The Warlock Wandering (19 page)

Rod nodded. "This is the real thing, darling. Of course, if you saw it with your naked eye, the sun would be a lot brighter, and the planets would be lost in its glare. They aren't lined up so neatly that you can count them, but you can ferret 'em out. Let's see—there's one, that little dot near the sun, that's probably a planet. And, yes, there's number two, a little further away, and number three..."

"Yet what is that one that doth grow?" Rod frowned. "Yeah, that is kind of funny."

"Not humorous at all!" Yorick whirled and scuttled back to his seat. "That swelling dot is growing knobs and fins!

Web in, everybody—we're about to be intercepted!" Rod stared. Then he whipped about to Gwen, but her webbing was still secure from break out. So was his, for that matter.

"What's the trouble?" Chomoi looked around at them, frowning. "So they're intercepting us. They're not going to shoot us down, you know."

"No," Rod grated, "we don't know. They tried to kill us twice already, remember?"

Chomoi stared at the screen, her eyes growing huge. Gwen frowned up at Rod. "What is it, mine husband?"

"Another ship," Rod explained, "and there's no way to tell who's steering it."

Across the aisle, Yorick looked nervous. "I'm sure the captain is busy trying to find out that very datum." The glowing dot had swelled into the form of a spaceship, seen head-on. It spat a bolt of light that washed the screen with searing brightness. The ship lurched about them, and somewhere, a huge gong chimed.

"Yoicks!" Yorick bleated. "What a way to answer a hail!

Doesn't his radio work?"

Rod felt his stomach sliding over toward his left kidney.

"Everybody hold on! Our pilot isn't waiting for a second sentence!"

On the screen, the attacking ship slid up to the upper right-hand comer. Another bolt of energy shot out from it—

and off the screen.

"Missed!" Rod squeezed his fist tight. "Way to go, skipper! Zig your zags!" His stomach dropped back toward his coccyx. Gwen gasped, and Chomoi moaned. On the screen, the attacker veered toward the lower left-hand comer, and the stars wheeled behind it. The sun slipped toward theTeft, too.

"Be brave, dear." Rod clasped her hand. "It has to end some time." Hopefully, the right way...

" 'Tis not... entirely... unpleasant," Gwen gasped. "I 148

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shall become accustomed to it, my lord."

"I hope you won't have time..."

The enemy ship fired another bolt that lit up the upper right-hand comer of the screen. The sun-disc drifted off the screen to the left.

"Missed again." Rod nodded. "Have we got a good pilot!"

"Or a good computer," Yorick added. "No human being could react this fast. So just punch the buttons for 'evasive action.'"

Rod glowered at him. "Just had to make a point of it, didn't you?"

Yorick grinned. "What can I tell you? Homo sapiens has its limits, too."

"You don't have to be so happy about it, though... Whoa! Hold on!"

The other ship veered into the center of the screen; the sun-disc disappeared entirely.

"What is that maniac doing?" Chomoi gasped.

"Trying to get between the ship and the planet." Rod put out an arm as Gwen leaned over against him—or tried to, but the webbing held her tightly.

"Smart!" Chornoi's eyes glowed. "If he can get close enough to the planet's surface, the bandit won't dare shoot, for fear he'll fry innocent people."

"I... don't... really think that would make him hesitate." Rod scowled. "But he might attract the attention of the local constabulary."

"You mean I'm supposed to cheer for the cops?" Chomoi asked.

"Why not? You were one..."

On the screen, the pirate spat another bolt. It mushroomed out to fill the screen with glaring whiteness, and the whole cabin sang as though they were inside a piano string. Stars glared through a ragged hole in the ceiling.

"Abandon ship!" Yorick howled. "Or is it the other way around?"

But Rod didn't answer. His eyes lost focus as, frantically, he concentrated on his psi powers, seeing the passenger blister not as it really was, but as he wanted it to be. In his mind's eye, he saw the little bulge falling away from the main freight ship. He pictured a thin membrane sliding over the open side, where the ship had been.

Yorick looked around, flabbergasted. "Hey! I can still breathe! How come we're not drinking vacuum? How come our blood isn't boiling out our noses, from sheer lack of air pressure?"

Chomoi saw Rod's abstracted gaze. "Major, what are you doing?"

