Well-Tempered Clavicle (20 page)

“Why?” he demanded. “You’re a shallow, selfish creature, seductive but untrustworthy. Why should I trust you now, when you betrayed me before? Why do you come to me with this news? What’s your angle?”

“Dawn destroyed Attila the Pun,” she said simply.

“Ah. Now I get it. You are a vengeful female, using me to get back at the one you hate. You figure that my desire to recover my appearance and status will override my anger at you.”

“Exactly,” Pundora agreed. “You never loved me, you just used me, so your anger with me lacks staying power. Your desire to become handsome and successful is far more enduring, and you are not entirely stupid, so you will do what it makes sense for you to do.”

She had a point. “Very well. Tell me where this princess is.”

“I can lead you to her. But she’s a moving target, chasing after Caprice. It may be a long chase.”

“You mean I have to keep company with you for a prolonged period? Without smooching you or eating you?”

“You may smooch me,” Pundora said, coming close, “but not eat me, because you need me to lead you to her. I didn’t really mind your touches before; I merely loved Attila better. Do we have a deal?”

“I am no longer handsome as I was before.”

“But I remember how you were, and my rage is great. Try me without your compelling music.”

He extended a pseudopod and touched her provocative chest. She didn’t flinch. He wrapped another pseudopod around her bouncy bottom. She accepted it. He heaved up a section and smeared goo on her face. She kissed him, showing no aversion. She was serious. She figured she would be safe from him as long as she gave him whatever he wanted. And that he wanted her luscious body, for the interim.

Pundora was cynical, but no dummy, and she had nerve. As she said, her rage was great. Perhaps as great as his own rage. She understood him.

“Deal,” he agreed. Just in time, because the understanding spell was fading out. His music became merely music again.

However, Pundora had made the deal she wanted. She would have her revenge, with the help of the monster.

*   *   *

The narrative paused. Dawn looked pale. “I don’t like this,” she said.

The others nodded soberly. It was not a nice situation.

11

N
ICE
B
ONES

“It is ugly,” Picka agreed. “You have a bad enemy.” Woofer growled in agreement, Midrange showed his claws momentarily, and Tweeter fluffed his wings. None of them liked it.

“If I had known, I never would have told Attila he was a pun,” Dawn said glumly. “But though I know anything about anything living, my talent has limits. I can’t use it on you walking skeletons, because you’re not alive. And I can’t use it on someone who isn’t in my immediate sight. So I didn’t know about Pundora. I understand why she hates me; I destroyed her lover. Now I fear there will be no way to deal with her, because I can’t bring back Attila.”

“You will have to deal with Pundora,” Skully said, “because otherwise she will lead Piper to you, and that will be serious mischief.”

“How does Pundora know where Dawn is?” Joy’nt asked.

There was a surprised silence of a generous two moments. Finally Dawn interrupted it before it could try for a third moment. “I never thought of that! Maybe she’s bluffing.”

“I doubt it,” Skully said. “She knows Piper will eat her if she deceives him again.”

“Maybe it’s in the History,” Granola suggested.

Dawn focused on the book again. The picture formed, showing Pundora in the period soon after she had fled Caprice Castle with Attila. She was having a dialogue with another woman.

*   *   *

“This is my territory,” Pundora said. “I have been foraging here for years. It’s where I found my man.”

The other woman was tall, lean, and grim. “Xanth has no territories that can be enforced, and men are not properties. My name is Steel, and I will forage here if I choose.”

“Well, my name is Pundora, and I don’t like being balked. Suppose I call my man and have him roust you out?”

“He would have a problem,” Steel said sharply. “My talent is to become any magic weapon I choose.”

“Oh? What weapon can match this, when dealing with a man?” Pundora asked, opening her blouse and inhaling.

“This,” Steel said cuttingly, becoming a long razor-edged sword. It flashed for a moment, then reverted to the woman.

Pundora reassessed the situation. “Did you say your weapon-forms are magic?”

“Yes. For example, a sword might cut through metal, or glow bright enough to illuminate dangerous darkness.”

“But if you become the sword, who wields it?”

“Anyone I choose to allow. That’s what makes me attractive to men: I can give them what they most truly desire: effective violence.”

