Space Assassins: The Complete Series 1-5, page 6
“I share that hope,” the Wampeh said, then headed back to his own ship. A minute later he had released his spells and was on his way, hopeful they might find Orkut without too much fuss. But deep in his gut, he knew that was going to be highly unlikely.
Chapter Ten
It was during a careful survey of the sixth consecutive world the Ghalian operatives had scoped out, but with no success thus far, that Hozark’s otherwise boring little adventure took an abrupt turn. At least it was something, although not what he was looking for.
Bud and Laskar were both out in other systems, scanning as best they could for any sign of the mysterious Orkut, leaving the Wampeh Ghalian to himself as he made his way to yet another world. And this one was a doozy.
Dropping down from orbit, Hozark found himself landing on a planet so verdant and alive with growth that it almost hurt the eye. As he drew closer and set the ship down, he noted something else. It was lush absolutely everywhere. And the world was crackling with magic.
Curious, Hozark cast the smallest of pushing spells at a nearby shrub. Nothing violent. Just enough to make it move from the force. But instead of simply rustling, as was the caster’s intent, the shrub instead reacted in a most violent manner, puffing up its leaves and spraying out a burst of harmful retaliatory magic.
It seemed the system’s red dwarf sun was emitting a particularly potent form of energy that imbued the native plant life with some rather disconcerting properties. Namely, when the wrong kind of magic was used near them, or, heaven forbid, against them, they would react, their innate defensive mechanisms engaging like a skunk, but of flora origin.
He was not sure if all the world’s plants possessed this trait, but Hozark was in no mood to find out. Fending off magical deterrents was exhausting work, and this place was full of them, it seemed. It was also what made it a perfect place for Orkut to hide out.
There were few settlements in the dangerous landscape. Carving them out of the wilderness without killing those building them was difficult work. An arduous process that took decades, yet still cost many lives. Those who had survived, though, were a very, very hardy type, and as a result, only the toughest visited this world.
Again, a perfect hiding place for the powerful swordsmith seeking to be left alone.
Hozark had surveyed the smaller towns with some speed. As on the previous worlds, signs of Orkut would be easy enough to detect with his Ghalian senses. But so far it seemed he was coming up empty yet again. It was only in the largest of the rather dense cities that he felt the first hint of something. A bit of power, though he couldn’t be sure if it was Orkut or something else.
He walked through the city with a leisurely gait, doing his best not to seem like anything more than another man out for a stroll. Being a master assassin, well versed in the art of subterfuge, he excelled at it. But sometimes, that just didn’t matter.
The scent of magic was getting stronger. Not extremely powerful, but it was there. Hozark knew he was getting close to the source. He just hoped it was finally the man he sought.
As he homed in on the scent, a handful of large Tslavar mercenaries stepped out of the shadows shrouding the side alley of a squat building. A tavern of some sort, it seemed. Their muscles bulged within their green skin, and their body language was as aggressive as the looks in their eyes.
Hozark could handle them easily, of course, but the last thing he wanted was a scene. Not when he needed his target to remain calm. If Orkut caught wind of any danger, he might bolt, and tracking him down again would be even more difficult.
The assassin casually steered his course away from the approaching men. There were five of them, the smallest of the gang being the leader. It wasn’t so much anything he said as it was the way he moved, and how the larger men around him followed his lead, like the Alpha of their little pack, that defined him.
And it was the Alpha who was matching his course.
“Excuse me,” Hozark said, turning to confront the would-be attackers. “I’m new to this city and am seeking a local healer to help with my skin condition.”
He had used variants of the ploy on several occasions. The visceral “eww, cooties” reaction the mention of skin disorders often elicited provided him the distance he needed to make a casual escape. But these men were different. They didn’t seem to care about anything but their goal. Namely, his coin.
“Too bad for you, friend,” the largest of the group said.
