Hunt the Space-Witch! (37 page)

“Nine hundred is bid,” the auctioneer said. “Lord Moaris, will you bid more?”

“I would,” Moaris grunted. “But I am summoned and must leave.” He looked blankly angry, but he did not question the boy's message. Herndon noted that down for possible future use. It had been a lucky guess, but Lord Moaris of the Seigneur's court came running when his lady bid him do so.

“Nine hundred is bid,” the auctioneer repeated. “Do I hear more? Nine hundred for this fine proteus—who'll make it an even thousand?”

There was no one. Seconds ticked by, and no voice spoke. Herndon waited tensely at the edge of the crowd as the auctioneer chanted, “At nine hundred once, at nine hundred for two, at nine hundred ultimate—

“Yours for nine hundred, friend. Come forward with your cash. And I urge you all to return in ten minutes when we'll be offering some wonderful pink-hued maidens from Villidon.” His hands described a feminine shape in the air with wonderfully obscene gusto.

Herndon came forward. The crowd had begun to dissipate, and the inner ring was deserted as he approached the auctioneer. The proteus had taken on a froglike shape and sat huddled in on itself like a statue of gelatin.

Herndon eyed the foul-smelling Agozlid and said, “I'm the one who bought the proteus. Who gets my money?”

“I do,” croaked the auctioneer. “Nine hundred stellors gold, plus thirty stellors fee, and the beast's yours.”

Herndon touched the money plate at his belt, and a coil of hundred-stellor links came popping forth. He counted off nine of them, broke the link, and laid them on the desk before the Agozlid. Then he drew six five-stellor pieces from his pocket and casually dropped them on the desk.

“Let's have your name for the registry,” said the auctioneer after counting out the money and testing it with a soliscope.

“Barr Herndon.”

“Home world?”

Herndon paused a moment. “Borlaam.”

The Agozlid looked up. “You don't seem much like a Borlaamese to me. Pure-bred?”

“Does it matter to you? I am. I'm from the River Country of Zonnigog, and my money's good.”

Painstakingly the Agozlid inscribed his name in the registry. Then he glanced up insolently and said, “Very well, Barr Herndon of Zonnigog. You now own a proteus. You'll be pleased to know that it's already indoctrinated and enslaved.”

“This pleases me very much,” said Herndon flatly.

The Agozlid handed Herndon a bright planchet of burnished copper with a nine-digit number inscribed on it. “This is the code key. In case you lose your slave, take this to Borlaam Central and they'll trace it for you.” He took from his pocket a tiny projector and slid it across the desk. “And here's your resonator. It's tuned to a mesh network installed in the proteus on the submolecular level—it can't change to affect it. You don't like the way the beast behaves, just twitch the resonator. It's essential for proper discipline of slaves.”

Herndon accepted the resonator. He said, “The proteus probably knows enough of pain without this instrument. But I'll take it.”

The auctioneer seized the proteus and scooped it down from the auction stand, dropping it next to Herndon. “Here you are, friend. All yours now.”

The marketplace had cleared somewhat; a crowd had gathered at the opposite end where some sort of jewel auction was going on, but as Herndon looked around, he saw he had a clear path over the cobbled square to the quay beyond.

He walked a few steps away from the auctioneer's booth. The auctioneer was getting ready for the next segment of his sale, and Herndon caught a glimpse of three frightened-looking naked Villidon girls behind the curtain being readied for display.

He stared seaward. Two hundred yards away was the quay, rimmed by the low sea wall, and beyond it was the bright green expanse of the Shining Ocean. For an instant his eyes roved beyond the ocean, to the far continent of Zonnigog where he had been born. Then he looked at the terrified little proteus, halfway through yet another change of shape.

Nine hundred and thirty-five stellors altogether for this proteus. Herndon scowled bitterly. It was a tremendous sum of money, far more than he could easily have afforded to throw away in one morning—particularly his first day back on Borlaam after his sojourn on the out-planets.

But there had been no help for it. He had allowed himself to be drawn into a situation, and he refused to back off halfway. Not anymore, he said to himself, thinking of the burned and gutted Zonnigog village plundered by the gay looters of Seigneur Krellig's army.

“Walk toward the sea wall,” he ordered the proteus.

