She nodded, looking uncomfortable.
“Oh, Fleta—I’m sorry! Without ever knowing it, I brought you so much mischief!”
“Nay, Mach. Thou didst bring me joy.”
“But you know I am not the man Bane is—not here in Phaze! Without your help, I’d have been lost many times over. I’d still be lost without you! Bane would have been no burden to you at all!”
“Aye, he needed me not,” she agreed.
He looked at her, slowly understanding. “You need—to be needed.” Then he took her in his arms again and kissed her.
But after a bit another thought occurred. “Two weeks—you must be overdue at the other herd!”
“Aye,” she said.
“And now I am keeping you from it. This really is not fair.”
“I wanted to join the other herd not really that much,” she confessed. “Better to roam free, as my dam did, before my time.”
“Well, you are welcome to my company as long as you like it,” he said. “I’m in no position to refuse it, even if I wanted to.”
There was a spot in the sky to the east. Fleta looked nervously at it. “Mayhap just a bird,” she said. “But if a harpy—”
“On a search-pattern for us,” he agreed. “Where can I hide?” They were in open meadow; there was not even a substantial tree nearby.
“Take my socks,” she said.
“Your socks?”
“Take them,” she repeated urgently as the flying shape came closer. She became the unicorn.
“But Fleta, that’s just the color of your fur on your hind feet! No way—”
She fluted at him. Mach shrugged and squatted to touch her hind leg. To his surprise he discovered that the golden color did come off; in a moment he held two bright socks, and Fleta’s legs were black.
Fleta resumed human form. “Put them on, quickly.”
Mach put them on over his shoes. And stood astonished.
His body changed. He now seemed to be a golden animal. A horse—or a unicorn. He could see illusory hindquarters behind him, and suspected that his head resembled that of a horse with a horn.
“Graze,” Fleta whispered, and changed back to equine form herself.
Mach leaned forward, trying to get his illusory head into the proper position for grazing. Evidently his performance was satisfactory, for Fleta did not correct him.
The flying form turned out to be a large bird, perhaps a vulture. It flew overhead and did not pause. False alarm, perhaps, but Mach was glad they hadn’t taken the chance. If the Adepts interrogated the bird, all they would get was a report of two unicorns grazing in the field. Meanwhile he had learned another thing about his fascinating companion!
Fleta changed back to girl form. “It was nothing, I think,” she said. “But here we be dawdling when we should be traveling. Methinks I must carry thee, to make the distance.”
“But I don’t want to burden you—”
“An we get spotted, how much greater a burden!” she exclaimed. She changed into unicorn form.
Mach realized that she was correct. Quickly he removed his socks and put them back on her feet; then he mounted her.
She started walking, then trotting, then galloping. Now they were moving like the wind, covering the ground far more rapidly than they had. She headed straight southwest, angling toward the distant Purple Mountain range. All he had to do was hang on.
She began to play on her horn, a lovely tune whose cadence was set by the beat of her falling hooves. Mach, delighted, picked up the melody and hummed along with her. His father was musical, and music was part of the Game, so Mach had trained on a number of instruments and learned to sing well. He had perfect pitch and tone as clear as an instrument could render it, being a machine himself, but it was more than that. Through music he could come closest to the illusion of life and true feeling. Now, of course, he really was alive, and this body had a power of voice almost as good as his own. So he hummed, first matching Fleta’s tune, then developing counterpoint, and it seemed to facilitate her running. Unicorns, he realized, were made to play while moving. He knew that their combined melody was a kind of a work of art, for Fleta was very good and so was he. There was rare pleasure in this, despite the urgency of their traveling.
An hour passed, and still she ran at a pace no horse could have maintained. Her music became less pretty, more determined. Her body became warm, but she did not sweat. Instead, he noted with surprise, her hooves got hot. Sparks flew from them when they touched the hard ground. She was dissipating heat through her hooves!
