Up In A Heaval (21 page)

That sent him on another thought, as they reached the north side and visible land. He had nodded off, and instead of complaining, Tacy had held him up. He had kissed her; did she have the wrong idea? No, she had accepted Surprise as a visitor, so she knew how he felt. So she was just being companionable. Probably because she was not a fouled-up person, just a fouled-up speaker.

In due course they came to a valley with a number of crushed trees. This was not the work of an ogre; they weren't twisted into pretzel shapes but were pressed into the ground as if stepped on. But what could squish a full-grown tree flat?

Then he heard a distant stomping that rapidly approached. The others heard it too. “Uif jowjtjcmf hjbou!” Tacy exclaimed.

“Whatever it is, I don't like it,” Umlaut said. “I don't want to be squished flat.”

Para scooted into the entrance of a dark cave. Then they came to a lighted chamber, where a rather junky contraption sat, with a vertical flat screen. Words printed on it: GREETINGS.

“Com Pewter!” Umlaut exclaimed, getting out of the boat. “I have a letter for you.”

A troll approached. “I am Com Pewter's mouse, Tristan Troll. I will handle the letter.”

“You don't look like a mouse,” Umlaut said.

“It is a term for a special service,” Tristan explained. “Pewter does not move about himself, so I perform physical tasks.” He opened the letter and held it before the screen.

SEND ARJAYESS AN EEEE-MAIL the screen printed.

“Now, sir, that would not be nice,” Tristan told the screen. “The Eeee is such an ugly creature, and its Eeee-mail makes recipients scream in rage or agony.”

PRECISELY.

“Surely we can do better for her than that. She is evidently a nice person, for a Mundane. We can't in conscience allow her to suffer longer.”

YOU HAVE TOO MUCH #### CONSCIENCE, TROLL.

“Of course,” Tristan agreed complacently. “Shall I summon a search engine from the Electri-City to range the Information Highway for a suitable answer for her?”

44 4 ft $$$$.

That was a bad word. Pewter was being mean.

“Thank you, sir. I will get right on it.” The troll went into a backroom cave to attend to it.

It occurred to Umlaut that this was a rather noble troll. He wondered how he had come to serve the evidently disreputable machine.

WHY ARE YOU HANGING AROUND, BOATLOAD OF BAGGAGE?

It would be possible to dislike the machine, if one put one's mind to it. Of course Umlaut had delivered the letter, despite Demoness Metria's distraction. Still, there were a couple of things. “We had some trouble locating you, though Sammy Cat can find anything except home. I wondered whether there was some contrary magic involved.”

THE DEMONESS METRIA DARED ME TO REVERSE MY LOCATION MARKER.

That explained that. So Metria had tried more than one way to interfere with the delivery of this letter. First by messing up Sammy's search, then by distracting Umlaut when he was about to notice. In the process, it had involved another person, Tacy. So he had to try to do something about that.

“We have in our number a person who can't speak Xanthian. I wondered whether with your power to change reality in your vicinity, you could enable her to communicate more effectively.”

WHY SHOULD I BOTHER?

“Well, it would be a nice thing to do for one in need.”

PRECISELY.

Umlaut realized that this was a negation. Without the benign influence of the troll, Pewter was his normal ornery self. “Maybe she could be useful to you in some way, as a return favor.”

HOW?

“Well, uh—” Umlaut glanced at Tacy, realizing that he didn't have a good answer. “Maybe if you asked her, she might know something.”

BRING HER FORWARD.

Umlaut turned back to the boat and put his hand on Tacy's elbow, urging her out. She was hesitant but obeyed. She came to stand before the screen.

WHAT CAN YOU DO FOR ME?

“Well, I might be able to sweep your cave, or—” She broke off, surprised. “I understood you!”

OF COURSE. I CHANGED YOUR REALITY TO MAKE YOU INTELLIGIBLE.

She looked at Umlaut. “Do you understand me also?”

“Yes I do. But probably you can speak and understand Xanthian only in this vicinity, where Com Pewter governs,”

“Oh, that's just so wonderful!” She flung her arms about him and kissed him.

