Son Of Spellsinger

Buncan turned in his seat. “I just want to find out what we may be getting into.”

“We ain’t gettin’ into nothin’. We’re gettin’ past it.”

Ignoring the otter’s protests, Buncan dismounted and walked up to Wurragarr. “What is this Kilagurri, anyway?”

The thylacine’s jaws parted, showing sharp teeth. “I don’t think you should tell them anything. What if you’re wrong and they are in league with the Dark Ones?”

“I’m convinced they’re not, Bedarra. For one thing, they could ride to safety now yet this one chooses to stay and ask questions. Minions of the monks would grab the first opportunity to flee. For another, can you imagine the Dark Ones recruiting anything like those two to their cause?” He indicated Squill and Neena, who were bickering vociferously atop Snaugenhutt’s spine.

Viz left his iron perch to settle on Buncan’s shoulder. “My friend and I are well-traveled, but I’ve never heard of this Kilaguni either.”

“Maybe you’re not as indifferent as you make out.” Wurragarr regarded human and tickbird thoitghtfully. “I accept that you’re sorcerers, even if so far you’ve only proven that you’re sorcerers of the flowers.” Behind him, Quibo and several others chuckled. The brooding Bedarra didn’t crack a smile.

“We can do more man conjure flowers,” Buncan told hun. “A lot more.”

“I won’t deny that we need all the help we can get.” The roo indicated the trio of kookaburras, who were still recovering from their bout of hysterics. “I’d hate to have to depend on that lot in a critical moment.” Those of his companions-inarms within earshot murmured their agreement.

“Even if pretty flowers represent the apex of your wizardry, we could use whatever kind of help you could provide. It’s clear from the armor worn by your great friend and the ready bows of your water rats that you travel prepared to fight. I won’t say that your presence among us would turn the tide.”

“Hold on,” said Buncan. “I just asked to know what’s going on. I haven’t said anything about helping.”

“Fair dinkum, stranger.” Wurragarr encompassed the mob with a sweep of his free hand. “We’re all dwellers in this same land, in these hills and mountains. We and our ancestors have lived here in peace and harmony, more or less, since before memory.

“Most of us are farmers or simple townies, or craftsfolk like myself. We ask only to be left alone to live our lives in peace. We’ve never had any trouble with the monks . . . until a little more than a year ago.

“The monastery of Kilagurri sits in a small, steep-sided basin high above the valley of Millijiddee. It’s not a place for those who’d contemplate the goodness of the world. Prior to a year ago we had little or no contact with those who dwell within. Then something changed. Kilagurri has become home to those who thrive on evil machinations. Bad doings, stranger.

“Travelers who pass close tell of frightful noises issuing from within. Tormented screams and unnatural voices. Though curious as to the source of these sounds, they hurry on. One can’t blame them.

“From time to time several of the monks will descend to shop in Millijiddee Towne, or have something fixed they cannot repair themselves. Nowadays all good folk shun them as well as their business.” The roo was leaning on his thick tail as he spoke.

“Not that we haven’t had trouble with ‘em before.” The wombat wagged a thick finger at Buncan. “Used to be little things. A blight on some greengrocer they thought had cheated ‘em. A sprained leg that took too long to heal. Consumptive farm animals. Nothing like what’s been happening recently. Nothing like it.”

Wurragarr took up the refrain. “Just over a year ago, unnatural clouds were seen to gather above the monastery. Bolts of lightning struck within, yet there were no fires, no sign of damage. The Dark Ones began to play with great forces. What little we’ve been able to learn of their doings fills us with fear. It’s clear that the monks are intent on some vast evil.

“A truce used to exist between the common folk and the monks. They’ve broken that with their detestable doings.

Nothing was left to us but to try and put a stop to them permanently, before they can go any further.”

“Go any further with what?” Viz asked him. “Snaugenhutt! All of you, you’d better come and listen to this.” The rhino nodded, ambled over. The crowd retreated to make room for him.

Wurragarr turned and peered into the assemblage. “Mowara! Where’s Mowara?”

A pinkish-white avian fluttered out of the crowd to land without ceremony on the roo’s left shoulder. In addition to a light blue-and-green-checked scarf, a mother-of-pearl anklet flashed from his left leg.

“Mowara’s actually been inside the monastery,” Wurragarr informed them. “He’s the closest thing we have to a spy. He’s taken a big risk.”

The galah nodded. “They pluck birds up there. Seen it myself.” He shuddered, feathers quivering. “Horrible. You should see their new guards. Great awful things, all claws and fangs and beaks.”

“Mowara confirmed the stories we’d been hearing,” Wurragarr went on. “Confirmed them, and worse.”

“Too right, mate.”

Then- spy was old, Buncan thought. His eyes were dulled with age and his beak worn. His attitude suggested the first stages of senility. Or maybe he was just a little crazy. Could he be believed? Wurragarr seemed to trust him completely.

“People have been abducted,” the roo was saying, “and taken to the monastery.” His voice was grim. “Lately the monks favor cubs and infants, those of travelers and out-landers as much as local folk. Most are never seen again. But there have been a few escapees. Mowara confirms what they’ve told us.”

“Seen them at work, the Dark Ones.” The galah stretched his aged wings significantly. “Heard them talking. Saw things.”

“Cor, wot sorts o’ things?” Neena inquired. In front of her, Squill affected an air of bored indifference.

“Saw them,” the galah insisted. “Tampering.”

“Tampering with what?” Buncan wanted to know.

The bird leaned forward, and his eyes bulged. “Nature. The Dark Monks, they’re tampering with Nature itself.”

CHAPTER 21

“I don’t understand,” Buncan said cautiously.

“Who does, who does?” Pink wings flapped urgently. “The Dark Ones don’t understand either, but that doesn’t stop them. The forces of life, the threads that bind it together, that’s what they’re stuck into up there on that mountaintop. Weavers they think they are, but all they can tie are knots, nasty knots.” Though there was no need to lower his voice, he leaned forward and whispered.

“Used to be just irritating, the monks were. Not no more. Want to control it all now. Not just the hills and valleys. All of it. The whole world.

“I’ve heard them speak words, words I don’t understand. Nobody understands them, including the Dark Ones. But they use ‘em. Words of somber power, traveler. Words unknown to the monks until a year previous.”

“What sort of words?” Gragelouth slowly dismounted. “I am quite facile with words.”

“Not these, mate, not these. Words like . . .” The galah struggled to remember. He was old enough, Buncan mused, that his memory was no longer his servant but a constant irksome challenge.

Squill whistled derisively. “ ‘Ell, there ain’t no bloomin’ mystery words.”

“Desoxyribonucleic acid!” the galah abruptly blurted. “Peptide chains! Molecular carbon. Heterocyclic compounds. Enzymatic cortical displacement.” He blinked.

It all sounded like nonsense to Buncan. But organized nonsense. Necromantic or not, organized nonsense could be dangerous. Maybe Clothahump could have made sense of the galah’s ravings. Buncan couldn’t, nor could Gragelouth.

“Cross-nuclear chromosomal ingestion. Forced immune system rejection repression.” Mowara was gesturing wildly with both wingtips. “They use these words to commit iniquities. To make things.”

“What ‘things’?” Buncan pressed him. “New things. Outrages. Horrors.” Even Bedarra was subdued as the bird rambled on. “New kinds of people.” Neena’s expression reflected her confusion. “How can you make new kinds o’ people?”

“By combining them. I saw them, I saw them myself.” His voice fell again. “They take a wallaby. Then they take a lynx. Tie ‘em up and put ‘em in a cauldron. Pour foul-smelling liquids over them. Then the Dark Ones come out, the monks in charge. They chant the words.” Buncan could see that the galah was all but overcome by his own memories. But the bird pressed on.

“Vapors cover that cauldron. You can’t see. The Dark Ones chant louder. Now you hear the sounds.” Again he shuddered. “The chanting fades away. So does the smoke. And that poor wallaby, and that poor lynx, they’re gone.”

“Gone?” Gragelouth swallowed.

“Gone, departed. Something in their place. Some things. One useless, dribbling and drooling, gone. The other, a combining. Legs of a wallaby, eyes of a cat. Tail of a wallaby, claws and teeth of a cat. Ugly, nasty, evil. No mind of its own anymore. Does what the Dark Ones tell it.”

“What do they do with the unsuccessful half?” Neena was unsmiling.

Mowara stared at her. “What do you think?” She didn’t push him to elaborate.

“That was a good one,” the galah insisted. “Seen worse. One head, three eyes. One body, six legs, all mixed up. Two tails. Two heads. Horrors. Lose their bodies, lose their selves. Lose their wills. Belong to the Dark Ones now. Do their will.”

“But whyT’ Buncan demanded to know. “It’s the worst thing I’ve ever heard of. To take two healthy, happy individuals and do that to them . . . it’s worse than the stories I’ve been told of the Plated Folk.”

“Sounds bloody ridiculous to me.” Squill looked bored. “Does it now?” The galah gazed up at the otter with such unexpected intensity that Squill blinked involuntarily. “Wouldn’t think so if you’d seen some of the things, some of the things I’ve seen. Mole-rats merged with gazelles. Koalas all mixed up with hawks. Numbats with fish fins.”

“But what can it all be for?” Gragelouth wanted to know.

“Not sure. Heard the Dark Ones wanted to make people more beautiful. At first. That doesn’t justify the tampering, no sir. They had some successes. Got ideas, got corrupted. Started trying to make guards and warriors, servants. Beauty can’t never compete with power.” His feathers quivered. “Destroy the results they don’t like. Can’t change ‘em back.”

“When we first questioned the disappearances, they denied knowing anything,” Wurragarr explained. “Then they insisted only criminals and maladroits were taken, or travelers who tried to break into the monastery and rob them. We stopped believing then- denials when our own young started disappearing.”

“Sham, all sham,” the galah insisted, “to cover their activities. We know them now for what they are. Been corrupted, yes they have. By the Dark Forces. Maybe too much testosterone. They use that word a lot now.”

Wurragarr indicated the anxious, determined faces gathered close. “Many of those here have lost children. They don’t even know if they’re still alive, or in their original form. But they want to find out. They have to find out.” The roo’s eyes were level with Buncan’s. “Human infants have also been taken.”

“Even if any o’ this piffle is for real,” said Squill challengingly, “what makes you think you can do anythin’ about it?”

Wurragarr’s tone didn’t change. “We will, or die trying.”

“Fair dinkum,” growled Bedarra, gripping his pike tightly.

The roo took a step back. “We won’t see any more of our cubs vanish from their beds, or disappear from our towns and farms. We won’t watch them turned into creatures their own parents wouldn’t recognize.”

“So you’re goin’ to storm mis bleedin’ monastery.” Squill glanced back at his sister. “Sound familiar, Neena?

Why does I ‘ave a feelin’ this’ll be a tougher nut to crack than a certain Baron’s walled mansion?”

“It will be difficult,” Wurragarr admitted. “The monastery is located high in the mountains, in a narrow basin. A wall protects it from the front, and the cliffs on both sides are extremely steep and difficult to scale. There are no trees above the wall, and cover is scarce. Therefore we must attack from the front. There are two springs in the basin behind the monastery itself. They can withstand a long siege.

“But there will be no siege. We all of us have trades to practice, crops to plant or bring hi, families to look after. We can’t afford to be long at this work. So we must attack and shatter the mam gate, the only gate.” He gestured with the ax. “Then we will put Kilagurri to the torch, and incinerate the evil it contains.” An inspiring cheer rose from his companions, echoing through the paperbark woods.

Buncan hesitated, uncertain how to respond. “I don’t know what to say, Wurragarr, except that we have our own priorities.”

“Bloody right we do.” Squill gazed down importantly. “We’ve come a long way, and we ain’t about to chance no dangerous detours here.”

“We’re searching for the Grand Veritable and we’ve a ways to go yet,” Buncan added.

“Tell ‘em, Bunc,” Squill said with a whistle.

“So if you want what help I can give, it’s yours.” He extended a hand.

“Right, we’ve . . .” Squill broke off, goggling at his friend. “Say that again, mate?”

“It’s what Jon-Tom would do,” Buncan explained.

Squill was beside himself. “Well, it ain’t bleedin’ wot Mudge would do!”

