Knot Gneiss (33 page)

“The history of our people extends back thousands of years,” Steven said. “We even had two calendars to track our civic and routine events, and they hardly even overlapped. We were excellent farmers and warriors. We sacrificed regularly to our gods, and they rewarded us with fine harvests. Always we asked their permission for any key decisions we made. Our priest would stand before the statue of a god and ask ‘May I?’ and if the god did not say no, we would do it.”

“Did the god ever say no?” Wenda asked, curious.

“Sometimes. The gods did not speak in words, but in signs. If there was a sudden close crack of thunder, that was no. If the earth shook and a building fell, that was no. If a bird smacked into a tower and fell dead, that was no. But usually there was nothing, so we knew it was all right.”

Wenda realized that in the great majority of cases, it would be all right, even if there were no gods. But she did not want to annoy the believers by pointing that out.

“Then a prophet came and told us that there were no gods, that nature was everything, and that we were wasting our resources by sacrificing our best and brightest to these imaginary deities. That no sensible god would relish receiving a beating heart in a stone dish. That we were taking the silence of gods that were no more than stone idols as permission, and attributing our naturally good weather to their intercession. ‘Cease this nonsense!’ he cried. ‘Just be great warriors and farmers without soiling it with supernatural crap.’”

Wenda realized that that must have been some prophet. To go against thousands of years of culture; to speak what to Wenda was plain obvious truth, crediting nature rather than gods—that would have taken intelligence and courage.

“We believed him,” Steven continued. “We stopped the sacrifices, thereby sparing the lives of many doughty warriors and beautiful maidens. And for a time all was well, and we prospered. The days were fine and sunny, one after another. Then came the drought. Fine sunny days are not so great if not interspersed with dark rainy days. We dug wells, and irrigated, tiding through, but the drought continued. The water table lowered, requiring us to dig our wells deeper.”

He sighed, and the women sighed with him, their bare breasts rippling in a manner that made Wenda almost incoherent with envy. She had no such equipment herself, now, only a hollow that matched the curvature of her back. She had stuffed her clothing, so as to look complete, but was able to show no actual flesh. Sooner or later Prince Charming was bound to wonder why she no longer removed her shirt when embracing him.

“We had been at peace,” Steven continued. “But war broke out as the drought intensified, as people fought over the diminishing number of wells that still provided copious fresh water. The green fields shrank. Hunger spread. Until at last no producing wells remained, and the last crops dried up in their fields. Folk fled in masses, but the drought was everywhere. There was no place to survive.

“Then belatedly we realized that this was the gods’ answer to our infidelity. We had renounced the gods, so they renounced us, and ceased providing the water we so desperately needed. We should never have listened to that false prophet. But he was gone to some far distant land, with wealth and lovely women, leaving us to our folly. We had no recourse but to perish with what little remaining grace we could muster.”

“That is so sad,” Wenda said, feeling a teardrop formed of sap on her face.

“Naturally once the last of us was gone, the water returned. There were heavy storms washing out many of our remaining traces, and the jungle trees overgrew our cities. Now our only visitors are wild animals, and abysmal puns from the Strips. We are still being punished.” He grimaced. “Pun-ished. All we want at this stage is to let our spirits fly to another world, where we can perhaps form a new culture. But we have been unable to do that.”

“Yew can knot just go?”

“We cannot. That is our problem.”

“I dew knot understand.”

“We must be given leave. We must ask ‘May I?’ and be given leave by an understanding, living mortal person. It is our nature.”

“I can dew that,” Wenda said, relieved yet with a tinge of disappointment.

“Yes, you can,” Steven agreed. “But you must be recompensed. What wish do you have that we can grant? Understand, we are unable to offer you anything physical.”

What she most wanted was to complete this mission, recover her frontside, and go home. But she was pretty sure these ghosts could not handle that. Then she thought of something that might be within their compass. “We barricaded ourselves against the Dogs of War. We think we nullified them, but can knot bee sure. Can yew tell me whether we can safely make our way to the nearest Strip?”

“That is no problem at all, nymph. Once a pun has been nullified, it is without power. But why would you ever want to go to a Strip? We found them sickening, when we lived, and avoided them in droves.”