Before Umlaut could properly (or even improperly) react, the screen printed girl loses interest in man.

Tacy immediately turned Umlaut loose and faced the screen, having no further interest in him. Maybe that was just as well—but he knew better than to say so.

WHAT ELSE MIGHT YOU DO?

Tacy glanced around. “I see that this cave is rather spare of furnishings. Ugly, in fact. That's what comes of having a troll take care of it. I could fix it up to look better. Maybe some curtains here, and a rug there, and some chairs for guests to sit.”

DO YOU PLAY CARDS?

“I love card games! But I haven't found anyone to play them with, so I'm not very good at them.”

YOU WILL DO. A deck of playing cards appeared.

Tacy glanced at them. “You play cards? But who moves them for you?”

MY MOUSE. NOW I WON'T HAVE TO PLAY COM PASSION ALL THE TIME. I HAVE TO LET HER WIN TOO MUCH. I LIKE WINNING.

“Well, then, we will get along, because I don't mind losing. I like games just for the fun of playing them.” A table appeared, and she began to deal the cards. Umlaut wasn't clear how she knew what card game to play.

Tristan Troll returned. “What is this?” he asked.

YOU HAVE A GIRLFRIEND.

Tacy looked startled, but it was Tristan who answered. “But I already have Mouse Terian, Com Passion's mouse. She's the only woman I desire.”

Umlaut knew this was none of his business, except in the sense that he had precipitated it. “Uh, I didn't mean to complicate your life, Tristan.”

UMLAUT CHANGES SUBJECT.

Umlaut discovered he could no longer argue the case. “But I'm sure you know best, Com Pewter. May I bring up another matter?”

DO SO.

Umlaut had not meant to raise this subject, but it was the only other one on his mind. “I have a, uh, romantic problem.”

“Romance!” Tacy said, interested. “Surprise?”

“Yes. I, uh, want to be with her. But her folks won't let me. What should I do?”

“You should find another girlfriend,” Tacy said immediately.

“I can't do that. Surprise is the only one I want.”

She sighed. “Then I suppose you will just have to persevere. Maybe in four years they will relent.”

“Four years!”

“When she is eighteen and they can't stop her. Meanwhile—”

“How old are you?” Tristan asked her.

“Eighteen. I'm not limited in that particular manner.”

THEREFORE YOU ARE ELIGIBLE FOR TRISTAN.

Tristan shook his head. “But I already said—”

TROLL CHANGES MIND.

“Ouch. I may be stuck for it. I can't overrule my mentor.”

Tacy was not so limited, however. “I'm very glad finally to be able to speak and understand the local dialect. But I was not looking for a troll for a boyfriend.”

TACY CHANGES MIND.

She looked speculatively at Tristan. “On the other hand, it is clear that you are a very nice person.”

Tristan shuddered. “I fear it is my curse.”

“Curse? I haven't been called that before. At least, not in any language I understood at the time.”

“It requires some explanation. But that would be tedious to detail.”

DETAIL IT, the screen printed. Umlaut realized that the irate machine was getting back at the troll for being so decent.

Tristan, of course, was unable to argue. He launched into his explanation. “It relates to my name. I was not a perfect troll, because I did not like to perform brutal deeds, so my kind punished me by naming me after a fantasy hero who was cursed. Now it seems his curse is mine.”

His namesake Tristan, it turned out, was a fantasy hero in early Mundania, back in the days when there was some magic there. His father was king of Lioness, and he crossed the sea to come to the aid of Mark, the king of Corn-wall, saving him from his enemies. Mark was grateful and gave the king his sister White-Flower to wed. From that union came Tristan, but alas, his father died in battle before he was delivered, and his mother died of sorrow even as he arrived. Thus his name meant sorrow, and he was raised by a loyal servant. He grew up to be a talented and handsome warrior and went to serve his uncle Mark. He fought very well and saved the kingdom from a ruinous annual levy of copper, silver, gold, and youths and maidens. When Mark decided to marry a very pretty princess of Angry-land named Iseult the Fair, Tristan went to fetch her for the king. She was indeed beautiful and had fair hair that reached to her knees and was as bright as gold thread. She didn't like Tristan, for he had slain her brutish brother in battle. But by mistake a servant gave them a magic love potion to drink, and they fell deeply in love with each other. Of course Iseult married the king, but that drink cursed them, for she could not stay away from Tristan, nor he from her.

