Castle Roogna (16 page)

       "A magic ring. It grants wishes," Dor said, hoping this was not too great an exaggeration. Actually, he hadn't caught the ring failing; he just was never sure that its successes were by any agency of its own magic.

       "Oh? I've always wanted one of those."

       Dor pulled it off his finger. "You might as well have it; I just want to rescue Millie." Oops-he had said her name.

       Helen snatched the proffered ring. Harpies were very good at snatching. "You're not a goblin spy, are you? We're at war with the goblins."

       Dor hadn't known that. "I-we killed a number of goblins. A band of them attacked us."

       "Good. The goblins are our mortal enemies."

       Dor's curiosity was aroused. "Why? You're both monsters; I should think you'd get along together."

       "We did, once, long ago. But the goblins did us the foulest of turns, so now we are at war with them."

       Dor sat down on the edge of the nest. It was as soft and fluffy as it looked. "That's funny. I thought only my own kind waged wars."

       "We're half your kind, you know," she said. She seemed fairly nice as he got to know her. She smelled faintly of roses. Apparently it was only the old harpies who were so awful. "A lot of creatures are, like the centaurs, mer-folk, fauns, werewolves, sphinxes, and all-and they all inherited man's warlike propensities. The worst are the pseudo-men, like the trolls, ogres, elves, giants, and goblins. They all have armies and go on rampages of destruction periodically. How much better it would be if we half-humans had inherited your intelligence, curiosity, and artistry without your barbarity."

       She was making increasing sense. "Maybe if you had inherited our other halves, so you had the heads of vultures and the hindquarters of people-"

       She laughed musically. "It would have made breeding easier! But I'd rather have the intelligence, despite its flaws."

       "What did the goblins do to the harpies?" She sighed, breathing deeply. She had a most impressive human portion, that way, and Dor was glad it was the upper section she had inherited. "That's a long story, handsome man. Come, rest your head against my wing, and I'll preen the dirt from your face while I tell you."

       That seemed harmless. He leaned back against her wing, and found it firm and smooth and slightly resilient, with a fresh feather smell.

       "Way back when Xanth was new," she said in a dulcet narrative style, "and the creatures were experiencing the first great radiation of forms, becoming all the magical combinations we know today, we half-people felt an affinity for each other." She licked his cheek delicately with her tongue; about to protest, Dor realized that this was what she meant by preening. Well, he had agreed to it, and actually the sensation was not bad at all.

       "The full-men from Mundania came in savage Waves, killing and destroying," she continued, giving his ear a little nip. "We half-people had to cooperate merely to survive. The goblins lived adjacent to we harpies-or is that us harpies? I never can remember-sometimes even sharing the same caves. They slept by day and foraged by night, while we foraged by day.

       So our two species were able to use the same sleeping areas. But as our populations grew there was not enough room for us all." Her preening, fitted between words, had progressed to his mouth; her lips were remarkably soft and sweet as they traversed his own. If be hadn't known better, he might have thought this was a kiss.

       "Some of our hens had to move out and build nests in trees," she continued, reaching the other side of his face. "They got to like that better, and still do perch in trees. But the goblins became covetous of our space, and reasoned that if there were fewer of us there would be room for more of them. So they conspired against our innocence. Their females, some of whom in those days were very comely, lured away our males, corrupting them with-with-" She paused, and her wing shuddered. This was evidently difficult for her. It was none too easy for Dor, either, because now her breast was against his cheek, as she strained to reach the far side of his neck. Somehow he found it difficult to concentrate on her words.

       "With their arms and-and legs," Helen got out at last. "We had not been so long diverged from human beings that our males did not remember and lust after what they called real girls, though most human and humanoid women would not have anything to do with vulture tails. When the lady goblins became approachable-I would term them other than ladies, but I'm not supposed to know that sort of language-when these creatures beckoned our cocks-oh, males are such foolish things!"

       "Right," Dor agreed, feeling pretty foolish himself, half-smothered between her neck and bosom. He knew better than to argue with the really foolish sex.

