"In 1074," Jordan said. He counted on his fingers. "Eighteen years ago. We've been happily exploring the wilderness ever since. And whatever." He pinched Threnody's well-rounded bottom.
"There's a certain charming naturalness about barbarians," Threnody said, smiling as she kicked his shin. "They're so ill-mannered."
"And a certain sexy mystery about demon women," Jordan agreed. He tried to pinch her again, but this time his hand seemed to pass through her body as if it were smoke.
It occurred to Dug that the two were well matched. Jordan liked a woman who was mysterious and sexy and had certain demonly qualities, and Threnody/Renee liked a man who had few human restraints. She probably didn't give him any trouble about seeing her panties, but she could prevent him from handling her flesh when she chose.
"The demons are running the game," Jenny said. "It's for two Mundanes: a girl who won a prize, and—well, I'm not sure how Dug got in."
"Pirated copy, probably," Dug said. "I should've asked. My friend who wanted my girlfriend got it"
"Pirates, eh?" Jordan said, interested. "They're like barbarians."
"I'm from Mundania," Dug said. "I'm just visiting Xanth, playing the game. But right now I don't want to play it, I want to intercept the other player, Kim, so I can—"
"Wipe her out!" Jordan said, pleased.
"Not exactly. I really don't care about the prize. But—"
"But you like the girl," Threnody said. "So you want to catch her and make like a barbarian." She pinched Jordan's bottom.
"Uh, not exactly that, either," Dug said, privately intrigued by the byplay between the two. "I maybe did something that's going to wipe her out, and I have to warn her before it happens. So it's fair."
"Fair?" Jordan asked blankly.
Threnody nudged him. "You know about fairness. It's in the Barbarian Handbook. Page 432, Footnote F."
He looked sheepish. "I guess I didn't read that far. Barbarians aren't much for books."
"I quote: 'If all else fails, try fairness. Fair women can be very appealing.' "
He brightened. "Oh. Sure. All I need now is a fair—"
He broke off, because she had just drawn a knife and cut off his mouth. Jordan looked surprised. Then he fetched out a big handkerchief, mopped the blood, and gave her a reproving glance. Already his mouth was healing. New lips were growing to replace the lost ones. Well, he had said that his talent was fast healing. He had meant it literally.
"Anyway," Dug continued, refusing to act as shaken as he was by this incidental demonstration, "I just want to get on away from here and on my way. But the big thorny hedge is stopping me. Do you know any way past it?"
"I could phase through it," Threnody said. "I can become demonically insubstantial when I choose. But I don't suppose that will help you much."
"That hedge usually doesn't bother us," Jordan said. He lisped a bit, because his mouth had not yet grown back to full size and flexibility. "But probably you can't get by it. You see, it grows only when it wants to catch someone, and then it grows in a circle, so they can't get out. You have to find a magic talent to get out."
"That's a game challenge!" Dug said. "How could you have encountered it, if you're not part of the game?"
"Threnody told me we might have a bit part to play in a game," Jordan admitted. "I guess this is it. Maybe it will relieve the boredom of being stuck with one woman."
Threnody lifted her knife, but this time he caught her hand, then kissed her with his new-formed lips. Dug doubted that Jordan was really bored.
"Well, then, can you tell me how I find a magic talent? I'm Mundane; I don't have any magic of my own."
"Sure, There's a box of talents in the center. You can't miss it. Only there's a catch."
"There's always a catch," Dug agreed wearily.
"You have to pick out talents blindly. You have to use a talent at least once before you can put it back and take another."
That didn't seem like much of a catch, so Dug knew it couldn't be the whole story. "What's the catch to the catch?"
"Hey, you're thinking like a barbarian!" Jordan said with approval. His mouth was now almost the way it had been before. "Never trust any civilized person. The catch is you don't know what talent you've got, so you'll have trouble using it."
"But it will take forever to guess, without a hint," Dug protested.
"There's a hint," Threnody said. "It's a list of fifty talents. You can check them off as you identify them. If you use up all fifty, there'll be a new list. If you get one that will enable you to escape the garden early, you won't need to return it; it will fade out in a day or so anyway."