They had many trysts and somehow always managed to escape detection, though there were several nasty members of the king's court who suspected and tried to trap them. Finally King Mark caught on and banished Tristan and made ready to burn up Iseult in a fire. But Tristan charged in and rescued her, and they hid in the forest together for several months. There was little to eat, and Iseult got very thin. Rather than let her suffer further, Tristan arranged to return her to the king, then he moved to Brit-any across the sea and married the king's daughter there, who was named Iseult of the White Hands. But he did not love her, though she was a good and lovely princess. Not only was he cursed to endure sadness himself, he brought it to those he associated with, so that Iseult the Fair was sad because she could not be with him, and King Mark was sad because his wife did not love him, and Iseult of the White Hands was sad because Tristan would not touch her.

When Iseult the Fair learned that Tristan had married another woman, she was sorely grieved. But Tristan crossed the sea and visited her and convinced her that she was the only Iseult he loved, and that was true. Then he returned to his wife, but she was angry when she found out that he loved a different woman. When he was foully ambushed and wounded by a poisoned spear, and lay dying, he sent his ring to Iseult the Fair, begging her to come to him before he died. The ship that went for her was to spread a white sail if she was aboard, and a black one if she was not. As it came into view, Tristan asked his wife what color the sail was, and she told him it was black though it was white. “Iseult,” he said, grief-stricken, and died. Then Iseult of the White Hands lamented at the evil she had done; she had not meant to kill him, only to punish him. Then Iseult the Fair arrived and said, “Lady, move over,” and she lay down beside the dead man, hugged him and kissed him, and died of grief.

The ill-fated lovers were buried beside each other in two tombs, and from Tristan's tomb grew a leafy green brier that came to root again by Iseult's tomb. The peasants cut it back three times, but always it grew again, until King Mark told them to leave it alone. So the lovers were together at last in death, leaving all around them saddened.

“And that,” Tristan Troll concluded, “is the curse of my name. I must love one I can't have, and marry another I don't want, and make both of us unhappy and those who associate with us miserable. I had thought to escape it by loving Mouse Terian, but she is bound to Com Passion and I to Com Pewter, and we are separated by the Gap Chasm. Now here is Tacy, a similar name to Terian, and I am required to be with her instead. Thus is the curse fulfilled.”

“But I don't want to be the cause of such sadness,” Tacy said.

TACY CHANGES MIND.

“Let's get married,” she said. “And if I catch you with Terian, I'll blacken your sail.” She hugged Tristan, who was unable to resist.

A wall became transparent. Beyond it was a device similar to Com Pewter, only somewhat more feminine, and a truly lovely woman. Umlaut realized that this was Com Passion and her mouse. CARDS, ANYONE? Passion's screen scripted.

“Tristan!” Terian cried, appalled. “You're with another woman!”

“But I love only you,” he cried back, trying to disengage.

“A likely story! It seems I can't let you out of my sight half a moment without you being untrue to me.”

MALES ARE LIKE THAT, Passion agreed.

“Terian! Please!” But Passion and Terian were already fading out.

“Maybe we can explain,” Umlaut said.

UMLAUT CHANGES MIND.

“But I guess it's none of our business.”

VISITORS DEPART.

Umlaut got back into the boat, and Para waddled out of the cave. They were, it seemed, finished here. Somehow, without meaning to, he had succeeded in making mischief for innocent people. How did he always manage to be such a klutz?

Sesame nudged him. It was Tristan's curse, not Umlaut's, she suggested, and Claire agreed. Somehow that did not make him feel much better.

They were on their way again, heading back south toward the Gap Chasm. Umlaut brought out the next letter, addressed to BUBBLES DOG.

Greetings and salutations to Bubbles,

As one member of the most superior species to another, I send barks from Mundania.

