FREE BOOKS

Author's List




PREV.   NEXT  
|<   64   65   66   67   68   69   70   71   72   73   74   75   76   77   78   79   80   81   82   83   84   85   86   87   88  
89   90   91   92   93   94   95   96   >>  
boomerang balls yesterday, while we had sun to mask the return-flashes. Nothing. The Croutha have taken the city of Sohram, just below the big bend of the river. Tomorrow, when we have sunlight, we're going to start boomerang-balling the central square. We may get something." "The Wizard Traders'll be moving in near there, about now," Vall said. "The Croutha ought to have plenty of merchandise for them. Have you gotten anything more done on narrowing down the possible area?" The deputy bit back a yawn and reached for his coffee mug. "The experts have just about pumped these slaves empty," he said. "The local religion is a mess. Seems to have started out as a Great Mother cult; then it picked up a lot of gods borrowed from other peoples; then it turned into a dualistic monotheism; then it picked up a lot of minor gods and devils--new devils usually gods of the older pantheon. And we got a lot of gossip about the feudal wars and faction-fights among the nobility, and so on, all garbled, because these people are peasants who only knew what went on on the estate of their own lord." "What did go on there?" Vall asked. "Ask them about recent improvements, new buildings, new fields cleared, new paddies flooded, that sort of thing. And pick out a few of the highest IQ's from both time lines, and have them locate this estate on a large-scale map, and draw plans showing the location of buildings, fields and other visible features. If you have to, teach them mapping and sketching by hypno-mech. And then drop about five hundred to a thousand boomerang balls, at regular intervals, over the whole paratemporal area. When you locate a time line that gives you a picture to correspond to their description, boomerang the main square in Sohram over the whole belt around it, to find Croutha with firearms." The deputy looked at him for a moment then gulped more coffee. "Can do, Assistant Verkan. I think I'll send somebody to wake up Subchief Ranthar, right now. Want to talk to him." "Won't be necessary. You're recording this call, of course? Then play it back to him. And get cracking with the slaves; you want enough information out of them to enable you to start boomerang balling as soon as the sun's high enough." * * * * * He broke off the connection and sent out for coffee for himself. Then he put through a call to Novilan Equivalent, in western North America. It was 1530, there, when he
PREV.   NEXT  
|<   64   65   66   67   68   69   70   71   72   73   74   75   76   77   78   79   80   81   82   83   84   85   86   87   88  
89   90   91   92   93   94   95   96   >>  



Top keywords:

boomerang

 

coffee

 

Croutha

 

picked

 

slaves

 

devils

 

deputy

 

fields

 
buildings
 

square


Sohram

 

locate

 

balling

 

estate

 

picture

 

correspond

 

description

 
highest
 

paratemporal

 

intervals


sketching
 

mapping

 

features

 

visible

 

location

 

regular

 

hundred

 

showing

 

thousand

 

connection


enable

 

cracking

 

information

 
America
 

western

 
Novilan
 

Equivalent

 

recording

 

Assistant

 

Verkan


gulped

 
moment
 
firearms
 
looked
 

Subchief

 

Ranthar

 
garbled
 

narrowing

 

plenty

 

merchandise