“Fair warning,” he echoed. Why couldn’t he just accept her wonderful offer and embrace her in love? But he couldn’t; it would be betraying his Quest. Not to mention Feline and Merge.
“Time to return,” she said. She put him against her breast again and towed him back across the lake. If this was intended to remind him of what she offered, it was effective; he was completely reminded.
She kissed him again and turned him loose in the shallows. “Oh—here is a trinket to remember me by. It will tell me where you are. If you decide you want no part of me, above or below, ever, simply throw it away.” She removed a clear gem-like stone from her ear and touched it to his ear. It took hold, and it was cold; he realized it was ice, but it was pleasant rather than painful. It did not melt.
She kissed him a third time. Then she was gone. She had made her case.
He returned to the blanket where Feline still slept; he hadn’t actually been gone long. He set his hand back where she had left it, and sank back into sleep. He didn’t wake until morning. He was back in his shorts; had they ever been off?
When Feline stirred, waking him, he knew he had to tell her. “Uh—”
“Uh?” she repeated as she sat up. “Are you trying to be communicative?”
“I saw the gorgon in the night. Her song summoned me. She said she wanted me for a boyfriend.”
“Oh, you dreamed it! I suppose she does have some curves that might appeal to a sleeping man.”
Had he dreamed it? “Uh—”
“What’s that on your ear?”
He remembered. There was the confirmation. “She gave me an ice gem to remember her by. She said to throw it away if I completely rejected her.”
“And will you throw it away?” Her voice was deadly neutral.
He considered, and realized that he couldn’t. “No.” And waited for the storm to break.
“So it’s like that. The bad girlfriend. Indeed, it is past time for me to deal with her. I’d better stop pussyfooting.”
He had escaped the storm. For now.
After the morning ablutions, and his explanation to the others about the ice gem, the two of them followed the path on around the lake. Then it deviated, picking its way through a thicket of water rushes to a narrow pass between misty mountains to a private valley with a smaller pond. There it was: the perfect spot for seduction.
What made him nervous was that he knew that Carmen the Gorgon was nearby, surely in the pool beyond, and watching. But they had to pretend they didn’t know. That it was coincidence they had come here at this time.
“It’s lovely,” Hapless said, speaking a line they had rehearsed. “But what is here that you wanted to show me?”
“Put on your blindfold.”
He put on the bandanna he had brought. Its thin material covered his eyes without blinding him; he could see fuzzily through. “Now what?”
“This,” Feline said, removing her shirt.
He stared. It was the first time he had seen her bare topped when she wasn’t washing. Her curves were phenomenal. He would have freaked out without the protective bandanna. “Uh, that’s really something. But you could have shown me back at the camp.”
“Yes. But others would be watching. I couldn’t do this.” She took his right hand and made it stroke her front. That would have freaked him out, but for the translucent thin gloves he wore for this occasion.
“Oh, Feline!” he said. “What are you doing?”
“I am seducing you. Before anyone else gets you, like that lady dog gorgon. Now get your clothes off.”
“But Feline!”
“Do I have to do it for you?” She started removing his shirt.
“That’s more than enough!” It was the gorgon’s voice. She was striding out of the water in wet natural splendor, having evidently rendered her tail into legs during the night. She was in fighting trim, with no bluffing concerning her ability to seduce him. Her hair snakes were rampant. She was not about to let another woman steal his precious virginity.
“It’s the gorgon!” Feline cried. “O, woe is us!”
“No, woe is you, cattail,” the gorgon said, coming up to them. “Him I’m saving for ultimate pleasure. You thought you could poach on my territory? Look at me, strumpet!”
“Now!” Feline hissed, averting he gaze.
Hapless belatedly remembered. He conjured her kit and handed it to her.
“Get away from her,” Carmen snapped. “I’ve got better things for you than she does.”
“No!” Hapless exclaimed, turning away as if to escape. “I’ll—I’ll toss the ice!” He reached for his ear.
Carmen tackled him. They fell to the sand together. “Feel this!” she said, grabbing his hand and hauling it to her body. He knew she was about to freak him out with a panty touch. If she had panties on. He could not resist her. She meant to get him out of the fray and captive so she could deal with Feline directly.
Then the music started. Feline was playing her little violin with all the skill his presence bequeathed.
He felt the gorgon freeze, transfixed by the music. He was able to crawl out from under her touch. He did not look at her. “Oh, bleep!” she swore helplessly. “In my rage I forgot about that detail.”
The music continued, getting louder as Feline closed on the mesmerized gorgon. Then suddenly the gorgon was gone. In her place was the Water Totem, in the mermaid form.
“Gotcha.” Feline said with immense satisfaction, picking up the Totem.
“I guess the seduction is over?” Hapless asked, trying to make a joke of it. That didn’t work.
“Do you want it to be?” Feline asked.
“I, uh—”
“That’s what I thought. Well played, Hapless; it almost seemed as if you wanted it.”
It had been an act, yes, to lure the gorgon in, but he had wanted it. He had somehow fumbled it away, as usual. Now he had lost his chance with both Carmen and Feline. He felt a dark depression coming on.