       "And so we lost our cock-harpies, and our hens became soured. That's why we have a certain exaggerated reputation for being impolite to people. What's the use of trying, when there are no cocks to please?"

       "But that was only one generation," Dor protested. "More cocks should have hatched in the next generation."

       "No. There were no more eggs-no fertile ones. There had never been a great number of cocks-our kind hatched about five females for every male-and now there were none. Our hens were becoming old and bitter, unfulfilled. There's nothing so bitter as an old harpy with an empty nest."

       "Yes, of course." She seemed finally to have completed the preening; he had no doubt his face was shiningly clean now. "But why didn't all the harpies die out, then?"

       "We hens had to seek males of other species. We abhor the necessity-but our alternative is extinction. Since we derived originally from a cross between human and vulture-I understand that was quite a scene, there at the love spring-we have had to return to these sources to maintain our nature. There are some problems, however. The human and vulture males aren't inclined generally to mate with harpies, and we can't always get them to the love spring to make it happen-and when they do, the result is always a female chick. It seems only a harpy cock can generate males of our species. So we have become a flock of old hens."

       That was some history! Dor had heard about the nefarious love springs, where diverse creatures innocently drank, then plunged into love with the next creature of the opposite sex they met. Much of the population of Xanth was the fault of such springs, producing the remarkable crossbreeds that thereafter bred true. Fortunately the love-water had to be fresh, or it lost its potency; otherwise people would be endlessly slipping it into the cups of their friends as practical jokes. But he could see how this would create a problem for the harpies, who could not always carry a potential mate to the spring, or make him drink from it.

       Now Helen's whole body shook with rage, and her voice took on a little of the tone of the older hens. "And this is what the cursed goblins did to us, and why we hate them and war against them. We want to kill off all their males, as they did ours. We shall fight until we have our vengeance for the horrible wrong they did us. Already we are massing our armies and gathering our allies among the winged kinds, and we shall wreak a fittingly horrible vengeance by scratching the goblin nation from the fair face of Xanth!"

       By this time Dor had fairly well grasped the purpose for which he had been brought here. "I, uh, I sympathize with your predicament. But I can't really help you. I'm too young; I'm not a man yet."

       She drew back and twisted her head to look at him, her large eyes larger yet "You certainly look like a man."

       "I got big quite suddenly. I'm really twelve years old. That's not much for my kind. I just want to help my friend Millie."

       She considered momentarily. "Twelve years old. That just might be statutory seduction. Very well. I'll accept the ring you offered, in lieu of-of the other. Maybe it can wish me a fertile egg."

       "I can! I can!" the ring exclaimed eagerly.

       "I didn't really want to do this anyhow," Helen said as she screwed the ring onto her largest claw. She had merely held it, up till now. "Momma insisted, that's all. You can have the girl, though at your age I really don't know what you'll do with her. She's four caves to the right."

       "Uh, thank you," Dor said. "Won't your mother object-I mean, if I just walk out?"

       "Not if I don't squawk. And I won't squawk if the ring works okay."

       "But that ring takes time to operate, even if-"

       "Oh, go ahead. Can't you see I'm trying to give you a break?"

       Dor went ahead. He wasn't sure how long she would have patience with the ring, or whether she would simply change her mind. Of course it was always possible that the ring really could produce. How nice for the harpies if it could give them a male chick! But meanwhile, he didn't want to waste time.

       The old harridan eyed him suspiciously, but did not challenge him. He counted four subcaves to the right and went in. Sure enough, there was Millie, disheveled but intact. "Oh, Dor!" she cried. "I knew you'd rescue me!"

       "I haven't rescued you yet," he warned her. "I traded my wishing ring to get to you."

       "Then we'd better get out of here in a hurry! That ring couldn't wish itself out of a dream."

       Why would it want to? he wondered. He checked the cave exit. Like the other, it opened onto a formidable drop. "I don't think we can just walk out. I don't think there are any exits that don't require flying. That's why the harpies aren't worried about us escaping."

