Jack L. Chalker - Watchers at the Well 03 - Gods at the Well of Souls

GODS OF THE WELL OF SOULS

ebook ver. 1.0

This one's expressly for

David Whitley Chalker and Steven Lloyd Chalker- To the future, wherever it

leads!

A Few Words From the Author

THIS IS THE THIRD AND FINAL BOOK IN THE NEW WELL WORLD project. The Watchers

at the Well, which began with Echoes of the Well of Souls and continued in

Shadow of the Well of Souls. It completes the massive novel.

If you've just come across this and haven't read the other two, you should

immediately look for them where you found this copy. Any reputable,

responsible, intelligently run bookstore should have the previous two so that

anyone happening on the third one by chance doesn't have to hunt for them

just to read the entire work. If they don't, tell them what they aren't and

find a better bookstore!

There are also five original Well World books. You don't need them in order to

read Watchers, but it would be a good idea to start at the beginning. The

first was Midnight at the Well of Souls, followed by (in order) Exiles of the

Well of Souls, Quest for the Well of Souls, The Return of Nathan Brazil, and

Twilight at the Well of Souls. All are still available from Del Rey Books,

and don't let any book dealer tell you differently!

The Well saga now spans sixteen years, although with a twelve-year break. Will

there be any more? None are intended, but I didn't intend to write this one,

either, and I'm quite pleased with it.

Those of you who have been waiting, I've planted some good action, added a lot

of nasty plot twists (but you were ahead of me on those already, right?), and

tied up all the loose ends in nice, neat knots. You may not like all the

things I do (I am expecting some adverse reaction to the very last one), but

they are, I assure you, carefully and logically thought out. And if, along

the way of entertaining you, I've raised a few points and made you think a

little, well, that's fine, too.

And now (drum roll, curtain up) here's the way it works out ... Jack L.

Chalker Uniontown, Maryland August 1993

Between Galaxies,

Heading Toward Andromeda

The Kraang had been wondering much the same thing. The limitations placed on

it still prevented it from direct contact with beings on the Well World

unless, thanks to the happy accident that allowed it net access, someone was

in the transitional stage, totally energy within the net in midtransmission.

Otherwise it was strictly read only, and that was proving less amusing now

than frustrating.

Monitoring the lives and thoughts of these beings had reawakened in the Kraang

a feeling it had thought long dead, a taste of what it was to be alive again.

It wanted that now more than anything; the lust for it was cracking its

heretofore absolute self-control, bringing back longings that it had believed

it had long outgrown.

The Well perceived no threat to itself or its master program; it only desired

that what it considered an anomaly- the relinking, however tenuous, of the

Kraang to the net-be rectified. A simple matter, really, for anyone capable of

plugging into the net; not even seconds to find, comprehend, and repair,

cutting the Kraang off once more from the system. Brazil was the threat-he'd

been there many times, been changed into the master form, and would hardly

even think twice about it. He'd do whatever the damned Well said and be done

with it, and he would understand the threat sufficiently to be impervious to

the Kraang's entreaties and offers. There was nothing Brazil really wanted

except, perhaps, oblivion, and the Kraang wasn't so certain that the captain

would really take it if it were offered in any event. Brazil was so damned ..

. responsible. Duty above all.

No, if the Kraang were to effect a return, it would be Mavra Chang. Human,

inexperienced, self-involved, and unencumbered by any sense of duty or

mission. Mavra Chang would listen before she acted and believe what she

wanted to believe. She was certainly tough, no pushover, but she was far

too-human-to blindly obey the dictates of an ancient race she neither knew

nor understood. According to the data, she'd been close to being a goddess

before, going from world to world, taking many forms, playing both explorer

and missionary to the misbegotten.

The Kraang could deal very comfortably with an activist.