To get it off my chest, I think Bubbles is a sissy name for a canine. I won't hold it against you, however; humans choose the oddest names to saddle us with. It's not your fault. Having said that, at point of poisoned raw meat, I'll never divulge the name my human has seen fit to burden me with. I call myself Alaric, meaning “Ruler of all.” It fits with my breed, which is rottweiler. Most folk around here are plain scared of me, which suits my lifestyle just fine. I'm usually given a wide berth and left alone to contemplate life. Of course I often have to perform bouts of snarling and jumping around just to keep up appearances.

It was good of your friend Kim to release you from that confining bubble. Floating around indefinitely is no life for a dog. My friend Arjayess is another decent human type like Kim. She's the only one who understands me. She feeds me well when there's a shortage of cats, mice, moles, and the sick to gnaw on. She'll romp with me when I feel like getting some exercise and keeps me in huge bones as special treats. She even knows enough to leave me alone when I give a bit of a growl because I'm feeling solitary.

Yup, that makes two special humans in our worlds. Out of... how many are there now? Could that be an exaggeration? Naw, didn't think so. Too bad they couldn't coach the rest of the canine-ignorant ones, huh?

So stick around, little buddy. Just thought I'd say hello and farewell.

Alaric Friend of Arjayess

Umlaut considered that. If there was anything to generate mayhem here, he couldn't see it. So far, most of the letters he had delivered had been downright innocuous, and the rest had not been bad. Was there really a point to this? Of course they needed to be delivered, because their recipients deserved to see them, but just how did any of them relate to solving the problem of Demon Jupiter's hurtling Red Spot? Neither the letters nor the folk receiving them seemed to have any relevance to that.

Yet the Demoness Metria was trying to prevent him from delivering them, sometimes quite deviously. That meant there was a reason. Maybe not her own reason, but one sufficient for whoever or whatever was threatening her son, Demon Ted. Could it be Demon Jupiter himself? Could he know that there was something to balk the Red Spot, and he didn't want that to be found, lest it ruin his strike? But this was the Land of Xanth. How could there be anything in it to interfere with another big-D Demon?

And Umlaut himself: He seemed pretty dull normal, until he tried to remember his past life. It was as if he had just come into existence for this purpose, to try to deliver—

The huge Gap Chasm loomed again, distracting him, and his thought evaporated. That was the trouble with thoughts, they were easily lost when any distraction came. Well, he would surely return to it in due course.

This wasn't the same place where they had used the invisible bridge, yet Para was swiftly waddling right up to the verge. “Uh—” he began uncertainly.

Then the boat went over the brink and into a sidelong gully leading down into the chasm. That wasn't necessarily better. What about the dread Gap Dragon, the one that snorted steam and could cook his meals at yea many paces? Para would never be able to run fast enough to escape that monster, “Uh, are you sure—?”

The boat did seem sure. Sammy was riding, and Claire was napping. Sesame was viewing the steep scenery with interest. They weren't worried, so why should he be? Still, he was.

The slanting ledge-path managed to reach the base safely. Para set out across the bottom of the chasm, which was much like any other scenery, with patches of grass, copses of trees, and even a stream meandering its way as if looking for even lower ground.

Then he heard an odd sort of thumping or pounding. Whomping, that was it. He knew that it had to be the Gap Dragon. Oh, no, it had spied them! Worse, Para was waddling right toward the sound. The dragon came into sight. It was green, with stubby wings and three sets of legs. It lifted one set at a time, moving it forward in semi-inch worm style and slamming it down on the ground while another lifted. This might have seemed like a clumsy mode of locomotion, but in practice it was efficient enough. And while steam might seem less formidable than fire or even hot smoke, the puffing clouds of it surrounding the dragon seemed sufficient to bring down any fleeing prey quickly enough.

Para and the dragon rushed together—and stopped. They sniffed noses, or rather, snout sniffed prow. And that was it. The dragon did not gape his jaws, and the boat did not try either to ram or flee. It looked as if they were friends.

“Friends?” Umlaut asked Claire. She nodded.

So that was why there had been no concern. Para and the Gap Dragon knew each other. He had been worrying about nothing. As usual, it was the things he didn't worry about that made the most trouble.

