Read 03. Quest for the Well of Souls for Free Online Page B

Goddess of Animals lived in her compound and that they would be turned into animals if they so much as caught sight of her.
    And, of course, for quite a while she wanted no one, preferring to sulk in self-pity. But, eventually she would leave the compound, sometimes for the beach where she would prop herself up so she could see the magnificent starfield. Eventually she also explored inland, but always by night to minimize possible problems. Except for the mosquitoes and other pests she no longer felt, there were no predators that could bother her, and the natives feared the dark.
    But, of course, she had eventually run into a couple anyway, and the first encounter was a disaster. They knew immediately what they saw—the very animal described in their tales—and it so terrified them that one actually did drop dead on the spot and the other became insane.
    The most powerful voodoo is the one one's mind believes in, she found.
    And so, at first, she was cautious. Having a translator meant she could understand them and they her—although the device added an eerie tone to her voice.
    Just the right effect. Ambreza-like, but not Ambreza. Something else: The Goddess!
    And, of course, finally she announced to the local natives that if they served her she would show herself once without their suffering any ill effects. When she eventually walked into the firelight, ghostly and eerie, they did what she had hoped. They fell on their faces and worshipped her.
    But, she warned them, to tell the Ambreza was to risk her wrath. Even to tell other tribes would bring down upon them a fate worse than death. Her tribe had kept the faith. They were the People of the Goddess, and they reveled in that knowledge.
    Mavra demanded offerings, and offerings she got. Hoards of food dumped at the door of the compound. Tobacco, too. Rare on the Well World, the substance was much prized; the Ambreza took most of the crop, of course—but now she had some to trade with the monthly supply ship for things she wanted more than the now largely unneeded provisions.
    For tobacco, the ship's crews would bring what she asked. Since Glathriel was a nontech hex, machines were out; but books, geographies, and grammars were useful. She learned to read several related languages and waded through everything in their published histories.
    She was, by her eleventh escape attempt, probably the greatest living expert on Well World life, geography, and geology. And she reread the books frequently, turning pages with nose and tongue until the volumes were almost unreadable. Even after she changed she continued to read voraciously; it was one of the few activities that kept her properly stimulated.
    She also gave native hunters advice on game traps, which increased their yields, and suggestions for the manufacture of new nontech weapons. The Glathriel, of course, worshipped her all the more. The Ambreza became suspicious, but there was little they could do. The situation had gone too far.
    Then, one night just after she changed, she noticed a strange glow in the direction of the village. Positioning herself nearby, she watched as one of the huts burned and people screamed. They got only one out alive, a young boy with massive burns on hands and feet.
    She ordered him brought to the compound and launched one of her little rockets to signal the Ambreza. More Goddess magic.
    And the Ambreza doctor had come, and looked at the boy.
    "There's no hope," he told her. "I can get him to a hospital, yes, but not in time to do any good. He's horribly burned. I might save his life, but never his limbs, and he'll bear those tremendous scars his whole life as a cripple. Best I put him out of his misery."
    Something rose in her, looking at the burnt and pitiful boy of ten or eleven. "That's not a pet to be put out of its misery!" she'd shouted to the beaverlike creature. "That's a person! If you won't save him for yourself, save him for me!"
    She didn't know why she'd said that, it just