Brazil was at the moment romping in mindless joy with that silly girl on that

speck of land in the ocean, but the Well would never leave him there. If Mavra

Chang's progress to the Well had been stopped, then Brazil would again get the

nomination and be forced to accept. The longer there was no movement or

probability of movement by Chang, who was by far closer to the Well gate than

Brazil, the more likely the Well would be forced to make the switch. The

others would never find her, and it would be all the worse if they somehow

did track down Campos but never recognized Chang in her current form.

Campos was the key. Such a limited mind! Not stupid, not by the likes of the

races there, but sadly warped. Campos was so enjoying her revenge and was

comfortable enough in an environment not all that different from the one back

on the home planet that had bred and shaped her, that she was in danger of

losing sight of the ultimate game. The Kraang had not counted on her

adjusting, though, and that was the real problem. Since Campos had been a

male from a background that had little value for women, the Kraang had been

certain that she would be driven to the Well to reclaim her manhood.

It wasn't happening.

If Campos had gotten hold of Mavra Chang earlier, it would have, but the Well

had its own ways of subtly adjusting a subject to a form. The brain chemistry,

the hormonal balances, and being completely immersed in a new culture

eventually took hold. A transformation that seemed horrible when first

discovered began to seem normal; prior life and existence were distanced in

the mind as it adjusted, becoming more and more remote. If one were to go mad

from the process, it tended to happen rather quickly; otherwise that barrier

the mind erected became progressively insubstantial until it either

shattered, as in the case of Lori and Julian, or, as in Campos's case, just

slowly evaporated to nothingness. Without even realizing it, or perhaps

admitting it to herself, Juan Campos no longer thought it odd. or even wrong,

to be female, let alone a Cloptan female. She had managed in a relatively

short time to gain a fair amount of power and influence, in part because she

was attractive to male Cloptans who already had that power and influence, and

she was actually enjoying it. Experience counted. The Well might have played

a joke on Campos by making her female, but it also had dropped her into a

totally familiar milieu. Being the tough girlfriend of a drug lord wasn't

much different from being the son of one. and the knowledge and ruthlessness

actually made her a valuable asset to the organization. After that first

month she hadn't even experienced much of the fear and insecurity that being

a woman in such a society inevitably produced; everybody dangerous knew how

suicidal it would be to mess with the boss's girl and how vicious that girl

could be if she perceived one as a threat.

Not that Campos didn't want to get at all the power the Well represented; it

was just that she was smart enough to know that before she let Mavra Chang

near the Well, her control had to be ironclad. And until Juan Campos figured

out how to do that or was forced by circumstance to gamble, she'd keep things

pretty much the way they were.

It was frustrating to the Kraang. If only Campos would go through a Zone Gate.

Then some contact, some influence, could be attempted. But Campos wanted no

part of those Gates if she could avoid them. She remained where she could

ensure protection.

Somehow there just had to be a way to kick Campos in the ass. There just had

to be!

But until and unless it found a way to make contact, the Kraang knew it had to

depend on forces beyond its control. The psychotic former Julian Beard-now

turned into a complaisant wife for that female astronomer turned male

swordsman who was now gelded and trapped as a courier for the Cloptan drug

ring-was showing some promise, after all. Aided by the Dillians, who were

somewhat in the pay of the Zone Council, she might well disrupt things

sufficiently to cause a major move. When one no longer cared if one lived or

died unless one attained one's objective, it made for a spicy and dangerous

time for all those in one's way. The threat there was the Dillians. If they

did come upon Mavra Chang by some miracle, helpless though she was, would the

Dillians' first loyalty be to their former Earth comrades or to their new

leaders and lives? Unknown to any of them, forces were moving in on the

region and the situation was getting very, very dicey as the council and the

various hexes weighed their own options. If they captured Chang, no matter

what her form, while the surprisingly resourceful Gus liberated Brazil,

everything could go wrong. Of course, there was always the colonel ...

Possibilities! Far too many! This was getting much more difficult than the

Kraang had originally thought. And there were far too many ways for things to

go wrong . . .

