produced only a blank from the wizard's description. Flor
listened intently.
"It talks to Eejakrat," Clothahump continued, "his voice far
away, distant, "in words I can't understand."
"Several containers.. .the mind is several minds?" Jon-
Tom struggled to make sense of a seeming impossibility.
"No, no. It is one mind that has been split into many
parts."
"What does it look like? You said containers. Can you be
more specific?" Flor asked him.
"Not really. The containers are mostly rectangular, but not
all. One inscribes words on a scroll, symbols and magic
terms I do not recognize." He winced with the strain of
focusing senses his companions did not possess.
"There are symbols over all the containers as well, though
they mostly differ from those appearing on the scroll. The
mind also makes a strange noise, like talking that is not. I can
read some of the symbols... it is strangely inscribed. It
changes as I look at it." He stopped.
Jon-Tom urged him on. "What is it? What's happening?"
Clothahump's face was filled with pain. Sweat poured
down his face into his shell. Jon-Tom didn't know that a turtle
could sweat. Everything indicated that the wizard was expending
a massive effort not only to continue to see but to understand.
"Eejakrat... Eejakrat sees the failure of the attack." He
swayed, and Jon-Tom and Flor had to support him or he
would have fallen. "He works a last magic, a final conjura-
tion. He has... has delved deep within the deadmind for its
most powerful manifestation. It has given him the formula he
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ds. Now he is giving orders to his assistants. They are
ringing materials from the store of sorceral supplies. Skrritch
watches, she will kill him if he fails. Eejakrat promises her
the battle will be won. The materials... I recognize some.
No, many. But I do not understand the formula given, the
purpose. The purpose is to... to..." He turned a frightened
face upward. Jon-Tom shivered. He'd never before seen the
wizard frightened. Not when confronted by the Massawrafh,
not when crossing Helldrink.
But he was more than frightened now. He was terrified.
"Must stop it!" he mumbled. "Got to stop him from
completing the formula. Even Eejakrat does not understand
what he does. But he... I see it clearly... he is desperate.
He will try anything. I do not think... do not think he can
control..."
"What's the formula?" Flor pressed him.
"Complex ... can't understand..."
"Well then, the symbols you read on the deadmind
I containers."
"Can read them now, yes... but can't understand..."
"Try. Repeat them, anyway."
Clothahump went silent, and for a moment the two humans
I were afraid he wouldn't speak again. But Jon-Tom finally
managed to shake him into coherence.
"Symbols... symbols say, 'Property.' "
"That's all?" Flor said puzzledly. "Just 'property'?"
"No... there is more. Property... property restricted ac-
cess. U.S. Army Intelligence."
Flor looked over at Jon-Tom. "That explains everything;
the parachutes, the tactics, the formula for the explosives to
undermine the wall, maybe the technique for doing it as well.
Los insectos have gotten hold of a military computer."
"That's why Clothahump tried to find an engineer to
combat Eejakrat's 'new magic,' " Jon-Tom muttered. "And
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he got me instead. And you." He gazed helplessly at her.
"What are we going to do? I don't know anything about
computers."
"I know a little, but it's not a matter of knowing anything
about computers. Machine, man or insect, it has to be
destroyed before Eejakrat can finish his new formula."
"What the fuck could that devil have dug out of its
electronic guts?" He looked back down at Clothahump.
"Don't understand..." murmured the wizard. "Beyond
my ken. But Eejakrat knows how to comply. It worries him,
but he proceeds. He knows if he does not the war is lost."
"Someone's got to get over there and destroy the computer
and its mentor," Jon-Tom said decisively. He called to the
rest of their companions.
Mudge and Caz ambled over curiously. So did Bribbens,
and Pog fluttered close from his perch near the back of the
wall. Hastily, Jon-Tom told them what had to be done.
"Wot about the Ironclouders, wot?" Mudge indicated the
diving shapes of the great owls working their death up the
Pass. "I don't think they'd 'old you, mate, but I ought to be
able to ride one."
"I could go myself, boss." Clothahump turned a startled
gaze on the unexpectedly daring famulus.
"No. Not you, Pog, nor you, otter. You would never make
it, I fear. Hundreds of bowmen, a royal guard of the
Greendowns' most skilled archers, surround Eejakrat and the
Empress. You could not get within a quarter league of the
deadmind. Even if you could, what would you destroy it
with? It is made of metal. You cannot shoot an arrow through
it. And there may be disciples of Eejakrat who could draw
upon its evil knowledge in event of his death."
"We need a plane," Jon-Tom told them. "A Huey or some
other attack copter, with rockets."
Clothahump looked blankly at him. "I know not what you
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describe, spellsinger, but by the heavens if you can do
anything you must try."
Jon-Tom licked his lips. The Who, J. Geils, Dylan: none
sang much about war and its components. But he had to try
something. He didn't know the Air Force song....
"Try something, Jon-Tom," Flor urged him. "We don't
have much time."
Time. Time's getting away from us. There's your cue,
man. Get there first. Worry about how to destroy the thing
then.
Trying to shut the sounds of fighting out of his thoughts, he
ran his fingers a couple of times across the duar's strings. The
instrument had been nicked and battered by arrows and
spears, but it was still playable. He struggled to recall the
melody. It was simple, smooth, a Steve Miller hallmark. A
few adjustments to the duar's controls. It had to work. He
turned tremble and mass all the way up. Dangerous, but
whatever materialized had to carry him high above the com-
bat, all the way to me end of the Pass.
Anyway, Clothahump's urgency indicated that there was
little time left now either for finesse or fine tuning.
Just get me to that computer, he thought furiously. Just get
me there safely and I'll find some way to destroy it. Even
pulling a few wires would do it. Eejakrat couldn't repair the
damage with magic ... could he?
And if he was killed and the attempt a failure, what did it
matter? Talea was dead and so was much of himself. Yes, that
was the answer. Crash whatever carries you and yourself into
the computer. That should do it.
Time was the first crucial element. Though he did not
know it, he was soon to leam the other.
Time... that was the key. He needed to move fast and he
didn't have time to fool with machines that might or might
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not work, might or might not appear. Time and flight. What
song could possibly fill the need?
Wait a minute! There was something about time and flight
slipping, slipping into the future.
His fingers began to fly over the strings as he threw back
his head and began to sing with more strength than ever he
had before.
There was a tearing sound in the sky, and his nostrils were
filled with the odor of ozone. It was coming! Whatever he'd