Deluge Drivers by Alan Dean Foster

Author:Alan Dean Foster [Foster, Alan Dean]
Language: eng
Format: epub
ISBN: 9780345333308
Publisher: Del Rey
Published: 1987-05-12T00:00:00+00:00

"Then what about all this cloud cover? It's not a rifs storm. Something has to be generating all that moisture."

Jacalan shrugged. "Ask Hwang or Semkin. Weather's their department."

He did, but neither meteorologist had a ready explanation for the dense layer of clouds that hung over this area of the continent. It was part and parcel of what they'd come to investigate, and thus far their studies hadn't produced anything particularly informative. Hal Semkin clung to the hot springs theory despite Jacalan's counterarguments, while Hwang was trying to put together a theory allowing for warm subcrustal emissions of heat and moisture which would not conflict with the geologist's findings.

Ethan moved to the quarterdeck. Ta-hoding still stood by his useless helm. "Know anything about this place?" Ethan asked him, fairly sure of the captain's response.

"Nothing." Next to the captain the great wooden wheel spun aimlessly.

"What about the sailors from Poyolavomaar?"

"The questions have been asked." Ta-hoding sounded irritated but Ethan knew it was only frustration that made his replies short and sharp. "This land is as foreign to them as to those of us of Sofold. At this end of the world only Moulokin was spoken of, and as you know it, too, was unknown until we went there and made allies of its people." He stared at the low-lying city they were approaching. "Would that the soldiers of that fine metropolis were here to aid us now." He pointed toward the port.

"What a poor place this is. See, with' all this broken stone lying loosely about, their homes and storehouses are still ineptly fashioned. There is no profit to be made trading with such a community. The wonder of it to me is that it exists in this place at all. Who do they trade with? We encountered nothing between here and Poyolavomaar."

Indeed, the closer they drew and the better view they had, the more Ethan found himself wondering what this city was doing in this isolated region in the first place. There was little use of mortar or cement. Gaps between undressed stones were chinked with smaller rocks and pebbles or stuffed with raw pika-pina. Roofs were fashioned of large flat stone slabs instead of the dressed and cut slate common to developed communities like Wannome or Ar-sudun. Except for a single multistory structure which overlooked the town from off to the left and resembled an oversize hut with battlements, the entire city conveyed the impression of being nothing more than a hasty afterthought.

"No walls, either," observed Ta-hoding professionally. "No gates. It is evident they do not expect to be attacked. There are no other city-states nearby to threaten them."

"Who would want to?" Hunnar commented contemp-tuously. "What is there to plunder? New buildings that are already falling down? Citizens clad in rags and tatters? All the loot this place could offer would not be worth the life of a single warrior."

None of which, Ethan reflected, squared with the presence of skimmers and energy weapons.

The skimmer with the cannon was moving inboard.

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