As evening closed, they were near the great mountains. Now at last Fleta slowed. Mach could tell from the way her body moved that she was extremely tired; she had covered a distance of perhaps three hundred kilometers in short order without respite. Her melody had faded out, the energy it expended now required for her running. Finally she stopped, and he jumped off, sore of arm, leg and crotch. He had learned bareback riding for the Game, but never this extreme!
They were near a grove of fruit trees, probably by no accident. “Rest, Fleta!” he said. “I’ll forage for food!”
She didn’t argue. She went under a tree, changed to girl form, and threw herself down as if unconscious.
Mach collected fruits and located a nearby spring. This was an ideal location!
Then he heard something. He flattened himself against a tree.
It turned out to be a party of what he took to be goblins. They were like gnarled little men, about half his own height, with huge and ugly heads, and correspondingly distorted hands and feet. “Damn nuisance!” one was muttering as they passed, traveling a faint forest trail. “No unicorns here!”
“But we’ve got to check anyway,” another said.
The six of them trekked on. They hadn’t spotted Mach; they hadn’t really been looking. This was just a pointless assignment to them; evidently they hadn’t been told the reason for it. Mach relaxed.
“Hey, I see something!” one exclaimed.
Mach’s living heart seemed to catapult to a crash-landing against his breastbone. Had they seen him?
No, they were hurrying away from him. He started to relax again.
“A doll!” a goblin cried.
They had spied Fleta!
“A damn nymph!” another exclaimed. “Sleepin’ by a tree.”
“Well, let’s have at her! Anything like that we catch—”
“That’s no nymph,” another said. “See the horn-button in her forehead? That’s a unicorn!”
Fleta woke. She tried to scramble to her feet, but they were upon her, grabbing at her arms and legs. “Hold her horn!” the leader cried. “So she can’t change form!”
A goblin clapped a calloused hand on Fleta’s forehead, covering the horn-button. The others virtually wrapped themselves around her limbs, one to each. She struggled, but she was still very tired and they overwhelmed her.
Mach had noted all this as if detached; meanwhile he was charging to the rescue, drawing his axe. The goblins, preoccupied by their capture, did not see him.
“Now, mare, tell us where the man is, or we’ll take turns raping you,” the leader said, yanking her cloak up. “You animals don’t like that much, do you!”
Fleta’s forehead was covered, but not her eyes. She saw Mach charging in. “No!” she cried. “Not that way!”
But Mach was already committed. His axe swung down at the goblin-leader’s head. The goblin turned, but too late; the axe chopped into his face, slicing off his nose.
The goblins were no cowards. They let Fleta go and pounced as one on Mach. Before he could get in a second blow, four of them were on his arms and legs. They had surprising power; they bore him back and down, spread-eagling him on the ground.
The goblin leader, amazingly, retained his feet. His nose was gone, but he seemed otherwise unbothered. “That be him!” he exclaimed. “The one we seek!”
Mach struggled, but the goblins were too strong for him. Now he understood why Fleta had tri
ed to warn him off. She had known he could not handle these creatures. Who would have thought that monster’s skull could be so hard as to make the axe shear off! For Mach knew he had scored directly on the goblin’s forehead; had it been fashioned of ordinary stuff, the stone blade would have cut right in. Instead it had been turned aside by the super-hard bone, doing what was apparently only minor damage to the goblin’s face. How could an ordinary man fight such creatures?
“Tie him up,” the leader said. “I’d love to chew up his eyeballs, but orders are orders. The Adept wants him intact. We’ll have to content ourselves with the animal.” He looked about with sudden alarm. “Who’s holding her?”
“I am!” the sixth goblin cried. But though he still had his hands on Fleta’s forehead, his touch nullifying the magic power of her horn, he was now the only one. Fleta’s arms and legs were free, because the other four goblins were now holding Mach.
Fleta smiled. She reached up and grabbed the goblin’s hands in her own, hauling them down while she straightened up. He might be stronger than she, but he could not keep his hands in place while she was moving her body. He needed more hands. In a moment her forehead was clear.
