Faun and Games (59 page)

could meet her!" she said.

"That, I fear, is impossible," Imbri said.
 
"How could you take your

moon along-when going to that moon?"

"How, indeed," Ida agreed sadly.
 
"But this detailed knowledge of it is

the next best thing.
 
I'm glad she has a nice residence."

"She sent her regards to you," Forrest said, remembering.

"Oh!
 
How nice."

"She's a nice person," Dawn said.

"Just like you," Eve said.

"Oh!" Ida blushed.

Then it was time to resume their mission.
 
"We must locate Ghina on the

red face, and Jfraya on the green face," Forrest said.
 
"With their

help, we can nullify the Wizards.
 
Then you will be free."

"That will be nice," Ida agreed.
 
"But do be careful, because the

Wizards may not take kindly to your effort."

"As long as nobody tells them what we are up to, we should be all

right," Imbri said in a dreamlet.

"I will certainly never tell," Ida said.
 
"Farewell, good visitors."

Dawn & Eve hugged her.
 
Then the four of them left her blue stone house,

and walked off the blue ridge to the blue lake.
 
There Forrest took the

large cross from Imbri's pack.
 
They clustered together, and shot across

the water in a bundle.

They landed tumbled together on the far shore.
 
Dawn was plastered

across Forrest's front, and Eve across his back, all of them on top of

Imbri.
 
But no one was hurt.
 
He wondered to what extent the girls had

arranged things that way.
 
Did it matter?

They disentangled, and resumed their trek.
 
The red face was in the

direction they thought of as west, though such a designation was

meaningless here.
 
A straight march in that direction would get them

there.
 
Forrest invoked the blanket of obscurity so that they would not

be bothered by natives.

But night was coming.
 
They needed a place to spend the night. They were

in deep woods, and weren't sure how safe it would be, because the

blanket would wear off long before the night ended.
 
Already they heard

the howling of the hunting wolf spiders.
 
They didn't want to blunder

into a wolf web.

Dawn went from tree to tree, touching their trunks.
 
"This is a tea

tree," she said of one.
 
"It grows all kinds of teas: Mediocri,

subversi, adverse, propensi, versatili, priori, supertori, monstrosi-"

"We get the point," Eve said.
 
"We won't be drinking any of those.

Dawn circled around it.
 
"And on this side it's a Tree Tea," she

announced.
 
"When enemies meet here, they can make a peace agreement."

"There's a house," Eve said.
 
"Maybe we can stay there."

"How long has the blanket been invoked?" Imbri asked. "Over an hour,"

Forrest said.
 
"But what we want is friendly accommodation.
 
So if we

find that, we won't need the blanket."

"So who inquires at that house?"

"I will.
 
We all have our own value, so none of us are more at risk than

the others."

"But we love you," Dawn said.
 
"We don't want anything to happen to you.

"And I don't want anything to happen to any of you." He glanced at

Imbri.
 
"If an ogre or something answers the door, throw a bad dreamlet

at him to distract him until I can get away."

The others nodded, realizing that this was probably sufficient

protection.

He went up to the blue house and knocked on the door.
 
A young woman

with blue hair answered.
 
She reminded him of someone. "Hello," he said.

"I am Forrest Faun, from another world, and I and my friends need a

place to stay the night.
 
We wondered if you-"

"Another world?" she asked.
 
"Do you mean Ptero?"

"Yes, as a matter of fact.
 
We are on our way to the red face, and-"

"You are welcome.
 
We haven't had visitors from there for a long time.

In fact, we've never had them.
 
I am Ilene, and this is my brother

Gerrod." She indicated the man who came up behind her.
 
He looked

familiar too.

"Don't you want to meet my companions, to be sure-"

"Certainly.
 
Bring them in."

Forrest turned and beckoned the others.
 
They came to the house.

.
 
"You look familiar," Ilene said, looking at the twins.

"I am Dawn."

"I am Eve."

"We are the twin daughters of Prince Dolph and Princess Electra."

"That's it!" Ilene cried.
 
"You are our cousins!
 
