Trent's chuckle came down from above. "My dear, you have a keen mind and a sharp tongue. Actually, I prefer to turn my opponents into trees; they are more durable than turnips. I don't suppose you could concede, merely for the sake of argument, that I might make a better ruler than the present King?"
"He's got a point, you know," Bink said, smiling cynically in the dark.
"Which side are you on?" Fanchon demanded, mimicking the tone Bink had used before.
But it was Trent who laughed. "I like you two," he said. "I really do. You have good minds and good loyalty. If you would only give that loyalty to me, I would be prepared to make substantial concessions. For example, I might grant you veto power over any transformations I made. You could thus choose the turnips."
"So we'd be responsible for your crimes," Fanchon said. "That sort of power would be bound to corrupt us very soon, until we were no different from you."
"Only if your basic fiber were not superior to mine," Trent pointed out. "And if it were not, then you would never have been any different from me. You merely have not yet been subjected to my situation. It would be best if you discovered this, so as not to be unconscious hypocrites."
Bink hesitated. He was wet and cold, and he did not relish spending the night in this hole. Had Trent been one to keep his word, twenty years ago? No, he hadn't; he had broken his word freely in his pursuit of power. That was part of what had defeated him; no one could afford to trust him, not even his friends.
The Magician's promises were valueless. His logic was a tissue of rationalization, designed only to get one of the prisoners to divulge the location of the Shieldstone. Veto power over transformations? Bink and Fanchon would be the first to be transformed, once the Evil one had no further need of them.
Bink did not reply. Fanchon remained silent. After a moment Trent departed.
"And so we weather temptation number two," Fanchon remarked. "But he's a clever and unscrupulous man; it will get harder."
Bink was afraid she was right.
Next morning the slanting sunlight baked the crude bricks. They were hardly hard yet, but at least it was a start. Fanchon placed the items in the privacy cubicle so that they could not be seen from above. She would set them out again for the afternoon sun, if all went well.
Trent came by with more food: fresh fruit and milk. "I dislike putting it on this footing," he said, "but my patience is wearing thin. At any time they might move the Shieldstone routinely, rendering your information valueless. If one of you does not give me the information I need today, tomorrow I shall transform you both. You, Bink, will be a cockatrice; you, Fanchon, a basilisk. You will be confined in the same cage."
Bink and Fanchon looked at each other with complete dismay. Cockatrice and basilisk--two names for the same thing: a winged reptile hatched from a yolk-less egg laid by a rooster and hatched by a toad in the warmth of a dungheap. The stench of its breath was so bad that it wilted vegetation and shattered stone, and the very sight of its face would cause other creatures to keel over dead. Basilisk--the little king of the reptiles.
The chameleon of his omen had metamorphosed into the likeness of a basilisk--just before it died. Now he had been reminded of the chameleon by a person who could not have known about that omen, and threatened with transformation into-- Surely death was drawing nigh.
"It's a bluff," Fanchon said at last. "He can't really do it. He's just trying to scare us."
"He's succeeding," Bink muttered.
"Perhaps a demonstration would be in order," Trent said. "I ask no person to take my magic on faith, when it is so readily demonstrable. It is necessary for me to perform regularly, to restore my full talent after the long layoff in Mundania, so the demonstration is quite convenient for me." He snapped his fingers. "Allow the prisoners to finish their meal," he said to the guard who reported. "Then remove them from the cell." He left.
Now Fanchon was glum for another reason. "He may be bluffing--but if they come down in here, they'll find the bricks. That will finish us anyway."
"Not if we move right out, giving them no trouble," Bink said. "They won't come down here unless they have to."
"Let's hope so," she said.
When the guards came, Bink and Fanchon scrambled up the rope ladder the moment it was dropped. "We're calling the Magician's bluff," Bink said. There was no reaction from the soldiers. The party marched eastward across the isthmus, toward Xanth.