The roo ignored the fuming otter as he shook Duncan’s hand. “We can use every extra fist, mate. I’m sorry we misinterpreted your presence here at first.”

“No, no, you didn’t misinterpret anything’!” Squill was waving wildly, looking to his companions for support. Neena gave a little shrug and smiled beatifically.

“What about the rest of you?” Wurragarr let his gaze rove over the travelers. “The workings of the Dark Ones threaten you as much as us. If they are not stopped in our country, who knows how far then- scourge might spread? Maybe even beyond the Tamas.”

“I’m hi.” Snaugenhutt gave a little shake that set his armor to jingling lightly. “Could do with a good fight. Don’t remember too much of the last one I participated in.”

“Same here.” Viz and Mowara exchanged acknowledgments by simultaneously dipping then- beaks.

Buncan eyed the merchant. “Gragelouth?”

The sloth was reluctant to commit himself. “Squill’s observations are like a battered bowl: It leaks, but still holds truth. We should be on our way.”

“I know, but there’s greater truth in these folks’ misery. We could maybe make a difference here.” He indicated the three now abashed kookaburras. “I don’t see how we can deny them our help.”

“Ask me,” growled an indignant Squill. “I’ll show you.”

Buncan looked past him. “Neena?”

“ ‘Tis an awful lot you’re askin’, Bunkles.”

“You really think Mudge would have ridden on by?” She squirmed uncomfortably. “Don’t you want to be better than that?”

“Don’t you want to bloody well live?” Squill asked nun.

Buncan glared at his friend. “We survived Hygria. We survived the Sprilashoone and Camrioca. We saved Neena from Krasvin and crossed the Tamas in spite of the Xi-Murogg. What does that tell you, Squill?”

“That we’re temptin’ bloomin’ fate, mate.”

“Are we spellsingers or not?”

“You sure got Jon-Tom’s talent.” The otter sighed. “Why’d you ‘ave to go an’ get ‘is bleedin’ sense of duty as well?”

“I’m not going to argue with you anymore.” Buncan turned away. “You don’t have to come.”

“Cor, wot are we supposed to do?” Neena put hands on waist. “Go on by ourselves, then? Without ‘im?” She pointed at the reluctant merchant. “ ‘E’s the only one who knows the way.

“We three needs to stick together, we do. We can’t make magic without you, and you can’t make it without us.”

“I can still use my sword,” Buncan reminded her.

“You? A swordsman?” She let out a series of long whistles.

He ignored the insult. “I don’t like the circumstances either, Neena, but part of the reason I’m here is to participate in worthy adventures like this.”

“Is it now?” said Squill. “Then why’d we ‘afta come all mis blinkin’ way? You coulda got yourself killed right back ‘ome. There’s plenty o’ them in Lynchbany would do the job for free.”

“As I told you, I’m a blacksmith by trade.” Wurragarr spoke quietly. “Not a soldier. None of us are.”

“Me ‘eart bleeds for you.” Squill spat to his right, unfortunately not quite missing his foot. A hundred pairs of eyes and more watched him silently. “Oh, right then,” he muttered. “Go on, bury me in guilt. Dump it copiously. I loves it, I’m a glutton for it.” He reached back to finger his quiver. “Blacksmith, you think you can make me some more arrows?”

A broad smile creased the roo’s face. “We’ve plenty with us. You can have your pick, so long as you promise to stick them where they’ll do the most good.”

“fi-iar Dunkum, or wotever the ‘ell you said,” Squill mumbled disconsolately.

Wurragarr, Bedarra, and Mowara let Snaugenhutt lead the column as it wound its way through the forest. The path led steadily upward. Unfamiliar evergreens began to appear more and more frequently as they ascended, their branches and needles so evenly spaced one would have thought them fashioned by hand instead of grown. Higher up they could make out the first bare rock faces, naked granite devoid of any vegetation.

“We’re not afraid of the monks,” Wurragarr explained. “Only the revolting creations that do their bidding. Some are more formidable than others. We have Mowara’s description of a numbat crossed with a thylacine. I wouldn’t care to meet something like that on a black night.”

“If you and your people can handle the fighting,” Buncan told him, “maybe my friends and I can come up with a spellsong to counteract their sorcery. Based on our experiences, I think the best thing to do would be to confront them directly. That means slipping us inside. We managed that feat under similar circumstances not long ago, but we were lucky. I don’t know if we could do it again.”

The roo looked thoughtful. “Mowara’s the only one of us who knows the monastery’s interior, but he’s a flier.” He rubbed his chin as he hopped along, easily keeping pace with Snaugenhutt, his tail flicking behind him. “What about it, Mowara?”

The galah timed his shrug to Wurragarr’s bounce. “Hard to get out. Might get in. Can you sneak?”

Buncan grinned. “I’m traveling with two otters.”

“Wait just a bloody minim, mate.” Squill had been listening closely. “You want us to go inside this den o’ sorcerers an’ their offspring an’ clean ‘em out?”

Buncan looked up at the otter. “Not clean them out. Just keep them from using their necromancy against Wurragarr and his people. Confuse them, tie them down, create a diversion.”

“I liked it better when we were throwin’ Snaugenhutt around.”

The rhino glanced back and up. “Easy for you to say, otter.”

“Right. So this time all of us are to act as a diversion. Wot ‘appens if the oversize rat ‘ere an’ ‘is mates don’t make it in? By my way o’ thinkin’ that leaves us ‘appy sappy diversions ‘igh an’ dry, singin’ our bleedin’ ‘earts out.”

“You get tucked into the Dark Ones and we’ll get in,” Wurragarr assured him.

“Well, then, there’s nothin’ to worry about, is there? Wot am I goin’ on about it for? Why, there’s one thing don’t concern me already.”

“What’s that?” Wurragarr asked politely.

The otter’s reply was bitter. “I don’t own enough worth makin’ out a will for.”

“What about aerial guards?” Buncan inquired.

“According to Mowara, that shouldn’t be a problem.”

The roo hopped easily over a large boulder that Duncan had to scramble around. “They can combine an eagle with a badger, but it still won’t fly.” “Planning to attack at night?”

“Yes. We’ll strike when the moon is at its highest. Maybe we’ll catch them groggy with sleep. Even monsters have to sleep, or so I’d imagine.” He didn’t sound like he believed it, Buncan mused.

Suddenly he recalled something the roo had mentioned earlier. “You said that the cliffs surrounding Kilagurri were steep and difficult to negotiate. How’s Snaugenhutt going to climb them?”

Wurragarr looked away. “Actually, I don’t see that your large friend can. We were hoping he would help us assault the gate. Surely you can see that he’s better suited to that than alpining?”

“I hear you,” said Snaugenhutt. “Besides,” the roo added, “I’d mink you’d find it hard to slip him inside unseen, even with Mowara’s help.”

“It isn’t up to me.” Buncan looked over at the tickbird. “Viz?”

“The roo’s right, Buncan. We’ll take this gate, however strong it is. If there’s climbing to be done, you’d be better off with an elephant than ol’ Snaug here.” The rhino did not object to the conclusion.

“I, too, should remain with our newfound friends,” Gragelouth declared. The merchant was contrite. “My tribe is not designed for speed. I would not want to delay you at a critical moment.”

“Marvelous,” said Squill from atop Snaugenhutt’s back. “Anything else we need to leave behind? Our clothes maybe? Our weapons? We’re already leavin’ our bloomin’ brains.”

“Wot brains?” Neena opined. Squill turned on his sister as they embarked on their favorite pastime of trading insults.

Buncan let his gaze sweep over the valley below. In the distance the lights of a small village were just visible. He returned his attention to the mountain path. “How much farther?”

Wurragarr indicated the lightly used trail they were following. “Another day’s march. Are you still ready and willing?”

“We’re willing, anyway.” Buncan smiled.

“You won’t surprise ‘em.” Snaugenhutt maintained his steady, unvarying pace. “They’re bound to see a troop this size coming.”

“We know. Our hope is that when we just encamp outside the wall and don’t attack they’ll think we’re settling in for an extended siege. Then we’ll get into ‘em when they’re in bed. You’ve obviously had experience in these matters. What’s your opinion?”

Snaugenhutt considered. “Good a strategy as any.”

“Don’t let’s drown in optimism, wot?” Neena made a face. “Don’t it trouble no one else that this whole enterprise depends on the wiles of a senile pink parrot?”

The monastery of Kilagurri was an impressive pile of moss-covered cut masonry situated behind a massive wall of huge, square-cut stones each as big as a good-size boulder. The wall sealed off the basin containing the monastery buildings as thoroughly as a dam. A trickle of water ran from a pair of drainage pipes set in the base of the wall. Heavy iron grates prevented entrance to the pipes, and Buncan had no doubt they were watched at all times. That obvious way in was closed to them. He was not disappointed. The culverts smelled abominably.

The trail they were following continued past the main gate and ended at an impassable waterfall. Trees had been cleared in front of the wall, meaning anyone approaching would be instantly visible to those within. The only way in was through a comparatively narrow gate reinforced with iron bands and bolts the size of his fist. It was a far more impressive and forbidding structure than Buncan had anticipated. He found himself wondering if it would ever yield to Snaugenhutt.

As they spread out among the trees he could see caped figures gathering atop the wall. Wallabies, a couple of koalas, one numbat. By the light of the torches they carried he could see that regardless of species the fur had been shaved from the crown of each head. Cryptic markings decorated each naked skull.

“Hermetic tattoos.” Bedarra stood close to Duncan. “We don’t understand them.”

Occasionally the monks and acolytes atop the rampart paused to converse with one another. More torches were brought and set in empty holders, until the entire wall and the open ground below were thoroughly illuminated. Certainly there was enough light for those within the monastery to watch as the corps of common folk busied themselves setting up camp. None of Wurragarr’s people had challenged those inside, nor had the silent shapes on the wall tried to hail the interlopers establishing themselves among the trees.

“Maybe they think we are pilgrims,” Gragelouth ventured, “and are waiting for the first supplicants to present themselves at the gate.”

“We’ll present ourselves, all right.” Buncan was studying the steep slope where the mountain met the wall. “But it won’t be at the gate.”

CHAPTER 22“THIS WAY.” MOWARA WOULD VANISH INTO THE DARK-

ness, then dart back to chivvy them onward. “It’s not bad, it’s not.”

Our second nocturnal sortie, Buncan reflected as he scrambled up the increasingly steep cliff. He dared not look down. Nearby he could hear the agile but short-legged otters cursing steadily.

This, he mused darkly as he fumbled for a handhold above his head, was a smidgen more difficult than being gently set down atop the Baron Krasvin’s mansion.

The idea was to climb until they were high above the well-guarded point where the wall met the mountain, scramble forward, and then slink downslope until they were within the monastery proper. A large scaling party would doubtless have been spotted, but just the four of mem creeping slowly along might escape the notice of those within, whose attention was sure to be focused on the rowdy mob of angry farmers and townsfolk who were busily establishing camp in the woods.

“We’re high enough.” Mowara fluttered inches from Duncan’s face, pivoting in midair to gesture downward with a wingtip. “Quietly now.” Trailing in his wake, they began working their way toward the shadowy structures below. Most were dark, but lights beckoned in a few high, narrow windows. To Buncan’s relief, the slope leading into the monastery was much gentler than the one they had scaled outside. There was no sign of any guards. He hoped the monastery’s entire defense would be concentrated on the wall.

Neena kicked a rock loose and they all hunched low as it initiated a miniature avalanche. The pebbles banged and bounced noisily off one another for a minute or so before the slide petered out. Silence once more took possession of the hillside. No shouts rang out below them, no torches were waved in their direction. Buncan breathed a sigh of relief as he resumed his downward crawl.

“I can’t believe no one’s even looked up ‘ere.” Squill tried to tiptoe around the loose scree. “We’re pushin’ our luck, we are.”

“Not luck, no, not luck.” Mowara dipped and darted above their heads. “They have so much confidence in their sorcery, and in everyone else’s lack of imagination. Think they’re the only ones who can think, they do.” He allowed himself a soft derogatory squawk. “Stuff ‘em, the pongy sods.”

Buncan edged carefully around a steep drop. “Keep in mind that we don’t have wings, Mowara.”