Buckgrud, Capital of Clopta

lately, IT was always pretty much the same dream. A dense, living forest

filled with strange, twisting plants shimmered in a nearly constant but

gentle breeze. Not familiar in any waking sense, yet familiar somehow to her

in her dream. Comforting, safe, secure.

She would awaken into this living darkness in the Nesting Place, along with

many others of her kind, and then proceed out from the hollow tree and onto

the forest floor. Most of the night would be spent in the hunt, sometimes

searching out and sometimes lying in wait as still as one of the bushes that

were all around, waiting for prey to venture forth. Tiny animals, large

insects, it didn't matter, so long as it was alive and small enough to be

swallowed whole. There was always plenty of prey, for they bred all the time,

or so it seemed, but much needed to be eaten to satisfy, and it was a task

that consumed much of the night. There was no particular fear on her own

part, though; there were no natural enemies in this forest for such as they,

and the Big Ones who lived among the treetops ate no flesh and seemed

appreciative of the service she and her kind did in keeping the crawling

things in check so that they could not become so numerous as to threaten

survival. She knew each by the scent and by the sounds it made.

The scent from a small mound nearby told her that there were delicacies

inside; she moved to it, and her powerful claws dug into it, and she bent

down so that her long, sticky tongue could go inside and sift through and

find and draw the little Insects Into her beak . . .

It was near dusk when Mavra Chang awoke. She slept more than she was awake

now, it was true, but that was blessed relief in more than one way. It not

only meant escape from the sadism and torments of Juan Campos, when, of

course, the Cloptan was awake and not busy with other things, it also was

relief from the strange and unpleasant sensations that seemed unending.

There were feverish flushes, dizziness, unexpected pains of varying degrees in

various places, and, above all else, a nearly universal itch that was driving

her crazier than Campos ever could.

At first she thought that the sadistic surgeons employed by the drug cartel

had been butchers as well, but over the passing weeks she had come to realize

that it wasn't that, either. Something-strange-was happening to her,

something even someone with her vast life and long experience in what evil

could do had never undergone before. Still, that life allowed her to

understand to a degree what was happening, if not exactly why.

She had been surgically altered, mutilated, disguised, but that was only the

start of it. She had become other creatures before, but always the way the

Well did it: quickly, without pain or sensation. She was becoming another

creature again for the first time since she had last been on this world, but

by a different method, and slowly by the standards of the Well but with

astonishing speed by any other means.

She knew that now for several reasons, not the least of which was that what

the surgeons had removed, such as her arms, had not even begun to grow back.

She recalled that sensation well. Her body was changing. Grafted feathers

were being replaced by real ones just as colorful and even more dense. Her

center of gravity had moved down, and her midsection had thickened, while her

head seemed to be enlarged and set flush on the shoulders, but with a neck

that could pivot the head amazingly far. All this had been at the cost of an

already shortened height; she was now a bit under a meter tall, but somehow

she knew she would grow no shorter.

Her backbone had become increasingly limber, to the point where she could bend

backward and almost touch the floor with the top of her head while still

standing or lean forward so effortlessly and with such good balance that she

could touch the floor with her beak.

From that vantage point she could see that her stubby, mutilated legs were

rapidly changing into huge, thick drumsticks; the rather stupid feet they had

fashioned for her now were solid, enlarged, and black and were gaining almost

the prehensility of long, thick fingers, with sharp needlelike nails

developing at the tips. Even the large, curved beak they had fashioned over

her mouth was no longer the crude but effective graft; her tongue, now thin

and greatly elongated, told her that beyond the beak was the gullet. Bright

light blinded her, and even normal daylight was pale, washed out, and

difficult to see in, yet the darkness glowed with sharpness and detail.

Through the beak, countless strange odors came to her, each somehow separate

even when mixed, and it was a bit of a game to try and identify and classify

them. It was something to do. The same went for sounds, although she could

understand nothing of speech. She could understand only Campos, and then only

when Campos directed something specifically at her; only Campos's translator

could accept the eerie clicks and moans, some from deep in Mavra's chest,

that passed for her speech. That little gift of a dedicated translator

remained, but she was glad of it somehow in spite of her hatred of Campos.

