The Source of Magic (44 page)

Chester scowled. “I gad about
because
you spend all your time with the colt!”

“Uh, there’s no need—” Bink interposed.

“Stay out of this,” she murmured to him with a wink. Then, to Chester, she flared: “Because he is just like you! I can’t keep
you
from risking your fool tail on stupid, dangerous adventures, you big dumb oaf, but at least I have him to remind me of—”

“If you paid more attention to me, I’d stay home more!” he retorted.

“Well, I’ll pay more attention to you now, horsehead,” she said, kissing him as the arena dissolved and a more cosy room formed about them. “I need you.”

“You do?” he asked, gratified. “What for?”

“For making another foal, you ass! One that looks just like me, that you can take out for runs—”

“Yeah,” he agreed with sudden illumination. “How about getting started right now!” Then he looked about, remembering where he was, and actually blushed. The golem smirked. “Uh, in due course.”

“And you can run some with Chet, too,” she continued. “So you can help him find his talent.” There was no hint of the discomfort she must have suffered getting the word out.

Chester stared at her. “His—you mean you—”

“Oh, come on, Chester,” she snapped. “You’re wrong ten times a day. Can’t I be wrong once in my life? I can’t say I like it, but since magic seems to be part of the centaur’s heritage, I’ll simply have to live with it. Magic does have its uses; after all, it brought you back.” She paused, glancing at him sidelong. “In fact, I might even be amenable to a little flute music.”

Startled, Chester looked at her, then at Bink, realizing that someone had blabbed. “Perhaps that can be arranged—in decent privacy. After all, we are centaurs.”

“You’re such a beast,” she said, flicking her tail at him. Bink covered a smile. When Cherie learned a lesson, she learned it well!

“Which seems to cover that situation sufficiently, tedious as
it has been,” the Demon said. “Now if you are all quite ready to depart, never to return—”

Yet Bink was not quite satisfied. He did not trust this sudden generosity on the part of the Demon. “You’re really satisfied to be forever walled off from our society?”

“You can not wall
me
off” the Demon pointed out. “I am the source of magic. You will only wall
you
off. I will watch and participate anytime I choose—which will probably be never, as your society is of little interest to me. Once you depart, I forget you.”

“You ought at least to thank Bink for freeing you,” Cherie said.

“I thank him by sparing his ridiculous life,” X(A/N)
^th
said, and if Bink hadn’t known better he might have thought the Demon was nettled.

“He earned his life!” she retorted. “You owe him more than that!”

Bink tried to caution her. “Don’t aggravate him,” he murmured. “He can blink us all into nothingness—”

“Without even blinking,” the Demon agreed. One eyelid twitched as if about to blink.

“Well, Bink could have left you to rot for another thousand years, without blinking himself,” she cried heedlessly. “But he didn’t. Because he has what you will never understand: humanity!”

“Filly, you intrigue me,” X(A/N)
^th
murmured. “It is true I am omnipotent, not omniscient—but I believe I could comprehend human motive if I concentrated on it.”

“I dare you!” she cried.

Even Chester grew nervous at this. “What are you trying to do, Cherie?” he asked her. “Do you want us all extinguished?”

The Demon glanced at Grundy. “Half-thing, is there substance to her challenge?”

“What’s in it for me?” the golem demanded.

The Demon lifted one finger. Light coalesced about Grundy. “That.”

The light seemed to draw into the golem—and lo, Grundy
was no longer a thing of clay and string. He stood on living legs, and had a living face. He was now an elf.

“I—I’m real!” he cried. Then, seeing the Demon’s gaze upon him, he remembered the question. “Yes, there is substance! It’s part of being a feeling creature. You have to laugh, to cry, to experience sorrow and gratitude and—and it’s the most wonderful thing—”

“Then I shall cogitate on it,” the Demon said. “In a century or so, when I have worked out my revised nomenclature,” He returned to Cherie. “Would one gift satisfy you, feeling filly?”

“I don’t need anything,” she said. “I already have Chester. Bink is the one.”

“Then I grant Bink one wish.”

“No, that’s not it! You have to show you understand by giving him something nice that he would not have thought of himself.”

“Ah, another challenge,” the Demon said. He pondered. Then he reached out and lifted Cherie in one hand. Bink and Chester jumped with alarm, but it was not a hostile move. “Would this suffice?” The Demon put her to his mouth. And Bink and Chester jumped, but the Demon was only whispering, his mouth so large that the whisper shook her whole body. Yet the words were inaudible to the others.