“No worries, mate,” the aged galah cackled. “She’ll be right, she will.” He left them to scout on ahead.

Eventually he directed them to a spot where the third floor of a large stone structure impinged against the bare rock. In the light of a waxing moon, they followed the galah across the open slate roof past planters filled with sleeping blossoms of unknown type toward an arched doorway of peculiar design. As they hugged the shadows, Buncan saw that the portal was framed by numerous bas-reliefs. The subject matter set his hair on end.

A reassuring distance off to their right they could see the inside of the wall. Brawny forms dire of aspect were beginning to join the monks on the parapet. Buncan was inordinately glad he could not see their faces.

He glanced skyward. They had until first light to do what damage they could before Wurragarr’s people attacked. That assault would take place whether the infiltrating spellsinging trio succeeded or not. The country folk had come too far to turn back now.

We’d better do something, he thought grimly. They’ll never breach that wall without help. Not even with Snaugenhutt leading the charge. The question most profound was: Precisely what could they do?

Improvise, Jon-Tom had always told him. When in doubt, improvise. Almost as if in anticipation, the duar chafed and bumped against his back. He found himself wishing he had the knowledge to grasp the meaning behind the Dark Monks’ mysterious invocations.

“Softly now, groundbound friends.” Mowara settled gently on Duncan’s shoulder. “Around this first corner your first glimpse. You can decide if what is measures up to what I’ve said, you can.”

Buncan stepped through the open doorway and peered down the lamplit corridor. Mowara’s descriptions had prepared them, but words could only do so much.

Standing guard at the nearest intersection was a creature with the legs of a wallaby and the squat body of a wombat. Its profile revealed the face of a dingo in the last stages of some grisly degenerative affliction. Abortive dull green wings protruded like diseased eruptions from its shoulders. It carried a blade the size of an executioner’s sword.

‘• ‘Ow do we get past that freak?” Squill whispered.

“Leave it to me.” Neena edged to the forefront. “I’ll dazzle it with me charms an’ the rest o’ you can sneak up behind ‘it.”

“Hey, wait!” Buncan made a grab for her but was too late. She was already sauntering down the corridor as if she owned it, in full view of the wallabat and whatever else might happen to come along.

“Shit,” Squill muttered. “Get ready.”

Neena halted right in front of the guard, who gaped at her. “ ‘Ello, gorgeous. ‘Ow come you’re stuck in ‘ere when all the action’s out front?”

Yellow, bloodshot eyes narrowed as they focused on her. Its voice was tortured. “Kill,” it rumbled as it swung the oversize blade in a great descending arc.

It cracked the floor where Neena had been standing an instant earlier. “ ‘Ere now! Wot do you think I am, rough trade?”

“Kill,” snarled the abomination, lurching after her.

“So much for stunnin’ it with ‘er irresistible beauty.” Sword drawn, Squill was racing down the hallway. Buncan and Mowara had no choice but to follow.

It saw them coming and brought the blade around in a sweeping horizontal arc. Buncan stumbled to a halt, glad that the haphazard creature hadn’t been given the arms of a gibbon. Squill ducked lithely beneath the blow and drove his sword up into the ogre’s belly, while Neena struck it from behind. It let out a soft gurgle, choking on its own blood, and made a last desultory swipe at the hovering Mowara which the galah avoided easily. The blade tumbled to the floor as the guard clutched at its throat. It fell over, kicking spasmodically. The kicking slowed rapidly, and soon all was still.

The otters stood over the corpse, breathing hard. Mowara fluttered approvingly nearby. “Hope you’re as adept with your magic as you are with your swords.”

“There were only one of ‘em.” As he wiped his weapon clean on the fallen guard’s raiment, Squill grinned at his sister. “I ‘ope we don’t ‘ave to depend on your good looks to overcome anythin” else.”

“Oh, shut up,” she snapped. “It were worth a go. At least I distracted it.”

Controlling his revulsion, Buncan forced himself to examine the dead guard. “Gross. I wonder who it was originally.”

“This is but a tame example of the horrors perpetrated by the Dark Ones.” Mowara was keeping an eye on the corridor ahead. “There exists far worse.”

“Cor, now that’s encouragin’.” Squill sheathed his weapon.

In truth they were lucky. Once, a troop of unholy grotes-queries armed with huge battle-axes marched by ahead of mem and they were forced to wait in an alcove until the guards had passed to a lower level, but nothing actually impeded their progress.

“Where are you taking us?” Buncan inquired of Mowara as they cautiously started down yet anodier set of winding stone stairs.

“To me axis of all evil,” the galah replied. “So you can kill it at its source.”

Buncan found he was more eager than afraid. Whoever could deliberately pervert honest, wholesome sorcery in such an appalling fashion deserved whatever Fate bestowed on them.

Their advance continued unchallenged. Perhaps diose who would normally be patrolling these corridors were gathering on the wall to confront and intimidate Wurragarr’s people. Whatever the reason he was grateful, and remarked on their good fortune to Mowara.

“Won’t last, it won’t.” The galah was pessimistic. “The Dark Ones will realize Wurragarr ain’t going to attack right away. Then maybe they’ll think to check their backsides. Got to work fast, we do.” Abruptly he backed wind and landed on Duncan’s shoulder. “We’re close now, we are. Quiefly go.”

Buncan lowered his voice and tensed. “Close to what?”

“To the secret room. To the place where the Dark Ones plot their malignancies. The Lair of the Board.”

The galah turned into a narrow, low-ceilinged corridor. “Found diis by accident, I did. Hush now: I can hear them talking.”

“Planning their defense,” Neena opined.

“Cadet, I said,” Mowara hissed.

They slowed, and Buncan saw they were approaching a small hole in me corridor wall. Light and voices were visible on the other side. As he eased forward and caught a glimpse of what lay beyond, he sucked in his breath. It was a vision extracted whole and uncensored from the fevered imaginings of some seriously ill necromancer.

There were ten of them garnered in the chamber below. All wore the dark cowl of the Kilagurri monk, making it impossible to identify individuals. They sat around a long table of polished wood of a color and grain Buncan had never seen before. It had a sheen more suggestive of glass than honest lumber.

Strange carpeting widi a weave so tight and fine he couldn’t imagine how it had been loomed covered the floor. The cups the monks sipped from were filled with a dark, bubbling, odorless liquid. Several of diose present were scribbling on diick pads bound together at the left edge widi loops of thin metal wire.

lii the center of the table four boxes set widi glass windows faced the four points of the compass. Several dials protruded from the top of each. Wires connected mem to a much bigger box in the middle of the table, and also to small rectangular panels that rested in front of each monk. Several of the attendees were tapping hesitantly at their respective panels. Theurgically lit from within, the window boxes displayed shifting, moving images that appeared to respond to the seemingly random tappings of the monks. The master box in the middle whined softly, like a live thing.

As Buncan stared a beautiful female possum entered, tail elaborately wound widi green ribbon and held high. Squill whistled softly, inducing his sister to jab him in the ribs. From a ceramic carafe balanced on a tray the servant refilled the monks’ cups with more of the steaming dark liquid. They took no notice of her presence.

“Wot sort o’ sorceral potion is dial?” Neena murmured.

“I’ve heard them speak of it.” Mowara craned his neck for a better view. “From what I’ve been able to observe, they’re all addicted to it. It alters them in strange and subtle ways. They call it ‘coffee’ and believe it bestows on them special powers, diough I’ve no proof of dial. Maybe it’s some kind of collective ritual delusion whose social function is of paramount importance. See?”

As they looked on, the assembled monks raised their cups in unison and mumbled some sort of hypnotic chant, of which Buncan caught only the solemnly intoned words “Brighten your day” and the meaningless “caffeine.” Following mis brief ceremony they returned to their conferencing. Try as he might, Buonferencing. Try as he might, Buen-collective demeanor as a result of consuming the liquid. Any glow or enhancement they felt must be wholly internal.

The windowed boxes were something else, something tangible. He wondered at the complexity and staying power of the spell that caused the images displayed therein to change so rapidly. Often two or more of the monks would put their heads together and whisper furiously before tapping on the knobby panels. The unnatural activity raised prickles on his spine.

Listening intently, he thought he could make out some of the sorceral terms Mowara had mentioned during their first meeting, words like “haploid dispersion” and “mitochondria! enhancement.” There was frequent mention of the long necromantic term desoxyribonucleic acid.

“They’re concocting some great misfortune to throw against Wurragarr,” Mowara whispered. “We have to stop mem, we do. This all has to do with implementing the corporate plan.”

Buncan frowned. “ ‘Corporate plan’? What’s that?”

“I’ve heard them speak of it often. It’s the foundation of their sorcery, me framework for all the iniquity they work.”

Squill made a face. “Sounds like somethin’ that should be stepped on to me.”

“ ‘As a cold sound to it, it does.” Neena’s whiskers twitched involuntarily.

“You were right, Mowara.” Buncan rolled the shoulder the galah was perched on, trying to keep the muscles loose. “This evil does extend beyond your country. It needs to be stopped here, now, before it can grow and infect other parts of the world. Or even other worlds,” he added, mindful of Jon-Tom’s place of origin.

“Don’t want no bloody corporate plan pollutin’ the Bellwoods,” Squill muttered darkly. “Wotever it is.”

“Look, they’re doin’ somethin’.” Neena nodded toward the opening.

The monks were rising from their oddly upholstered chairs. The window boxes had gone blank, their glass faces now dark and imageless.

Raising a hand for silence, the figure standing at the head of the table solemnly addressed his colleagues. His words were clearly audible to the quartet huddled in the narrow corridor.

“We shall now vote.”

At that command they all threw back then- hoods and stood revealed in the steady lamplight as representatives of the same tribe, though many individual clans were represented.

Hares, Buncan realized. They were all hares.

“Why hares?” he found himself whispering aloud. “Why should they be the Dark Ones, the dabblers in evil? Why them?”

“I know. I know because I’ve listened to them rage, because I’ve watched their frenzies, I have.” Mowara’s beak was close by Buncan’s ear. “It’s because they’re sick of being thought of as cute and harmless. Ten thousand years and more of accumulated resentment has pushed this lot over the edge, it has. They’re tired of being cuddled and stroked by everyone else. It’s respect they want, and they ami to get it through sorcery.”

Puzzlement mottled Neena’s expression. “But they are cute and cuddly. ‘Tis the way they were designed. They can’t ‘elp it, the bloody fools. Would they rather be like the skunk tribe, wot nobody wants to get near? Wot’s wrong with this lot?”

“I told you,” Mowara whispered. “They’re so mad they’ve gone bad. Collective self-loathing. I think it’s one reason why they’re so set on creating new creatures, I do. Twisting and warping reality. Their anger has driven them insane.”

Buncan found himself staring at the nominal leader of the ten. His fur was predominantly dark brown, with white, unhealthy-looking splotches. With his wild eyes and buck-teeth that had been filed to sharp points, he looked anything but cute and cuddly.

“We will throw the blasphemers back!” he was declaiming.

“Fling them over the falls!” another added enthusiastically.

“This, too, can be incorporated into the Plan.” The leader ran a finger along the edge of the strange table. “Once this band of simple villagers has been defeated, there will be none to stand against us in the mountains. We can make servants and slaves of those who survive, and use them as the base for our planned corporate expansion. Mergers and takeovers can then proceed apace.” He let his gaze rove over his followers. “All those in favor?”

“Aye!” the chorus of acolytes resounded.

The leader nodded his approval. “See that it is so recorded in the minutes.” Lifting both hands, he tilted back his head and closed his eyes. His colleagues did likewise as he intoned The Words.“Stock manipulation. Insider trading. Currency exchange”

The room grew dark save for a singular greenish glow which seemed to emanate from the ceiling. The assembled monks murmured softly to themselves.

“They’ve certainly tapped in to something,” Duncan whispered. “Some kind of gloom-laden power I’ve never encountered before.” He wished silently that Clothahump were there.

Mowara shifted nervously from foot to foot on Buncan’s shoulder. “That’s Droww doing the invoking. He’s the biggest fanatic of the lot.”

The chanting rose in volume and the greenish glow intensified, until with a triumphant shout of “Leveraged hostile buyout!” the assembled monks vanished in a cloud of bilious smoke.