So that was it. If he were lucky, and quick to fathom his luck, he could be on his way rapidly. Otherwise he might be stuck for hours. Or days.
Dug turned and walked to the center of the glade. Sammy jumped down to show him the way. The others followed.
"May I pet Puck?" Jenny asked, approaching the ghost foal. "He's so cute."
The chained foal approached her, agreeing to be petted. "Why are they wearing those chains?" Sherlock asked.
"That's the way ghost horses are," Jordan said. "Without their chains they'd fade out. It's the chains that hold them in this realm."
"Wouldn't it be kinder to unwrap them and let them go?" Jenny asked.
"Then what would we ride?" Jordan asked sensibly.
Sherlock and Jenny didn't argue. They evidently realized that there was not too much point in discussing gentle social concerns with a barbarian.
Dug came into the central glade. There was the spellbox. It was circular, with a flat top. Behind it was a billboard, titled 50 SPELLS.
There did not seem to be any opening in the top. But Dug was getting used to the ways of magic. He touched the top with his hand, and sure enough, his hand passed right through it, disappearing beyond, as if the top were a sheet of liquid paint. His questing fingers caught something. He drew his hand back, hauling out the thing—and his hand was empty. But he felt subtly changed.
The others were watching him. "Do you have a talent?" Jenny asked.
"I have something," he said. "I suppose it's a talent. But I don't know which one."
"You can read the list, and try them in order," Sherlock suggested.
Dug read the list:
1. Change Color of Anything.
2. Change One Food to Another.
3. Null Taste.
4. Alter Smells.
5. Make Objects Adhere.
The talents seemed straightforward and harmless. "Okay, how does a person make his magic work?" he asked.
"I have to get injured before mine works," Jordan said. "Then it's automatic."
"I just will myself smoky," Threnody said. "And solid again. It's slow, but it happens. It's not really a talent; I simply partake of some human and some demon nature."
"I just hum," Jenny said. "Anyone who isn't paying attention enters my dream."
Dug hadn't realized that Jenny had a magic talent of her own; he had assumed that it tied in with her cat. "Okay, I'll will something to change color." He looked around. "That stone there: turn pink."
He concentrated, trying to turn the stone pink. Nothing happened. "No luck," he said. "So it's not that."
"Are you sure?" Jenny asked. "Maybe you have to call it 'anything.' "
"Okay." He addressed the stone. "I dub thee 'anything.' Now turn pink."
Again, nothing happened. "So I'll try the next." He fished in his pocket and found a few nuts left over from his last snack: two M's, one N, one O, and three P's. He lifted the P-nut. "Change to a marshmallow," he ordered it.
Nothing happened. "Maybe it's a marshmallow in the shape of a P-nut," Sherlock suggested.
Dug tasted it. "No, it's still peanut-flavored." He glanced at the list. "So now I'll null its taste." He concentrated, then tasted it again. It remained P-flavored. So he tried the next: "Make it smell like a rose." With no success. "Then make it adhere to my finger." He touched his finger to it, but the
re was no adhesion.
He sighed. "This is apt to be tedious." He read the next five talents:
6. Change Water to Vapor or Ice, and Back.
7. Make Raw Food Cooked.
8. Sense When Someone Is About to Die.
9. Call Up Small Intense Gusts of Wind.
10. See Through Objects.
"We have any water?" Dug asked.
Jordan had a flask. He poured a bit out, and Dug tried to vaporize or freeze it, but without success. Then he tried to cook the P-nut, with no luck.
#8 brought him up short. "How do I tell when someone's about to die, if no one is about to die?"
"I can slay someone for you," Jordan offered cheerfully, drawing his sword.
Dug would have laughed, but he had the eerie feeling that the man wasn't joking. "No thanks! That talent wouldn't help me get out of here anyway, so I'm just going to assume this isn't that. I'll try the next, and see if I can call up a small, intense gust of wind."
"That's not magic," Sherlock said. "I can do it naturally." He bent over.