“Hello, Stanley Steamer,” Umlaut said, “I am Umlaut, and these are Sesame Serpent, Sammy Cat, and Claire Voyant Cat.” He realized as he spoke that this was largely unnecessary; Sammy obviously knew the dragon, and Sesame probably could communicate in Serpentine. “We're on our way to deliver a letter to Bubbles Dog.”

The dragon nodded; he understood human speech. But he did not get out of their way, and Para did not try to move forward. Something else was expected.

Then he had it. The Gap Dragon was friends with one of the human folk they had encountered. “We delivered another letter to Princess Ivy. She's fine. So are her children.”

Stanley nodded. Then he moved out of the way, and Para resumed motion. Umlaut breathed a silent sigh of relief. It wasn't that he distrusted the judgment of the animals, just that errors or confusions sometimes occurred, and a confusion here in the bottom of the chasm could be extremely awkward.

They came to the far side. There was another slight ledge-path scraping its way upward. It looked precarious, but it turned out to be just wide enough for Para to fit on. The slope above and below it was almost sheer, so Umlaut made sure to sit in the center of the boat and not rock it. It would be so easy to overbalance and tumble out and awfully down.

At last they crested and were back on safe land. Now all they had to be concerned about was regular dangers.

“This should be fairly easy now,” Umlaut said.

A cloud formed. “That's what yooouuu think!”

“Get out of here, Metria!”

“I prefer to timepiece.”

He knew better but couldn't help it. “To what?”

“Chronometer, lookout, measure, clock, alarm—”

“Watch?”

“Whatever,” she agreed crossly. “You will have to choose.”

“Choose?”

“You'll see.” The cloud dissipated, but he knew she was still watching.

He turned to Sesame. “Do you know what she means?”

Maybe she was bluffing, she said in Serpentine.

That hadn't occurred to him. If Metria could stop him with a bluff, she surely would do it.

They came to a slight vale with a small red river meandering from one side to the other. It looked innocuous, but Claire suddenly took note. “Meow!”

Para skidded to a halt. “What is it?” Umlaut asked the cat.

In a moment he had it: fire ants.

“Those are bad?”

Sammy, Sesame, and Para all nodded. They did not want to pass through that column of ants.

“Well, let me see,” Umlaut said, suspecting that they were making too much of it. “I've got shoes on; I'll check.” He got out of the boat and walked to the column.

It did indeed consist of red ants. There were hundreds of them marching the length of the vale. They did not look fierce. “If I had a broom, I could sweep a channel clear so Para could cross,” he said. He looked about for something he could fashion into a suitable sweeper.

He spied a pine tree with one low branch. That should do, if he could break it off. He put his hands on it and pushed.

“I wouldn't do that if I were you,” the tree said. “Of course that's just my opinion.”

“What?” Umlaut still tended to be stupid when caught by surprise. And at other times.

“In my opinion, it won't work.”

“You're a talking tree?” he asked dumbly.

“I am an O-Pinion pine tree,” the tree said proudly. “I have opinions on everything.”

Umlaut belatedly caught on to the pun. “Well, thanks for your opinion.” He broke off the branch.

“Ouch! That's just my opinion.”

“I'm sure it is.” Umlaut carried the branch to the narrowest part of the ant column and used the tufts of pine needles to brush the ants out of the way.

Something stung his forearm. “Ouch!” he screamed, for it burned like fire. An ant had stung him. He slapped it off, but the pain did not abate. In fact he saw that a little tongue of flame was flickering over it. No wonder it burned!

He grabbed a handful of dirt and rubbed it on the burn, but it did no good. The pain continued just as fiercely. He ran back to the boat. “Fire ant!” he cried, showing his burning arm.

Sesame dived for the end of the boat. She dug out a little wad of balm Umlaut hadn't known was there. She used her teeth to hold it while she rubbed it across the burn. In two and a quarter moments the pain faded. The balm had done the job.

“Thanks,” Umlaut gasped. “An ant must have gotten on my broom. I didn't see it.”