He was an imposing beast of a man, obviously chosen to take the lead in their shakedowns due to his sheer size. It was enough to intimidate just about anyone. Anyone who wasn’t a Wampeh Ghalian, that is.
With the goons so close, Hozark was able to get a far better sense of the men.
Damn, he thought. The magic he’d sensed wasn’t coming from Orkut. No, it was one of the thugs who possessed a modicum of power. He’d been taking it slow and careful for nothing, it seemed.
“Give us your coin and all of your belongings,” the man continued. “Or I’ll have to get rough.”
“Oh, you’ll get rough with me?” Hozark said, his sweet and calm demeanor sliding from him like water from an oily surface. “How quaint.”
The would-be muggers looked at one another in confusion. This was not how it was supposed to go. The target should have been cowering in his boots, handing over his possessions in a panicked hurry. But instead, he was smiling at them. And there was something about that smile they all found quite unnerving but couldn’t quite put their fingers on.
The smaller man took charge, trying to salvage the heist. “Grab him. Into the alley, quick!”
The goon seized the pale man by the arm and dragged him from the main street, as ordered.
It was precisely as Hozark had wanted. He would perhaps break the tiniest of sweats negating this pathetic threat, but he could at least top off his power from the magic user among them in the process.
The men felt something terribly wrong in the air but didn’t know what it was. Uneasy, they closed in on their prey, just as he let the remainder of his disguise slip away as his fangs slid into place.
“A Ghalian!” the enormous man managed to squeak just moments before the assassin ended him. As he fell, the others realized just what a terrible mistake they had made and tried to flee. But it was far, far too late.
Hozark cast a silencing spell across the alleyway, blocking all sounds from escaping, the same fate as the men whose screams no one would be able to hear. The assassin dropped four of them in quick order, pausing to drain the meager magic from the fifth. He then used some of that power to cast a levitation spell and move the dead men to a nearby corral.
The sounds from within told him all he needed to know. This was a fortuitous turn of events that would save him wasting precious magic to get rid of the bodies.
The Bundabist within the corral were not dangerous creatures. In fact, they were quite harmless. But they were omnivores with sharp teeth and strong jaws, and they ate just about anything. He hefted the bodies into the enclosure, and the animals set to work with hungry gusto.
They would dispose of the remains in short order, leaving no trace of the violence that had just occurred. And Hozark would continue his quest, heading off for yet another world. He hoped Bud and Laskar had better luck than he had.
Chapter Eleven
Quietly orbiting the uninhabited third moon circling the planet Iggnaz, Uzabud and Laskar were eating a hearty meal of roasted vegetables sourced from the little world below.
While both men were omnivores, as was pretty much anyone who often lived in space for any long periods, they each preferred lighter fare. But having limited edible resources in the systems they visited at times forced them to not be terribly picky eaters and take what they could get in the way of supplies. Fortunately, Iggnaz had been something of a boon for them. A pleasant surprise in a mission full of frustration and dead ends.
Neither had ever been to that system before, let alone that planet, and happening upon its abundant marketplaces had been a most welcome discovery. Laskar had arrived first and sourced a hearty supply of fresh produce. When Uzabud joined him a day later, his copilot docked his smaller vessel and helped restock the mothership’s larder.
“This is fantastic,” Uzabud said between mouthfuls of a savory-sweet variety of root vegetable.
“I know, right?” Laskar said. “I could get used to this. I mean, I know we have a bunch more systems to search, but maybe we could stay here just a bit longer.”
Uzabud flashed a knowing look. “Trust me when I tell you this. When Hozark is on a mission, nothing will keep him from his goal. Not injury, not exhaustion, not hot or cold. And certainly not something as pedestrian as food. Why, one time, while stalking a target for weeks and weeks, he ran out of supplies, but that didn’t stop him. He stayed in position and ate three rotten Malooki while lying quietly in wait.”
“It was two,” a voice said.
Uzabud and Laskar leapt to their feet, weapons ready. Hozark laughed and shed his shimmer cloak.