To Rod, her words seemed to come thinly from a great distance. Carefully, he answered, "I'm... holding the air

... in... with us."

Chomoi stared. White showed around the irises of her eyes.

"Gwen?"

"Aye, my lord."

"We're... falling."

"Our ship was heading toward the planet when the pirate shot our cabin off the freighter's side," Yorick explained,

"so we're still going toward the planet, too." Gwen looked from the one to the other. "Is that not where we wish to go?"

"Yeah, but... not so fast..." Rod answered. "Take us down... darling... slowly..."

Gwen looked about them, and finally thought to look up. She gasped. "But... there is no 'down,' my lord. There is only some great bulge above us, a curving wall of blue, with swirls of white!"

"That's ... Otranto," Rod grated.

"We're not close enough for it to seem like 'down' yet," Yorick explained, "but we're moving toward it, right enough. It's just that we're moving toward what you call 'up,' just now."

Gwen stared. "But how can one fall upward?"

"Gravity," Yorick explained.

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Gwen's eyes opened wide. "That's to say that when I toss a ball into the air and it falls, 'tis the earth that pulls it down."

Yorick nodded. "Yeah, that's most of it. Of course, the ball pulls, too."

Gwen smiled. "Though so small a pull, could scarce be more than a wish."

"I suppose that's one way of looking at it." Yorick sucked in one cheek. "The ball wants to come down."

"And so... do... we," Rod grated.

"The closer we get to each other, the planet and us," Yorick explained, "the stronger the pull." Gwen stared. Then her mouth opened in a silent "O." Yorick nodded. "So the closer we get to the planet, milady, the faster we're gonna be going."

"Very... fast... already," Rod reminded him.

"Yeah." Yorick gave a bleak smile. "We're already traveling a thousand miles per second."

"And we will gain speed as we fall?"

Yorick nodded. "Unless you can do something about it."

"Well... may nap I can." Gwen leaned back, gazing thoughtfully up at the bulge of the planet above them.

"Do it... soon," Rod begged.

"Uh, yeah." Yorick scratched at his ear. "That's the other thing I forgot to mention, Lady Gallowglass. It's called

'friction.' You know how when you rub your hands together, they start feeling hot?"

Gwen nodded, not taking her eyes off the planet above.

"Well, we're going so fast that just our hull pushing through the air can be friction enough to cause a lot of heat," Yorick explained. "Enough to kill us."

"So," Gwen mused, "I must slow us and cool us." Beside her, Rod nodded. "Molecules... slow 'em down..."

"Thou hast explained that to me oft enow, my lord," Gwen said, with some asperity. "I must own, 'twas thou who didst teach me what my mind did when I did stare at a branch, and made it burst into flame. Nay, I ken the slowing of these 'molecules,' as thou dost term them. And, I think, I can slow our descent enow so that we may land gently." She frowned up at the planet. "Let us begin by putting the world where it doth belong."

Slowly, the huge curve moved off to the side. There was no sensation of movement, but the sun-disc slowly slewed into the center of the hole in the ceiling.

Yorick exhaled sharply. "Yes. Everyday occurrence. Right."

Gwen nodded, satisfied. "Now we fall downward." Across the aisle, Chomoi stared, aghast. "What are they?"

"A witch and a warlock," Yorick informed her. "But that's just the local term, where they come from."

"This isn't really magic?" Chomoi said hopefully. Yorick shook his head. "Just psionics. These are two very high-powered espers."

Chomoi sat back, going limp. "I'm glad to hear that's all it is."

"Right." Yorick's smile soured. "It's so much less scary when you can give it a name, isn't it?"

"The pirate is gone now," Gwen informed them.

"Huh?" Yorick looked up and saw a clear sky. "Well. Guess once he saw he'd shot off our cabin, he figured we were dead."

"He had every right to," Chomoi said devoutly.

"Well." Yorick laced his fingers across his midriff and settled back into his acceleration couch. "Might as well relax and enjoy the ride."

"It may be rough," Gwen warned.