Abruptly she vanished. In her place was the hummingbird, and its buzz was quite angry. It darted at the goblin leader.
One of the goblins holding Mach began to laugh, for such a tiny creature could hardly hurt a goblin. But the laugh was cut off when the unicorn manifested almost in the leader’s face. The forward motion of the bird translated into a plunge by the unicorn.
The long horn speared right through the goblin’s head.
Then Fleta lifted her head and flung the goblin off her horn. She whirled to face the ones holding Mach, but these were already scrambling desperately away. Their skulls might be too tough for Mach’s crude axe, but the unicorn’s horn was another matter! In a moment there was not a live goblin in sight.
Fleta fluted, blood spitting from her horn as she blew it. She stood by Mach, angling her head.
He needed no further urging. He scrambled to her back, and they were off. It was obvious that the goblins would soon spread the news of the discovery of the prey, and greater numbers of them would be in hot pursuit. He hated to make Fleta run again, when she had had so little rest, but they had to find a better place to hide.
Where was there? If the goblins roamed this forest that was no good. But out in the open the harpies would be able to spot them. It was getting dark now, but what of the morning?
Fleta was pounding directly south, toward the looping Purple Mountains. Mach had to have faith that she knew what she was doing. But he could feel the fatigue of her body; she shouldn’t be running at all, right now!
Well, he could do nothing about it at the moment. He just had to hang on and hope it would be all right.
Meanwhile, he realized that he had learned some new things. A unicorn couldn’t change form if her horn was covered; thus she could be held captive, or even raped, despite her normal powers. So if they were ever in a situation like this again, his first job would be to eliminate whoever was holding her horn, so as to free her magic. That was the way he should have proceeded before, had he but known. He could have thrown himself upon the goblin at her head, dragging it off for that necessary instant.
But also, the goblins had confirmed that it was an Adept behind this. And that it was Bane’s presence, not his death, that was wanted. That meant that their guess about trying to eliminate Bane during his weakness was wrong; the Adept wanted something else.
What could the Adept want? Mach was simply not very effective as a resident of Phaze! Without Fleta he’d have been dead several times over already. He was learning to do magic, but even that was only a poor suggestion of what Bane could do. He wouldn’t be worth much even as a hostage, since he was the wrong person.
He shook his head. He just couldn’t make much sense of it. But he was sure he didn’t want to get hauled in to that enemy Adept!
Fleta slowed. He feared it was because she was exhausted, but he discovered it was the terrain; the level plain had ended, and the slope of the mountain range was beginning.
“I’ll walk now!” he said quickly. “You’ve done enough!”
She did not object. Mach slid off. It was now dark, except for the light of three moons. Proton had seven small moons, which meant that Phaze did too, and several were normally in view. Most were pale shades of gray; the one blue moon seldom showed.
She changed to girl form, showing the way up the mountain slope. Mach was amazed by the amount she evidently knew of far-flung terrain. She must have done a lot of exploring in her day! He followed, covertly admiring her rear view, though he knew that her human shape was exactly what she had chosen and crafted; naturally she had not devised an ugly one.
Then she stumbled. Mach hastened to join her, putting his arm about her waist. But she sagged, too tired to keep her feet.
“The hummingbird!” he exclaimed. “Change to that form!”
“Nay,” she whispered. “It takes more energy to fly than this!”
“Not to fly,” he said. “To perch! You carried me; let me carry you, now!”
She turned her head to him. She nodded. She became the bird. He put out his hand, and she flopped in it. He lifted her to his shoulder, and there she perched, her little claws anchored on his homemade shirt.
“Sleep, Fleta,” he said. “I will climb this hill.”
Climb he did. It made him feel good to do his part, his strength filling in for hers. His legs were stiff, but he had plenty of remaining energy. As the way became steeper, he hauled himself up by grabbing handholds on saplings. He hoped he got them wherever they were going. It was so dark now that he could barely see the next tree before him.
