'll have a chance to talk again on this trip. How far you goin'?"

"Well, we're supposed to be going to Covanti. Your guild recommended this route as safer, if longer."

"Yeah, well, it's sure longer. Then you'll be with us all the way to Quodac. Well, we'll have plenty of time then. Nice talking to you, and my regards to your-wife? Maybe I'll talk to her, too. We often got use for an alchemist out there. And don't you listen to nobody else on your looks. For the record you're kind'a cute."

She smiled and got up and was startled when he took her hand and kissed it. She felt almost an electric shock at the gesture, and her eyes followed him off to the next campfire. God! He was charming! Ten minutes and he'd bummed a good meal and had her swooning over him like she never did with a man before.

Charley came over to collect the dirty plates. "Real Romeo," she whispered to Sam as she cleaned up. "Three women alone and he's drawn like bees to honey the first night. You watch out for his type or you'll wind up givin' him the money and me in the bargain."

"You're just jealous 'cause he came on to me and not you." She paused a moment. "I never had a guy come on to me before."

"Oh, he was lookin' at me. He'll seduce you to get to me, if you let him, though."

Sam felt a flush of anger. "Just do the dishes and shut up!"

"Yes, Mistress. Y'm," Charley said mockingly, but she didn't press it.

Boday returned and sat down. "Sorry to be so long, darling, but while waiting over there at least three men came to Boday wanting to know if they could have a bit of Charley. Peasants, mostly. They offered little. The first one, the big fellow with the beard, Boday deferred to you."

Sam suddenly felt angry and betrayed. Deep down she'd known all along that Charley was right but she didn't really want to have it proved to her. She got up and walked to the side of the wagon, out of view of the other two, and felt the Jewel of Omak against her breast, and she thought of its power so seldom used by her. The demon
owed
her for what it had done to her. She had the power to have any man she wanted no matter how she looked or sounded. Up to now all her sexual experiences had been with women. Maybe she
was
one of "them," and if so, that was okay-she certainly enjoyed it. But there would certainly be differences with a man. Big ones. Hell, Charley had done it with her in the shack and Charley was a real man-lover. Charley's power was beauty, but she had power, too. She was through being a patsy. It was time for Sam to take a little.

From Zenchur's cave to the city had been only forty miles or so; the trip to the border where the train would leave Tubikosa was maybe a hundred in the other direction, counting having to go around part of the big lake. The trip was already just starting to settle into a big and potentially boring routine when they reached that border.

Tubikosa ended in a flat plain here, but it still gently sloped down into that glowing mist. It had been so long since they had seen it that it was almost like seeing it for the first time. Tubikosa was a mixture of the primitive and the modem but it was still a large, cosmopolitan city. It was easy to forget that it was such a small part of a new and very alien world rather than just a remote part of their home.

Across the mists another land could be seen, one not very appetizing to look at. A mass of tall, green trees that seemed to cover virtually everything in sight. From their distance it looked just plain green, but with the aid of strong binoculars borrowed from one of the crew it looked like a pretty creepy and dark jungle.