“But then why did you say the trek is dangerous?”
“Dangerous for me, because of the louts. They think that all girls want to be hugged and kissed indiscriminately. That’s only the beginning. The enchantment does knot consider the loss of innocence a threat.”
“Spiders aren’t much for hugging and kissing,” he agreed. “But I thought human girls liked it.”
“Only with the right man. A lout is knot right. A lout would just yews me, knot make me a woman.”
“Couldn’t you just tell him not to?”
“Louts dew knot listen well. That’s why they’re louts.”
This was evidently more complicated than he understood. “I can keep the louts from you.”
“Thank yew.”
An innocuous creature approached them, clearly no threat to anyone. But Wenda was alarmed. “Dew knot let it close!”
“But it is harmless,” he protested as she guided him to a place behind a big tree. 039-40892_ch01_4P.qxp 7/30/09 12:35 PM Page 18 18
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“No. I know the forest predators. That’s a No gard.”
“I don’t understand.”
“Backwards for Drag on. He’s pretending to bee harmless, putting yew off yewr guard until he can get close enough to chomp yew.”
Sure enough, as the creature passed by the tree and they saw the other side of it, it was a horrendous toothy smoky reptilian creature. Quite big enough to chomp Jumper. A dragon.
“You saved me,” Jumper said.
“Well, yew saved me first.”
He experienced a largely unfathomable emotion. “I . . . feel good about you. I don’t know why.”
“Yew like me,” she said. “And I like yew. We are becoming friends.”
“Spiders don’t have friends.”
“Maybee they dew when they are in our realm.”
That was evidently the case. “What do friends do with each other?”
“They help each other, and enjoy each other’s company, and are sad when they part.”
“Friends,” he agreed, satisfied.
They came to a clearing in the forest. Suddenly a wind stirred up. It caught one of Jumper’s legs. “Ouch!” he said, expressing discomfort in the human tongue.
“Oh, it’s a biting wind,” Wenda said. “We’ll have to go around this region.”
Jumper would have preferred to bite the wind back, but there was nothing to chomp on. So they circled the clearing, going behind trees, where the wind could not get at them well enough to bite. As they completed their circuit, one of Jumper’s eight sharp eyes spotted something to the side. It looked like a bare human leg. But it was gone before he could get a second eye on it.
“Something may be stalking us,” he said.
“The woods are full of stalkers,” Wenda said. “How big is it?”
“All I saw was a leg, perhaps the size of yours.”
“That could bee anything from a goblin to a troll. Dew knot let it come close; they’re even worse than louts.”
“I will remain alert. If I catch it, is it all right to eat it?”
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“Well, I guess so. But I understand goblins taste awful. At least the ugly male ones dew.”
“They probably don’t much resemble fat bugs,” Jumper said with regret.
“The enchanted path is knot far from here. Then we’ll bee safe from such threats.”
They came across a human man sitting under a tree. He looked up and saw Wenda. “Well, now,” he said. Then he saw Jumper. “Stay away!”
he cried. “My name is Oxalate. I can change the amount of oxygen in the air. If you come close I’ll smother you.”
“What are yew talking about?” Wenda demanded.
“If I increase the oxygen enough, the air may burst into flame. If I decrease it, no one can breathe, and it can stifle a fire. So don’t let that monster come close.”
“This is Jumper,” Wenda said. “He is knot going to eat yew.”
“Well, I don’t want to risk it.”
“Then we will leave yew alone,” Wenda said, and walked on. Jumper followed her.
“Why did you do that?” he asked when they were alone again.
“Yew are my friend, are yew knot? He was knot being nice to yew.”
Jumper thought about that, and concluded that he liked this woodwife even better than before. In due course they intercepted the enchanted path. Once they stepped on it, other threats faded, knowing they couldn’t do anything. That was a relief.
“Now all we have to dew is follow this until we reach the Good Magician’s Castle,” Wenda said confidently. Jumper wondered whether it could be that simple. He really didn’t quite trust this odd realm. He wished there were a magic path leading back to his own realm.
Sure enough, they had hardly started walking along the enchanted path when a large bird coasted in for a landing before them. “What is that?” Jumper asked as the thing braked to a sliding stop on the path, blocking their way.
“Oh my hollow head!” Wenda exclaimed. “It’s a stork!”
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“There is something wrong with a stork?”
“Knot exactly. They deliver babies.”
“Small humans? Why would they do that?”
“It’s complicated to explain. Just be satisfied that the stork has no business with us.”
“It looks as if it has business,” Jumper said. For the bird was walking toward them.
“I’d better talk to it,” Wenda said. “There’s been some mistake.”
The stork hailed them. “Greetings, fair nymph, monster spider.”
“We dew knot want any,” Wenda said. “I never even let a lout touch me.”
“I am not looking for you, nymph. I am looking for Maeve Maenad. There’s a special delivery for her.”
“A maenad?” Wenda asked, astonished. “They dew knot signal storks!
They’re wild bloodthirsty bare women who would as soon bite a man to death as kiss him.”
“That may be the case,” the stork agreed, “but we received a definite signal from one of them, and the delivery must be made. I am the supervisor, here to resolve an awkward situation. It is very unusual to lose a potential mother. Have you seen her?”
