The Ship Who Won(1993)

Margaret BallAnne McCaffreyMercedes Lackey

Like Helva, the Ship Who Sang, (and Nancia from PartnerShip, Tia from The Ship Who Searched, and Simeon, who runs The City Who Fought) Carialle was born so physically disadvantaged that her only chance for life was as a shellperson. And again like those others, Carialle decided she would strap on a spaceship. Her brawn is a guy named Keff. Their mission: to search the galaxy for intelligent beings, to travel where no shellperson and her brawn have gone before...

Alas, intelligent life is thin on the galactic ground, so when Carialle and Keff arrive on a very nice little world with very nice little aliens, fuzzy and polite and eager to please, they are overjoyed. But their joy does not last: their fuzzy friends turn out to be virtual slaves to a race of sorcerers, sorcerers who really do seem to possess magical powers of frightening potency, and who are neither fuzzy, polite, nor the least bit eager to please.