Within sight of the Shield, Trent stood beside a wire cage. Soldiers stood in a ring around him, arrows nocked to bows. They all wore smoked glasses. It looked very grim.
"Now I caution you," Trent said as they arrived. "Do not look directly at each other's faces after the transformation. I can not restore the dead to life."
If this were another scare tactic, it was effective. Fanchon might doubt, but Bink believed. He remembered Justin Tree, legacy of Trent's ire of twenty years ago. The omen loomed large in his mind. First to be a basilisk, then to die...
Trent caught Bink's look of apprehension. "Have you anything to say to me?" he inquired, as if routinely.
"Yes. How did they manage to exile you without getting turned into toads or turnips or worse?"
Trent frowned. "That was not precisely what I meant, Bink. But, in the interest of harmony, I will answer. An aide I trusted was bribed to put a sleep spell on me. While I slept, they carried me across the Shield."
"How do you know it won't happen again? You can't stay awake all the time, you know."
"I spent much time pondering that whole problem in the long early years of my exile. I concluded that I had brought the deception upon myself. I had been faithless to others, and so others were faithless to me. I was not entirely without honor; I breached my given word only for what I deemed to be sufficient cause, yet--"
"That's the same as lying" Bink said.
"I did not think so at the time. But I dare say my reputation in that respect did not improve in my absence; it is ever the privilege of the victor to present the loser as completely corrupt, thus justifying the victory. Nevertheless, my word was not my absolute bond, and in time I realized that this was the fundamental flaw in my character that had been my undoing. The only way to prevent repetition was to change my own mode of operation. And so I no longer deceive--ever. And no one deceives me."
It was a fair answer. The Evil Magician was, in many respects, the opposite of the popular image; instead of being ugly, weak, and mean--Humfrey fitted that description better--he was handsome, strong, and urbane. Yet he was the villain, and Bink knew better than to let fair words deceive him.
"Fanchon, stand forth," Trent said.
Fanchon stepped toward him; open cynicism on her face. Trent did not gesture or chant. He merely glanced at her with concentration.
She vanished.
A soldier swooped in with a butterfly net, slamming it down on something. In a moment he held it up--a struggling, baleful, lizardlike thing with wings.
It really was a basilisk! Bink quickly averted his eyes, lest he look directly at its horrible face and meet its deadly gaze.
The soldier dumped the thing into the cage, and another smoke-glass-protected soldier shoved on the lid. The remaining soldiers relaxed visibly. The basilisk scrambled around, seeking some escape, but there was none. It glared at the wire confinement, but its gaze had no effect on the metal. A third soldier dropped a cloth over the cage, cutting off the view of the little monster. Now Bink himself relaxed. The whole thing had obviously been carefully prepared and rehearsed; the soldiers knew exactly what to do.
"Bink, stand forth," Trent said, exactly as before.
Bink was terrified. But a corner of his mind protested: It's still a bluff. She's in on it. They have rigged it to make me think she was transformed, and that I'm to be next. All her arguments against Trent were merely to make her seem legitimate, preparing for this moment.
Still, he only half believed that. The omen lent it a special, awful conviction. Death hovered, as it were, o
n the silent wings of a moth hawk, close...
Yet he could not betray his homeland. Weak-kneed, he stepped forth.
Trent focused on him--and the world jumped. Confused and frightened, Bink scrambled for the safety of a nearby bush. The green leaves withered as he approached; then the net came down, trapping him. Remembering his escape from the Gap dragon, he dodged at the last moment, backtracking, and the net just missed him. He glared up at the soldier, who, startled, had allowed his smoked glasses to fall askew. Their gazes met--and the man tumbled backward, stricken.
The butterfly net flew wide, but another soldier grabbed it. Bink scooted for the withered bush again, but this time the net caught him. He was scooped inside, wings flapping helplessly, tail thrashing and getting its barb caught in the fabric, claws snarled, beak snapping at nothing.