“We have knot,” Wenda said. “And we hope knot to. Maenads are dangerous.”
“Thank you. But keep an eye out for her.” The stork re oriented, ran down the path, spread his wings, and finally managed to take off. In two and a half moments he disappeared into the sky.
“Keep an eye out?” Jumper asked.
“The bird wants us to keep on eye on the maenad, in case she shows up.”
“I have eight eyes, but I need them all. I don’t want to put one on anyone.”
She smiled. “That is knot literal. Knot in this case. It just means to watch for her.”
“Oh.” Jumper was relieved. “So we have to look for her?”
“Knot really. We dew knot want to find her. But maybee she will bee like an inanimate object.”
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“How is that?”
“They always hide in the last place yew look for them.”
Jumper was confused again. This was one really strange realm! “So let’s not look.”
“Of course,” she agreed.
Jumper was glad that was settled, and that he didn’t have to risk any of his eyes looking for something they did not want to find. They resumed walking. “That’s weird,” Wenda said. “A stork looking for a maenad. There must be a glitch in their paperwork.”
So it seemed it wasn’t quite done with. “I am not clear what this is about.”
“Oh. That’s right. I guess yew wood knot know. Yew see, sometimes two humans— a boy and a girl, usually— get together and signal the stork,
in that way telling it they want a baby. The signal goes out in the form of an ellipsis. That’s three dots loaded with significance. The stork bureaucracy is very inefficient, and it takes them anywhere up to nine months to deliver the baby. They follow the path of the dots back, locate the mother, and give it to her.”
“You’re right. That does seem complicated.”
“But maenads dew knot signal the stork. They use their sex appeal to lure men close so they can pounce on them and bite them to death. Even most village louts know better than to get close to one of those bloodthirsty creatures. So it’s ridiculous for a stork to try to deliver to a maenad. It has to bee a mistake.”
“It must be,” Jumper agreed. This realm was proving to be every bit as weird as it first seemed.
“Oh, there’s a campsite,” Wenda exclaimed. “Let’s stop there.”
“There is something there we want?”
“Food. Rest.”
Jumper realized that he was getting tired, and certainly he was hungry. He hoped there would be fat bugs there. They entered the camp. It was very nice, with all manner of pie plants, and a pleasant shelter.
And there was a beefsteak tomato plant. Jumper picked a beefsteak and brought it to his mandibles. It was delicious. One of the pie plants 039-40892_ch01_4P.qxp 7/30/09 12:35 PM Page 22 22
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had a shoe-fly pie; he threw away the shoe and ate the fly. This camp was all right.
Meanwhile Wenda found a small acorn tree and chewed on several acorns. Jumper remembered that she was made of wood, so must need wood food to sustain her substance. He wasn’t sure how she assimilated it, because her mouth opened on emptiness inside, but concluded that was her business.
They entered the shelter. There was a bloodcurdling scream. Jumper fell back, as curdled blood didn’t work well for his system.
“Someone’s in there,” Wenda said. “A girl. She must have thought yew were going to eat her.”
“Actually I prefer fat bugs.”
“I will talk to her.” Wenda went on in.
Jumper inspected the adjacent pond. Something leaped out of it and sailed through the air. Jumper snagged it with a loop of web and reeled it in: a flying fish. So he stripped away the ing fish and ate the fly. Yes, this would do.
Wenda emerged. “This is complicated,” she said. “Yew had better come in and listen. I have told her yew are knot for eating.”
She seemed to have it garbled, but he let it be. “Told who?”
“It’s Maeve Maenad,” she whispered. “Hiding from the stork.”
He was astonished. “The one we didn’t see! We should inform that stork.”
“No. That wood be telling.”
“I don’t understand.”
“Yew woodn’t. Take my word: storkly secrets are knot bruited about. We must help her.”
“But you said maenads are dangerous.”
“They are, normally. But Maeve has become a maiden in distress. That’s different. I am similar, in my fashion. I must help her if I can.”
Jumper clicked his mandibles in perplexity. It remained a very strange realm. “So we help her.”
“Yes. We’ll take her to the Good Magician, since we’re going that way anyway, so she can ask him how to escape the stork. Meanwhile 039-40892_ch01_4P.qxp 7/30/09 12:35 PM Page 23
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we’ll have to hide her from the stork. That’s why we need to hear her story. So we know exactly how to help her.”
What could he do? “We listen,” he agreed.
They entered the shelter. This time there was no scream. There was a succulent morsel of a bare girl, with wild hair and a feral smile.
“Jumper, this is Maeve Maenad,” Wenda said. “Maeve, this is Jumper Spider. We are meeting in peace.”
“Peaches and cream!” Maeve swore. “He’s mouthwateringly fat.”
“And she’s saliva-dribbling fleshy,” Jumper replied. He realized that Wenda had not misspoken when she said he was not for eating: the wild woman really would have attacked him. Of course then he would have bitten her head off and sucked out its juice. It was a nice head, surely very tasty.
“Yew both wood like to eat the other,” Wenda said. “Yew must knot. We need to get along together.”
