Large tribes and clans of horsemen roamed the grasslands around Lake Karnoosh, but many were paid tribute by the city of the same name to refrain from molesting trade. These warriors, then, tended to prey upon those groups that did attack caravans. The continual warfare that resulted kept the nomadic warriors in check while distributing some of the caravan loot – that which actually reached the city
– to even those who protected the merchants' trains. Of course, the least slight or pretended offense could send some formerly nonhostile tribe into a frenzy of raiding. When this occurred, other clans would happily take bribes and tributes to reverse their roles. Then these nomads would ride out to seek the now-hostile group, being paid to do so and relishing the prospect of taking loot from those who had recently gained it by pillaging some caravan or other. Obmi greatly admired this system, remarking pleasantly to Bolt on its practical and logical workings, and the sorcerer had to agree.
Turrets and domes dominated the brick city of Karnoosh. The walled portion of the place – the actual city – was relatively small; no more than seven or eight thousand souls were enclosed by the high barriers. All around the city, except on the side that abutted the shore of the big lake, were ancillary villages and towns that quadrupled or quintupled the total population of the area. Most of these smaller places were liberally dotted with caravansaries and wine shops where traders and laborers could find housing and amusement during their brief stay.
Continual streams of merchants came to the city, for Karnoosh was a hub where purveyors from north, south, east, and west could exchange commodities. An open bazaar was always busy. Slaves, spices, animals, ivory, and a multitude of other goods were sold and traded there. The brick casbah housed sufficient troops to encourage everyone to do business peacefully, but just in case auxiliary fortresses also stood on either flank of the city. The Shah of Karnoosh was very rich and very powerful. There were no strong states around his little realm, so for a century there had been no warfare troubling the place. Such peace and prosperity brought even more merchants to Karnoosh, and it was a thriving cosmopolis by all measures of the whole of Oerik.
Obmi's attitude about the place was in conflict with all the obvious facts. "This is no real city," he observed petulantly. It was obvious that the dwarf belittled Karnoosh for one simple reason. Men, not demi-humans – and in particular, not dwarves – dominated it. In the whole of the city, there were not more than a half-dozen of his own kind. In fact, there were so few of any nonhuman sort here that even Bolt was amazed. An easterner like Obmi, he had long been accustomed to encountering at least a fair number of nonhumans in any city or large town. Even in the western cities of Hlupallu and Ghastoor, they had seen enough dwarves and elves so that neither Obmi nor Bolt felt terribly out of place. But out here on the steppes, such was not the case.
Here there were males and females with deep brown, dusky, swarthy, tan, yellow, or reddish hues to their skin. There were short men and women, tall ones, stocky folk and lean. Some had small noses, others beaks. They looked different from one another, but with few exceptions they were all humans. These folk lived and worked together in harmony of a sort, at least bound to each other by their common racial heritage, but they did not consider elves, dwarves, or the like as their equals.
So, instead of desiring to linger in this exotic city as he had wanted to do in both Hlupallu and Ghastoor, Obmi demanded to leave Karnoosh as quickly as possible. This edict placed a terrific strain on Bolt, for the sorcerer had to gather more equipment and supplies, see that all was properly packed and loaded, and all the while make certain that no spy discovered what was taking place. It required four days for Bolt to handle all the details, but then the dwarfs group was away from Karnoosh, going along the southeast track that followed the lake's edge for more than seventy miles before splintering into three smaller trails heading in different directions of the compass. They led their carts and wagons, horses and mules along the smallest of the three paths, the center one that led south toward the town of Tashbul and then east and south into the Grandsuel Peaks.
"Tashbul will provide all the rest of what we need," Obmi told Bolt smugly, even though he himself did not know the whole truth of the matter, for he was aware that the sorcerer had no knowledge of this part of the west, and Obmi had picked up some intelligence on the subject back in Kamoosh. Although even most sages and savants of the Flanaess could boast no great store of knowledge on the subject at hand, the sorcerer's ignorance was a tool the dwarf enjoyed using against Bolt.
"You are most learned, lord," Bolt replied with a touch of sourness evident in his tone.
Obmi basked in the glow of this grudgingly given praise. This verge of the old Baklunish Empire, my dear Bolt, still retains some small vestiges of the once-great culture lost in the Invoked Devastation. They are a decadent people, but interesting nonetheless, and they will understand our needs."
"I bow to your wisdom, lord," the sorcerer murmured, vowing to do his best to return the favor at the first opportunity.
Between five and six days later they arrived in Tashbul, found suitable lodgings, and set about the final preparations before entering the Ashen Desert. This city was as devoid of nonhumans as Karnoosh had been, but here Obmi and his ilk were looked upon more as a novelty to be enjoyed than a lesser to be shunned. The dwarf actually had a good time, in his sense of the term, during a week of debauchery in the ancient town. But then it was time to be on his way. Bolt had spent his stay in the town acting under more of Obmi's orders, seeking out some personnel and materials they still needed, enlarging and reorganizing the train, and generally doing his utmost to see that all would go as planned. He was tired, frazzled, and near his wits' end when the day arrived for departure, but he had accomplished everything he was responsible for.
The journey from Tashbul to the mountain pass that would lead them through the Grandsuels to the desolation of the old Suel lands was relatively quiet. But then, after covering a little more than ninety miles in six days across grassland and then again over dry ground, they came to the place where the guides Bolt had hired in Tashbul would take over, leading them through the mountains. The pass was winding, steep, and treacherous. To traverse a distance of twenty-five leagues as the crow might fly, they had to go twice that far overland, following the rocky path that was the only sure route between the crags. The journey was even more difficult because of die carts that were necessary to haul the equipment Obmi needed, but after more than two weeks of climbing, carrying, and stumbling through the rocks, the party made its way to the place where barren rock gave way to the vast stretch of dust and ash that rolled away to the south, east, and west as far as the keenest eye could see.
Most of the party turned back now. The mountain guides, of course, were not needed any longer. Likewise, the caretakers of the carts did not have to go farther, because the carts themselves had served their purpose. Before the majority of the group left to head back north, artisans assembled the stuff that the carts had brought through the mountains. They worked day and night while Obmi brooded and paced, occasionally overseeing the work but more often simply waiting out the delay inside his tent. At sunrise of the second day since the group had camped, Bolt came to Obmi at the end of his master's morning meal and gently led him outside.
There she is, Lord Obmi – faithfully recreated from the drawings I obtained in Ghastoor," said the sorcerer, making no attempt to conceal his pride.
The object that the sorcerer pointed to was a shiplike device that rested on four great tubes. These cylindrical wheels were made of the skins of grubs, immature giant beetles that were native to the lush, semitropical valleys that lay west of Tashbul. These, along with the pieces of the dismantled craft, had been carted from that city to the edge of the Ashen Desert to form a unique mode of transport across the waste. The skins were cut to the proper shapes, then laboriously sewn together, and the seams were sealed by heat before the cylinders were inflated with bellows. The body of the vehicle, its shape resembling that of a seagoing vessel, was filled with stores of provisions and equipment. Even though the group that would travel across the desert included a cleric who would be able to supply magical provisionings, it was wise to carry real food and water in case something should befall the man. The vehicle had a single large sail, as yet not raised. The whole thing was a sight that was at once incongruous yet quite logical, considering the "sea" over which it would be traveling.