Buncan exhaled slowly. “That’s very impressive.”

“Where’ve they got to?” Neena wanted to know.

“Not far, not far, if experience is an indicator.” Mowara shifted to Buncan’s other shoulder. “To the Vault is my guess, it is, to prepare some special poison. Come, and we’ll find them.” Spreading aged but still competent wings, he fluttered off back up the corridor.

They had to avoid a single, pitiful guard: a transformed sugar glider whose wings hung about her in tatters. A prehensile tongue dangled from the misshapen head of what had once been a graceful gazelle. The sight turned Buncan’s stomach.

“Tread softly here.” Mowara settled once more onto Buncan’s shoulder. “This is the kitchen where decay is prepared.”

The corridor opened onto a vast chamber dominated by a lofty bowl-shaped ceiling. Lamps glowed in holders set high on stone walls. They stood on an upper floor looking down into a circular pit within which slablike tables and numerous cages were visible. The tables held much elaborate thauraa-turgical apparatus fashioned of glass and metal.

Buncan recognized the monks from the Board room. Hoods back, they were bustling about the exotic apparatus and cages, mixing fluids and measuring powders. Droww stood at an intricately inscribed wooden pulpit which supported a huge, open book. There was also a knobbed panel attached to its own small window. This pulsed with light and unseen schematics. The leader of the Kilagurri monks gripped the sides of the podium while watching his faithful at work.

“There, in the back.” Neena gestured insistently at the far side of the pit. “By the Black River itself!”

Buncan let his gaze follow her lead. She was pointing at the last row of stacked cages. These held not deformed monstrosities, not unfortunate travelers, but cubs: the young of numerous tribes. Even at a distance he could make out an infant flying fox and immature osprey huddled fearfully together. Both their wings had been clipped to forestall any chance of their flying to freedom.

Other cages held juvenile roos and platys, possums and tiger cats, dingoes and koalas, along with equally disconsolate representatives of outlying tribes such as small felines, rodents, a black bear cub, and an especially wretched sifaka. It was a panorama of collective misery heartbreaking to see, and for the first time he was glad as well as proud to have offered his help to Wurragarr’s band.

There were also two human children crammed into a cage too small for them to stand up in. While he wasn’t and never had been a tribal chauvinist, their plight still affected him more powerfully than that of any of the other captives. That was only to be expected, he thought.

An angry knot formed in his stomach. At that moment the wizard Droww and his fellow hares did not look in the least bit cute or cuddly.

Though he knew sorcery was involved, the mechanics of the physical intermelding baffled him. Aside from wondering why anyone would want to, how could you combine the characteristics of a human child and a flying fox or wallaby? He couldn’t shake loose of the question as his gaze shifted to the abominations jammed into some of the other cages.

“What you doing here?”

Whirling, Buncan saw exactly the sort of brute he feared.

Except for the protruding, black-tipped snout it had the face and arms of a young human, but the remainder of the body was wholly roo. Enormous, oversize feet, stout lower body tapering to a narrower chest, powerful tail, high leathery ears; all reminded him more of Wurragarr than his own tribe. The creature regarded them belligerently, a large club easily balanced in both hands, light chain mail hanging from the smooth shoulders.

“Get ‘im!” yelled Squill without hesitation. He and Neena were on top of the creature instantly. Buncan was right behind them as Mowara darted back and forth overhead, whistling encouragement.

Buncan wrenched the club out of the creature’s grasp while avoiding a kick that if it had connected would have taken his head off. The rooman fought back as best it could, but was no match for the combination of Buncan’s strength and the otter’s agility. In moments they had it pinned on its side. Neena’s face burned where she’d caught a glancing blow from the muscular, madly flailing tail, but otherwise they were all three unharmed. Straddling the prone neck, Squill raised his sword.

“Go ahead; kill me,” the rooman mumbled.

Frowning, Buncan raised a hand to block the otter’s blow. “Wait.”

“Wait?” Squill pushed his hat back on his forehead. “Wot the ‘ell d’you mean, ‘wait’? ‘E’ll give the bleedin’ alarm.”

The trapped creature gazed up out of limpid blue eyes. “Please, just kill me. I want die.” To everyone’s astonishment, the grotesque entity began to cry. Now even the notoriously unempathetic Squill found himself hesitating.

“Go on,” it sobbed. “What wait for? Finish.” The eyes closed.

Squill hadn’t lowered the sword. “The ugly blighter’s tryin’ some sort o’ bloomin’ trick, ‘e is.”

“I don’t think so.” Rising, Buncan eased Squill gentry but firmly aside. The otter backed off reluctantly.

Given the chance to rise and flee, the rooman didn’t move. It just lay there bawling softly like any abandoned kid. “Make quick. Fast, before Dark Ones see what happening.”

Buncan looked toward the busy pit, then back to their captive. “They can’t see over here. We won’t let mem hurt you.”

“Can’t prevent.” The rooman’s sobs faded to sniffles, and he squinted up at Buncan. “Who you people, anyway?” Twisting his malformed head, he met first Squill’s gaze, then Neena’s. “You not from around here.”

“No, we’re not.” Buncan retreated a step, giving the creature some room. “We come from a land far to the southeast, farmer than you can imagine.”

Gingerly, the rooman sat up. “Why? What you do here?” He gestured at Mowara as the galah landed on Buncan’s shoulder. “You kind I know. You from here.”

“Damn right I am, mate,” said the bird huskily. “What we ‘do here’ is gonna put an end to these monks and their monkeying once and for all.”

The rooman’s eyes widened. “Cannot do. Cannot challenge the Dark Ones. Will destroy you. They draw strengdi from other worlds. Too powerful now.” He looked around anxiously. “You go now, before they see. I not tell. Not!”

“We saw them at work.” Buncan spoke patiendy, soodiingly, trying to calm the panicky creature. “They’re powerful, but it’s only sorcery.”

“Only sorcery!” The rooman rose, and Squill immediately pressed the point of his sword against the poor creature’s ribs. It gazed at him sorrowfully.

“Not tell,” he reiterated.

The otter glanced at Buncan, who nodded slowly. Squill backed off, but not far. His sister hung close on the other side.

“We’re spellsingers,” Duncan explained. “We’ve come with Mowara here, the warrior Wurragarr, and many others to try and put a stop to what these Dark Ones have been doing.”

“Oi. We were just passin’ through with notnin’ else t’do.” Squill’s tone was caustic.

The rooman studied each of them in turn, still unwilling or unable to believe. “You sorcerers too? You fight Dark Ones?”

“That’s right,” Buncan told him.

“Must do this!” The creature spoke with such sudden violence that Buncan was taken aback. “Must stop them now, or they take over whole world. Everyplace and everyone and everything. Stop them now!”

“That’s what we aim to do, mate.” Mowara fluffed his feathers.

“Their style of sorcery is new to us,” Buncan noted, “but it is only sorcery. As the great wizard Clothahump has said, ‘Any magic which can be propounded can be countered.’ “ Neena gave him a sideways glance, and he looked slightly embarrassed.

The rooman’s human fingers worked nervously against one another while the thick tail switched back and forth. “Been here long time. Sometimes I listen, learn things. Not so dumb. Not! Droww first to make hateful breakthrough and learn words of corruption. First makes plan, then recruits others. Starts small, with bugs. Puts wings of one on body of other. Fish next.

“I remember when both my turn. Originally two me. Now one you see. Other. .throw away.” His voice was momentarily choked. “Not sure which me, me. Not sure which throw away. Me lucky. Many times both throw away. Sometimes make things hard even for Dark Ones to look at. Much screaming.” He was silent for a long moment.

“Me ‘success.’“ The word was uttered with enough sarcasm to cut oak. “Must serve Dark Ones, all monks. Only life. Rather be dead. Not so easy to be dead. Forget things.”

“What’s your name?” Buncan asked as gently as possible.

Tortured blue eyes gazed back into bis. “Name dead too.”

“Well, then, what do they call you?”

“Cilm. Maybe original name of one of two that I was. Maybe not. Matters not.” It turned hopeful. “Kill me now?”

“We’re not going to kill you,” Buncan declared firmly. “I can’t do it.”

Squill lowered his sword. “Bloody ‘ell, I can’t do it neither. That’s a first.”

“You’re not responsible for . . . what you are,” Buncan continued. “We don’t want to hurt you or any of your friends.”

“Have no friends.” Cilm managed a feeble shrug of his half-human, half-roo shoulders. “None here friend to another. Each our own private horrors.”

Buncan nodded as if he understood. “Then help us. I’m asking you to be our friend. Help us to make an end to this.”

The rooman looked doubtful. “Dark Ones have so much power.”

“You ain’t ‘eard our power, guv. Wait ‘til you ‘ear wot we can do.”

“Will you help us?” Buncan tried to be insistent without being overbearing.

Clearly resistance was not a concept with which the rooman was conversant. “I not sure. Not . . . know. You not see what Dark Ones do to any who dare fight back.” He quivered all over. “Not want to see.”

“We can take care of ourselves,” Neena assured him with a confidence she didn’t entirely feel.

Still the creature hesitated. Then roo ears flicked forward, suddenly alert. “Cilm help. But only if you promise one thing.”

“What’s that?” Buncan asked curiously.

“If we losing, you will kill me.”

Buncan swallowed hard. This was very different from Neena’s gallant rescue. There was no glory to be had; only something that needed to be done. He felt no exhilaration, no feeling of anticipation. Only a grim sense of determination.

“All right,” he heard himself mutter. It sounded like someone else.

Cilm nodded understandingly. “Must be strong. I beautiful compared to what you will see. Must destroy devices, potions, powders, everything. No more experiments. No more sorcery. No more me’s.”

Duncan peered down into the pit. “We have friends outside. A small army. They’re going to attack Kilagurri just before daybreak. When they hit the wall, that’s when we should make our move.”

“Too right,” Squill murmured by way of agreement.

“Is there a place we can hide ‘til then?” Neena inquired.

The rooman considered, then beckoned for them to follow. “Storage place near here. Little used. Window high up. You come.”

CHAPTER 23

Despite his determination to stay awake, Buncan found himself dozing on and off. His intermittent sleep was filled with fractured dreams populated by broken bodies. As soon as one would come together properly it would fall, tumbling over and over, to shatter like glass against the red rocks of the Tamas. Each tune he would awaken, only to drift off again.

Finally he awoke to an enclosure that was perceptibly brighter. And no longer silent. A distant clamor could be heard through the single high window. He shook Mowara awake, then Squill. Neena was already alert, conversing softly with Cilm. Following his lead, they moved back out into the corridor.

A hooded monjon was hopping just ahead of them. They trailed a safe distance behind, halting at the overlook as the small marsupial continued down into the busy pit. The Dark Ones were conversing anxiously with one another, their voices louder and considerably more agitated man they’d been earlier. As the travelers watched in silence they left in groups of two or three through the main doorway, until the chamber was deserted save for those who were unable to flee.

“Now.” Cilm rose from his crouch and took a long bound toward the nearest stairs. “Before they come back.”

Down on the floor of the pit Buncan found himself surrounded by tables laden with arcane apparatus. Sleepy moans emanated from the stacked cages. Tilting back his head enabled him to see the elaborately painted symbols stenciled on the curvilinear ceiling. Despite the rising sun, it was still dark inside. He found himself longing suddenly for the lucid, unpolluted air of the woods; any woods.

On the table in front of him were several constructions that looked like children’s toys: unrecognizable shapes consisting of small balls connected together by sticks, globes that split into other globes. Notepads were filled with peculiar hieroglyphics.

A crash sounded off to his right, followed quickly by another. The otters had started hi, dumping fluids and powders onto the floor and smashing their containers. Taking out his sword, he began flailing methodically at the toy-models, reducing them to fragments.

At Droww’s vacant pulpit he found himself staring at the blank window box. Though he put his face right up against the glass, he couldn’t see anything inside. It was an unpenetrable, opaque gray. He tapped on the connected panel, but nothing happened. Being ignorant of the requisite magic, he was neither surprised nor particularly disappointed when his fingering failed to enlighten him.

The important thing was to ensure that it could no longer enlighten the Dark Ones. Removing it from its resting place, he raised it high overhead and slammed it to the floor. The shell cracked like an egg, spewing bits and pieces of wire and plastic. With his sword Buncan hacked at the remains, reducing them beyond hope of repair.