A half-formed mouth said blurredly, “M-master?”

“You understand me, don't you? Then walk toward the sea wall. Keep going and don't turn around.”

He waited. The proteus formed feet and moved off in an uncertain shuffle over the well-worn cobbles. Nine hundred thirty-five stellors, he thought bitterly.

He drew his needler.

The proteus continued walking through the marketplace and toward the sea. Someone yelled, “Hey, that thing's going to fall in! We better stop it!”

“I own it,” Herndon called coolly. “Keep away from it if you value your own lives.”

He received several puzzled glances, but no one moved. The proteus had almost reached the edge of the sea wall now and paused indecisively. Not even the lowest of lifeforms will welcome its own self-destruction no matter what surcease from pain can be attained thereby.

“Mount the wall,” Herndon called to it.

Blindly, the proteus obeyed. Herndon's finger caressed the firing knob of the needier. He watched the proteus atop the low wall staring down into the murky harbor water and counted to three.

On the third count he fired. The slim needle projectile sped brightly across the marketplace and buried itself in the back of the proteus' body. Death must have been instantaneous; the needle contained a nerve poison that was effective on all known forms of life.

Caught midway between changes, the creature stood frozen on the wall an instant, then toppled forward into the water. Herndon nodded and holstered his weapon. He saw people's heads nodding. He heard a murmured comment: “Just paid almost a thousand for it, and first thing he does is shoot it.”

It had been a costly morning. Herndon turned as if to walk on, but he found his way blocked by a small wrinkle-faced man who had come out of the jewelry-auction crowd across the way.

“My name is Bollar Benjin,” the little prune of a man said. His voice was a harsh croak. His body seemed withered and skimpy. He wore a tight gray tunic of shabby appearance. “I saw what you just did.”

“What of it? It's not illegal to dispose of slaves in public,” Herndon said.

“Only a special kind of man would do it, though,” said Bollar Benjin. “A cruel man—or a foolhardy one. Which are you?”

“Both,” Herndon said. “And now if you'll let me pass—”

“Just one moment.” The croaking voice suddenly acquired the snap of a whip. “Talk to me a moment. If you can spare a thousand stellors to buy a slave you kill the next moment, you can spare me a few words.”

“What do you want with me?”

“Your services,” Benjin said. “I can use a man like you. Are you free and unbonded?”

Herndon thought of the thousand stellors—almost half his wealth—that he had thrown away just now. He thought of the Seigneur Krellig, whom he hated and whom he had vowed so implacably to kill. And he thought of the wrinkled man before him.

“I am unbonded,” he said, “but my price is high. What do you want, and what can you offer?”

Benjin smiled obliquely and dipped into a hidden pocket of his tunic. When he drew forth his hand, it was bright with glittering jewels.

“I deal in these,” he said. “I can pay well.”

The jewels vanished into the pocket again. “If you're interested,” Benjin said, “come with me.”

Herndon nodded. “I'm interested.”

Chapter Two

Herndon had been gone from Borlaam for a year before this day. A year before—the seventeenth of the reign of the Seigneur Krellig—a band of looters had roared through his home village in Zonnigog, destroying and killing. It had been a high score for the Herndon family—his father and mother killed in the first sally, his young brother stolen as a slave, his sister raped and ultimately put to death.

The village had been burned. And only Barr Herndon had escaped, taking with him twenty thousand stellors of his family's fortune and killing eight of the Seigneur's best men before departing.

He had left the system, gone to the nineteen-world complex of Meld, and on Meld XVII he had bought himself a new face that did not bear the telltale features of the Zonnigog aristocracy. Gone were the sharp, almost razorlike cheekbones, the pale skin, the wide-set black eyes, the nose jutting from the forehead.

For eight thousand stellors the surgeons of Meld had taken these things away and given him a new face: broad where the other had been high, tan-skinned, narrow-eyed, with a majestic hook of a nose quite unlike any of Zonnigog. He had come back wearing the guise of a spacerogue, a freebooter, an unemployed mercenary willing to sign oil to the highest bidder.

The Meldian surgeons had changed his face, but they had not changed his heart. Herndon nurtured the desire for revenge against Krellig—Krellig the implacable, Krellig the invincible, who cowered behind the great stone walls of his fortress for fear of the people's hatred.