“It is where the Door back to our world is,” Wenda said. “We must brave the awful puns to find it.”

“You poor thing,” one of the women said.

The dead were being sympathetic to the living. But Wenda appreciated it. “Thank yew.”

“I think that reassurance is our return favor,” Steven said. “Now may we depart?”

“Yew may,” Wenda said, hoping that her accent did not foul up the permission.

“Thank you.” Steven and the three women faded.

Wenda’s urgent desire to clasp the man dissipated. In fact she could hardly remember his name or anything much else. Just the dialogue.

Wenda woke. It was morning. They had some traveling to do.

The others stirred. Merwyn was on guard. “I believe I saw some ghosts,” he said.

“Yew did,” Wenda agreed. “I talked with them in my dream. They say we can safely trek to the Strip.”

“Then let’s get to it,” Hilarion said.

As they organized for the trip, Wenda overheard Hilarion and Jumper talking. “I am pretty sure my betrothee is not a ghost,” Hilarion said. “Otherwise I would have loved to clasp one of those women and kiss her.”

“Eris is not a jealous female,” Jumper said. “And I am not in human form. But had I been, those bare-breasted, short-skirted women would have freaked me out.”

“I believe I did freak out when one of them swung her knees in my direction. The May I may have been great farmers and warriors, but they surely were great lovers too.”

“That man—what’s his name—Steven, was surely so,” Ida said. “Even I felt the attraction, and he is not near my generation.”

“I simply wanted to comfort him,” Angela said. “My newly solid flesh would surely have helped.” She blushed.

Wenda knew exactly how it was.

They moved out. The Dogs of War did not show up, and the trip was uneventful. By noon they were at the fringe of the Strip.

“I dread this,” Hilarion said candidly. “An ordinary enemy can be dealt with by sword or persuasion, but those puns erode a person’s self-respect.”

“True,” Ida agreed.

They peered through the shimmering border of the Strip, trying to see whether the Sidewalk and Door were there. Instead all they saw were piled-up puns. The nature of many of them was not clear just from the murky images, but they were able to make some guesses.

“That patch of water,” Ida said. “That resembled the Brain Coral’s pool, where surplus characters are stored until needed. The pretty coral snake would be guarding it.”

“What’s that bird?” Meryl asked. “It doesn’t look quite like Dipper.”

“That is the pet peeve,” Ida said. “A notorious bird of indeterminate gender who insults everyone within range. It is said that it wore out its welcome in Hell and was expelled. It is also said that only crackers from a vigorous crackerbarrel tree will shut it up even temporarily. We don’t want to go near it.”

“And these bees buzzing around,” Angela asked. “Are they dangerous?”

“No, those are wanna-bees,” Ida said. “They are filled with unrealizable ambitions.”

“I dew knot think we will ever find the Sidewalk or Door by looking from the outside,” Wenda said. “I fear we shall have to plunge in and find it by trial and error.”

“Mostly error,” Jumper said. “Merwyn—you have not experienced this before. Stay close to Meryl and try not to be disgusted out of your mind.”

“I don’t see what can be so bad about puns,” the winged merman said.

No one argued with him. He would learn.

They picked what looked like a less obnoxious spot, linked hands, and plunged in.

There before them was a sad-looking donkey. “You must be desperate to come here,” he said.

“We are,” Wenda said shortly. The very presence of the animal was making her feel depressed. She tried to brush by it, and it balked her.

“And you are a wood nymph out of your forest,” the creature said. “How can you stand it?”

The awful thing was, suddenly Wenda seriously doubted that she could stand it. The longer she remained close to the donkey, the worse she felt.

Then she recognized it. “Yew are a beast of burden! Yew make people heavyhearted.”

“Justifiably,” the beast agreed. “When you think about it, don’t you realize that routine existence is barely worth it? To be depressed is to be realistic.”

“Where have I heard that sort of reasoning before?” Hilarion asked.

“The May I prophet who denounced the gods,” Ida said.

“Ah, yes. We must be rid of this.”

“Lotsa luck, lonely prince,” the beast said.

“I’ll look,” Meryl said, taking off.

