Currant Events (6 page)

 “You are sure it is safe?”
Clio asked. She found she was tired, though on this world she knew it was only
a bit of her soul that formed her body. Much had happened, rapidly.

 “Oh, yes, I won't sleep until Drew
returns, and I will spot any other mind in the vicinity.”

 “Then I shall rest,” Clio
agreed, and sat on the ground with her back against a tree. She had to do what
she hated: review the worst puns she knew.

 “May I question you about your
nature?” Drusie asked Becka. “We have no dragon/human crossbreeds
here; I didn't know it was possible.”

 “Anything is possible in
Xanth,” Becka said. “My father, Draco Dragon, was diving down to snap
up a tasty nymph by a pool, not realizing it was a love spring. They both got
doused, and instead of eating her he summoned the stork with her. He was most
embarrassed and never talked about it after. I grew up with my mother, then
sought my father, and he came to accept me. But such events are rare; I'm the
only dragon girl I know.”

 “Fascinating. I really appreciate
the way you scared off that small dragon and saved us from getting
crunched.”

 “It was Clio who made it
possible.”

 “Yes. We both owe both of you.
Will we be accepted as a couple in Xanth?”

 “I think so. Xanth dragons are not
as particular about types; a fire breather can date a smoker and no one thinks
anything of it. In fact I date a brassy boy.”

 “That is so wonderful. If we
hadn't had to be secret, we wouldn't have needed to meet far from our homes,
and wouldn't have been vulnerable.”

 “But you'll still need to watch
your tails in Xanth. There are many predators besides dragons.”

 “Tell me about them.”

 “For example, ogres. They like to
crunch bones, twist trees into pretzels, and teach young dragons the meaning of
fear. Then there are nickelpedes. They are five times as bad as centipedes,
gouging out nickel-sized disks of flesh.”

 So there was much about Xanth dragons
did not know. That should be helpful. Clio drifted into sleep.

 She woke when Drew returned. “It
is arranged,” he said. “The land dragons will gather on the
Belly.”

 “The belly? You said they wouldn't
eat us immediately.”

 “The belly of the beast,”
Drusie explained. “Our world is in the form of a dragon.”

 Oh. She should have realized. “Of
course. How do we get there?”

 “I can fly there, and carry
you,” Becka said. “If I have guidance.”

 “I will guide you,” Drusie
said. “At your cruising rate, there should just be time.”

 “I will watch out for hostile
forces,” Drew said. “Do you have a convenient spot for me to
perch?”

 “My shirt pocket?” Clio
asked.

 “That's right-you wear clothing.
That will do.” He flew up to her, landed on her shirt, and disappeared
into her breast pocket. In half a moment he poked his head out. “This
makes a fine temporary nest. It's well cushioned.”

 “Thank you,” Clio said,
slightly embarrassed for no discernible reason.

 At that point an elderly human man
walked into sight. “I thought you said there were no other humans
here,” Becka said.

 “It's true,” Drusie replied.
“He must be a stray from some other world.”

 “We'd better help him,” Clio
said. She hailed the man. “Hello! I'm Clio.”

 He saw her. “I am Faxon from the
future. Is this contemporary Xanth?”

 Clio was taken aback. “That
depends on your perspective. Why are you here?”

 “Xanth is about to come to a
significant crossroads, so I am traveling back in time to see that it is not
thrown into a bad alternative.”

 Clio wasn't sure whether this was
legitimate, or the confusion of a man whose brain was suffering atrophy. But
she didn't have time right now to figure it all out. “No, this is not
Xanth proper. It is a subordinate world. I think you need to travel a bit
farther back.”

 “Thank you.” Faxon vanished.

 “Was he for real?” Becka
asked.

 “Yes,” Drew said. “I
read his mind. He's from about a century hence.”

 “I hope he doesn't change our
past,” Clio said a bit nervously. “But meanwhile we have our own job
to do.”

 Becka turned dragon. Drusie flew up and
perched on the top of her head. Clio mounted her back, as before.

 Becka spread her wings and ran forward,
soon taking off. Clio didn't hear Drusie's instructions, but the dragon girl
did seem to know where she was going. She circled up over the eye, then flew
out over the tip of the tail and up toward the belly. At one point there was a
storm; they rose above it and went on. This was after all a planet; it had
weather.

 It was a fairly long flight, even at
dragon speed, but in due course they arrived at the site on the belly. There
were many dragons there, ranging in size from giant to tiny; Clio could not
distinguish between the smaller giants and the larger large dragons, but
presumed the categories were clear to their complements.

 “They are,” Drew said.
“The leader of this assembly is the largest giant land dragon, who is a
black smoker, indifferent and rational, which is to say, smart. He will bargain
shrewdly, but is very curious to see Xanthly flesh, so will enter the contest.
I will translate, as neither of you are telepathic.”

 “Thank you,” Clio said. This
was exactly the kind of scene she would have preferred to write about, rather
than participate in. But she hardly had a choice.

 They came in for a landing. A monster
dragon lifted his snoot and sent a warning jet of fire. “Halt! No flyers
here.” That was Drew's translation; it was a telepathic challenge.

 “Cower down, rotten chops,”
Drew replied similarly from her pocket. “We're here for the pun contest,
per the truce.” He gave their identification. The guardian dragon nodded,
withholding his fire.

 Clio got the impression that Drew liked
having a pretext to address a giant that way.

 “Don't tell,” Drew told her
privately.

 They landed safely, and were immediately
surrounded by dragons of every size and type as Clio dismounted and Becka
resumed girl form. There were hundreds of them. Technically, six hundred and
twenty-five, she realized. All the variants of land dragon. They were all
colors, but none of them had functional wings.

 Before them was the biggest of them
all, a black dragon the size of a youthful mountain. Curls of smoke issued
menacingly from his nostrils as he gazed down at them. “This better be
good,” he said, in Drew's rendition.

