Currant Events (4 page)

 “Ah, yes,” Clio agreed.
“Now I see it. I like to understand things when I write the histories, and
that one slipped by me.”

 “It is understandably
confusing,” Che agreed. “I'm told you need me to relate to
dragons.”

 “Yes. We need to persuade them to
move to Xanth. But we have what may be a more immediate problem: how to
transport dragons from a Moon of Ida to Xanth. It seems the Xanth dragons are
doomed.”

 Che considered. He was a handsome young
stallion of nineteen, the same age as Becka. He was also very smart. He had to
be, because he was the tutor for Sim Bird, the Simurgh's chick, who was
destined to know everything in the universe, in due course. “This is true.
There is a malady going around that infects dragons without souls. Since those
of the moon will have souls, by definition, they will be immune.”

 “So my father Draco is at risk,
and I'm not,” Becka said, looking half relieved.

 “True. Your human portion provides
you with a soul. He may be saved by the infusion of a soul from a souled
dragon, however.”

 “I'll talk him into it.”

 “Nevertheless, there will have to
be new bodies here for the majority of them to occupy. This is not
straightforward, because folk existing here are not eager to give up their
bodies.”

 “They can do that?” Becka
asked.

 “Yes. The process is called morphing.
When an existing character is ready to fade away, he or she can morph into an
animate blob. Then a theoretical character from Ptero or beyond can animate
that blob, giving it the new semblance, and the new character exists. But very
few Xanth characters care to undergo this process; all cling to the hope that
there may be some great future adventure awaiting them. So it's not a viable
procedure for wholesale replacement of dragons.”

 Clio was starting to feel desperate.
“Is there any other way?”

 “There should be. Perhaps these
bodies can be crafted from organic material, such as swamp peat or
topsoil.”

 Clio liked the way his mind worked.
“Is this a thing you might arrange, while we go to that dragon
world?”

 “I could make the effort,”
Che agreed. “This would seem to be a problem that needs to be
addressed.”

 “Then perhaps we should leave that
to you,” Clio said. “While we go to Dragon World.”

 “Agreed. There is certainly a
pressing need for more dragons. I had not before properly appreciated the role
of such predators in Xanth.”

 “Then it is up to me to carry you
after all,” Becka said. “Come outside where I can change.”

 They exited Castle MaiDragon, and the
girl transformed into a full-sized dragon with bright green scales tinged with
purple at the ends. The wings were like those of an insect, with sparkling
facets. Overall, a pretty creature.

 Clio climbed onto the dragon's back.
She would have been reluctant to do so, had she not talked with the girl and
seen the transformation. Also, she had written about Becka in prior volumes, so
knew she could be trusted.

 The dragon flapped her wings, at first
slowly, then more rapidly, until they fairly buzzed. She slid forward, then
lifted from the ground. Clio clung to the scales of the back as the wind rushed
by her body and tore at her dress.

 Becka spiraled upward until she cleared
the treetops. Then she flew toward Castle Roogna. The ground passed below, with
seeming slowness, but Clio knew they were moving rapidly.

 There was a cloud ahead. For a moment
Clio was afraid it was Fracto, who usually meant trouble, but this turned out
to be an innocuous white puffball. It was being harassed by crows. They passed
it by fast enough to scatter the crows and stroked on. Then there was another
large flying creature, a griffin, with the head and wings of a bird and body of
a lion. It veered to intercept them, but Becka let out a warning hiss and the
griffin changed its mind. It was not being mobbed by crows, for it was a crow
predator. But there were clearly not enough griffins to fill the role of the
dragons.

 Clio was coming to appreciate working
with a dragon girl. Transportation and protection-these were worthwhile.

 The castle came into sight. The dragon
glided down and landed just beyond the moat. The moat monster's head lifted,
spying them.

 “Hello, Souffle,” Clio
called. “Do you recognize us?”

 Souffle did. He sniffed noses with
Becka Dragon, then sank back under the water as Becka reverted to Girl mode.

 “I admired the way you backed off
those flying predators,” Clio said. “You intimidated them.”

 “I learned that long ago from my
friend Bortre. She could intimidate anything, even objects, when she wanted
to.”

 “Friends can be beneficial,”
Clio agreed, realizing that she had very few friends herself. Her position as
the Muse of History tended to isolate her.

 “And fun,” Becka agreed.
“I have another friend called Toney Harper. That's tone-y. He makes
evocative music with his harp. When he makes tones of romance, everyone within
earshot gets all goo-goo eyes. But the tone of danger brings all manner of
danger out of the woodwork. A happy tone makes folk dance; a sad one makes them
weep. Toney is great at a party.”

 “I can imagine.” But she
couldn't, really; Clio had never been to such a party. She hadn't been out in
Xanth proper in some time; she feared she was missing things she might have
liked to experience.

 They walked toward the drawbridge.
Three girls appeared on it, wearing three little crowns. They were the triplet
Princesses, eight years old, all of them Sorceresses and full of mischief.
Because of their magic power, it could be considerable mischief. Clio knew them
rather better than they knew her. What was the best way to handle this?

 “Hi, Becka,” Melody called.
“Who's your friend?” She was the one in the green dress, with
greenish hair and blue eyes. She always spoke first.

 Becka looked at Clio questioningly.
Clio nodded; it was all right to identify her. The information couldn't be
concealed from these girls anyway.

 They had paused too long. “We
already know,” Harmony said. She was the one in the brown dress, with
brown hair and eyes, and a harmonica.

 “It's Clio, the Muse of
History,” Rhythm concluded. Her dress was red, as was her hair, but her
eyes were green. Clio was not sure why Melody hadn't gotten the green eyes, to
match the rest of her; the storks might have gotten confused. She carried a
little drum.