She knew that the sounds she could make were really bird sounds, animal

sounds, not any sort of intelligible language to any race. The animal urges

disturbed her more. She could no longer physically tolerate any vegetable

matter. Campos had been feeding her raw, bloody meat strips, it being a bit

too civilized in the city to go pick up a carton of worms or grubs, even if

Campos would have entertained the idea of live creepy crawlies in her nice

apartment. Although Cloptans resembled giant humanoid ducks, they were

omnivores and even had tiny rows of teeth inside those remarkably elastic,

oversized bills of theirs.

Campos had hardly failed to notice the metamorphosis: it was happening at a

rate that could not be seen by the naked eye but fast enough that something

new would be evident between the time she left in early evening and the time

she returned to sleep.

Now she came in the door and turned on the light, washing out Mavra's vision.

The door slammed, and the Cloptan kicked off her shoes and threw a purse on

the chair.

Campos looked over at the corner where Mavra stood, held there by a strong

chain fastened to an anklet and to a welded-on socket in the wall, allowing

perhaps a meter's movement one way or the other.

"Ah, my pet! And how are you this evening?"

"Food, master! Please! Food! Birdy begs you!" The worst part was, she no

longer even felt humiliated by begging. It said something about Campos's

mind-set, though, that she had insisted on being called "master," not

"mistress." "In a minute, my sweet. I need to freshen up and get a drink. It

is going to be a long evening, I fear."

"Please, master! Feed Birdy!"

"Shut up! No more, you miserable little shit or I might just forget to feed

you at all!"

It was not a threat to be taken lightly. The craving for food after sunset was

overwhelming, more even than the craving for the exotic Well World drug that

Mavra's made-over body no longer needed or even noticed. Mavra had not,

however, volunteered that fact.

Campos went into the bathroom, and after an agonizing wait there was the sound

of a toilet flush and then water running. Finally the Cloptan emerged, now

naked.

Although it was nothing unusual now, the first sight Mavra had had of Campos

naked had been something of an odd feeling. The shape was very human to a

point, but even the breasts were covered with countless tiny white feathers

except at the very tips. The shoulders were unnaturally squared off, it

seemed, the arms and thinly webbed hands oversized for the body. The neck was

quite long and thin to be supporting that oversized head. Below the waist it

became more birdlike, with a definite rounding, almost turnip-shaped, with

the turnip top angled back and slightly up, becoming short but large tail

feathers. The legs extended straight down, a golden yellow color, and ended

in two wide, thickly webbed feet that could still be consciously rolled up

and fit into shoes.

She shared the huge apartment with two Cloptan females who were apparently

attached to other drug cartel kingpins, but they stayed away from the big

bird's area and Campos rarely referred to them or appeared to interact much

with them. They ignored their roommate's "pet" and gave it a wide berth and

seemed otherwise to be fairly typical of their type.

There had been more than a few naked males in as well. If they were

representative of the race, they tended to be larger, chunkier, with almost

wrestler builds, bent a bit forward on the hips in a slightly more birdlike

fashion but without much in the way of tail feathers at all. Male genitalia

weren't visible at all; they were apparently hidden by a thick clump of

feathers growing forward between the widely spaced legs, which explained why

they all seemed to be bowlegged.

Campos went to the cold storage compartment and took out a box of something,

then popped it in a fast defroster that might have been operated by microwaves

or some other means.

"Ah! I should tell you that I got word today from those nice doctors who made

you so very pretty for me." the Cloptan said as the defroster whirred in the

background. "They said you were genetically reprogrammed using the actual

genetic code of a real bird in a hex very, very far away. I forget the name,

but what does it matter? They said not to worry, that you would still be able

to think and remember but that you'd also have all of the bird's instincts.

They even said that by three months or so you would be so physically like

this bird that you would even be fertile!" She laughed. "Just think! The zoo

here doesn't have any of your birdie kind, but you're on their wish list, and

the other girls here still seem a bit frightened of you and keep trying to

talk me into getting rid of you."