"That won't be necessary," Dug said quickly, though he was strongly tempted to laugh. Jordan didn't worry about temptation; he burst out with a rich ho-ho-ho!
"That's another way of doing it," Sherlock agreed.
Pook, the ghost horse, didn't bother to laugh. He simply let fly with his own loud gust of wind.
"Thanks, folks," Dug said. "But I'm the one who has to break the, uh, make the wind." He concentrated, but no other wind stirred.
Next he tried to see through objects. He couldn't. "Just as well," Jenny said. "You might have looked through Threnody's or my clothing and seen our panties."
Dug hadn't thought of that. He bit his tongue so as not to laugh, knowing that they took such things more seriously than he did. "Right. Close call."
He addressed the next five talents:
11. Make Others Mute.
12. Extinguish Fires.
13. Heal Cuts & Abrasions.
14. Resist Bad Dreams.
15. Reverse Someone's Sex.
"Okay, in order," Dug said. "Do I have a volunteer to become mute?"
"Sure, try me," Sherlock said.
Dug concentrated. "Sherlock, become mute!" he intoned. "Did it work?"
"No."
Dug went on to the next. "We'll have to set a fire, to see if I can quench it magically."
Jordan went to Pook and fetched two small stones. He squatted by some dry grass and knocked the stones together. A fat spark flew out, igniting the grass. There was a little fire.
Dug focused on the fire, but he couldn't put it out. So Jordan brought out some marshmallows and began toasting them on the end of a stick.
"Now, can I heal a cut?" Dug asked. "I don't think we should cut anyone to test this! Anyway, we have some healing elixir, which would do the job. Let's skip this one for now."
"No, we can test it," Jordan said. He took his knife and passed the tip across Threnody's arm, scratching it. "Heal this."
Dug focused on the scratch, but nothing happened. "I think that's not it."
Jenny brought out the healing elixir and dripped a drop on the scratch. The scratch disappeared.
But the next one was worse. "How can I find out whether I can resist bad dreams, if I'm not asleep? And if I were asleep, and dreaming, suppose only good dreams came? It could take a month before I had a bad dream to resist."
"Maybe you could try a bad daydream," Jenny suggested.
"Mare Imbri would never deliver one of those," Threnody objected.
"Who is Mare Imbri?" Dug asked.
"She's the day mare who brings good daydreams," Jenny explained. "She brought Kim the daydream of floating bubbles, and Kim got Bubbles Dog from one of them."
Live and learn. "Well, I'll try to imagine a bad daydream, and see if I can resist it," Dug said. He concentrated, imagining falling into an endless hole. That notion had always scared him, and it still did. "I don't seem to have any special resistance," he said.
But there was no easing the difficulty of the progression. "I don't want to change someone's sex!" Dug said.
"You could change one of us, then change him back," Threnody suggested.
"Who volunteers for that?" Dug asked. He glanced at Sherlock. "You want to be a woman for a minute?"
The man shook his head no. He pointed to his throat.
"That's what I thought," Dug said. "It could be a oneway trip. So I'll just skip this one, for now." Then something registered. "Why did you point to your throat, Sherlock?"
The man didn't answer. He just pointed again.
"He can't speak!" Jenny cried. "The mute talent worked!"
"No it didn't," Dug said. "He said it didn't."
Sherlock pointed to Jordan. "Jordan said it," Threnody said.
"Well, I thought it didn't," Jordan said. Threnody gave him a disgusted look.
Dug looked at Sherlock. "The magic really did make you mute?"
Sherlock nodded vehemently.
"Well, at least that identifies it. But it's not the one I need. Let's see if I can unmute you." He concentrated. "Sherlock, speak again."
There was no result. It was a one-way talent.
"It should wear off in a few hours," Threnody said.
Sherlock grimaced, not completely pleased.
"Gee, I'm sorry," Dug said. "I guess I'd better not experiment on real people any more."
"I can make you feel better," Threnody said. "I'll give you a gourd-style apology for your inconvenience. She approached Sherlock, took hold of him, and gave him a demonically passionate kiss.