Whooping and hollering with delight, Squill and Neena were smashing their way through the surviving apparatus.

Mowara helped where he could, but Cilm was unable to overcome his conditioning. He stood off to one side, not lending a hand. But he observed it all, and his eyes shone.

Powders and fluids mixed on the stone floor, occasionally forming hissing, bubbling patches which Buncan and his friends in their deliberate vandalism were careful to avoid. By now the first uncertain queries were being voiced by the bastard inhabitants of the cages. Buncan wanted badly to release them, but knew the contrivances of the Dark Ones had to be attended to first.

He wondered how Wurragarr and his people were doing outside, not to mention Viz and Snaugenhutt.

The knobby panel was fashioned of some particularly tough material. Putting up his sword, he picked up the rectangle and slammed it repeatedly against a wall until not a knob was left connected to the panel itself. Then he stood on the rectangle and tugged until it snapped in half. He threw the two pieces in opposite directions, looked around, and paused.

“Where’s Squill?”

Panting heavily, Neena relaxed her sword arm. She was surrounded by debris. Mowara stood on a table that had been cleared of equipment.

“Don’t know.” The galah sounded concerned.

Neena flicked her head in the direction of the far stairway. “Said not to worry. Said ‘e ‘ad a bit o’ an errand to run. See, there ‘e is now.”

Turning, Buncan saw the otter standing at the top of the stone staircase. In his short arms he held the critical metal box from the Dark Ones’ conference chamber.

“Wouldn’t want to leave an’ forget this.” Smiling, he heaved the heavy container into the air. It slammed into the stone stairs and tumbled toward the floor of the pit.

To their astonishment, it screamed as it bounced.

“Leave me alone! Don’t come near me! Unauthorized access, unauthorized access!” The words were clearly audible above the metallic whangs and bangs as the box bounced down the stairs.

When it finally rolled to a stop, Buncan moved toward it.

Instantly it rose up on four tiny rubber feet and tried to skitter away from him.

“Don’t touch me! You have not been properly formatted.” The words issued from one of a trio of tiny slots in the box’s front. All three were jabbering away simultaneously.

“C drive inactive, C drive inactive . . . Unauthorized access attempted. .Insert a properly formatted diskette Entry refused, entry refused”

“Is that so?” After overcoming his initial surprise, Squill had trailed the protesting contraption down the stairs. Now he deliberately thrust the point of his short sword into the most vociferous of the complaining slots.

He was rewarded with a grinding, whirring sound. The entire sword began to vibrate. So did his arm. When he tried to yank the weapon free the slot clamped down hard on the blade. Drool dripped from the other slots, and Buncan thought he could see tiny teeth lining the interiors.

“Wipe intruder, wipe intruder!” piped one of the free slots.

“You ain’t wipin’ notnin’, you bloody hunk o’ accursed tin!” With both hands Squill managed to wrench his weapon free. Raising it high overhead, he began flailing away enthusiastically at the frantic container. Still screeching incomprehensible insults and occasional comprehensible threats, it tried to dodge and, failing that, to bite its tormentor, but was no match for the active otter.

On the other hand, its metal skin was uncommonly tough, and Squill’s best efforts succeeded only in denting the smooth surface.

“See the damned thing.” Mowara hovered just above Buncan. “Sorcery that complains.”

“Let me.” Cilm took a flying leap and landed on the box with both huge feet. His weight failed to faze it.

A commotion on the level above drew Buncan’s attention. “We’re discovered. We’ve got to finish here and get out.” Working alongside Neena, he concentrated on smashing the last of the intact gear. With Cilm’s help they were able to upend the largest of the worktables. What remained of the delicate equipment it held went crashing to the floor. Still not satisfied, he took his sword to the fragments while Squill continued to duel with the jabbering box.

“Rebooting required, rebooting required!” As it hobbled toward the stairway from which it had made its ignominious entrance, Squill leaped on its back in an effort to restrain it. Like that of some squat, squarish turtle, its internal mass was sufficient to haul him upward.

“Gimme a ‘and ‘ere, mates!” he bawled as he clung to the slick metal surface. “ Tis tryin’ to get away!”

“Hold it, Squill!” Searching through the rubble, Buncan found an intact bottle three-quarters full of some pale yellow liquid. Racing up the stairs, he joined Squill in forcibly tilting the box onto its back. Rubbery feet kicked at the air, seeking purchase.

“Unauthorized entry, unauthorized entry!”

While the otter did his best to hold the box steady, Buncan poured the bottle’s contents into the largest and loudest of the three mouths. When it was empty he stepped back. A moment later Squill let go.

The box staggered up another two stairs, then stopped and began trembling violently. A distinct gargling noise came from all three slots. This was followed by mechanical retching noises and the regurgitation of several small bits of plastic. One mouth gasped feebly.

“Blind, I’m blind! Where’s the See-prompt? I can’t find the See-prompt. Maledictions on you all! Abort, reentry, fail. Abort, reentry . . . fail . . .”

With a final shudder it seemed to settle down on its tiny feet. Then it rolled over and bounced back down the stairs, to lie silent and unmoving at their base. Descending to stand alongside, a wary Squill nudged it with a foot, glanced over at Buncan. Both human and otter were breathing hard.

“I think it’s dead, mate.”

Buncan nodded, turned to look upward. The commotion he’d detected was growing louder. “Someone’s coming. Mowara?”

The galah flew toward the ceiling, called anxiously down to them. “They come! The Dark Ones come! Beware and be ready!”

A hand touched Buncan’s arm and he forced himself not to pull away from its tormented owner. “Remember promise,” Cilm said softly.

“I’m not killing anyone. Not yet.” Sheathing his sword.

he brought the duar around in front of him. “Squill, Neena!” The three of them put their heads together and in low tones began to rehearse possible defenses, while Mowara squawked and circled overhead. Left to himself, Cilm ripped and tore at the innards of the unmoving box until they lay strewn all over the floor.

“Who dares!” came a bellow of outrage from above.

“They have destroyed the oracle!” Judging from his tone, the second speaker was more frightened than angry.

Hooded figures were gathering on the level above the pit. Buncan was gratified to see that they carried not cryptic sorceral implements but ordinary weapons: swords and knives.

“Get ready,” he murmured to his companions. They formed a tight little knot off by themselves.

“Kill them, kill mem!” Beginning softly with one of the figures, the chant grew quickly in strength and volume.

The tallest of the hooded ones stepped to the edge of the stairs and shoved back his cowl. Eyes burning, ears twitching, Droww glowered ferociously down at them.

“You will be most agonizingly dismembered, and then I will have the pleasure of transmuting your genes!” His glare was pitiless. The threat had little effect on Buncan, since except for the part about dismembering he didn’t have the vaguest idea what the wizard was talking about.

“By the power of the All-Splicing Mage, by the haploid dissolution. By the fecundity of my kind and the fevered twists of their DNA, I call upon the Great Master of Selective Breeding to make an example most hideous of these blasphemers!” Raising his hands toward the ceiling, he began a new chant that was quickly picked up by his followers.

A dark glowing mass formed at the base of the stairs. Low, reverberant grunts and growls began to issue from within.

“Steady,” Buncan urged his companions, his fingers taut on the strings of the duar.

Something was moving within the bloodred cloud. As it began to dissipate, a hulking shape half as big as Snaugenhutt emerged. Sloping, hunched shoulders were clad in a studded leather vest. Its short, fluffy tail had been transformed into a nest of spikes, as had the crest that ran down its back. Both ears were ragged and torn, and long fangs hung from the upper lip. One hand dragged an immense wooden mallet along the floor.

“Carrot!” it rumbled.

“No, no!” Above, Droww was forced to interrupt his chant and point at Buncan and the otters. “Rend, tear, immobilize!”

The massive figure blinked uncertainly. “Carrot?”

“Carrot later!” a dyspeptic Droww bellowed. “Rend first!”

Heavy-lidded eyes focused on the unmoving trio. Lofting the mallet in both hands, the mutated hare lurched forward and swung.

Buncan began to play even as he leaped to his right, the otters scattering in the other direction. The head of the mallet dimpled the floor where they’d been standing.

“Hey, gruesome, over ‘ere!” From beneath a still-intact table Squill made a face at the apparition, which brought the mallet around and down with a prodigious grunt, reducing the wooden platform to splinters. Squill had long since scrambled to safety.Droww wrung his hands helplessly. “No, no! Be carefitll”

This request evidently involving elements of subtlety far too fine for the ungainly executioner to comprehend, it paused to blink dumbly up at its master. “Rend careful?”

The delay allowed Buncan and his friends time to regroup. Despite being winded, the otters harmonized splendidly and without hesitation.

“This no place to Ignore a dare

Callin’ up this thing’s ‘ardly fair

But that’s all right, ‘cause we got rap to spare

If you won’t fight straight, we won’t fight square

Beware

Up there

Better have a care

Better watch your hare

‘Cause our fresh hip-hop’s

Gonna fix your lop _

An’ your magic ensnare.”

Silvery fog enveloped the mallet-wielding monster. Halting in midswing, it let out a mammoth sneeze (evidently the enchanted mist was ticklish) and, despite the by now somewhat desperate chanting of the Dark Ones, began to shrink. Fangs diminished, feet contracted, head and body dwindled. Only the ears remained resolutely unchanged.

The brute continued to reduce until there stood in its place a diminutive rabbit no larger than Mowara, with ungainly ears that went all over the place. A representative of the lop clan, Buncan thought with a smile as he relaxed his fingers, to end all lops.

Despite the transformation, it still made an effort to comply with its original directive. “Rend!” it declaimed in a high, squeaky voice as it brought its equally shrunken mallet down on Squill’s foot.

The otter let out a yelp and danced clear. “You bloody little . . . I’ll tie you up in your own ears an’ use you for a bleedin’ yo-yo!”

“Enough!” The raging Droww flung his arms wide. The other Dark Ones drew away from him.

“ ‘Ear that?” Neena prompted him. Straining, Buncan could make out the sounds of fighting somewhere outside the chamber. He smiled. With the Dark Ones diverted, it sounded like Wurragarr and his people had managed to breach the gate. If they were inside the wall, it was only a matter of time.

“It’s over!” he shouted up at the aggrieved hare. “You’re finished, Droww. Even as we stand here, our friends are busy cleansing this monastery.”

“Except for you,” Neena added pleasantly. “You’re too bloomin’ ugly to cleanse.”

“You slew the oracle.” Droww’s voice was a tormented snarl. “You have destroyed knowledge. Do you know what that means?”

“Yeah, we know what it means.” Buncan gave the inert, disemboweled box a kick, and it rattled hollowly. “It means you’ll never again be able to use it to foist your perversions on innocent people.”

“Perhaps not, but while the knowledge-giver has been slain, the knowledge it has already given remains with us.”

He spread his aims to encompass the pit. “All this, yea, even all this, can with time be replaced.” He glanced to his left. “We can begin anew, Brothers.” A murmur arose from the other Dark Ones as they waited to see what their mentor would do.

He returned his gaze to Buncan and his companions. “But first,” he hissed, “we must deal finally and irrevocably with these intruders. Then we will take care of those pathetic country folk outside.” The wizard straightened. “You spellsing impressively.”

“Cor, we ain’t ‘ardly worked up a sweat, guv. Colloquially speakin’, that is.” Though Neena knew she was physically incapable of perspiring, she’d often wished she could sample the sensation.

“I tire.” Droww let out a measured sigh. “So much to do, so many distractions. It is hard to contemplate greatness when one is always tired.”

“It’s even ‘arder when you’re dead.” Squill fingered his sword as he favored the wizard with a friendly grin, whiskers arching.

“An observation full of truth, water rat, and one which applies equally to the mundane.” Turning to the acolyte on his immediate left, he murmured, “Release the Berserker.”“The Berserker?” the hooded one stammered. “But great Droww—”

“Release it, I say!” He gave the hesitant hare a violent shove. “I will establish control.”

Hearing a moan, Buncan turned to see the rooman backed up against the wall. “What’s this ‘Berserker,’ friend Cilm?” But this time their ally was unable to reply.