“And they were only Bundabist, not Malooki,” he said of the horse-like creatures. “Look at the size of me, Uzabud. Do you really think I could eat an entire Malooki, let alone three?”
“Well, it makes for a better story,” Bud replied, relaxing his pull on his konus’s magic and sheathing his blade.
Laskar, however, held his at the ready a moment longer before following suit, eyes still wide at the man’s sudden appearance.
“How did you do that? We didn’t see any trace of you or your ship. And I set the wards and alarms myself. I know they were in place.”
“He’s a master Ghalian, Laskar,” Uzabud replied for his friend. “Trust me, if he doesn’t want to be seen, he won’t be. All but the most powerful of vislas wouldn’t stand a chance.”
Laskar sat back down, but now only picked at the food before him. Having someone sneak up on them like that, aboard their own ship, no less, was more than a little disconcerting.
“Apologies, Laskar,” Hozark said. “I did not intend to frighten you and put you off your meal.”
“I wasn’t frightened,” the man blustered, digging back into his food, but with less gusto than previously.
Hozark and Uzabud shared a little glance and a grin.
“Of course not,” Hozark said. “In any case, as you did not send a long-range skree, but rather came to the rendezvous point, I assume you had as little success in your efforts as I did.”
“Unfortunately, that’s the case,” Bud replied. “Neither of us found a thing. Not even a whisper of the guy.”
“Yeah, he’s like a ghost,” the copilot mumbled through his full mouth, dribbling a piece onto the table.
“Charming, Laskar,” Bud joked.
Hozark raised a brow. “A geist, you say? Perhaps not. But he is definitely a capable man, and one who has apparently proving far more difficult to trace than our network gave him credit for.”
“So, what do we do?” Bud asked.
“There are over a dozen more worlds to go, but I think we’ve learned our lesson. Given these results, we are just going to cut straight to the chase,” Hozark said.
Laskar swallowed hard, nearly choking himself in the process. “You mean––?”
“Yes,” the assassin replied. “We are going to Xymotz.”
“Awww shit,” Bud grumbled. “Here we go.”
* * *
Xymotz. It was a somewhat notorious planet among scavengers, pirates, mercenaries, and other less-than-savory sorts. Naturally, Bud knew of it. He’d avoided it all these many years and never particularly wanted to pay a visit. Unfortunately, that didn’t seem to be an option any more.
It was a place whose dangers were far greater than merely the rough and ready folk on its surface. Xymotz was a gas giant at the farther edges of its system, where it orbited a yellow dwarf star that only emitted a fairly minimal stream of power, and a variety useless to most.
The planet, though gaseous in nature, actually possessed a small, solid orb at the center of the dense, poisonous clouds that comprised nearly all of its mass. Normally, the crushing gravity found on the surface would have prevented any life whatsoever from making a foothold there, but centuries upon centuries of magic had been layered upon the inhabited section, creating a sort of eddy in the swirling river of death.
Some might think the place an easy target for raiders seeking a new hideout. And they’d be right, if not for one important detail. Namely, the only means of arrival and departure was a single, narrow funnel of magic weaving through the deadly clouds.
It was the only way in and also the only means of escape. Something Bud was not happy about one bit. The perfect place for a trap, and being trapped was not something he was particularly fond of. Though it was for precisely that reason people were sure to behave on the surface, he was nevertheless not thrilled about the prospect. Fortunately, Hozark had given him an easy out.
“I want you and Laskar to stand lookout from orbit, safely outside the disruptive forces of the planet’s clouds,” the Wampeh said as they completed the final jump to the system.
“Don’t have to tell me twice,” Bud replied, settling the ship into orbit.
“Really?” Laskar said. “You say he’s good, sure, but is it smart to go in alone?”
Bud winced at the man’s tone. If he wasn’t such a talented pilot, he just might have left him at the next world. Blurting things like that to one of the deadliest men in the galaxy––and his friend, no less––could wear one’s welcome thin, and quickly.