Mavra said nothing. Anything she could say would only cause trouble. "Just

think of it!" Campos went on, enjoying herself. "The nice zoo people say that

if they had you, they could secure at least the loan of a male of the

species. That might be quite the answer here. I won't have to worry about your

care or suffer your presence here, but you'll be secure and in a happy little

nest I can visit any time. That would be very amusing, seeing you sitting

there hatching eggs, knowing that all your children would be birdbrains.

Would you like that?"

"Whatever master wishes Birdy will do," Mavra responded as if by rote, eyes on

the defroster. "You bet your sparkly feathered ass you will!" It was far from

hopeless, but how the hell she would get this stupid asshole to head for the

Well was something Mavra Chang was far from figuring out yet. The zoo wasn't a

very appetizing new destination, but maybe it would provide some way out. Zoos

didn't usually plan on animals being as smart as humans.

Somehow, some way, she had to get to the Well. She was building up too long a

list of people to get even with to fail.

Subar,

a City in Northern Agon

IT WAS A REGION OF THICK FORESTS AND ROLLING HILLS, WITH mild days and chilly

nights; if it hadn't smelled something like an overcooked egg, it might have

been very pleasant.

Agon was a high-tech hex with just about everything one could expect of modern

life. Private cars were banned; there just wasn't enough room to tolerate them

or anywhere to dump the old ones. Still, public transport of just about every

kind was available for a very low fee, along with taxis and buses that seemed

to glide on air working not only every city and town but every rail and road

crossing as well.

The Agonese were a strange lot, looking to Anne Marie like something out of a

children's fairy tale. In fact, they resembled nothing so much as squat

turtles without shells, but with very tough greenish-gray hides that might

have been at home on elephants or rhinos back on Earth. But unlike those

animals they were bipeds, walking on two short, thick trunks of legs that

terminated in wildly oversized feet out of the age of dinosaurs. The

omnipresent if unpleasant odor was nothing less than their collective body

odors, to which they of course were oblivious.

"We are strangers very far even from our native Well World homes," Anne Marie

noted as they approached a medium-sized city, the first they'd seen since

making their way south from Liliblod. "We have no choice. We must contact the

authorities and ask for help."

Tony, reluctantly along on this new quest and not liking it a bit, sighed.

"You are correct, of course. But it makes me uneasy to do so. Such an

operation could not go on in this kind of setting and with this technology

without some connivance from high local officials. We are far from the places

where the foul stuff is grown and into where it is distributed. This close to

the business end, the government official who comes to help us might well be

in the pay of those we seek. I would feel more at ease if we could contact

our own government. They, after all, sent us on this great expedition in the

first place. If we vanish outside their knowledge and contact, then we vanish

forever."

Anne Marie nodded. "Agreed. But there must be a way of getting a message to

our people in-what is that place called?-Zone? Where the embassies are. They

have telephones, radios, probably much more, here. I think our best course is

not to mention any more than we have to at the outset about why we're here

and simply ask as stranded travelers to call our embassy. That would be a

reasonable and natural request, wouldn't it?"

Tony nodded. "We have to do it that way, but something makes me uneasy about

it. I still do not feel very clean about our role in this so far, even though

we had nothing to do with the current problem. And I was born and raised in a

very different society than you. I feel, unfortunately, far more at home with

the governments here than I ever did with the British government I very much

prefer."

There were a great many stares as the two large, blond, twin centauresses came

into the city, one with an equally exotic if very different creature on her

broad equine back. Alowi, the former Julian Beard, had said virtually nothing

and seemed almost disinterested in the city or its inhabitants or anything

else. Without a translator, she was merely along for the ride in most of the

alien environments. That, both Tony and Marie agreed, would be a top

priority. The Erdomese would get a translator or give up any thoughts of

tracking down her kidnapped husband. There was no alternative. This was

certainly a hex with the technical abilities to install one, although it

would take more money than any of them had.