We are the children of

Grey and Ivy.

"Oh, more cousins," Dawn said.
 
"How nice."

"Do you have Magician caliber talents?" Eve asked.

"Of course.
 
I control storms, and Geffod communicates with water."

"Fascinating," Dawn said.
 
"I know about living things."

"And I know about inanimate things."

"Let's compare notes," Ilene said.

Soon Gerrod and Eve were telling each other about all manner of aspects

of a cup of water, and it was clear that their talents were genuine.

Similarly Ilene and Dawn were demonstrating storm clouds and information

about living things.
 
Then they all settled down inside, including

Imbri, for a nice supper and more talking.
 
Forrest realized that on

these worlds, where the might-he's resided, it was easy for them to

accept alternate folk.
 
Dawn & Eve knew all their cousins on Ptero, and

Ilene and Gerrod knew all their cousins on Pyramid.
 
They considered it

a fair exchange of information, and no one gained or lost size.
 
Imbri

paid her way by demonstrating her ability to project dreamlets, and

Forrest brought out his panpipes and played a merry melody for their

hosts.
 
So it was a good night.

In the morning, refreshed, they set off again.
 
Ilene and Gerrod did not

know what was to be found on the red face; it seemed that the folk on

one face kept pretty much to their own color, and those who tried to

cross over stood out like sore big toes.
 
But Geffod gave them several

packaged storms to use in case of need.
 
Imbri accepted them, and did

lose some mass, but it seemed worth it.

As they progressed, the ground tilted.
 
It didn't bother them, since

they tilted with it, but they were aware that they were getting near the

edge of the blue triangle.

When they reached it, the demarcation was striking.
 
The border was like

the ridge of a mountain range, blue on one side, red on the other.

"We'll have to change color," Forrest said.

"Maybe not," Imbri said.
 
"With the blanket of obscurity, we may not be

noticed."

He hadn't thought of that.
 
"Then let's go ahead.
 
You can ask

directions with dreamlets that show the correct color."

They crossed the ridge-and abruptly their tilt was wrong.
 
It was geared

to the blue face, which was sharply different from the red face.
 
They

were now at a steep angle to the terrain.
 
In fact their heads wanted to

collide with the ground at a slight angle, while their bodies wanted to

point slightly into the air.

"We are oriented ninety degrees to the blue face," Imbri said.

"The red face differs from the blue face by a hundred and twenty

degrees.
 
We shall have to crawl on our hands.
 
I don't feel comfortable

with that." Indeed, she was lying on her side with two feet in the air.

"Maybe I can figure it out," Eve said.
 
She touched a finger to the red

rock.
 
"Aha!
 
There's a colony of lings near the edge.
 
We can make a

deal with them."

That was a relief.
 
They crossed back to the blue face and walked along

the edge until they were near the lings.
 
This happened to be by the

shore of a blue lake that went right up to the boundary, bent around the

corner, and became a red lake at the new angle.
 
Then they waited for

the obscurity to wear off, so that Forrest could crawl to the lings'

camp.
 
But as the spell faded, a large canine creature loped toward them

from the blue side.

"What is it?" Eve asked, concerned.

"That looks like a dire wolf," Dawn said.
 
"Get well away from it!
 
"

"Maybe I had better invoke the blanket of obscurity again," Forrest

said, taking it out of his knapsack.

.
 
"No, just cross to the red side," Dawn said urgently.
 
She and Eve

were already doing so, while Imbri stood warily by.

A deep bass note sounded from the lake, almost under Forrest's elbow. He

jumped-and the can flew out of his hand.
 
It splashed into the water,

where a big fish swallowed it.

"Oh, no!" Dawn cried.
 
"That's a largemouth bass.
 
It swallowed the

can."

Meanwhile the dire wolf was coming close.
 
Forrest quickly brought out a

storm package and opened it.
 
Dark clouds swirled out, making sheets of

rain and peals of thunder.
 
The wolf got a blast of spray in the snoot,

reconsidered, passed close by them, and ran on, not attacking.
 
"Of all