       "They-they were threatening to cook me for supper. I'd rather jump, than-"

       "That was just to get me to cooperate," Dor said. Yet he had the grisly fear that it had been no bluff. Why should they have told her the threat, when he wasn't there to hear? The harpies were not nice creatures.

       "To cooperate? What did they want from you?"

       "A service I couldn't perform." Though this body of his had masculine capabilities and probably could-no, that wasn't the point.

       Millie looked at his face. "It's clean!" she exclaimed.

       "I, uh, had it washed."

       Her eyes narrowed. "About that service-are you sure-?"

       Damn that female intuition! Dor kneeled by the exit hole, feeling around it with his fingers. "Maybe there are handholds or something."

       There weren't. The face of the cliff was as hard and smooth as glass, and the drop looked horrendous. He saw harpies flitting from other caves, coming and going, always flying. No hope there!

       Even if there had been handholds, they would have required both of his hands. He would have been unable to hold on to Millie with one, and she would have screamed and kicked her feet and flung her hair about and fallen to her death the moment she attempted to make such a climb by herself. She was a delectable female, but just not much use at man-business.

       Not that he could make any such claim himself, after that session with Heavenly Helen Harpy.

       Helen had said that the harpies had once shared quarters with the goblins. The goblins did not fly, and he doubted they could climb well enough to handle this sheer cliff. If they had shared these caves, there had to be footpaths to them, somewhere. Maybe these had been cemented over, after the goblins had been driven out. "Walls, do any of you conceal goblin tunnels?" he asked.

       "Not me!" the walls chorused.

       "You mean the goblins never used these caves?" Dor demanded, disappointed. Had Helen lied to him-or had she been referring to other caves, before the harpies moved here?

       "Untrue," the walls said. "Goblins originally hollowed out these caves, hollowed and hallowed, before the war started."

       "Then how did the goblins get in and out?"

       "Through the ceilings, of course."

       Dor clapped the heel of his hand to his forehead. Of course! One problem with questioning the inanimate was that the inanimate didn't have much imagination and tended to answer literally. He had really meant to question all the artifacts in and of this chamber, but he had only actually named the walls, so only they had responded. "Ceiling, do you conceal a goblin passage?"

       "I do," the ceiling replied. "You could have saved a lot of trouble if you'd asked me first, instead of talking with those stupid walls."

       "Why isn't it visible?"

       "The harpies sealed it over with mud plaster and droppings. Everyone knows that."

       "That's why the stink!" Millie cried. "They use their dung for building."

       Dor drew his sword. "Tell me where to strike to free the passage," he said.

       "Right here," the ceiling said at one side.

       Dor dug his swordpoint in and twisted. A chunk of brown plaster dropped to the floor. He dug harder and gouged more out. Soon the passage opened. A draft of foul air washed down from the hole.

       "What's that fresh smell?" a harpy voice screeched from the cavern hall.

       "Fresh smell!" Dor exclaimed, almost choking on the stench. He and Millie had become more or less acclimatized to the odor pervading the caves, but now that the air was moving, his nostrils could not so readily filter it out. Yet perhaps this breeze was offensive to the harpies.

       The old hen appeared in the entrance. "They're trying to sneak out the old goblin hole!" she screeched. "Stop them!"

       Dor strode across to block her advance, sword held before him. Afoot, unable to spread her wings, the harpy was at a disadvantage, and had to retreat. "Climb up into the hole!" Dor cried to Millie. "Use the goblin passage to escape!"

       Millie stared up into the blackness of the hole. "I'm afraid!" she cried. "There might be nickelpedes!"

       That struck him. Nickelpedes were vicious insects five times as ferocious as centipedes, with pincers made of nickel. They attacked anything that moved in darkness.

       Now more harpies were pressing close. They respected Dor's bared blade, but did not retreat farther than they had to. He could not swing freely in the passage, and didn't really want to shed their blood; after all, they were half-human, and it wasn't nice to kill females.