“Attractive in other ways than romantic,” Pundora said musingly.

“Why would I want anything romantic? I prefer violence. The problem is finding men who are properly committed to it, instead of merely indulging occasionally.”

“My man is committed to destroying puns—all except me. Can you become a pun-destroying sword?”

“Readily.”

“Then let’s make a deal. Let me give you, in the form of the sword, to him to use against puns. You will enable his unceasing violence, for he is a violent man. I will enable his romance when he’s not violenting.”

“That seems good to me. I like to be in the center of action.”

Then Steel became a magic sword, and Pundora took it and presented it to Attila. He tried it, and loved it; he no longer had to stomp on puns, getting stinky pun squish on his boots. Now he could simply touch them with the blade, and they puffed into smoke and dissipated. It was a long and mutually beneficial association.

Right up until the time Dawn approached him for her mission, lost her temper, and spoke the words she regretted.

Then Attila self-destructed, leaving the sword unwielded. Steel was desolate, for she had never been handled with such consistent violence before.

Until Pundora made her another deal. “I need to track the lady dog princess who did this, so I can wreak cruel vengeance on her,” Pundora said. “Can you become a weapon that will enable me to find her?”

“How about a magic mirror oriented on her,” Steel suggested, interested. “I never thought of a mirror as a weapon, but really it is, for this purpose. Of course you would have to bring me to her, to zero in.”

“But that’s the problem. I can’t bring you to her if I can’t find her. Using the mirror to identify her is fine, but that won’t bring me to her. I will need an indication of direction.”

Steel pondered. “Maybe there’s another way: a mirror oriented on beauty.”

“How will that help? I have beauty of my own.”

“But maybe not the beauty of a princess.”

“Maybe not,” Pundora conceded grudgingly.

“Try this: hold the mirror up and say ‘Mirror, mirror, in my hand, who is the fairest in the land?’” She became the mirror.

Somewhat dubiously, Pundora held her up. “Mirror, mirror, in my hand, who is the fairest in the land?”

The mirror went blank for an instant, then formed the picture of Princess Dawn. It was working!

“But this merely identifies her,” Pundora said, “as before. I still need to locate her.”

Steel reappeared, with Pundora’s hand still on her leg. “Turn the mirror so that the image is clearest. That will be the direction of the subject.” She returned to mirror form.

Pundora rotated the mirror, and soon found the clearest image. “Good enough!” she said. She had the wit not to say that this technique should have worked as readily when the mirror oriented specifically on Dawn. Steel was stronger on talent than on common sense. “Now to put the rest of my evil plan into place. This will require a strong stomach, but I believe I can manage it, for the sake of vengeance.” And she went for her dialogue with the monster.

*   *   *

Dawn stopped reading. “That certainly clarifies things,” she said. “Now what do we do about it?”

“We are in Caprice Castle,” Joy’nt reminded them. “We need to complete our mission by finding Pundora’s Box and taking it to the Good Magician. Then you can return to Castle Roogna, Dawn, where you will surely be safe from angry puns and lecherous blobs.”

“Good thinking,” Dawn agreed. “Picka and I did not find the Box in the upper reaches. The pets did not find it on the ground floor, and I gather Skully and Joy’nt did not find it in the cellar.” Dawn glanced at the last two, her mouth quirking. “You
were
searching?”

“Yes,” Joy’nt answered, though the slightly pink cast to her bones suggested that that was not all of what they had been doing. “There’s no Box there.”

“Something must have happened to it after the puns escaped,” Picka said. “We know Pundora and Attila did not take it.”

“The castle has been traveling around Xanth for an indefinite time,” Skully said, “occasionally entertaining visitors. Anyone could have taken it.”

“I don’t think so,” Dawn said. “The Good Magician said it was in Caprice Castle, and he would not be wrong about a detail like that. So it must be here, somewhere.”

“We’ll just have to search harder,” Picka said. “Our mission is not complete until we find the box.”

Dawn sighed. “It’s a nuisance. Let’s relax with a song, then resume the search. There may be closets or dungeons we haven’t explored.”

The others were glad to agree. They selected a song and played it with a certain tired enthusiasm. Then they had Picka improvise again. He did so, really getting into it, enjoying it as his melodies filled the courtyard and made the fountain quiver.