Para suddenly backed up, startling him. Then he saw why: The ants, now alerted to the presence of potential prey, were swarming toward them. They could not move very fast, but it would not do to stand and wait for them.

Sammy was agitated. The way to Bubbles Dog was across that column of fire ants. What were they going to do?

Umlaut sighed. Where was there a zombie roc bird, or a toe truck, or a tunnel, or a demoness, or something when they needed it? He was pretty sure that if they ran along beside the ant column they would find it reached all the way from the sea to the Gap Chasm, and they would not be able to cross it. So what could they do?

He came to a momentous conclusion: “I think we need help.”

The others looked at him as if awed by his profundity, or whatever. He felt the heat rising to his face. He had such a genius for being if not outright stupid, at least somewhat dull. “I mean, maybe we should seek help.”

They still gazed at him. Para sidled away from an extending pseudopod of the ant column. It was up to him to seek that help.

So he tried it the dull direct way. “Help!” he called.

Something flew in from the horizon. It was a bird, no, a harpy, no, a lovely butter fly-winged woman. Her dress was almost as brightly colored as her wings, and her hair matched. She came to land beside the boat. “Hello. I am Phanessa. Can I help you?”

Umlaut got out and stood before her. “I'm, uh, Umlaut, and these are my friends Para Boat, Sesame Serpent, and Sammy and Claire Cats. We need to cross the fire ant column to deliver a letter. Do you have a way we can do that?”

She glanced at the column, which showed pale flames close above it. “Why, yes, I do happen to know of a way. What will you give me for that information?”

“Give you?” Umlaut asked blankly.

“Well, you don't expect me to do it for nothing, do you?”

It was another signal of his dullness that he had rather expected it for nothing. “Uh, what do you wish?”

She looked at the boat. “I'd really like to have an interesting craft like that.”

“I can't give you that! Para doesn't belong to me.”

“Or a pet cat.”

“Those cats don't belong to me—any—anybody, really. They're my friends.”

“Or maybe a nice serpent.”

“Sesame? She's her own person too.”

Phanessa sighed. “Then I suppose I'll have to take you.”

“Me?”

“As my boyfriend. I had hoped for one who could fly, but there aren't many winged boys in Xanth. They don't want to look like fairies.”

A vision of the plight of poor Tristan Troll flitted across his mind. “I can't do that. I'm committed elsewhere,”

“Oh, that's too bad,” she said sympathetically. “I hope you do make it safely past that horrible ant column.” She spread her wings and flew away.

But now someone else was approaching. This was another girl, with violet hair and eyes. “Hello,” she said. “I am Violet. And no, I'm not an African flower.”

Somehow that didn't surprise him. He introduced himself and his friends. “We need to get across that fire ant column. Can you help with that?”

“Why, yes, I believe I can,” she said. “My talent is to make living things friendly. I'm sure I could befriend the ants so they would let you pass.”

“Great!” But then he got cautious. “What would you expect in return?”

“You seem like a decent boy. I would like—”

“I’m committed elsewhere," Umlaut said quickly.

Violet frowned. “I am so disappointed. Won't you reconsider?”

“Uh, no,” he said, feeling somehow guilty.

“Then I suppose there is nothing for me to do but look elsewhere.” Violet departed.

Umlaut shook his head. “Why is it that now that I have found the girl of my dreams, others are offering? I'm sure either of these two would have been nice, if it weren't for Surprise.”

The others shrugged. It was, it seemed, just the way a fellow was fondled by the fickle finger of fortune.

Another girl approached. She looked fairly ordinary, which was to say that her hair was hair brown and her eyes were eye blue, and her figure was not the kind to madden a man's mind with half a glance. “Hello. My name is Sage. Were you calling for help?”

“Yes,” Umlaut answered guardedly. “We need to cross that fire ant column?”

“I could enable you to do that,” Sage said. “At least, my dragon could.”

“Dragon?” He looked around a bit nervously. “Is it close?”

She laughed. “He doesn't just walk behind me, silly. He has better things to do. But if I'm in danger, he comes immediately to protect me.”

Umlaut saw the ant column extending toward her. “You had better step back. Those ants—”