“Why?” Maeve asked. Jumper couldn’t have put it better himself.
“Because yew both need to see the Good Magician, and yew can get there better together.”
Maeve sighed, making her body jiggle in a truly appetizing way. Her flesh, unlike Wenda’s, was edible. “If we must, we must.”
“Now tell us yewr story,” Wenda said. “So we can figure out how to help yew.”
Maeve grimaced, then launched into it, while they listened. She was dropped into the central pool of bloodred wine with a resounding splash, with her name tag tied to her wild hair: Maeve, she who intoxicates. She immediately gulped some of the wine and got drunk and vicious: a true maenad. Gorged on wine, she soon grew into the flower of her wildness, racing with the other maenads to capture, tear apart, and consume any creature that strayed near Mount Parnassus. Especially anything male.
But as she grew older, reaching her teens, she discovered a new aspect of her situation. Her body changed, becoming thicker through the hips, thinner through the waist, and developing mounds on her chest. At 039-40892_ch01_4P.qxp 7/30/09 12:35 PM Page 24 24
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first she was disgusted, because it made her slower when running; her proportions had become ungainly, and the flesh on her chest flopped at high speeds. Then she happened to see a picture of a woman left by a man who had been routinely consumed, and it was just like that. It seemed that men really liked to see that awkward flesh on women. A bulb flashed over her head as she understood.
Maenads weren’t just wild women, they were sexy wild women. That was why human males came to their region. She wasn’t sure what a man actually wanted to do with a maenad if he caught her, because they always chased down and tore apart any men they spied, biting off gobbets of hot flesh and swallowing them in a feeding frenzy. That was, after all, the purpose of a man, wasn’t it? To be torn up and eaten. But it annoyed her when an occasional man was wary, and fled before the maenads could run him down. Perfectly good meat going to waste. So she experimented. Once when she spied a man near the fringe of the mountain, and he spied her, she didn’t run after him with spittle flying. She stood and watched him. He came closer, eyeing her warily. He obviously knew her nature.
But he did not come all the way up to her. He got ner vous, and was about to turn to go. That was when she might have run him down and bitten his leg to lame him, so that she could then finish him off at leisure. He represented a huge meal she might have all to herself. But instead she lifted her arms, put her hands on her head, and half turned. This had the effect of outlining her chest, a body part he seemed to be looking at. He did look, and took a step toward her, licking his lips. But then he hesitated again, justifiably ner vous about getting too close. So she inhaled. That made her chest expand, and her mounds stood out. The man’s eyes glazed over and he panted. But then he shook himself, tore his eyes away, leaving tatters of eyelids behind, and started to turn away.
So she turned away herself, pretending she wasn’t chasing him. With luck he would be deceived, and then she could whirl and pounce. But there was another effect. He stared at her bottom, and this time his eyes completely glazed. He had freaked out.
Good enough. She whirled and pounced, catching him before he 039-40892_ch01_4P.qxp 7/30/09 12:35 PM Page 25
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could recover his sight and flee. She tore a bite from his neck, then landed on his back as he collapsed on the ground. Soon she was tearing delicious gobbets of flesh out and gulping them down. Before long there was little left of him except bones, and her belly was so full she had to go hide in a tree to digest it all. What a successful hunt!
While she digested, she reviewed the pro cess by which she had caught him. Her
chest had almost done it, but in the end her bottom had finished it. Why these things should so fascinate a man she didn’t know, but philosophy was not her forte. She just wanted to know what worked. Chests worked, bottoms worked. But could they be improved upon?
When she was lean and mobile again, she went to spy on a human house hold beyond the maenad demesnes. It wasn’t safe to hunt here; the humans were too likely to cut off her retreat and slaughter her. But she might learn something useful just by watching. She did. She saw a farm girl eyeing a passing village lout. Evidently the girl was interested in the lout. Maybe she was hungry. But the lout was too stupid to pay attention, and was walking on.
“Hey, lout!” the girl called.
“Huh?” he asked, turning to look at her.
She turned away from him, pulled up her skirt, and flashed her pan ties. The lout was stunned. He just stood there, eyes glazed, until the girl dropped her skirt and went inside her house. He remained for some time, like a statue, until finally a wood-bee sat on his nose, startling him back into activity. He departed, trailing crumbs of glaze as his eyeballs recovered.
This was a revelation to Maeve. So it was clothing that did it! Pan ties freaked out men. She went to a small pantree and harvested a panty. She put it on, then admired herself in the reflection of a pond. It did do something for her bottom. It could be a secret weapon.
She took it off and hid it away, because it wouldn’t be secret if the other maenads caught on. Then when she was alone, and spied a man, she used it. He freaked out just like that, and she had no trouble catching and eating him. 039-40892_ch01_4P.qxp 7/30/09 12:35 PM Page 26 26
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Thereafter she became the most successful huntress of her kind, though still a teen. The other maenads were jealous, but couldn’t figure out how she did it. She made sure never to use the panty when any other maenad was near.
There was only one mishap. That was when she flashed a man, and he came to her, and she bit at his throat— and bounced off. So she bit at his arm, and missed again. Finally she bit at his leg, but still got nowhere.