Cherie perked up. “Why yes, that would suffice! You
do
understand!” she exclaimed.

“Merely interpolation from observed gestures of his kind.” The Demon set her down, then flicked another finger. A little globe appeared in air, sailing toward Bink, who caught it. It seemed to be a solidified bubble. “That is your wish—the one you must choose for yourself,” the Demon said. “Hold the sphere before you and utter your wish, and anything within the realm of magic will be yours.”

Bink held up the globe. “I wish that the men who were restored from stone by the absence of magic, so they could return to the village of magic dust, will remain restored now that magic is back,” he said. “And that the lady griffin will not turn back to gold. And that all the things killed by the loss of magic, like the brain coral—”

The Demon made a minor gesture of impatience. “As you see, the bubble did not burst. That means your wish does not qualify, for two reasons. First, it is not a selfish one; you gain nothing for yourself by it. Second, those stone and gold spells can only be restored by reapplication of their inputs; once interrupted, they are gone. None of those people have returned to stone or gold, and none of the similar spells in your land have been reinstated. Only magic
life
has been restored, such as that of the golem and the coral. The other spells are like fire: they burn continuously once started, but once doused remain out. Do not waste my attention on such redundancy; your wish must go for a selfish purpose.”

“Oh,” Bink said, taken aback. “I can’t think of any wish of that kind.”

“It was a generous notion, though,” Cherie murmured to him.

The Demon waved his hand. “You must carry the wish until it is expended. Enough; I become bored with this trivia.”

And the party stood in the forest that Bink and Cherie and the colt had left. It was as if the Demon had never been—except for the sphere. And Bink’s friends, restored. And the reviving magic of the forest. Even Cherie seemed satisfied with that magic, now.

Bink shook his head and pocketed the wish-globe. All he wanted to do now was to get home to Chameleon, and he needed no special magic for that.

“I’ll carry Bink, as usual,” Chester said. “Cherie, you carry the Magician—” He paused. “Crombie! We forgot the loud-beaked griffin!”

Bink felt in his pocket. “No, I have him here in the bottle. I can release him now—”

“No, let him stew there a while longer,” Chester decided. Evidently he had not quite forgiven the soldier for the savage fight the two had had.

“Maybe that’s best,” Cherie agreed. “He was in a life-and-death struggle when he was confined. He might come out fighting.”

“Let him come!” Chester said belligerently.

“I think it would be better to wait,” Bink said. “Just in case.”

It was dusk, but they moved on rapidly. The monsters of the night seemed to hold no terror, after their adventure. Bink knew he could use his stored wish to get them out of trouble if he had to. Or he could release Crombie and let him handle it. Most of the more dangerous wilderness entities were still recovering from the shock of the temporary loss of magic, and were not aggressive.

Chester had a problem, however. “I have paid the fee for an Answer,” he reminded the Good Magician. “But I found my talent by myself. Now I could ask about Cherie’s talent—”

“But I already know it,” Cherie said, coloring slightly at this confession of near-obscenity. “Don’t waste your Question on that!”

“You know your talent?” Chester repeated, startled. “What—”

“I’ll tell you another time,” she said modestly.

“But that leaves me without a wish—I mean without an Answer,” he said. “I paid for it with my life, but don’t know what to ask.”

“No problem,” Humfrey said. “I could tell you what to ask.”

“You could?” Then Chester saw the trap. “But that would use it up! I mean, your telling me the Question would use up the Answer—and then I wouldn’t have the Answer to my Question!”

“That does seem to present a problem,” Humfrey agreed. “You might elect to pay another fee—”

“Not by the hair of your handsome tail!” Cherie cried. “No more adventures away from home!”

“Already my freedom is slipping away,” Chester muttered, not really displeased.

Bink listened glumly. He was glad to be getting home, but still felt guilt about what had happened to Jewel. He had a wish—but he knew he could not simply wish Jewel out of love with him. Her love was real, not magical, and could not be abolished magically. Also, how would Chameleon react to this matter? He would have to tell her.…

They galloped up to the palace as night became complete.
The grounds were illuminated by shining luna moths whose fluttering green radiance gave the palace an unearthly beauty.

Queen Iris was evidently alert, for three moons rose to brighten the palace as they entered, and there was a fanfare from invisible trumpets. They were promptly ushered to the library, the King’s favorite room.