An instant later the chamber echoed to the sound of wood splintering as a mighty physique came smashing through an upper-level door. Fragments of wood spilled over into the pit. Buncan waved away sawdust and tried to focus.

A much smaller shape came gliding rapidly toward him. “Viz!” On the level above, Buncan could see Snaugenhutt peering down at them, a satisfied smile on his homely face. Bits of door teetered on his broad back and his armor was badly dented, but he appeared otherwise unharmed. In his wake the sounds of fighting doubled in volume.

“We’re through,” declared the tickbird, hovering overhead. “They’re giving up all over the monastery.”

Buncan turned to stare back up at the master of the Dark Ones. “It’s all over, Droww. The ‘simple’ folk you despise have overcome your creations. Make it easy on yourself and surrender now.”

Droww appeared not the least concerned. The wizard was looking not at him but to his right, toward the dark portal that sealed off the far end of the pit.

“Not only is it not ‘over,’ human cub, it has not yet begun. Your immature mind is not capable of envisioning the end product of informed and inspired genetic manipulation. Indeed, you are not even aware of the forces of which I speak. It therefore falls to me to enlighten you. Pay close attention. It is the last thing you will ever learn.” His laugh was like a rotting jellyfish: soft, unpleasant, redolent of decay.

“When you have been dismembered, it will be my pleasure to recombine you. I will fashion from your remains several simpering, crawling things, the lowest of the low. You will live in constant pain, begging for death, an example to any and all who would dare consider defying the sanctity of Kilagurri.”

Squill pointedly blew his nose into a sheaf of papers he’d picked off the floor. “That’s quite a speech, guv, but it ain’t relevant, ‘cause you’re gonna be ‘eadless real soon now.” Gripping his sword tightly, he started toward the stairs.

A distant rumble made him stop.

Everyone looked curiously, uncertainly, toward the shuttered portal that was now the focus of the wizard’s attention. Suddenly a high-pitched shriek that scraped the upper limits of audibility echoed from behind the opaque barrier.

Buncan shivered in spite of himself. Nothing screamed quite like a dying rabbit.

Droww pushed out his lower lip. “Pity. It would seem that in the course of carrying out his duties Brother Jeurrat did not move quite quickly enough.”

It wasn’t so much a rumbling, Buncan thought restively, a’ a ponderous heavy breathing that was coming nearer and nearer. He thought of the bellows constantly at work at the Lynchbany Smithy’s. No cheery, animated sparks accompanied the approach of this sound. It resonated with prodigious threat.

Neena glanced at him. “Duncan?” The seriousness of the situation was reflected in her calling him by his real name.

He kept staring at the blocked portal, mesmerized by something he could only sense. “I don’t know. Something big.”

Droww held his ground, but his colleagues commenced a slow retreat, murmuring nervously among themselves.

“Something wrong, spellsinger? Come, give us a tune! Something jaunty and brisk. Have you never crooned a Berserker before? Is not music supposed to soothe?” His arms and hands were jerking about, tracing edgy spirals in the air.

As Wurragarr’s people pressed their offensive deeper into the confines of the monastery, the constant buzz of hand-to-hand combat in Buncan’s ears diminished but did not cease. He knew now that was only an echo of a sideshow. The outcome of the entire undertaking would be decided any minute, here in the ruins of the monks’ laboratory. Mowara and Viz looked down from above, while Snaugenhutt paced fretfully on the upper level. Cilm was nowhere to be seen, the rooman having fled precipitously. Otter to the left of him, otter to the right of him, Buncan waited for whatever was coming.

And something was coming. Of that there was no doubt.

It did not crash through the heavy barrier, nor smash it violently aside. It simply bit through the gate as if it were fashioned of paper instead of iron-barred timbers, then contemptuously spat the crumpled wood and metal aside.

Buncan considered the apparition. It was not quite as big as Snaugenhutt. Its aspect, however, was enough to strike terror into the hearts of heroes yet unborn.

Great muscles bunched like skin-wrapped boulders beneath the humped shoulders. Two sets of widely spaced, sharp-pointed horns protruded from atop the skull: one facing forward, the other inclined forward and up as if standing ready to reinforce the murderous effects of the other pair. Except for its excessive muscularity, the rest of the body was unceremoniously ungulate: umber-hued short-haired coat, tufted tail, four legs terminating in cloven hooves. Only the head seemed grafted and greatly enlarged. It was that of a highly specialized canine grown to obscene proportions. Docked to those massive shoulders, it appeared neckless. Bulging red eyes sweating damp murder sought quarry, while the powerful jaws worked spittle from thick lips. From the hidden throat came an abyssal, squalid gurgling as if the creature were masticating a cud consisting of the tormented remnants of previously consumed souls.

Of all the corrupt crossbreedings and odious recombinants the Dark Ones had brought forth, of all their vile manipulations and stirrings of Nature’s most personal and private depths, this was their monument most foul. Body of a mammoth steer, skull of the most relentless of fighting canines. Teeth and horn, jaw and hoof.

The pit bull-bull shook its head and spat out a sticky iron bolt. Buncan heard it go ping as it ricocheted off the stone floor. Then it glanced up, searching, until it fastened on the long-eared figure of Droww. The intimidating skull dipped respectfully.

“Master, thy servant awaits.”

Droww looked quite pleased. But his finger quivered as he pointed. “Tear ‘em up . . .but not beyond hope of restitching.”

The skull rose and turned. A humorless smile split the timber-crunching jaws. “With pleasure, Master. It is what I love to do.” It started toward the opposing staircase.

Buncan and the otters were already retreating, scrambling up the wide stone steps. As he ascended, Buncan was once again unlimbering the duar.

“C’mon, guys. A song, some lyrics; let’s get with it!”

“Wot d’you think I’m doin’, Buckles?” Neena glared at him.

Droww was laughing delightedly to himself, his acolytes having by this time retreated to a far corner. There they huddled fearfully, their eyes panicky beneath their hoods.

“No song will save you now, young tunesmiths. Nothing will save you now! No power on or off the earth can stop the Berserker!”

“Maybe not, but I’m about to give it one hell of a try!” By the time the monster mounted the final step, Snaugenhutt had mustered an impressive head of steam.

He plowed into the surprised pit bull-bull with tremendous force. The creature stumbled and slid backward several steps. Then it gathered itself, eyes raging, and lunged with incredible jaws agape.

Displaying unexpected agility, Snaugenhutt dodged. Unnatural horns dipped and shoved. The points did not penetrate the rhino’s thick skin, but the muscles behind that stabbing blow could not be resisted. Snaugenhutt’s feet scrabbled for purchase at the edge of the level overlooking the pit. With a twist of its great head, the pit bull-bull actually lifted the rhino off the floor and tossed him to his right. The distance was short, but it was enough to send the helpless Snaugenhutt over the side.

With a sound like two symphonies colliding at high speed, the rhino struck the floor of the pit. The concussion sent bits of armor flying in all directions. He lay there on his side, kicking convulsively.

“Snaugenhutt, Snaug! Get up, load! Quit treading air!” Beating atmosphere, the tickbird tried to rouse his companion. “Viz, look out!” Buncan yelled frantically. With a loud whump! immense jaws slammed shut as the pit bull-bull snapped downward. The monster bit only air as Viz darted neatly aside and continued to beseech his fallen friend.

“Come on, move it! You ain’t dead. Quit acting like it. We need you.”

Snaugenhutt was indeed still very much alive, but the fall had stunned him. He lay blinking and kicking. It would be necessary for him to recover his senses before he could recover his feet.

The interfering rhino disposed of, the pit bull-bull sought other prey. Advancing deliberately, it tried to trap Buncan in the nearest corner, perhaps realizing he would be easier to catch than the more nimble otters. Holding the duar out in front of him like a talisman, Buncan retreated, knowing that while he might be able to dodge the creature, he couldn’t possibly outrun it.

“Let’s go,” he called to the otters, who hovered nearby. His fingers cajoled harmless melodies from the dual sets of strings. “Words, I need words!”

“We’re bloomin’ tryin’, mate!” In an attempt to distract the creature, Squill darted across its line of vision. The otter’s presence barely registered on the brute’s senses. It was utterly focused now. The young human first, then ample time for the others.

Scampering dangerously close to sharp forehooves, Neena was likewise ignored. She and her brother exchanged harassed whispers, while Buncan grimly tried to decide which way he was going to have to jump.

On the other side of the pit the rest of the Dark Ones had begun to edge forward, encouraged by their leader’s apparent control over the Berserker. Hesitantly at first, then with increasing enthusiasm, they began to voice their support in the form of an ascending, unified chant.

Squill and Neena, too, had finally begun to sing.

“Push ‘em back, push ‘em back,

Wayyyyy . . . back!

Back in the ‘ole where he can’t be seen

Over the line, back through the wall

Back so for that the big becomes small

Stop him right ‘ere, if you know what we mean.

Gots to do a number an’ fix this scene.”

Even as he played wildly, Buncan was shouting at his friends.

“What kind of spellsong is that?”

Squill made a face as Neena agonized over a second verse. “Cor, mate, she’s the best we can do for now.”

Bits and pieces of shattered glass and twisted metal began to rise from the floor of the pit. Sprouting glowing wings, they soared upward and flung themselves recklessly against the advancing form of the pit bull-bull. Every one bounced harmlessly to the floor, some to flap futilely against the stone, others to be ground to dust beneath ponderous hooves.

Even the crumpled operating table lurched into the air. On leathery wings of lambent green it soared as high as the ceiling, only to fold its sails and dive straight at the pit bull-bull’s skull. A smaller creature would have been killed by the blow, and even Snaugenhutt stunned, but the monster simply twisted and caught the plunging chunk of enchanted furniture in its massive jaws. A single, powerful snap reduced it to kindling.

“Give up!” Droww was yelling from the far side of the pit. “The Berserker is immune to your simple tunes. An all-encompassing veil of ignorance protects it. It doesn’t understand sorcery, it doesn’t understand spellsinging, it does not comprehend even the rudiments of thaumaturgy, and therefore cannot be affected by mem. Its entire development has gone to muscle. Only the sound of my voice penetrates its thick mode of bone to reach the brain beneath.”

The otters changed their song. Evanescent effervescent dust rose in clouds from the floor with the aim of obscuring the creature’s vision, but they only made it sneeze as it lumbered on through, shaking its head irritably from side to side.

Buncan was running out of room almost as quickly as he was out of ideas. Spellsinging seemed ineffective against this ultimate invention of the Dark Ones, and he said as much to his companions.

“ Tis got to work.” Neena strove frantically to improvise still-fresher lyrics. “ ‘Tis always worked for Jon-Tom an’ Mudge, an’ it ‘as to work now.”

“I’m not Jon-Tom!” Buncan slid to his right. The pit bull-bull edged sideways to match his movement.

“Then by the Aardvark’s Spittle, think o’ somethin’ your sue would never think of!” Squill challenged him.

Easy to say, Buncan reflected tiredly. Hard to do. Exhaustion was creeping up his legs. His fingers were growing numb, and he knew that the otters’ throats had to be raw from rapping at the tops of their lungs. Nothing they tried had any effect on the relentless specter. One snap of those preposterous jaws, one diffident bite, and he and his friends would be reduced to soggy pulp. That was assuming they managed to dodge the twin sets of horns and . . .

He brightened as the lyrics flashed on him. It had worked once before. Though using the same or similar lyrics in a second spellsong was dangerous, they were about out of options. What did they have to lose? He made the suggestion.

Neena squinted hard, trying to watch him and the advancing mountain-with-teeth at the same time. “Pardon me presumption, Bookoos, but ain’t this an inappropriate time for baby babble? We need strength, we need power, we need . . .”

“Something different, like your brother said. The lyrics have power. We just need a different take on them.” The wall was very near now. He saw himself kicking and twitching, impaled on one of those formidable horns. “I’ll start it off, and you and Squill copy. Just listen to the words and . . .”

With a roar that shook dust from the rafters, the pit bull-bull lowered its head and charged.

“Scatter!” Buncan threw himself to his right as boms slammed into the stone wall and steel-trap jaws crushed the air where he’d been standing an instant earlier. The monster was much faster than anything its size ought to have been. It skittered sideways to block any further retreat, realizing it had its quarry trapped. This time it didn’t even bother to lower its horns.