Then he was dumped out. Two shakes, three, and his claws and tail were dislodged. He landed on his back, wings outspread. An anguished squawk escaped him.
As he righted himself, the light dimmed. He was in the cage, and it had just been covered, so that no one outside could see his face. He was a cockatrice.
Some demonstration! Not only had he seen Fanchon transformed, he had experienced it himself--and killed a soldier merely by looking at him. If there had been any skeptics in Trent's army, there would be none now.
He saw the curling, barbed tail of another of his kind. A female. But her back was to him. His cockatrice nature took over. He didn't want company.
Angrily he pounced on her, biting, digging in with his talons. She twisted around instantly, the muscular serpent's tail providing leverage. For a moment they were face to face.
She was hideous, frightful, loathsome, ghastly, and revolting. He had never before experienced anything so repulsive. Yet she was female, and therefore possessed of a certain fundamental attraction. The paradoxical repulsion and attraction overwhelmed him and he lost consciousness.
When he woke, he had a headache. He lay on the hay in the pit. It was late afternoon.
"It seems the stare of the basilisk is overrated," Fanchon said. "Neither of us died."
So it had really happened. "Not quite," Bink agreed. "But I feel a bit dead." As he spoke he realized something that had not quite surfaced before: the basilisk was a magical creature that could do magic. He had been an intelligent cockatrice who had magically stricken an enemy. What did that do to his theory of magic?
"Well, you put up a good fight," Fanchon was saying. "They've already buried that soldier. It is quiet like death in this camp now."
Like death--had that been the meaning of his omen? He had not died, but he had killed--without meaning to, in a manner completely foreign to his normal state. Had the omen been fulfilled?
Bink sat up, another realization coming. "Trent's talent is genuine. We were transformed. We really were."
"It is genuine. We really were," she agreed somberly. "I admit I doubted--but now I believe."
"He must have changed us back while we were unconscious."
"Yes. He was only making a demonstration."
"It was an effective one."
"It was." She shuddered. "Bink--I--I don't know whether I can take that again. It wasn't just the change. It was--"
"I know. You made a hell of an ugly basilisk."
"I would make a hell of an ugly anything. But the sheer malignancy, stupidity, and awfulness--those things are foul! To spend the rest of my life like that--"
"I can't blame you," Bink said. But still something nagged at his mind. The experience had been so momentous that he knew it would take a long time for his mind to sift through all its aspects.
"I didn't think anyone could make me go against my conscience. But this--this--" She put her face into her hands.
Bink nodded silently. After a moment he shifted the subject. "Did you notice--those creatures were male and female."
"Of course," she said, gaining control of herself now that she had something to orient on. "We are male and female. The Magician can change our forms but not our sexes."
"But the basilisks should be neuter. Hatched of eggs laid by roosters--there are no parent basilisks, only roosters."
She nodded thoughtfully, catching hold of the problem. "You're right. If there are males and females, they should mate and reproduce their own kind. Which means, by definition, they aren't basilisks. A paradox."
"There must be something wrong with the definition,'' Bink said. "Either there's a lot of superstition about the origins of monsters, or we were not genuine basilisks."
"We were genuine," she said, grimacing with renewed horror. "I'm sure now. For the first time in my life, I'm glad for my human form." Which was quite an admission, for her.
"That means Trent's magic is all-the-way real," Bink said. He doesn't just change the form, he really converts things into other things, if you see what I mean." Then the thing that had nagged at his mind before came clear. "But if magic fades outside Xanth, beyond the narrow magic band beyond the Shield, all we would have to do--"
"Would be to go into Mundania!" she exclaimed, catching on. "In time, we would revert to our proper forms. So it would not be permanent."
"So his transformation ability is a bluff, even though it is real," he said. "He would have to keep us caged right there, or we'd escape and get out of his power. He has to get all the way into Xanth or he really has very little power. No more power than he already has as General of his army--the power to kill."