In fact, money was going to be the first problem if they remained here in the

north. They hadn't been allowed to take much more than basic packs and

provisions when they'd been forced off the ship off the coast of Liliblod, and

Mavra had been the dispenser of funds for the group.

They didn't need much to just survive; although all three preferred nicely

prepared and cooked dishes, their constitutions were such that they could

survive on grasses and leaves if need be. As for clothing, the Dillians in

particular could gallop forty or fifty kilometers a day without even sweating

hard, and they at least had been allowed to keep their coats for use in colder

climates. Still, they were well aware that they were very far away from

anything or anyone familiar, and while they could use the Well Gate in any

capital city, it would take them only to their home hexes, not to anywhere

they wanted to be. "Not much hope of finding any work around here, either,"

Tony noted. "Everything that we could do is automated. If the council won't

stake us, we're through." "Yes, I keep worrying that they will thank us for

our service and tell us to go home, that they are sending the professionals

in," Anne Marie responded. "Still, their professionals haven't been any good

up to now, have they?'' Aside from a small Liliblodian consulate, there was

nothing in the way of government offices in this fairly remote city, or much

need for it, when cheap, fast magnetic trains could take anyone to the

centrally located capital in under an hour and a half. While that also

implied that the local cops could have somebody who had some authority there

in a matter of hours, it didn't prove to be that easy. In fact, it almost

seemed as if nobody were interested in doing anything for them except telling

them how to get home and suggesting that they do so at the earliest

opportunity.

Unable to get any information on anything else, let alone help, they held a

conference to decide just what to do.

"You should both go home through the big gate," Alowi told them. "It will take

you home, I know, in very quick time, as they say."

"But dear! What will you do?" Anne Marie asked, worried.

"I will do what I must. I will never return to Erdom. Never. With no husband

or family, I have no wants or needs. So far I have been able to eat the

grasses, leaves, berries, fruits, and such that grow in these lands. I cannot

starve. My body seems most adaptable. I have become accustomed to the chill

nights here to the point where the coat is now uncomfortable, so I need no

clothing. I will search as I can; if I find him, that is fine, and if I do

not, nothing is lost." "But you cannot even speak to people! You have no

translator!" Tony pointed out. "You do, and I do not see that it has helped

you much. In truth, I do not expect to find him. I expect to wander this

world, or as much of it as can be wandered through, taking little from it and

seeing what is seeable. Sooner or later I will find a place for myself or I

will die. Either way, it is the most I can expect."

"But you're talking about living like an animal! Anne Marie exclaimed. "You

are better than that! Not to mention the fact that by your own admission you

are defenseless against the horrid beings that are a part of this world. It

is a death sentence either way."

"I will never go back to Erdom," she repeated, "but I will die an Erdomese.

Those are facts. I choose my own course. It is more than any Erdomese woman

has been able to do before."

Anne Marie sighed. "Then we shall simply have to contact our embassy in Zone

and tell them the situation and location. Then we will find some part of this

land that has some decent pasture and a few trees and wait them out." "Or

wait until they throw us out," Tony noted.

"Then we will leave, but only far enough to find some hospitality elsewhere,"

Anne Marie proclaimed. "I positively refuse to abandon this poor child to the

wolves!"

Tony sighed. "Don't overdramatize, Anne Marie. There are no wolves in a place

like this except perhaps the foul creatures who run the place. But we must

also be practical. If we remain, we need to find some sort of work, and this

is a high-tech hex surrounded by others that are not."

"But the closest ones are water!"

"True, but what of that? If a ship cannot come in to high-tech, then there is

at least some point where it must be handled by the old means. Compared to

one of our men we are not very strong, but the closest of our men is probably

half a world away. In these parts we are probably quite strong, and even if

we cannot lift what is required, we can certainly pull great weights."

"And Alowi?"

Tony shrugged. "She can cook. And supervise if need be. If we must remain in

this godforsaken country, let's try and make the best of it."

