The Source of Magic (16 page)

He left the crestfallen griffin and oriented on the golem. “The meaning of the Magician’s Answer to you is this: people care; inanimate objects do not. Only when you experience genuine feelings that pre-empt your logic will you be real. You can achieve this height only if you work at it—but beware, for
the emotions of living things are in many cases extremely uncomfortable.”

He turned to Crunch. “I say to you, ogre: go fetch your lady. She sounds like a worthy companion for you, in every respect a truly horrendous bitch.” And Crunch was so moved he almost blushed.

Beauregard turned to Bink. “I have never been able to fathom your magic, but I feel its operation now. It is extremely strong—but that which you seek is infinitely stronger. If you persist, you run the risk of being destroyed, and of destroying those things you hold most dear. Yet you
will
persist, and so I extend my condolence. Until we meet again—” He faded out.

The members of the remaining circle exchanged glances. “Let’s go to sleep,” Chester said. That seemed like the best idea of the evening.

I
n the morning they thanked the ogre and continued on their quest, while Crunch tramped eagerly into the dead forest to rouse his beautiful bride: her with the hair like nettles and skin like mush.

They had new material for thought. Now they knew the cause of the death of the trees—but what of the evil fiends who dwelt in the lake and possessed such devastating curses? Were there Magicians among them, and was the source of magic near them?

Magician Humfrey was particularly thoughtful. Either he had not been entirely asleep during the evening session, or he had drawn on his informational magic to ascertain the situation. He had to know that the demon Beauregard was gone. “What magic,” he murmured, “could devastate an entire living forest by the dissipation of a single curse? Why have I not known of this before?”

“You never thought to look,” Chester said undiplomatically.

“We’re looking now,” Bink pointed out. “Magic should be stronger near the source.”

Crombie squawked. “Strong magic is one thing. Magician-class curses are another. Let me get another line on it.” And he did his act once more.

They were headed in the right direction. The terrain seemed ordinary; large trees glowered at the trespassers while small ones shied away as well as they were able. Fruit flies buzzed about: berries, cherries, and grapefruits hovered as if in search
of another salad bowl. Tempting paths appeared through tangled reaches, which the party avoided as a matter of course. In Xanth, the easy course was seldom best! There was a dragon run, with scorch marks on the trees to show the dragon’s territorial limits. The safest place to be, when pursued by a dragon, was a few paces within another dragon’s marked demesnes; any poaching would lead to a settlement between dragons.

But soon the way became more difficult. Brambles with glistening points and ugly dispositions closed off large sections, and a pride of ant lions patrolled others. A copse of stinkweeds surrounded the most direct remaining route, and they were of a particularly large and potent breed. The party tried to pass through them, but the stench became so intense that even the ogre might have hesitated. They retreated, gasping.

They contemplated the alternatives: brambles and ant lions. Bink tried to clear a path through the plants with his sword, but every time he made a cut, several more branches closed in, threatening his body. These were exceptionally alert brambles, and the sheen on their points suggested poison. Bink backed off. Once again he was up against the possibility that his talent might protect him while letting his friends die.

He approached the ant-lion section. The lion-headed ants had beaten out good highways throughout, and ruthlessly eliminated all hazards in their way. All hazards except the ant lions themselves.

Bink’s sword might dispatch one lion, and Chester’s arrows and hooves could handle two or three more, and as a griffin Crombie could take on as many as four—but the creatures would attack a dozen at a time without fear or mercy. Again, Bink himself would probably emerge intact, by some incredible fluke—but what of the others?

He turned back—and his eyes wandered skyward; he saw a path through the trees. The tops of the trees.

He rubbed his eyes. A path in air? Yet why not? With magic, he reminded himself for the umpteenth time, all things were possible. The question was, could men and half-men walk on it? And if they could, where did it lead?

Still, it seemed to be the most promising route. If he rode Chester, his talent would not let them get on the airy path unless it would support them both. The griffin, Magician, and golem weighed much less, so they would be safe if they followed. “I think I see a way,” Bink said.