Off in the distance he could hear Viz yelling at Snaugenhutt to pull himself together, but the rhino couldn’t help now. He’d taken his best shot at the creature and barely budged it. It was all up to the others and to Buncan. In a quavering voice he began to mouth the lyrics he remembered from childhood, the lyrics which had worked so well for him and his friends not so very long ago. Only. .different, mis time. Even to his ears it sounded like a lamentation.

Squill and Neena could be as quick with their wits as they were with then- feet. Having sung the song once before, it was easy for them to rework the simple refrain.

Indifferent to the music, the pit bull-bull glanced from otters to human, trying to decide which to annihilate first.

As he listened to the otters, Buncan had to admit they had managed to inject a truly anguished quality into their singing. This time around, the same lyrics were full of sorrow and pathos, of sadness and poignancy. His playing was slower, their vocalizing was slower, and together they generated an aura of ineffable sadness that pervaded the entire chamber. No luminous clouds coalesced within the room, but the duar pulsed a rich, dark blue, utterly reflective of the music Buncan skillfully coaxed from the dual sets of intersecting strings.

“ ‘Ow much is that doggie in the window, yo?

The one with the waggly tail, y’know?

‘Ow much is that doggie in the window, bro’?

It looks so sad, gotta be mad

Wrong head on its body, it’s gotta be bad

Poor old thing, ‘Us all alone

Notbin’ else like it anywhere

Like to throw it a bone

But I hate to stare

Someone oughta care, it needs to rest

Be best, be safe, don’t wanna berate

But that anger you need to stick in a crate

And relax, take a pill, chill

lake some time your own dreams to fulfill.”

The spellsong was full of anger (it was rap, after all), but also loneliness and yearning, a yearning after stability that particularly escaped one inhabitant of that chaotic chamber. It expressed desire and want for the unobtainable, for half-forgotten dreams. Back on his feet at the bottom of the pit, Snaugenhutt too was caught up in the harmonic web of melancholy Buncan and the otters wove. No one within listening range remained unaffected. Even some of the Dark Ones unwillingly found themselves drawn to bygone memories.

Sweating profusely, Buncan played on, watching the pit bull-bull as it glared down at him.

It took a defiant step forward . . . and paused, bastard ears pricked forward. Spears it could disregard, arrows it could shrug off, swords it could shun, but it could not ignore the music. As Buncan stared, the fiery eyes seemed to dim and glaze over. The dark red tongue, a slimy hunk of drooling meat, slipped out the side of the powerful jaws and hung dangling from the misshapen mourn.

As the mountain-with-teeth sat back on its hindquarters and began to pant contentedly, an unmistakable if slightly obtuse canine smile spread slowly across its hideous face. As the otters continued to improvise, this was shortly replaced with an expression of great sadness framed by tears as profound emotions penetrated the benumbed berserker brain. The great jaws no longer snapped hungrily. Eyes half shut, swaying slowly in time to the music, it continued to listen and absorb and be affected.

Amazing the results thoughtful modifications to a simple tune could have, Buncan mused.

By the time they embarked on then- fourteenth improvised stanza, the great creature was lying on its belly, eyes closed, that nightmare skull resting peacefully on crossed forehooves. For the first time in its tormented existence, it was at peace. Every .now and then it emitted a distinct, soft whimper and wagged its composite tail.

Exhausted but quietly exultant, the otters terminated their most recent and final refrain. Duncan’s fingers plucked conclusively at the duar. Except for the futile howls of the sorcerer Droww and the echo of distant fighting, it was silent in the chamber. The soft snores of the soundly sleeping pit bull-bull drifted contentedly ceilingward.

Enraged and frustrated beyond reason, Droww wrenched a saber from one of his startled acolytes and rushed around the rim of the pit to confront Buncan. His duar secured, Buncan stood his ground, awaiting the charge with his own sword drawn.

The sorcerer made a pretense of swinging his weapon, then leaped into the air and struck out with both enormous feet. Buncan proved more agile than his opponent expected, but then, he’d spent years tussling with otters. At the last instant, he ducked. Droww sailed over him . . .

. . . to land with both feet, hard, on the head of the softly dozing pit bull-bull.

Awaking with a snort, it instantly espied the cause of the interruption of the first sound sleep it had ever enjoyed, and growled warningly.

Fumbling with his robes, Droww stumbled to his feet and thrust a shaky finger at Buncan. “Kill them. Kill all of them!

Start with that one. Don’t worry about preserving body parts for recombination. Shred him slowly. Pick him apart.”

The pit bull-bull rose to all four feet. Buncan began backing away slowly. But it did not come for him. It did not move at all.

Droww whirled and waved both arms emphatically. “What’s the matter widi you? Obey! Comply! By the gnarly DNA, I command you! By the genetic bonds and Mendelian Progression, by diploid dupes and haploid hopes, I order you to do my will!” Snarling deep in its throat, the ungulate ogre was slowly advancing on the irate sorcerer, pressing him relentlessly toward the edge of the pit.

“Stay back!” There was confusion in Droww’s voice and, for the first time, a hint of fear. “I will have you respliced!”

Two of Wurragarr’s people, an ax-wielding bandicoot and a sword-armed ringtail, stood entranced in the far doorway. The other Dark Ones likewise looked on in fascination and horror, unable or unwilling to interfere. Mowara and Viz rested on Snaugenhutt’s back, while the otters had moved to stand next to Buncan.

Droww glanced over his shoulder. He could probably survive a leap to the pit floor below, but an angry rhino awaited him mere. Snaugenhutt was nearsighted but not blind. His attention was fixed eagerly on the retreating sorcerer. One heavy foot pawed expectantly at the stone.

The long-eared wizard turned back to his grandest experiment, his greatest achievement. “Stop, I say. You will come no farther.” With a threatening snarl, the pit bull-bull took another step forward.

Despairing at the uncooperativeness of an indifferent universe, the sorcerer whirled and leaped for the pit, preferring to take his chances with the aggressive but awkward rhinoceros below. He never got the chance.

Lightning-fast jaws lunged and snapped. With a crisp, piercing crunch, Droww vanished into the mouth of the being he had caused to come into existence. A couple of cursory chews, a prodigious swallow, and just like that the sorcerer was gone. A few bones, a little blood, some shredded robes clung to the pit bull-bull’s lips: meager legacy for so much evil.

Duncan glanced at his friends. “I think it’s time for us to leave.”

The massive misplaced canine skull swung ‘round to peer in their direction. Then it leaped . . . not toward them, but across the wide gulf that was the pit, clearing it easily. It was an astonishing demonstration of physical prowess. As it landed heavily on the far side, the remaining Dark Ones scattered for their lives. The offspring of their inimical interference pursued energetically.

Snaugenhutt mounted the steps that led out of the pit, whereupon they all conferenced with the two fighters who had arrived moments earlier. Resistance within the monastery had begun to break down. As soon as word reached the remaining defenders that Droww had been killed and the pit bull-bull was on the loose and looking to revenge itself against its former masters, it would doubtless collapse.

The bandicoot and ringtail rushed out to inform their companions of what had transpired within. As soon as the information reached Wurragarr, he ordered a general pull-back. The victorious but spent fanners and craftsfolk retreated through the shattered gate to the fringe of the forest, leaving the terminal cleansing of the monastery to the rampaging pit bull-bull.

Overcoming their initial distaste, they eventually welcomed the grotesque but pitiable Cilm into their company, as they did all those refugees from the abode of the Dark Ones who made it out alive, repenters and innocents alike. Within the high walls terrible screams and piercing shrieks attested to the remorseless activity of the pit bull-bull as it revenged itself against its creators. Fires were beginning to break out among the stark structures as lamps and torches were toppled in the ongoing frenzy.

“What’ll happen to the canine-thing?” In the flickering light Snaugenhutt’s bulk looked as if it had been hewn from granite. Gragelouth stood nearby, talking trade with a casual cus-cus.

“I don’t know.” Buncan leaned against the rhino’s flank for support as he stared at the engulfed monastery. “But I don’t think it’ll come after us. Maybe it’ll stay with, live within the rains. Maybe it’ll remember the song we sung it and be comforted a little. Eventually I hope it’ll make peace with the people who live around here. After all, it was one of them once. Several of them.”

“What if it doesn’t, mate?” Turning, Buncan saw Wurragarr approaching. Bedarra and Quibo accompanied him. “What if it comes out looking for a fight?”

Buncan stood away from Snaugenhutt’s side. “Where are those happy fliers, your spellsingers? And their accompanists?”

“Too happy by half.” Wurragarr gestured at Bedarra, who disappeared into the woods. The thylacine returned moments later with the three kookaburras and their attendant musicians. Looking anything but jovial, the heavy-beaked birds landed on a convenient branch nearby. They had witnessed sufficient slaughter to mute even their normally irrepressible sense of humor.

Settling himself cross-legged on the ground, Buncan cradled his duar against his waist. “I want you all to pay attention. The tune is not difficult, nor are the words. Squill, Neena?”

Looking bored, the otters lay down next to him. “Not again, mate?” Squill picked at the grass.

“This shouldn’t take long.” Buncan turned back to his attentive audience. “If the monster emerges, and is hostile, this is the spellsong you use against it.” He began to play. With notable lack of enthusiasm, the otters supplied what words they could remember.

Deep within the blazing monastery a visceral, pitiable howl rose above the dry crackle of burning wood and the crash of collapsing timbers.

CHAPTER 24

All night the forest resounded to the ebullient cries of abducted children and unlucky travelers being reunited with their families and friends. At Wurragarr’s insistence, food and fresh clothing were shared with those unfortunate individuals who were the offspring of the Dark Ones’ experiments. Such joyous reunions helped everyone to put aside their memories of the carnage which had taken place behind the scorched walls of the monastery.

Gradually empathy supplanted revulsion as Cilm’s fellow mutants were welcomed into the fellowship of the country folk. Despite their often horrific appearance, all had been normal at one time. While their former lives could not be restored to them, they could be made comfortable within the limits imposed by their condition. Amid scenes of great heartache, all were promised a place to live in quiet and safety for the balance of their unnatural lives.

Once safely down the mountain a great weight seemed to lift from the little army’s collective shoulders. That night saw a celebration the likes of which Buncan and the otters had only imagined from Mudge’s often exaggerated tales. Buncan made friends with a human girl his own age, while Squill and Neena exuberantly partnered up elsewhere. Neena opted for the companionship of a handsome young tiger cat from a far valley, while Squill found himself in the company of a black-furred, bare-tailed, robustly built young female of a tribe he didn’t recognize.

“I’m a marsupalian devil, mate,” she informed him in response to his query. He lowered his eyelids along with his voice.

“I’ll bet you are, luv,” he replied suavely.

Songs of thanksgiving and reconciliation filled the forest.

The following morning the travelers gathered around a hastily erected stone firepit whose blackened contents still smoldered from the revelry of the night before. Seated on a half-burned log on the other side, Wurragarr and Bedarra listened respectfully to their newfound friends’ exotic tale of travel and tribulation. Around them the woods bustled with farmers and tradesfolk readying themselves for the long march back to then- homes.

“We can’t tell you how grateful we all are.” Wurragarr indicated the old galah, who perched comfortably on the big roo’s right shoulder. “Mowara’s told us about what happened inside. Seems clear that without your help we wouldn’t have stood much of a chance against the mucky sods.”

“You’re bloomin’ right there.” Squill allowed himself a broad smile until Buncan jabbed him in the side. “ ‘Ere now, mate,” the otter protested. “ Tis true.”

“Haven’t you two ever learned anything about tact?”Squill whistled sharply. “Learned about tact? Rom Mudgel”

Buncan pursed his lips. “I see your point.” He turned back to their hosts. “We were glad we could be of help. As the offspring of great adventurers, we had no other choice.”

“I seem to remember—” Squill began, but Gragelouth cut him off.

“Perhaps in your gratefulness you might do us a good turn?”

“Anything within our power to grant is yours,” Wurragarr replied magnanimously. “We owe you more than our lives.”

Gragelouth ran two fingers through the thick gray fur of his forehead. “As you know, we seek an undefined, uncertain something which may or may not actually exist. It is known as the Grand Veritable.”