And Caprice Castle faded, leaving them sitting on the barren plain.

They stared at each other, appalled. “It dumped us!” Dawn exclaimed indignantly.

“In the middle of our music,” Granola said.

“Not necessarily,” Skully said. “It may be that it can’t remain in any one location for long, so it was time to move on.”

“I don’t buy that,” Joy’nt said. “That is, it may be limited, but it has the option of taking occupants along with it, doesn’t it? It could have taken us, but chose not to. So it rejected us.”

“Maybe,” Skully agreed. “But we don’t really understand its motives. Maybe it was afraid that this time we would find Pundora’s Box, and it didn’t want that.”

“Why wouldn’t it?” Dawn asked.

“If we found it, we would have taken it away. That might leave the castle with no hope of reestablishing its original mission of storing puns.”

“It wanted us to become regular occupants!” Dawn said. “To stay here, instead of leaving.”

“Then why dump us?” Joy’nt asked. “That’s no way to encourage us to stay.”

“I have another reason,” Picka said. “One I don’t like.”

“Out with it, bone head,” Dawn said fondly.

“The one who occupies the castle must collect and store puns. Music is used to fetch them and pacify them. But it has to be superior music, if I understand the History correctly. Piper could do it, but maybe we could not.”

“But you are becoming a fine musician,” Granola said.

“Not fine enough, it seems. My music brought the castle, but when Caprice had another chance to listen and assess its quality, it concluded that it wasn’t enough. So it departed.”

The others looked at him. “Bleep,” Dawn muttered. “I have a horrible feeling you’re right. We were judged and found wanting. So now it’s looking for other prospects.”

“Bleep,” Granola echoed. That surprised Picka; he had never before heard the giantess swear.

“And meanwhile Piper the Music Monster is looking for Dawn so he can marry her and recover the castle,” Skully said. “So we had better not stay in one place too long, until we develop a new plan of action.”

“We should be able to stop him,” Picka said. “He may be able to stun and pacify living folk, but we’re not alive. He may not have counted on that.”

“Still, its best to avoid trouble if we can,” Joy’nt said. “Where can we go next, if only to a nice safe place so we can think about things?”

“I don’t know, but I can look,” Granola said.

They piled into the handbag, and she heaved them up and started walking. It was a gray day, matching their mood. To have come so close, then lose it!

After a time, Granola spoke. “Things are dreary all over, except for one little spot where the sun is shining. Shall I go there?”

“Why not?” Dawn asked. “It won’t last, but we can delude ourselves with foolish hope for a little while.” She was evidently feeling pretty negative.

They gazed ahead to see the spot. It was a hill with a copse of trees, and a house on top. A beam of sunlight speared down to brighten it, and only it. Picka distrusted this, but decided not to comment.

Granola came to the hill, which was big enough to hold her, and set down the handbag. They climbed out.

The door to the house opened and a young man emerged. He saw them and paused. “Oh, no! I knew death would come for me some day, but three deaths and a maiden? Whatever could I have done?”

“Not death,” Dawn called. “These are walking skeletons, my harmless friends, and three animal friends. I am Dawn.” She did not mention Granola; that might have been complicated.

“Oh. I am Skyler. I have heard of walking skeletons, but didn’t know they existed outside of bad dreams.”

“We saw your sunny hill, and thought it would be a nice place to rest. We’ll move on if you prefer.”

“No, that’s all right. My talent is to turn gray days into sunshiny ones, or at least the section around me. Or to imbue sad folk with sunny feeling.”

“I could use that,” Dawn said. “My talent is to know things about people, and I can tell you’re nice. But I feel someone else here.”

“That’s my sister Shy Violet. She blends into the scenery at will, when there’s a violet near. So I make sure to keep violets growing here.”

A girl appeared. She had been standing by the house, blending perfectly into it. “Hello,” she said shyly. “You’re very pretty.”

“Thank you,” Dawn said. Her beauty had been confirmed by the manner Pundora was orienting on her: fairest in the land. Probably her twin sister Eve, similarly lovely, was not in Xanth at this time. Or maybe it was that Eve’s beauty was dark rather than fair.