They tried it. They located a place where the magic path looped down within reach of the ground, and Crombie whirled and pointed to discover whether there was any danger along this limited-access highway. There was not. They climbed aboard and followed it up high into the trees. The strange thing about it was that the path was always level, no matter how it looped. The forest turned crazy circles about it, however. At times the sun was underfoot, and at times to one side, while the trees assumed varying angles. Bink, curious, reached out to touch the foliage of one tree whose trunk reached up into the ground above; it was solid. Of course he knew that he was the one who was upside down; the path established its own orientation. Looking back, he could see the griffin marching at a different tilt, and knew that to griffin, Magician, and golem the centaur was the tilted one. Intriguing magic, but harmless. So far.

Meanwhile, he enjoyed the convenience and the view. The path led through the forest, generally high above the ground, and this new view of things was refreshing. Slants of sunlight crossed it, and gently hued columns of mist. It was neither man’s-eye nor bird’s-eye, but an intermediate and unique perspective. The path passed safely above the ant-lion range, yet below the flying-predator range. Bink observed several small flying dragons, a harpy, and a distant roc, but none flew near the path.

The plants, too, were unusually passive. Constrictor tentacles dangled in the vicinity of the path, but never
on
it, and no branches reached across to block it. Obviously this path was charmed, and that was suspicious; the best paths were almost by definition the worst ones. Bink remembered how easy it had been to penetrate the forest around Castle Roogna, back when it had been derelict, and how hard it had been to escape it. What were they walking into now?

Crombie’s talent said there was no danger in the direction the path went—but Crombie’s talent could be too literal. To Bink, anything that might delay the completion of his quest was a threat. One simply could not afford to trust strange magic. He’d better ask the Good Magician.

“Of course it’s safe, Bink,” Humfrey said with irritation. “Do you suppose I would be riding it otherwise?”

Bink hadn’t even asked the question yet! The Magician retained his special talent, though his grumpy refusal to use it for the convenience of the party made his company seem at times to be worth little more than that of a harpy. What point was there in having a Magician along, if he never used his magic to facilitate things? Even the Evil Magician had freely pitched in when danger threatened to—

“That is the point, Bink,” Humfrey said. “There is no present danger. When the situation changes, I will expend my carefully hoarded magic. You are young, yet; you dissipate your resources heedlessly, and get into scrapes you should have avoided.”

Served him right for letting his thoughts flow carelessly! Bink shut up, mentally, and rode on. In due course the path wound down to a pleasant little village, with houses thatched with hay and daubed with colored muds, and neat walkways connecting places of faint interest.

“Do you notice,” Chester said, “there is no magic in the local construction? Only mundane materials.”

“That’s right,” Bink said, surprised. “If we’re approaching the source of magic, on a magic path, shouldn’t there be more magic rather than less?” He turned to the griffin. “Crombie, are you sure this is—?”

Crombie squawked. “Birdbeak is sure this is the right direction,” the golem said. “But the village may be a mere item on the way, not the destination itself.”

A grizzled old harpy flapped out to meet the party as it reached the foot of the path. All of them braced for trouble, for harpies were notorious. But this one, though suitably hideous, was clean and unaggressive. “Welcome, travelers,”
she said without even bothering to insult them. A most restrained harpy!

“Uh, thanks,” Bink said. “We’re looking for—a place to spend the night. We don’t mean any mischief.” He had never heard of a harpy acting polite, so remained on guard, hand over sword.

“You shall have it,” she agreed. “You are all males?”

“Yes,” Bink said uneasily. “We are on a quest for the source of magic. Your village appears to lie near this. We—”

“Five males,” the harpy said. “What a bonanza!”

“We’re not interested in your females,” Chester said with some of his normal belligerence.

Crombie squawked. “Not their minds, anyway,” the golem translated.

Chester’s lip curled with almost equine facility. Bink had to speak at once, before another quarrel brewed. “We shall be happy to do some chore for you, in return for food and safe lodging overnight. Then tomorrow, if you have information about magic—”

“You will have to discuss that with Trolla,” the harpy said. “This way, please.” And she flapped off, muttering once more: “Men!” with hideous excitement.