Without ceremony, Bink told his story. King Trent listened without interrupting. As Bink concluded, he nodded. “I shall make arrangements to set the shield as you suggested,” the King said at last. “I think we will not publicize the presence of the Demon, but we shall see that no one intrudes on him.”

“I knew you would see it that way,” Bink said, relieved. “I—I had no idea there would be such a consequence to my quest. It must have been terrible here, without magic.”

“Oh, I had no trouble,” the King said. “I spent twenty years in Mundania, remember. I still have a number of little unmagic mannerisms about me. But Iris was verging on a nervous breakdown, and the rest of the kingdom was not much better off. Still, I believe the net effect was beneficial; citizens really appreciate their magic, now.”

“I suppose so,” Bink agreed. “I never realized how important magic was, until I saw Xanth without it. But here in our group we’re left with distressing magical loose ends. Chester has a surplus Answer, and I have a wish I can’t use, and Crombie is confined—”

“Ah, yes,” the King agreed. “We’d better reconstitute him now.”

Bink uncorked the bottle, releasing Crombie. The griffin coalesced. “Squawk!” he proclaimed.

“About time,” Grundy translated.

King Trent looked at the griffin—and it became a man. “Well,” Crombie said, patting himself to make certain of his condition. “You didn’t need to leave me bottled up. I could hear what was going on, all the time.” He turned to Chester. “And you, you hoof-headed hulk—I only fought you because the coral controlled me. You didn’t have to be scared of me once that was settled.”

Chester swelled up. “Scared of you! You feather-brained punk—”

“Anytime you want to try it again, horsetail—”

“That will suffice,” the King said gently, and both shut up, albeit with imperfect grace.

King Trent smiled, returning his attention to Bink. “Sometimes you miss the obvious, Bink. Let Chester give his Answer to you.”

“To me? But it’s
his
—”

“Sure, you can have it,” Chester said. “I don’t need it.”

“But I already have a wish I can’t use, and—”

“Now you use Chester’s Question to ask the Good Magician what to do with your wish,” the King said.

Bink turned to Humfrey. The man was snoring quietly in a comfortable chair. There was an awkward pause.

Grundy went up and jogged the Magician’s ankle. “Get with it, midge.”

Humfrey woke with a small start. “Give it to Crombie,” the Magician said before Bink opened his mouth, and lapsed back into sleep.

“What?” Chester demanded. “The Answer I sweated for only brings a free wish to this bird?”

Bink marveled himself, but handed the wish-bubble to Crombie. “May I ask what you mean to use it for?”

Crombie fidgeted a moment, an unusual performance for him. “Uh, Bink, you remember that nymph, the one who—”

“Jewel,” Bink agreed. “I dread trying to explain about her to—”

“Well, I—uh, you see, I had this fragment of the magic mirror in the bottle, and I used it to check on Sabrina, and—”

“I fear constancy was never her strong suit,” the King interposed. “I don’t believe you two were right for each other anyway.”

“What about her?” Bink asked, perplexed.

“She was two-timing me,” Crombie said, scowling. “Right when she had me on the verge—but the other guy is married, so she was going to let on the kid was mine, and—I knew I couldn’t trust a woman!”

So Sabrina had deserted Crombie, as she had deserted Bink himself, before he knew Chameleon. Yet she connived to marry Crombie anyway—and it had been fated that he would have to marry her unless he married someone else first. “I’m sorry,” Bink said. “But I think it would be best simply to let her go. No sense wasting a wish for vengeance.”

“No, that’s not what I had in mind,” Crombie assured him. “I wouldn’t trust
any
woman now. But I think I could love a nymph—”

“Jewel?” Bink asked, amazed.

“I don’t expect you to believe this,” Crombie said seriously. “I don’t really believe it myself. But a soldier has to face realities. I lost the battle before it started. There I was, lying in that cleft where you had slain me, Bink. I don’t blame you for that; it was a hell of a good fight, but I was really hurting. Suddenly she came, smelling of pine needles and gardenias, bringing the healing elixir. I never saw anything so sweet in my life. She was weak and hesitant, just like a nymph. No threat to any man, least of all a soldier. No competition. The kind of female I could really get along with. And the way she stood by you—” Crombie shook his head. “That’s why I went back in the bottle, after pointing out the antidote for you. I wouldn’t do anything to hurt that nymph, and killing you would have torn her up. And if you got the antidote, you’d get out of love with her, which was how I wanted you. She’s lovely and loyal. But since she still loves you—”