“I shall be fine,” Hozark said. “And if I should not be, you will report my demise to the others.”
“Of course,” Bud replied. “But let’s not go that route just yet.”
“It is not my intention, my friend.”
The Ghalian assassin strolled to his shimmer ship and boarded it. He did not need to bring any supplies from the mothership. A Ghalian always had what he needed at hand. Minutes later, he released the magical clamps holding him on Bud’s ship and drifted away, engaging his Drookonus and powering up his own magical propulsion system.
“I’m going in,” he said over his skree. “Should any threat appear, I shall have my long-range skree on my person at all times. Hopefully its power will cut through the interference.”
“Gotcha,” Bud replied. “We’ll be ready up here with our eyes open.” He then settled into a comfortable position with the dozen or so other ships lingering near the funnel accessway’s gaping maw.
No one wanted to come up blind into a firefight or trap, and, thus, each was on guard, providing a similar service for their envoys to the planet below.
“Can you still hear me, Bud?” Hozark queried over the long-range skree as he passed the halfway mark.
“Yeah, I hear you. But your message is a bit fuzzy. This planet is wreaking merry havoc with your skree.”
“So it would seem,” Hozark said. “The magic in the clouds, as well as the planet’s own gravity well are indeed something to behold. I will save the skree’s power and only contact you in case of emergency from this point on. Until later, my friend.”
“Safe travels,” Bud replied.
“Safe? This place is anything but safe,” Laskar pointed out.
He was right. The top half of the magical funnel was dangerous, but survivable. But Hozark had just reached the midway point. There, the heat generated by the density of the gasses was not quite enough to form a second sun in the solar system, but it was certainly enough to melt any manner of ship that ventured outside the narrow tube of magical protections.
The sheer amount of power that had been poured into fixing them in place was impressive to behold. Generations of visitors and inhabitants alike had added their own contributions as they could, reinforcing and buttressing the spells, keeping the layered protections from collapsing and crushing all within to oblivion. The center of it all was like a tiny bubble of safety clinging to the edge of a churning whirlpool of death.
And Hozark was flying right into it.
Chapter Twelve
The surface of Xymotz was far more hospitable than Hozark would have expected of such an unusual world. Rough edifices and unbearable climate were logical, given what he knew of the place, but, instead, the surface was quite peaceful. Peaceful, and clean where one expected anything but.
It seemed that the magic used to support the funnel was only a small portion of the protective spells layered upon the hidden civilization, and the bulk of them––the hardiest, at least––were reserved for the surface dwellers’ comfort and quality of life.
“Fascinating,” the Wampeh mumbled as he stepped from his ship and strode into the quaint, yet relatively spread out city.
It took up far more space than he would have expected, to be honest. Underground dwellings would make sense, given harsh environs, but with the tranquil skies within the magical bubble, there had simply been no such need, and buildings climbed up several stories as a result.
There were some subterranean fabrications, naturally, but it seemed as if they were mostly used for storage rather than habitation.
Hozark sniffed the air, not with his nose, but with his Wampeh Ghalian senses.
“Yes, a trace,” he noted with a little smile. “And this time, I think I know who the owner is.” He pulled his skree from his belt. “Uzabud, if you can hear this, I have reached the surface safely and am en route toward what may very well be our target. I will check back in with you later. If you do not hear from me in three days, assume me dead.”
It was a morbid thing to say, but he’d run with the former pirate a long time, and they both knew full well that their demise was always a possibility on any mission. Even the seemingly easy ones. You just never knew.
It would be a stealthy hunt, but not his most difficult. Orkut was of particularly notable appearance, his race possessing a deep violet skin color far darker than the light violet of some of the residents of Slafara and other Council worlds. So dark it bordered on actual purple among some of his kind. Compared to the other inhabitants of this world, he would stand out. Yes, finding the swordsmith should be at least somewhat easy. That is, if he was there in the first place.