"All he can get now is the tantalizing taste of real power," she said. "I'll bet he wants to get into Xanth!"
"But meanwhile, we're still in his power."
She set out the bricks, catching the limited sunlight. "What are you going to do?" she asked.
"If he lets me go, I'll travel on into Mundania. That's where I was headed before I was ambushed. One thing Trent has shown me--it is possible to survive out there. But I'll make sure to note my route carefully; it seems Xanth is hard to find from the other direction."
"I meant about the Shieldstone."
"Nothing."
"You won't tell him?"
"No, of course not," he said. "Now we know his magic can't really hurt us worse than his soldiers can, some of the terror is gone. Not that it matters. I don't blame you for telling him."
She looked at him. Her face was still ugly, but there was something special in it now. "You know, you're quite a man, Bink."
"No, I'm nothing much. I have no magic."
"You have magic. You just don't know what it is."
"Same thing."
"I followed you out here, you know."
Her meaning was coming clear. She had heard about him in Xanth, the traveler with no spell. She had known that would be no liability in Mundania. What better match--the man with no magic, the woman with no beauty. Similar liabilities. Perhaps he could get used to her appearance in time; her other qualities were certainly commendable. Except for one thing.
"I understand your position," he said. "But, if you cooperate with the Evil Magician, I won't have anything to do with you, even if he makes you beautiful. Not that it matters--you can get your reward in Xanth when he takes over, if he honors his given word this time."
"You restore my courage," she said. "Let's make a break for it."
"How?"
"The bricks, dummy. They're hard now. As soon as it's dark, we'll make a pile--"
"The grate keeps us in; its door is still locked. A step won't make any difference. If just getting up there were the only problem, I could lift you--"
"There is a difference," she murmured. "We pile the bricks, stand on them, and push the whole grate up. It's not anchored; I checked that when they brought us in here. Gravity holds it down. It's heavy, but you're strong--"
Bink looked up with sudden hope. "You could prop it up after I heave. Step by step, until--"
"Not so loud!" she whispered fiercely. "They may still be eavesdropping." But she nodded. "You've got the idea. It's not a sure thing but it's worth a try
. And we'll have to make a raid on the store of elixir, so he can't use it even if someone else comes out to tell him where the Shieldstone is. I've been working it all out."
Bink smiled. He was beginning to like her.
Chapter 10
Chase
At night they piled up the bricks. Some crumbled, for the scant sunlight had not been sufficient to bake them properly, but on the whole they were surprisingly sturdy. Bink listened carefully for the guards, waiting until they took what they called a "break." Then he stepped to the top of the brick pile, braced his hands against the edge of the grate and shoved.
As his muscles tightened, he suddenly realized that this was Fanchon's real reason for demanding the privacy curtain of the privy. It had not been to hide her unsightly anatomy, but to hide the bricks--so they would be preserved for this moment, this effort to escape. And he had never caught on.
The revelation gave him strength. He shoved hard--and the grate rose with surprising ease. Fanchon scrambled up beside him and jammed the privy pot under the lifted edge.
Ugh! Maybe some year someone would develop a pot that smelled of roses!
But it did the job. It supported the grate as he eased off. Now there was room to scramble out. Bink gave her a boost, then hauled himself up. No guards saw them. They were free.
"The elixir is on that ship," Fanchon whispered, pointing into the darkness.
"How do you know that?" Bink asked.
"We passed it on our way to the--transformation. It's the only thing that would be guarded so carefully. And you can see the catapult aboard it."
She had certainly kept her eyes open. Ugly she might be, but she was smart He hadn't thought to survey the premises with such an analytic eye!
"Now, getting that elixir will be a problem," she continued. "I think we'd better take the whole ship. Can you sail?"
"I've never been on anything bigger than a rowboat in my life, except maybe Iris's yacht, and that wasn't real. I'd probably get seasick."