There was an angry squawk from ahead. Startled, Mach paused.
“Who the hell art thou?” a voice screeched. “Stay out o’ my bower!”
“A harpy!” Mach exclaimed with dismay. He gripped his axe. Fleta, on his shoulder, was so tired that she didn’t wake.
“What didst thou think it be—a damned goblin?”
“Yes,” Mach said. Could he escape her surveillance! in the darkness, or were they in for another horrible I chase? The harpy laughed raucously. “Well, no such luck! Come not near me, lest thou catch the tailfeather itch!” Mach knew he should shut up and hide, but something nagged at him. Why was this foul creature talking instead of attacking or summoning her cohorts? “I’m just a weary traveler,” he said. “I have no tailfeathers to itch, but I will detour around your bower. I apologize for bothering you.”
“Thou dost what?” she screeched. “I apologize for bothering you,” Mach repeated. “Nobody doth apologize to a harpy!”
“I don’t want any trouble, I just want to get somewhere where I can rest for the night.”
“Thou dost speak strangely. Who be ye?”
“I am called Mach.” If she knew his identity, his name made no difference now. “I am a robot.”
“What kind of monster be a rovot?” she demanded. “One that looks like a human being.”
“Oh, hell, come into my bower,” she said. “I be lonely for company.”
Stranger yet! Was it a trap? Well, might as well spring it as have it pursue him. Mach climbed forward.
He parted a thick curtain of leaves and came into a snug chamber padded with ferns. There was a tiny bit of glow, so that he could ascertain its approximate size and see the form perched on a stick at one side. This was the harpy.
“Why, thou dost be a man!” she exclaimed. “I said I looked like a human being.”
“Aye, that be true. And a bird on thy shoulder.”
“My companion.” Fleta was stirring now; what would she think of this interview?‘
“I be Phoebe,” the harpy said.
Mach checked through his memory. “I know of a bird of that name. Nondescript, except that it wags its tail.”
“Aye, that be why the name,” she agreed. She rustled about as if to make t
he point. “But it be uncomfortable as hell, and not just in the feathers.”
“You really do have a tailfeather itch?”
“Aye, and no cure, so I be exiled from my kind.”
“You mean you’re not part of the pursuit?”
“What pursuit?” Phoebe demanded.
“We’ve been chased by harpies, demons and goblins,” Mach said. “We don’t know why.”
“I know naught o’ that! I’ve had no contact with my kind in a year.”
Could he believe that! Or was she just trying to lull him while others closed in?
“No offense—but you don’t smell. The other harpies I encountered—”
“I wash my feathers daily to keep down the itch, but always it returns,” Phoebe said. “An’ another o’ my kind come near, it will spread. That be my curse.”
Fleta jumped off his shoulder, then materialized as her girl form. “Know thou my nature?” she asked the harpy.
“A werebird! Ne’er saw I the like before!”
“Nay. Unicorn.”
“And thou comest to roust me out o’ my bower? For shame, ‘corn; I have no quarrel with thee!”
“Willst swear so on my horn?”
“For sure, an thou attack me not.”
Fleta parted the leaves of the bower wall and stepped out.
The harpy peered after her. She shrugged with her wings. “Hell, trust must begin somewhere, and I have no life worth living alone.” She half-spread her wings and hopped out after Fleta.
Mach followed her out, not certain what was happening.
Outside, he could just make out the dark unicorn shape. Fleta lowered her horn, and the harpy hopped up to it. The horn touched her feathers. “I swear I have no quarrel with thee,” the harpy said.
Fleta fluted.
“What, turn about?” Phoebe asked, evidently understanding her. “What for?”
Fleta played several notes.
“That?” the harpy asked incredulously. “Thou wouldst?”
An affirmative note. Mach tried to fathom what this was about, but it baffled him.
The harpy turned about, and Fleta put her horn on the creature’s tailfeathers. For a moment there seemed to be a kind of radiance, but Mach could not be sure.