 “Your turn,” Drew told her
privately. “Just speak naturally. I'll translate your thoughts, with the
appropriate names and titles, and their telepaths will relay it to the others.
They won't read anything I don't relay; Drusie is seeing to that with a mental
privacy cloud.”

 Clio appreciated how the two tiny
dragons were coordinating. They really were quite helpful.

 “Thank you,” the two said
together. “But get on with it,” Drew continued. “Giants aren't
known for their patience.”

 “Greetings from Xanth, Giant
Dragon,” Clio began somewhat uncertainly. “I have a matter to broach
with you-”

 “I won't listen to this,” the
giant interrupted. “Are you going to show some tasty flesh?”

 “Only if you win the
contest,” Clio said. “And if I win, you must listen to my
pitch.”

 He nodded cannily. “First the
rules of the game. We take turns showing puns, my turn first. If I win one, I
choose what item of your coverage to remove.”

 He was bargaining. “And if I win
one, I am one step toward making my pitch.”

 “Five steps,” he said.
“First one to win five, wins. When you lose, we get to eat you and your
halfbreed friend.”

 Clio's knees felt like damp noodles,
but she held on. “When you lose five, you listen.”

 “Granted.”

 So they were on, ludicrous as the
arrangement was.

 The black dragon twitched an ear, and a
smaller dragon came forward. “Their telepath,” Drew explained.

 Several long metallic objects appeared
in a mental scene. They were projecting from a board. A dragon walked past the
board, his tail happening to twitch across it. Suddenly the black spikes
sprouted teeth and chomped the tail. The dragon screeched and emitted a cloud
of steam as it flew away. The scene faded as a wash of humor spread across the
watching dragons.

 “Want to see it again?” the
black dragon inquired.

 Clio recognized the pun; she had
encountered a variation a century back. But she didn't want to seem too
competent, so she hesitated as if uncertain. “Yes.”

 The scene played again. This time Clio
realized that this was a flying dragon; they were poking fun at one that was
not of their type, these all being land dragons. Becka and both tiny dragons
were flying dragons, so this was a pointed if oblique teasing.

 It was time to answer. “Nail
biting,” Clio said.

 The humor dried up. The dragons had
lost one. “One for you, morsel,” the black dragon said grudgingly. He
fetched a cup of tea and sipped it as another dragon set up a billboard with
the score:

 DRAGONS 0 MORSELS 1

 Now it was Clio's turn. She knew a
similar pun. Maybe it would stump them. She thought an image for Drew to
animate.

 A human man walked into the scene
carrying a bucket and a brush. He came to a palm tree with a number of palm
fronds that resembled human hands. He dipped his brush and slopped paint on the
extremities. That was it.

 The dragon struggled. “Painting
claws? Skipping palms?”

 “Want to see it again?” Clio
inquired sweetly, making an obliging gesture with her hands.

 The dragon's eye fixed on her hands.
“You have fingers instead of claws. That's it: finger painting.”

 He had it. “One for you,” she
agreed. Now she would have to take off a piece of clothing. She was wearing a
hat, shirt, shoes and socks, and underwear. She was afraid the dragon would
ignore the extremities and focus on the middle, which was exactly where she
didn't want to be exposed. But she was stuck for it.

 But he surprised her. “I like to
eat feet. Remove a shoe.”

 She obliged, not fully relieved. The
black dragon gazed at her sock-covered foot and licked his lips. Well, it could
have been worse.

 It was his turn for a pun. A scene
appeared with a demon floating into view. So they did have demons on this
world. It was in dragon form, but was floating rather than flying, and slightly
translucent. He looked unhappy. He drifted before a dragon. “Demon, you
look miserable,” the dragon said, or perhaps thought. “I am Feat,
unlucky in love,” the demon said. “I would kill myself, if I were
alive. As it is, I must continue to suffer.” He drifted on out of the
scene.

 Clio considered. Most demons had
punnish names, like D. Molish or D. Sire. This one would be D. Feat. But what
kind of feat was he accomplishing? He seemed more like a failure. In fact he
was almost in agony. Was this a foot pun, because the dragon liked feet?

 Then she had it. “The agony of D.
Feat!” she exclaimed.

 “Curses, foiled again,” the
black dragon muttered. Now it was 2 to 1 in her favor.

 And her turn for a pun. This time she
selected a tricky one. The picture was of a bridge over a river, with a woman
gazing at it. Then the woman turned away-and the bridge faded out. That was
all.

 The black dragon pondered. “What
is that structure?”

 “There are no bridges on this
world,” Drew explained to her. “I grasp the concept only because I
have it from your mind. Dragons fly across rivers, or swing or wade through
them, or tunnel under.”

 “It is a bridge,” Clio
explained. “We morsels can't always risk our tender flesh in the water, so
we make bridges across.” She modified the scene to show human people
walking across the bridge as the woman on the shore watched. But when the woman
looked away, bridge and people disappeared.

 The dragon finally admitted he was
stumped. “Where's the pun?”

 “It's an attention span,”
Clio said as the billboard chalked up another for her side. It was now 3 to 1.

 The dragon audience groaned. Their
unfamiliarity with the bridge had distracted them from its related pun.

 It was the dragon's turn, and she knew
this was going to be a tough one. A scene appeared with a dragon marching
onstage. “I have all mental powers,” he proclaimed. “I can do
anything!”

 A smaller dragon appeared. “Then
can you copy yourself?”

 “Certainly.” The dragon
huffed and puffed, then spun around so rapidly that he split into two identical
dragons. “Now we can both read your mind, you despicable doubter,”
the second one said as he diminished his spin so he could stand still. “I
am a perfect copy of my originator. It's all done through the mind.”