 “Hello, Princesses,” Clio
said.

 The three froze momentarily in place,
abashed. But the mood passed in exactly its moment, and they resumed animation.

 “Hello, Clio,” Melody said.

 “We're glad to meet you,”
Harmony agreed.

 “What are you doing here?”
Rhythm asked.

 “I have to fetch some
dragons,” Clio said.

 “Dragons!” Melody exclaimed.

 “Why?” Harmony asked.

 “Did they do something
wrong?” Rhythm asked.

 “Dragons are going extinct,”
Becka explained. “Because they don't have souls. We need to replace them
with souled dragons.”

 The girls considered half a moment.

 “Can we help?” Melody asked.

 Clio hadn't considered that, but
realized that they might indeed be able to help. Any single princess was a full
Sorceress; any two squared their power, and the three together cubed it. That
was a lot of magic. “Actually, Che Centaur is arranging for host bodies
for them here. That may be a big job. He could surely use your help.”

 “Che!” Harmony said gladly.

 The three vanished, leaving behind only
a word from Rhythm: “Bye.”

 “You handled that neatly,”
Becka said.

 “I was lucky.” It was the
truth.

 They entered the castle. Princess Ida
came up to meet them. She resembled Princess Ivy, the triplet's mother, but was
immediately identifiable by the little moon orbiting her head. “Dara said
you would be coming.”

 “We need to go to Dragon
World,” Clio said.

 “That is not safe.”

 “It seems the Good Magician felt I
was the appropriate person for it. Becka should be helpful there.”

 Ida nodded. “That is true. And of
course if you get chomped there, you will merely return here. Still, it would
be an unpleasant experience. Are you sure this excursion is necessary?”

 “I am not at all sure,” Clio
confessed. “And I'm not partial to dragons to begin with, present company
excepted. But it seems this is a thing I must attempt.”

 “I think the Good Magician has
lost it,” Becka said. “But this isn't my mission; I'm just helping
because I want to save the dragons.”

 “It is true that the dragon
population has been declining,” Ida said. “Something needs to be
done. Let's hope that this is it.”

 They went to Ida's office, where they
reviewed the mechanism for traveling to the moons. Clio reminded herself to
focus on Dragon World, so as to be transported directly there; she didn't want
to struggle with the confusing time schemes of planet Ptero.

 They lay on couches, and Princess Ida
gave them sniffs from a vial. Soon they left their bodies behind and floated up
toward Ida's moon Ptero. Clio took Becka's hand and concentrated on Dragon
World.

 Their souls accelerated toward the looming
world. It seemed to be getting larger, but actually they were getting smaller.
They zipped down to its surface, for it no longer resembled a tiny moon; it was
a giant planet. They came down by Castle Roogna, recognizable because it was
the same as the one on Xanth. They flew into it, and into the chamber where
Princess Ida stayed, with her pyramidal moon.

 They did not pause to greet her; they
zoomed right up to the moon, which seemed to expand enormously. Each triangular
face of it was a different color: blue, red, green, and gray on the bottom.
They descended on the blue section, and flew to the modest house where its
Princess Ida resided with her doughnut-shaped moon, more properly known as
Torus. On its curving inner surface, on an island in a sea, was yet another
Princess Ida, with her moon Cone.

 After that, the route fuzzed in her
mind. There seemed to be an endless chain of worlds and Idas and worlds. Of
course she had written about them before, as she recorded the histories of
significant people in Xanth. The most recent one, Cube, had traveled all the
way to Zombie World. But viewing and hearing it in her crystal ball, however
much it seemed to put her in the scene, hardly compared to actually being
there. Experience was far more intense than observation.

 Suddenly, after an endless age, they
were homing in on Dragon World. There was no doubt about it, because it was
shaped like a dragon. It was serpentine, with six legs, a long tail, and a
ferocious head. The dragon's teeth were chomping its own tail, so that the
world formed a twisted irregular ring, with the feet in the center, like
spokes.

 Now she had to depend on her own
discretion, which she hardly trusted. Her thought of Dragon World had brought
them to it, but where on it were they supposed to land? Where was the
destination on this world?

 She remembered the compass. She looked
at the pattern on her wrist. The blue arrow's position had changed; indeed it
was changing as she moved her wrist. It was orienting on its target. All she
had to do was go where it pointed. She hoped.

 It pointed at the planetary dragon's
fearsome head. True, that head was clamping to the tail, so was unlikely to
bite a visitor on short notice, but Clio would have preferred some other site.

 As they descended, the head expanded
horrendously. There was an inordinate number of teeth, each looking larger and
sharper than the next, and a great curling lip, and several lake-sized drools
of slaver. Were they going to enter that awful mouth?

 No, they passed by it and oriented on
the snout. This was a prickly horror of hide girt about by tree-sized whiskers.
Tiny bugs scuttled across it. No, as they got closer she saw they were neither
tiny nor bugs; they were small dragons flying across the surface. No, they were
big dragons. What a difference distance made!

 Fortunately they passed that too, and
oriented on one of the great red eyes. That resembled a convex sea of glass,
with a monstrous blue crater in the center. No, that was the iris. It expanded
to spread from horizon to horizon, with a deep dark black hole in the center,
the pupil. They were right in the dragon's sight.

 They came to land at last at the edge of
that pupil, which turned out to be a vast pool surrounded by a circular blue
forest. There was a beach all around the pool with multicolored sands. No
dragon denizens were in sight. It was a surprisingly pleasant scene,
considering.

 “Isn't that the most handsome
dragon you ever saw?” Becka asked excitedly. “What fangs! What
skin!”

 Well, she was a dragon girl. Probably a
human face would look no better, seen from a similar vantage. “It will
surely do,” Clio said.