“
We’ll
look,” Merwyn said, following.

“Dew knot get lost!” Wenda called.

“It should be close by,” Meryl reassured her.

The two landed by a brightly colored log. It seemed to have been dyed by an artist with paint to use up. “We must talk,” the log said.

“No need,” Meryl said.

“You may apply new colors to my bark while we talk,” the log said.

“We don’t want to talk, we want to stop the beast of burden.”

“That is too bad, because I am an excellent conversationalist.”

“You’re a Dye-a-Log!” Merwyn exclaimed. “You talk colorfully.”

“How very true.”

An angry older woman burst on the scene, the first of several. “What are you strangers doing here?” she demanded. “You ought to be ashamed of yourselves, bothering innocent things.”

“Oh, let it rest, harridan,” the log said. “That diet you’re on has made you foul-tempered.”

“Foul-tempered. Me? How dare you!” Now the woman was haranguing the log, and her companions were supporting her.

“Diet. Tribe,” Merwyn said. “I think we’ve got it.”

“Stay out of this, fishtail!” a woman screeched.

“Right this way,” Meryl said, flying slowly backward. The women followed, diatribing all the way.

They came to the beast of burden. In a moment they were all around him, berating him unmercifully.

“As if life isn’t bad enough on its own,” the beast muttered. They kept after him, fulminating constantly. The beast tried to escape by walking away, but they followed.

And the way was clear. “Thank yew,” Wenda murmured, leading the rest of the party through.

Except that the moment one pun obstacle was nullified, another took its place. Now they were balked by several ogres working in a garden. One was twisting young trees into knots. Another was squeezing juice from assorted colored stones. A third, an ogress so ugly that her face resembled the rear end of a cow with diarrhea, was pruning thorn bushes. But she was not using clippers or her bare hamhands. She was carefully squeezing juice on the stems, which promptly severed.

Curious despite the danger, Wenda spoke to the ogress. “What is that you are using? It is very effective.”

“Me use prune juice,” the ogress said, the second and fourth words jammed into unwilling rhymes. Ogres were rough on anything, physical or intellectual.

Prune juice to prune. And why not? Ogres could squeeze juice out of anything. “Thank yew.”

But this did not get them past the ogres, who blocked the way by no accident. What would distract ogres, who were justifiably proud of their stupidity?

“I will look,” Hilarion said.

“Take care,” Wenda said warily. In a Strip, it wasn’t just the obvious that was dangerous.

He explored the vicinity, searching for suitable puns, knowing there was bound to be one if he could just fathom it and its relevance. But all he saw was a swarm of bees going about its business. It did not seem smart to mess with those.

“Could bees sting ogres?” he asked musingly, then answered himself: “If the ogres even felt it on their horny hides, they would simply smash the bees into oblivion. No chance there.”

Yet there seemed to be nothing else. He studied the bees more closely. They did not seem to be gathering pollen for honey; instead they circulated around a metallic rod angling up from the ground. It was almost like a handle to some buried object or chamber.

Cautiously, he touched it. “The bee lever!” he exclaimed. “Now I am a bee lever!”

“A believer in what?” Wenda asked, not quite trusting this.

“I believe I can lead us out of here,” he said. “We have merely to forge ahead with confidence.”

“Unjustified confidence is dangerous,” Jumper said.

“Not to a believer. My strength is as the strength of eight or nine, because my belief is pure.” Hilarion marched up to the ogres. “We are looking for a Sidewalk and two Doors,” he said. “Where are they?”

Dully startled, the ogres hesitated. Then one pointed to the side, where there was a wall of bushes.

“Thank you,” Hilarion said. He turned to the others. “This way.” He marched toward the bushes.

“It is not like him to be rash,” Ida said, “so I will suppress my doubts for the nonce.”

That seemed to be the best policy. Wenda and the others followed the prince.

The bushes turned out to be illusion. Beyond them was—the Sidewalk.

Wenda realized that Hilarion had played on the natural stupidity of the ogres. He had asked them a direct question, and they had been unable to think of a reason not to answer it. The bee lever had given him the confidence to do it. Such a ploy could work only once, if at all, but he had done it.