She put a soft hand on his shoulder. “Yes, I am teasing you, Hapless. But there will come a time, I promise. Maybe not long, now; someone’s going to take your virginity, and it might as well be me.”
The depression sprouted wings and flew far, far away.
They returned to the camp. “We got the Water Totem,” Feline announced, brandishing the miniature figure of the gorgon.
“Great!” Zed said. “That leaves only one to go.”
“One to go,” Faro echoed grimly. She would be the next to face the challenge, probably the worst one of them all.
“What powers does it give you?” Nya asked.
“I don’t know. Let me see.” She held the totem in her hand, concentrating. “The power to make waves. And—” She broke off, looking astonished.
“To turn folk to water with a look?”
“Yes,” Feline agreed faintly. “Only I don’t have to do it. Only when I focus on it. So the rest of you aren’t in danger.” Then she paused, surprised.
“And?” Nya asked.
“And I can bring Carmen back to full life, only under my control. She will help us any way she can.”
“Can you trust her?” Zed asked.
“Yes. She is my slave for the duration, until I free her.”
“I think it was too easy to capture her,” Zed said. “Especially considering that opal she gave you, that informed her where you were at all times.”
“Opal?” Hapless asked.
“The water gem on your ear. The clear opal. It’s valuable apart from its magic. Such gifts are not carelessly given. She must really like you.”
“Uh—”
“Maybe we should talk with her.”
“If you wish.” Feline touched the Totem, and it expanded to the gorgon. Who promptly fell down, because her tail could not support her on land.
“Oh. Sorry,” Zed said, reaching down to lift her up. He set her on a stone, where her tail sufficed to brace her. She made a remarkably pretty figure. The several males were o
bviously impressed, the females less so.
“To answer your question,” Carmen said, adjusting her dark glasses, the only apparel she wore. “Yes, there was some ambiguity. I realized that Hapless was not going to give up the Quest. So if I wanted to continue my association with him, I would have to join the Quest. Otherwise I would lose him entirely. I did not want to do that. There’s something about him.”
“There is,” Feline agreed.
“I knew that I would not be allowed to join the Quest in my wild state. So I had to accept the tame state.” She sighed impressively. “It’s a nuisance, but what else is there?”
“That smells like love,” Faro said.
Carmen shrugged, as impressively. “Or fascination. It can be compelling.”
“It can,” Feline agreed. Then the gorgon shrank back into the Totem, and the males’ eyeballs reverted to normal. A cynic might almost have suspected that the cat woman was not completely at ease with the gorgon’s tame state.
At any rate, they had the fourth Totem. But the worst was still to come.
Chapter 13:
Void Horn
It was Faro’s turn. “Let’s do it,” she said.
Hapless opened the box. The picture was of a floating megaphone, with the words VOID TOTEM. The path led north.
“One thing we need to be aware of,” Zed said, drawing on his centaurly store of background information. “The perimeter of the Region of the Void is what is known as an event horizon. It is a one-way crossing. It is possible to enter the Region, but not to leave it. If we cross, we will be completely committed.”
“But the Quest would be impossible if it ended in the Void,” Nya said. “There must be a way through, and the path will show it to us.”
“The path will show us the way to the Void Horn,” Quin said. “That’s not the same. Presumably if we capture the Horn, we will be able to move on out of the Void.”
“And exactly what is the Void Horn?” Feline asked. “It doesn’t look like a ravening or seductive monster, but it must be dangerous.”
“Yet still possible to tame,” Zed said. “If we can just figure out how.”
There was half a silence.
“So should we cross?” Hapless asked.
“Is there any other way to complete our Quest?” Faro asked in return.
A furtive glance circulated. It died out before completing the circuit, as if swallowed by the Void.
“As the gorgon said,” Zed said, “It’s a nuisance, but what else is there?”
The others looked at Hapless, prompting him to confirm the decision. He realized that leadership consisted largely in following tacit directions. Then, having used up the other half of the silence, he spoke. “We’ll cross.”
They trekked north, past the village, around the lake, and to the shimmering boundary wall. This was the dread event horizon. The path led directly though it. Hapless nerved himself and stepped through.
There was no sinister chill, no jolt of pain. He simply crossed the line and stood in a pleasant landscape sloping gently down. Flowers grew amidst the greensward. The air was fresh. He turned to tell the others, but discovered he could not take even a single step back; he could go forward or sideways only. But at least he could reach back. He poked one hand through the curtain.
Someone took it. Feline, by the soft feel of it.
Then she stepped though and stood beside him, holding his hand. “I thought maybe you wanted company.”
“Oh, yes,” he said gratefully.
“This doesn’t look so bad.”
“You can’t go back. It’s one way.”
She experimented as he had. “So I see. Well, the others will be along presently. We forgot that you should have crossed last, but I think they know where we are.”
She was right; the path ended with him. It would have vanished behind him. In the tension of the moment it had slipped his mind. But it did extend before him, proceeding to the right side.
The two dragon crossbreeds were next, crossing together. “This is nice,” Nya said appreciatively.
Finally the two centaurs, crossing in step. Their party was complete.
“What now?” Hapless asked.