“Then again, you may have a point,” Chester murmured to Crombie. “If we have fallen into a nest of harpies …”

“We may be best advised to get on that aerial path and go back the way we came,” Bink finished, glancing back.

But the path was gone. They could not escape that way.

Trolla turned out to be—a female troll. She was almost as ugly as the harpy, but she too was amazingly polite. “I realize you are uneasy, you handsome male visitors,” Trolla said. “And you have reason to be. But not because of any of the residents of this village. Allow me to serve you supper, while I explain our situation.”

Bink exchanged glances with the others. Both centaur and griffin looked distinctly uncomfortable, but the Good Magician seemed to have no concern.

Trolla clapped her horny hands, and several wood-nymphs came in, bearing platters. Their hair was green, their skin
brown, their lips and fingernails red: like flowering trees. But their outlines were human; each was a pert, lithe, full-breasted bare beauty. Each eyed Bink and Humfrey with more than casual interest. “Hunger” might be a better term.

The food was virtually mundane: vegetables and fruits harvested locally, and small dragon steaks. Milkweed pods provided the liquid; it was good milk, but in no way special.

“You may have noted we have used no magic in the preparation of this meal,” Trolla said. “We use as little magic as possible here, because there is more magic here than anywhere else on the surface of Xanth. I realize that may not make much sense to you—”

“Quite sensible,” Humfrey said, chomping into another steak.

Trolla focused on him. “You must be a Magician, sir.”

“Umph.” He seemed to be more interested in his food than in her discussion. Bink knew that was deceptive. Humfrey paid close attention to all things magic.

“If you are—if any of you have strong magic—I must caution you to be extremely careful in exerting it,” she said. “Please do not misunderstand; this is no threat. We do not want you to feel at all uncomfortable here. It is simply that all magic—well, permit me to make a small demonstration.” She clapped her hands, and a nymph entered, as buxom and bare as the others. “Bring a small firefly,” Trolla said.

In a moment the nymph returned with the firefly. It was very small—the kind that generated hardly more than a spark, harmless. It squatted on the table, rather pretty with its folded flame-hued wings and insulated legs. “Now observe what happens when I frighten it,” Trolla said.

She rapped the table with a hooflike knuckle. The firefly jumped up, startled, and generated its momentary fire. A burst of light and heat emanated from it, and a ball of smoke roiled up toward the ceiling. A spot on the table a handsbreadth in diameter was charred. The firefly itself had disappeared.

“It burned itself up!” Chester exclaimed.

“It did not mean to,” Trolla said. “This was a normal Xanth firefly, not acclimatized to this region. Here near the source its
magic is multiplied a hundredfold. Thus its little spark became a self-immolating fireball. Until you males become acclimatized, I urge you not to practice your magic in this village. We value your presence, and do not wish you to suffer any mishaps.”

Bink looked to Humfrey, but the Good Magician continued eating. “Uh, none of us have inflammatory magic,” Bink said, realizing that it was up to him to respond for their party. Yet he wondered: what would his talent do if anything threatened? What it might intend to be a mere “coincidental” amelioration might become much worse. “But it would be best if—if nothing seemed to threaten our welfare.”

“There is, unfortunately, a most extreme threat to your welfare,” Trolla said gravely. “Because you are males. You must have noticed we have no males in this village.”

“We noticed,” Bink agreed. “Your nymphs seem quite intrigued by us.” Indeed, the nymphs were hovering so close that Bink’s elbows tended to bump their soft midriffs as he ate.

“Our problem is this,” Trolla continued. “A siren has been luring away our males. Originally we were a normal human village, except for our unique and critical task. Then the siren came and deprived us of our men. Because our job could not be neglected, we undertook at great personal risk the construction of the charmed access route you arrived on, so as to encourage immigration. But the new men, too, were soon taken away from us. We extended our search to nonhuman people; this was how I myself came here, with my husband the troll. But the awful drain continued; I was soon a widow—and not by the proper route.”