This time it was Anne Marie who was doubtful. "But for how long?" Tony

shrugged. "Until one or more of us goes crazy or gets fed up or something

breaks. It is better than this. Who knows? The council might at least extend

us some seed money. It was they, after all, who got us into this." "Oh, Tony!

You're such a dear! You're making me feel guilty about dragging you along on

this!"

"I have never been dragged," Tony responded. "I followed of my own free will,

and I stay for the same reason. And when all hope is gone, then I will go home

the same way!"

Anne Marie squeezed Tony's hand and then kissed her. "Of course you will,

dear!"

If there had been no hope, they would have headed home long before this, but

the problem was, as Anne Marie put it, they had been placed on hold but no

one had hung up on them. Anne Marie noted that in spite of many areas where

the Well World seemed futuristic to the point of being magical, the lack of

any way to fly or even send signals any great distance between the worldlets

led to everything more or less moving at, at best, a nineteenth-century pace.

Nobody was ever in a hurry here, it seemed, unless it was to do evil, and so

long as they were no threat, even evil seemed willing to leave them alone.

The council, still divided over exactly what course to take and thus taking

very little, or so it seemed, asked them in fact to stay on "in the Agon

region." They advanced the Dillians some credit and even found the pair a job

of sorts, although not quite what they had in mind. Hexes in the region

produced a variety of products that were of great interest to Dillia, but it

had never been practical to manage much trade with nations so far away

without some sort of permanent trade office coordinating things locally.

Dillia was half a world distant-almost five thousand kilometers away over a

vast stretch of water going west from the Ocean of Shadows and across the

entire Overdark. Deals could be made in Zone in the traditional way, but

without somebody on site, there was no way to guarantee quality, compare

prices and deals, and put everything together. Dillians had never been the

sort to relish staying long periods of time in remote and alien lands, and so

they'd pretty much had to accept the traditional "take it or leave it" deals

from their nearer neighbors. Merely the threat of competition could only

help, and here were two who wanted to remain, at least for a significant

period of time.

Dillia itself was something of a hotbed of semitech innovation, conservation

plans and concepts, and agricultural management, particularly forestry, and

had much to trade in areas most nations largely ignored. In exchange, it

needed steam vessels, particularly for internal lakes and rivers, and other

heavy industrial items either impossible or impractical to make at home.

Dillians also had a taste for things that could not be grown locally,

including many tropical and subtropical products, coffee, tea, cocoa, and

tobacco. The Dillian government was more than happy to set Tony and Anne

Marie up as a trade office and see what they could do.

Neither of them was under any illusions that this was a permanent job or that

the opportunity wasn't created because, for reasons of its own, the Zone

Council saw some value in keeping them in the region at that time, but as it

served everyone's purposes, there were no objections.

Alowi was not so fortunate. She was nothing to Dillia, of course, and even

less to Erdom, who clearly was disinterested even in whether or not one more

female came back at all. Nor did the council as a whole see any use for her.

So she became basically the Dillians' housekeeper, keeping their new home

clean, cooking the meals, and doing other chores, all of which was made much

easier by being in a high-tech hex where things not only worked smoothly,

they seemed in some ways futuristic compared to Earth.

Because she had no translator, Alowi spent the time studying and learning

Agonese, a language that sounded bizarre but that, she soon discovered,

followed a pattern not too different from some Earth tongues. It was soon

clear that Julian Beard was not dead inside her brain but merely dormant; it

was in fact Beard's knowledge of Japanese that gave her the clue to

understanding Agonese. Not that they resembled each other in obvious ways,

but the structure wasn't all that different.

The trade mission had some initial frustration but then some startling

successes. Tony was adept at business, and Anne Marie seemed able to spot a

con or a sucker deal almost instantly and knew just when to give in on a

negotiation. The initial commissions weren't huge, but they no longer had to

worry about going broke.

Jack L. Chalker - Watchers at the Well 03 - Gods at the Well of Souls

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