“Now we trust the path,” Feline said. “We go find the Horn.”
“Somehow I dread that,” Faro said.
“So do we all,” Zed said.
The path meandered around the Region, drawing gradually closer to the downhill side, which might be the dread center. The trees and bushes that grew on the slope seemed to be leaning away from that lower part as if nervous about it. Small wonder; it reminded Hapless of a giant maw.
There was a commotion down the slope, at the edge where it became more like a gulf. They paused cautiously to inspect it from a distance. A jolly jumbuck was caught in a brier patch. No, it was using the patch to keep from sliding down into that maw.
Something was coming. It was the Horn, floating up from below, the letter A prominent on its side. It oriented on the jumbuck, nudged the animal’s haunch, and made a weird keening sound. Air blew in from all directions to disappear into the horn. It was a giant suction. Instead of blowing, the horn was sucking.
And the jumbuck got sucked into the horn and disappeared.
“Now we know what it does,” Feline whispered.
“But the letter in the picture was O,” Zed said.
Hapless checked. The centaur was of course correct. This was not the same megaphone.
Then as they watched the letter A changed to the letter D.
“From Avoid to Devoid,” Zed said. “It may change each time it feeds.”
“So when it feeds on us it will be O?” Faro asked nervously.
“Ovoid. I am not making sense of that.”
The Horn, its appetite satisfied for the moment, floated back down the hill toward the gulf.
They stopped where they were and considered. “We need to understand this thing better,” Zed said. “Evidently the Void Horn has a purpose here, serving the interest of the Void. What would it be?”
“That jumbuck must have wandered in here to graze,” Nya said. “Not realizing that it couldn’t retreat. When it caught on, it clung to the brier patch, trying to escape its fate. Then the Horn came after it, seeming to know it was there.”
“Let’s try this for sense,” Zed said. “Things normally head toward the center of the Void, not because they want to go there but because there’s not much other direction they can go. Some may catch on before the final slide. They can’t retreat, but they can stop sliding. That’s a snag. It may interrupt the normal process of the Void. So it sends the Horn out to relieve the snag.”
“The Horn is an aspect of the Void,” Faro said. “That’s why it can travel against the current. If we capture it, we’ll be able to do the same.”
“That is centaur thinking,” Zed said. It was obviously a sincere compliment.
“But what about those letters?” Feline asked. “Why do they change?”
“They may be an indication of its current state,” Zed said thoughtfully. “A could mean it is hungry. D could mean it is sated. O must mean something else.”
Hapless realized that they were making progress, but he wasn’t sure it was enough. It was obviously dangerous to approach the Horn at any time. He needed to think outside the box.
Then he got a notion. “Chicken music!”
The others looked at him.
“We use music to tame the Totems,” he said. “What kind of music would tame the Horn? Ovoid means egg-shaped. That could mean it could be affected by chicken music. We have to play chicken music when it’s at O.”
“What is chicken music?” Feline asked.
“I don’t know, but maybe Faro does.” He turned to the winged centaur. “Play some chicken music.” He conjured her set of drums.
“This is insane,” she muttered.
“Way outside the box,” Hapless agreed.
She donned the drums and began to beat on them with her hands.
At first it was just an interesting syncopation, but then it started animating. It was as if a flock of chickens were pecking up bugs and grain. Pecca! Pecca! Peck peck peck PECK!
“That’s chicken music,” Zed agreed.
“It may ignore music at other times,” Quin said. “But it has a thing for chickens. Maybe a number of them wander in here, so it gets to feed on them often.”
“But the problem remains, how can we be on hand when it is at O?” Faro said, easing up on the drumbeat. “That thing must travel to wherever there is a snag, and we won’t know when it’s at O.”
Feline looked at Hapless. “We need another outside the box idea.”
Hapless concentrated. What would regular folk never think of? That might by some freak work? That seemed to make no sense at all, yet could circle around and work by surprise?
“A play!” he exclaimed almost before the idea bulb flashed.
“What do you mean?” Zed asked.
“A play about love, messed up love. Like maybe a boy with two good girlfriends and a bad girlfriend, and he can’t make up his mind between them, but he really needs to.”
“This is not a play,” Feline said. “It’s personal history.”
“Only this one’s about Void Horns. Boy and girl horns. With letters that change.”
“Hapless …” Feline said as if talking to an idiot with a bomb.
“But it might relate,” Zed said. “We don’t know what kind of social life the Void Horn has, but if the gorgon is any guide, it’s lonely. Such a story might appeal to it.”
“Is it male or female?” Nya asked. “That could make a difference.”
That brought them up short. Hapless had assumed male, but realized that something that took things in could perhaps more readily be female. Unless there were other things to determine gender. “I don’t know.”
“Well, we had better make a determination, or we’ll have no story,” Zed said.
“Um,” Feline said.
Hapless looked at her. “Isn’t that my line?”
“My Totem—Carmen Gorgon—says she can help.”
“Then why not let her?” Zed asked.
“I, um—” she said, evidently torn. “She wants to seduce Hapless.”
“But you control her, don’t you?” Zed asked. “You can forbid it.”