'"S okay! That's just fine. Lady Gallowglass!" Yorick held up a palm. "No matter how you slice it, it's going to be a hell of a lot better than I thought it was." Actually, it was rather boring from that point^on. Gwen was very good at slowing them down, but she had a lot of speed to kill, so it did take a little while. Every now and then, things did begin to get a little too warm, and Gwen 752

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had to frown in deep concentration until they cooled off. Yorick did some exploring, and found a couple of emergency oxygen generators, but even so. Rod was worried that he might have to try to precipitate the carbon out of the carbon dioxide in the air, and he wasn't exactly burning to have black dust all over the glowing brocade of his new doublet. At one point. Rod said, "Dear... the planet... is turning

... under us. Match... velocities..."

"That means matching the spin of the planet," Yorick explained. "'Velocity' is how fast something's going in any given direction. Just make sure we're moving at the same speed as the world's surface."

"How am I to do that?" Gwen asked.

"Find some landmark," Yorick explained. He glanced at the viewscreen. "Can't do much with that, the power cut off as soon as we broke away from the ship. All we've got is a little emergency power for lights, air, and heat, nothing left over for sight-seeing."

Gwen frowned at the screen, and it burst into life. A landscape reeled across it, blurred by speed, obscured by darkness.

Yorick stared. "How did you do that?" Then he squeezed his eyes shut and shook his head. "Never mind—I don't think I want to know. But try to pick out some big landmark, Lady Gallowglass, and slow us down until it stays put in the middle of the screen."

The landscape began to slow. Moonlight outlined ridges that were chains of hills, showing a groove that must have been a valley.

In its center, pricks of light glittered.

"Civilization!" Chomoi cried. "That's gotta be a city!

Only people make that kind of light! Quick, Lady Gallowglass, put us down there!" Gwen concentrated harder on the screen. "I will essay it..."

Chomoi leaned over to Yorick. "How come she can talk while she's doing it, and he can't?"

'"Cause she's better at it than he is." Yorick spread his hands. "What can I tell you? She's been practicing since she was bom, and he only found out he had power three years ago."

Chomoi reared her head back, looking askance at him.

"How come you know so much about them?"

"Friend of the family," Yorick assured her, "and if you met their kids, you'd want to be friendly, too."

"There." Sweat beaded Gwen's brow. "Master Yorick, is that as thou didst wish it?"

"Beautiful," Rod mumbled.

Yorick looked at the screen. It was as rock-still as though someone had hung a map at the front of the cabin. He blinked. "How the hell did you do that? I didn't feel a thing!"

"I slowed us folk as I slowed the vessel." Yorick stared at her. "Right." He shook himself. "Sure. Inertia—what's that? just a frame of reference, right?"

"Then refer to that frame." Gwen pointed at the screen.

"That square of darkness in the center—what is it?" Yorick leaned forward, squinting. Then he shook his head. "Can't tell yet. Lady Gallowglass. When we're closer, maybe."

The tiny square started growing. It swelled until it filled the screen. Moonlight silvered the dark square, revealing textures.

"Treetops!" Chomoi exclaimed.

Yorick stared. "Did you drop us lower, or did you just make the picture get bigger?"

Chomoi pointed. "See that silver thread straggling kittycomer across it? Has to be a stream."

"I think it's a park. Lady Gallowglass."

"Then there should be few folk about," Gwen said, with growing excitement. "'Twill make a good landing field." The park swelled in the screen. They could see individual trees, which moved off to the edges of the screen as they grew.

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The stream grew broader and broader, filling the center of the screen. Then it drifted off to the right and out of the screen entirely.

Chomoi and Yorick stared for a few seconds, holding their breath. The wreck jolted violently, slamming everybody back against their acceleration couches. They all sat still for a few minutes.

Then Gwen spoke, her voice soft in the dimness of the emergency lights. "My apologies. I had not meant to strike with such force."

"Oh, that's fine!" Chomoi held up a palm.

"Wonderful." Yorick nodded, with great enthusiasm.

"Believe me. Lady Gallowglass, that's a much softer landing than we were expecting."

"Any landing is just great," Chomoi added. Yorick loosed his webbing and stood up. "Here, let me give you a hand." He helped Gwen disengage her webbing. She caught his arm as she stood. "Gramercy, Master Yorick."

"Oh, it's nothing. It's... Hey! The major! Is he all right?" Rod was leaning back in his couch, his eyes closed, chest heaving.