Herndon could be patient. But he swore death to Krellig, someday and somehow.

He stood now in a narrow street in the Avenue of Bronze, high in the winding complex of streets that formed the Ancient Quarter of the City of Borlaam, capital of the world of the same name. He had crossed the city silently, not bothering to speak to his gnomelike companion Benjin, brooding only on his inner thoughts and hatred.

Benjin indicated a black metal doorway to their left. “We go in here,” he said. He touched his full hand to the metal of the door, and it jerked upward and out of sight. He stepped through.

Herndon followed, and it was as if a great hand had appeared and wrapped itself about him. He struggled for a moment against the stasis field.

“Damn you, Benjin, unwrap me!”

The stasis field held; calmly the little man bustled about Herndon, removing his needier, his four-chambered blaster, and the ceremonial sword at his side.

“Are you weaponless?” Benjin asked. “Yes; you must be. The field subsides.”

Herndon scowled. “You might have warned me. When do I get my weapons back?”

“Later,” Benjin said. “Restrain your temper and come within.”

He was led to an inner room where three men and a woman sat around a wooden table. He eyed the four-some curiously. The men comprised an odd mixture: One had the unmistakable stamp of noble birth on his face, while the other two had the coarseness of clay. As for the woman, she was hardly worth a second look: Slovenly, big-breasted, and raw-faced, she was undoubtedly the mistress of one or more of the others.

Herndon stepped toward them.

Benjin said, “This is Barr Herndon, free spacerogue. I met him at the market. He had just bought a proteus at auction for nearly a thousand stellors. I watched him order the creature toward the sea wall and put a needle in its back.”

“If he's that free with his money,” remarked the noble-seeming one in a rich bass voice, “what need does he have of our employ?”

“Tell us why you killed your slave,” Benjin said.

Herndon smiled grimly. “It pleased me to do so.”

One of the leather-jerkined commoners shrugged and said, “These spacerogues don't act like normal men. Benjin, I'm not in favor of hiring him.”

“We need him,” the withered man retorted. To Herndon he said, “Was your act an advertisement, perhaps? To demonstrate your willingness to kill and your indifference to the moral codes of humanity?”

“Yes,” Herndon lied. It would only hurt his own cause to explain that he had bought and then killed the proteus only to save it from a century-long life of endless agony. “It pleased me to kill the creature. And it served to draw your attention to me.”

Benjin smiled and said, “Good. Let me explain who we are, then. First, names: This is Heitman Oversk, younger brother of the Lord Moaris.”

Herndon stared at the noble. A second son—ah, yes. A familiar pattern. Second sons, propertyless but bearing within themselves the spark of nobility, frequently deviated into shadowy paths. “I had the pleasure of outbidding your brother this morning,” he said.

“Outbidding Moaris? Impossible!”

Herndon shrugged. “His lady beckoned him in the middle of the auction, and he left. Otherwise the proteus would have been his, and I'd have nine hundred stellors more in my pocket right now.”

“These two,” Benjin said, indicating the commoners, “are named Dorgel and Razumod. They have full voice in our organization; we know no social distinctions. And this—” gesturing to the girl—“is Marya. She belongs to Dorgel, who does not object to making short-term loans.”

Herndon said,
“I
object. But state your business with me, Benjin.”

The dried little man said, “Fetch a sample, Razumod.”

The burly commoner rose from his seat and moved into a dark corner of the poorly lit room; he fumbled at a drawer for a moment, then returned with a gem that sparkled brightly even through his fisted fingers. He tossed it down on the table where it gleamed coldly. Herndon noticed that neither Heitman Oversk nor Dorgel let their glance linger on the jewel more than a second, and he likewise turned his head aside.

“Pick it up,” Benjin said.

The jewel was ice-cold. Herndon held it lightly and waited.

“Go ahead,” Benjin urged. “Study it. Examine its depths. It's a lovely piece, believe me.”

Hesitantly Herndon opened his cupped palm and stared at the gem. It was broad-faceted, with a luminous inner light and—he gasped—a face within the stone. A woman's face, languorous, beckoning, seeming to call to him as from the depths of the sea—