Dug could have sworn that the man's feet left the ground for a few seconds. His eyes rolled back in his head, and a dreamy smile washed across his face. He looked as if he had been anesthetized. Certainly he felt better.
"Renee has that effect," Jordan remarked nonchalantly. "A demoness can make a man deliriously happy, if she chooses. I happen to know."
It was evidently true. Sherlock seemed to be beyond caring about any little inconvenience such as not being able to speak. In fact, he looked as if he would have been speechless even if he weren't already mute.
Dug returned to business. "So I don't need this talent, because it won't get me by the thorntree hedge. All it proves is that the magic does work, and that I have a whole lot of talents to check through." He looked around. "Where do I ditch this mute magic?"
"You just reach back into the spellbox," Threnody said. "It will let go, so you can take another."
"But won't I risk getting the same talents back?"
"No, new talents float to the surface; used ones sink to the bottom. Just don't reach too deep."
Dug reached in, and he did feel something leave him. He caught a new something, and brought it out.
He read the next five talents:
16. Can Merge with Others.
17. Can Re-create Any Sound Heard.
18. Can Create Heat.
19. Can Cause Objects to Levitate.
20. Can Adjust Weight of Things.
"Nuh-uh! I'm not trying to merge with anyone!"
Threnody sighed. "And I was so looking forward to it." Dug didn't comment, because again he suspected that she wasn't joking. She was opposite to Nada Naga in everything other than beauty.
He tried to re-create sound, but couldn't. He tried to heat something, and couldn't. He tried to make something float, and couldn't He tried to make a stone become heavier, and failed again. So he tried the next five:
21. Immunity to Poison.
22. Can Ease Pain in Others.
23. Can Breathe Anywhere.
24. Can Change the Magic of Water.
25. Can Make Trees Fall.
Dug refused to try the first. He wasn't sure how to test the second, until Threnody touched her knife to Jordan's arm, making it bleed. Dug tried to make the barbarian's pain stop, but couldn't. Fortunately it soon stopped itself, as Jordan quickly healed. Dug couldn't test the breathing, because he couldn't find a vacuum
or a deep lake to try.
Similarly he had no magic water to change from Hate to Love or Lethe. He wasn't going to mess with the vial of healing elixir they had, just in case it got spoiled. And the trees ignored his attempt to fell them magically.
He ground on through the remaining talents of the list. Nothing matched. "But how can that be?" he asked plaintively. "It's got to be one of them!"
"Maybe one of the ones you skipped," Jenny said.
"Or one of the first fifteen," Threnody suggested. "You didn't test them, this time; you picked up where you left off after the first talent."
She was right. Of course he had to test all the talents each time. Which made the job even more tedious.
Resigned, he tried #1, Changing Color. And it worked: he turned the rock pink.
“Two down," he said. "Only forty-eight to go." He was coming to appreciate how long it could take to test fifty times, for fifty different talents each time. Magic was becoming a lot more tedious than he would have thought.
"Maybe Sammy can help," Jenny said.
"I really don't see how—" Dug started. But the iittle cat was already bounding to the spellbox. "Wait for me!!" Dug cried, grabbing for Sammy before he fell through the porous lid.
But the cat didn't fall through the lid. For him it was solid. He sniffed the surface, looking for something, then seemed to find it.
Could it be? Dug reached into the box by the cat's nose, and caught the first spell he found there. He brought it out.
Was this the one he needed? But what did he need?
He skimmed through the list. Attract Animals. Mimic People's Appearance. Create Light. Darkness. Communicate with Anyone. Repel Dragons. Slow Time. Calm Tangle Trees. Reverse Emotions. Make Fire.
Would that last one enable him to burn down the thorntree hedge? He tried to make fire, but didn't get as much as a curl of smoke.
Make Earth Tremors. Blow Hurricane Force.
Maybe one of those would shake down the hedge, or blow it away. But he was unable to evoke either.
Create Pain. Sniff Danger. Control Animals. Make Others Sleep, Make Invisible Shield. Make Things Invulnerable. Reverse People's Actions. Generate Hatred. Mimic Person's Talent.
"I just don't see how any of these can get me out of here, really," Dug said, frustrated.