Ghost of the Well of Souls

Core wanted us here on our own, remember, and I don’t recall her sending us a briefing book.

They saw many demonstrations of what Mochida warned them against as they traveled along and just above the reefs that seemed to stretch out forever in front of them. Nasty heads of very large creatures full of teeth emerged from concealed holes in the reef and gobbled up fish as they swam past. Even schools of big fish weren’t immune; things that looked like the gently waving but at least permanently planted coral suddenly moved, showing themselves instead to be all poisonous tentacles, grasping and paralyzing and then drawing in fish half their size.

The beauty was not merely skin deep, it was a deliberate trap for the unwary.

Still, thousands of fish and crustaceans and creatures they couldn’t classify darted in and out of the coral, used it for protection, or even fed off the smaller creatures, down to plankton-sized levels, and off some of the coral itself in a few cases.

The coral was set up in colonies, with relatively barren gaps of lower rock and sand between, but it was more continuous than a set of islands. The gaps were brief, and it seemed only the larger fish and good-sized predators left one to go to the next.

Nor were any two beds exactly alike; some creatures were found only in one area and not in another, while the colors and even the types and shapes of coral changed as well.

It was easy to be mesmerized by the beauty and complexity of it all, but so much kill or be killed was going on that it kept jolting you back to reality.

So which are the Sanafeans? Ari wondered, and received a mental shrug from Ming.

Ahead, the commando squads fanned out, forming a nearly V-shaped formation with top officers inside the V. It was clear from the lack of serious attention they were paying to the pageant unfolding below them that the natives were not these pretty carnivores or concealed sea snakes.

“What do the natives do here that requires thinking at all, on more than the survival level?” Ming wondered aloud. “It doesn’t seem like there are any built structures, no roads, no signs of what we think of as civilization at all.”

“They manage the place, more or less,” the General replied. “Oh, they cultivate their own reefs and try and outdo each other in artistic skills, something that is certainly lost on me, and they herd and cross-breed to ensure species survival and balance, and the rest of the time they fight each other, except when they’re meditating upon and worshiping their gods. They don’t quite make sense to the likes of us, but I’ve learned to accept that as just the way things are between many species. I doubt if we make any sense to them, for example.”

“So why do you have to fight them? Respect, by their rules?”

“Something like that. In fact, one of their trophies for beating another clan in a fight is something we require. They don’t know the significance of it beyond the trophy stage, but we do.”

“Ah! I see! So you beat them and they give you the thing, huh?”

“Something like that. Ho! Stay back and be careful! We’re about to be challenged!”

He broke off and darted back to his position just behind the colonels in the V, which had now come to a sudden, tense halt and was clearly waiting for something to happen.

I don’t see anybody. Do you?

Ming was amused. Like I can see what you don’t? I—uh-oh! Wait a minute…

The Sanafeans were not coming from the riot of coral below, but from the near surface above. Big black shapes that seemed to be huge oval mouths with wings on them.

“Send up the buoy!” the General ordered, and immediately one of the colonels removed something from his pack and pulled a tab. It inflated with compressed air and rose to the surface, trailing a long thin line which the colonel now hammered into the nonliving coral base below with just one blow.

“Sweet Jesus! How many of those things are there?” Ari wondered aloud. The Sanafeans seemed to suddenly fill the field of view above and in front of them. Ten, twenty… maybe a hundred or more of the things.

They could now see that they resembled not winged mouths, but giant manta rays. The mouths, though, protruded and had vicious-looking fangs on both sides, leaving little to the imagination as to what else might be hidden inside. They also had long, very thin prehensile tails the equal of their body length, and at the end of each tail was a spread of what might be called three “fingers,” with an extended and controllable opposite “lip” that worked like an ultrawide thumb.

“Stop and turn back, invaders, or we will destroy you!” the huge, leading Sanafean thundered. Through the translator, he sounded supernatural and authoritarian; the voice of the underwater god.

One of the junior officers at the point of the V responded: “Who speaks like this to the forces of mighty Chalidang, Empire of the Overdark, lords of all they wish to rule?”

The kid was pretty good at this, they had to admit. Rehearsed or not, it was the proper response.

“I am Kobilo, High Lord of the Tusarch, invader. These are our lands and no other, not Sanafean nor foreign. We kept to our lands and demanded nothing of you or yours. You are the invader here. You must turn back or we must destroy you.”

“We have no fight with the Tusarch,” the lieutenant responded. “We regret that we must pass through and disturb their lands. It is necessary, but only to reach the Paugoth. We know of no other way to get there. Will you permit us passage over your lands to theirs?”

“Paugoth? Paugoth?” The clan leader seemed insulted. “What would you want with the likes of them!”

“We wish to challenge for the Trophy. They have it, you do not.”

That forced the old ray to think a moment. “What makes you think you could beat them? We couldn’t, last games, nor could anybody else. And you’ll need more than that fancy armor and smart parading to take them, too. Why, I don’t even believe you can take us.”

“We will fight you if we must, for there is no honorable way to do otherwise, but we do not wish to do it, and it might harm our strength even if we do prevail here, so that the Paugoth may well win because of the demands of the Tusarch. This is your choice. We fight here, now, and the survivors either press on, if it is us, or turn back, if it is you who prevails. But you must be told that the Chalidang can neither give nor accept quarter. Even if you win, how long will it be before there are enough Tusarch again to seriously challenge other clans? Let us pass and, win or lose, it will be the Paugoth who will have this problem.”

That was a wrinkle the old boy hadn’t thought of. In a no-quarter fight, he was outnumbered here, and facing a foe he didn’t know with weapons he was unsure of. If he lost, and he might, he’d just been told that the fight wouldn’t be like a clan fight; these aliens would kill all. If they were the suicidal fighter type—and they looked the part—then even winning would be very costly. He also noted the black shape that was closing in on that released buoy on the surface. If they had surface ship support, it could get really ugly and maybe even mess up the coral.

By the twenty-nine Hells, let ’em mess up Paugoth’s coral!

“All right,” the Elder said at last. “I’ll give you passage in to Paugoth. But if you’re pulling a fast one, if you do not fight them, then we will join with other clans and ensure that you have a far bigger fight. Understood?”

“Yes. The terms are acceptable. We can go on our own, but we would appreciate a guide to smooth things through to the Paugoth, and who would also ensure that we do not somehow trespass on your property nor do it harm.”

The Elder seemed impressed, and even Ari and Ming were giving even more respect to the General’s scouting and homework.

Two Sanafean warriors, sons of the elder, were delegated to escort them through without delay. It appeared that the clan boundaries weren’t all that big, and that the next one over was where they wanted to be. More good scouting from the General.

Mochida was in fact very pleased by it all. He drifted back to them and said, “Well, we got by that one. Had I not gotten all this force here surreptitiously, we’d have had to fight for every millimeter of ground. As it is, we’re going to be where we want to be with no losses and no problems in under two more hours. Right about midday, 1 would say.”