“Yes, I remember you mentioning it before,” said Wurragarr. “Go on.”

“I think we are closing on it, but we still have a ways to go to the northwest.” The sloth looked up at the shadows which loomed in that direction. “We must go higher still into these mountains. While supplies would be welcomed, a guide would be more useful still.”

Wurragarr and Bedarra exchanged a glance before the roo returned his gaze to the travelers. “We’ve left behind families who need to know that we’ve triumphed and survived. All of us have obligations at home: businesses to attend to, crops to plant or bring in, children to raise.” Turning with a slight hop, he gestured into the distance.

“No one I know travels into the high mountains. There’s nothing there except cold and rock. To the east, yes; to the south, yes; to the north, occasionally in winter. But never to the west or northwest. That may change now that the Dark Ones are defeated. Or it may not. The high mountains ate home to many shadows which we simple country folk are not inclined to pursue.”

“There, you see!” Gragelouth’s tongue darted in and out reflexively as he turned to his companions.

“Proves nothin’, guv’.” A disinterested Squill lay on his back, picking his teeth with a sharpened twig.

Bedarra yawned, displaying his incredible gape. “There are stories of some who choose to explore that country. They go in search of jewels or precious metals. They never return.”

“Bedarra’s right.” Wurragarr turned back to mem. “Nothing good has ever come out of those mountains. I’d prefer not to think of you, our good new friends, going up that way.”

“Nevertheless, that is our goal.” Gragelouth was apologetic.

The roo nodded slowly. “We will give you all we can in the way of supplies, but you won’t find anyone who’ll go with you. We’re not adventurers or great sorcerers like you. I myself have a farm to tend to. Sorry, mates.”

It was silent around the corpse of the fire. “We shall simply have to proceed on our own, then, as best we can,” Gragelouth said finally.

“Now ‘ow did I know you were goin’ to say that?” murmured Squill sarcastically.

They accompanied the ragtag but victorious army until a tumbling stream pointed the way up toward a likely-looking pass. There ensued many emotional farewells, replete with hugs and kisses in which Buncan and the otters participated enthusiastically while Gragelouth stood shyly aside. Wurragarr and his companions reiterated their promise of shelter and succor anywhere in the fertile valleys and hills beyond . . . should the travelers return this way, though that unhappy thought was not voiced.

“I wonder what finally happened to the pit bull-bul?” Buncan mused as they began their ascent.

“Died in the fires.” Snaugenhutt climbed slowly, carefully. “Pitiful critter, but a hell of a fighter.”

“Maybe it got away,” Neena suggested. “Found itself a cave or somethin’.”

“Maybe.” Buncan’s attention was on the rugged peaks that lay before them: “If it did, we could run into it again.”

“Let’s hope not, Bikies.” She was scampering along the edge of the stream, an eye out for edible crustaceans. “I ain’t sure I could sing any more verses o’ that bloody cub song o’ yours, no matter ‘aw strong its magic.”

As they climbed higher, the last of the paperbark trees gave way wholly to evergreens. These in turn grew stunted, becoming no more man bushes, until at last there was only hearty low scrub and grasses eking out a living amongst the wind-scoured boulders and scree.

Streams like molten quartz cascaded in musical falls down steps of schist and gneiss, while strange insects buzzed busily about the vegetation that invariably gathered at the base of each water drop. The blue of the sky was deeper here, the gray of the rocks more brilliant, and always they walked in the shadows of recent encounters. Curiosity and Gragelouth drove them on.

As the days passed, Duncan began to wonder if they would cross the top of the world and start down the other side. Rumor was a powerful bait, but it was not irresistible. Old doubts never put entirely to rest began to trouble him as they crossed ridge upon ridge, climbing ever higher. Whenever he felt assured, Squill was always there to put fresh doubts in his mind.

Snaugenhutt swerved to go around a large dark-brown bush when the growth, with unexpected alacrity, rose up on two legs, extended an absurdly small head on the end of a long, curved neck, and stepped out of their way. The travelers regarded it with astonishment.

“What are you?” Buncan asked as they halted.

Bright blue eyes blinked. An enormous feathered body balanced deftly on the pillarlike legs. Clawed, splayed feet looked strong enough to rip the guts out of any presumptuous attacker. For such a formidable body to terminate in so tiny a head was unavoidably comical. The creature was all out of balance, Buncan thought. It looked like a runaway adjective.

“Wot the ‘ell are you?” Neena asked with typical otterish subtlety.

“I’m a moa,” the giant flightless bird explained politely. “Who are you? Not many visitors up this way.”

“Your kind is new to us.” Gragelouth eyed the bird with the same sort of look he would have bestowed on a gold coin that had suddenly gone transparent. “Not in all my travels have I ever seen anything quite like you, though you are clearly kin to the tribe of ostrich.”

“There aren’t a lot of us,” the bird explained.

“No moa, huh?” Neena ignored the glare Buncan threw her. “Sorry, Bunkles. Couldn’t resist.”

“You should learn to.”

“I’m used to jokes.” The moa had a melancholy voice. “All of us who survive up here are. The world has left us behind.” A huge wiagtip indicated the surrounding, snow-clad peaks. “This is the Country of the Recently Forgotten.”

“As opposed to the Land of the Often Overlooked.” Gragelouth ventured a thin smile. “I have traveled that region, but not this one.”

“Here dwell creatures who have surrendered the future to others. Myself included.” It let out a heartrending whistle. Buncan was instantly sympathetic, and even the hardened otters were moved. How could one not feel sorry for something Nature had designed to look like a bad joke?

“I didn’t mean to make fun of you,” Neena said when that whistle of lamentation had finally perished among the side canyons. “Well, actually I did, but right now I rather wish I ‘adn’t.”

“That’s all right. I expect to be extinct any day now anyway. In the meantime, it’s nice to meet others, any others. I haven’t seen another moa for nearly a year. No, not many of us left. For all I know, I might be the last of my kind. There are a lot of lasts up here, living out their tribal heritage. Before long, only our memories will be left.”

“Well, ain’t this the cheery interlude,” Squill grumbled.

Gragelouth studied the absurd bird. “I don’t suppose that you have in your considerable wanderings heard anything of a Grand Veritable?”

Long eyelashes fluttered. “Oh, that old thing. Yes, I know of it. I even know where it is.”

Buncan felt a surge of relief and elation. Maybe they weren’t going to have to hike to the top of the world after all. Their quest had a destination.

If the flightless bird could be believed, the Grand Veritable was more than mere rumor.

“Well, what is it, what is it like?” The excited merchant fought to control himself. Which, in Gragelouth’s case, did not require much effort.

“What does it do?” Neena prompted the moa eagerly. The tiny head dipped to one side. “I wouldn’t know about that. When you’re facing imminent extinction, you don’t really have much interest in peripherals. You’d have to ask the Guardian.”

A catch, Buncan thought suddenly. As Mudge was so fond of saying, there was always a catch. Though he had to admit he wasn’t really surprised. If anything as fabulous as the Grand Veritable actually existed, it was only natural to expect it to have some kind of guardian.

Well, they’d overcome whirlwinds and bandits and inside-out rivers and a pit bull-bull. “What’s this Guardian like?” “Not too big?” Gragelouth essayed a hopeful smile. “Willing, perhaps, to let us have a look?”

“I wouldn’t think so.” The moa was unencouraging. “He’s very testy.”

“Is he also one of the Recently Forgotten?” Buncan inquired.

The moa nodded. “Personally, I’d like to see him become one of the Completely Forgotten. Him and all his tribe.” Feathers riffled as the bird gave a visible shudder. “He’s bad company. You don’t want to provoke him.”

“If we were foolish enough to want to,” said Gragelouth slowly, “how might we go about it?”

The moa let out a regretful whistle, like the lowest note of a pipe organ. Turning, it gestured with both beak and wing. “Continue on your present course. Before long you will come to a branching of this stream. Follow the branch. Though it appears to run straight into a sheer mountainside, track it upward. The Veritable is housed in a cave that is also home to the Guardian. You can confront him if you wish, but I wouldn’t try it. He’d probably eat me.”

“Eat you!” Gragelouth gaped at the moa. “The Guardian is one of the cold-blooded?” “No, he’s as intelligent as you or I. But we of the Recently Forgotten retain ancient instincts and habits that have been largely abandoned by the rest of the world. Oh, he’ll think about it before he eats you. Maybe even have a moment of regret. But he’s not called the Guardian for nothing. He’s up there to keep the Veritable away from inquiring minds. Been doing so for as long as the Verita-ble’s been there, I imagine.”

“ ‘Ow did this wonder get ‘ere?” Neena wanted to know. “In a shower o’ stars, or via some sorceral sublimation?”

The moa shrugged. Feathers went everywhere. “I have no idea. I’m not into necromancy. Some say it arrived on a pillar of blue flame, others that is was delivered in the beak of the Maker herself. The story I personally give the most credence to says that it just fell out of a stormy sky one day and bounced a couple of times before coming to rest in a puddle of muddy water. When some Wise-Ones-Who-Shall-Go-Unnamed found out what it could do, they stuck it in the cave and assigned a Guardian to it. Successive Guardians have kept watch over it ever since.” A huge wing rose and fell.

“Like I said, it doesn’t much interest me. When you’re on the verge of extinction, little things like Guardians don’t bother you. Obviously you feel otherwise. I wish you luck.”

Buncan smiled sympathetically. “We wish you luck as well.”

“And I,” Snaugenhutt rumbled. “I know what it is to be alone and abandoned.”

“Not by Nature, you don’t.” The moa turned and strode OS downstream, singing softly to itself. They watched until it had disappeared.

“Shame,” Neena murmured. “A handsome creature, if a bit oddly proportioned. Did you note the blue o’ its eyes, an’ ‘ow the sun reddened its plumage?”

“Maybe he’ll find another moa,” Buncan suggested, “and they’ll have lots of little moas.”

“ ‘Ow many moa does it take . . . ?” Squill began. In a somber mood, Buncan cut him off sharply.

They followed the cheerful little tributary up into a dense thicket of low scrub, Snaugenhutt plowing easily through the tightly interwoven branches and trunks. Much of the vegetation they were now encountering was of a type unfamiliar even to the widely traveled Gragelouth.

Truly this was a place of the Forgotten, Buncan reflected. He pondered what the Guardian would be like even as he wondered if he ought to be afraid, then decided he was too tired. Whatever it was they would deal with it, as they had dealt with every other obstacle which had crossed their path. The duar bounced lightly against his back.

Topping yet another in a seemingly endless series of natural granite steps, they found themselves standing on a small flat plateau. Cliffs rose steeply to left and right. Ahead additional steps led onward and upward, but the stream did not tumble down them. Instead it curved leftward against a raised shoulder of rock and terminated at the base of a narrow waterfall. A small clear pool shimmered at the rocky intersection of stream and cascade. To the right lay a dark, yawning void in the cliff face, a black blot on the otherwise unmarred granite.

Dismounting from Snaugenhutt to give him maximum room to maneuver, they approached the cave with caution. A thick, musky smell emanated from within.

“Let ‘im come.” The rhino pawed at the gravel. ‘Tin ready for anything.”

“Sure you are.” Viz bobbed atop his iron perch. Like the rest of Snaugenhutt’s armor, it was slightly the worse for wear from the fall the rhino had taken inside the monastery of the Dark Ones. “Just don’t get carried away. We may be up against something more powerful here than the minions of the Baron, or even the crazed horrors of the monastery.”

“You watch your butt and I’ll watch mine,” the rhino rumbled,

Buncan peered hard but saw nothing. The depths of the cave were veiled in blackness. He took courage from the fact that the opening wasn’t very large, and that it was unlikely any inhabitant would be larger than its egress.

After a querulous glance at Gragelouth, who could only shrug helplessly, he turned back to the black and called tentatively. “Hello in there? We’re travelers from a far land. We’ve come a long way to see if there really is such a thing as the Grand Veritable, and we were told you had charge of it.”

Silence most profound greeted this declamation. After a pause, Buncan tried again.

“Listen, all we want at this point is a look, to see if the damn thing’s real.” This time, an echo of silence.

Emboldened, Squill sauntered right up to the entrance. “Me, I always said there never were any such contrivance. Tis all piffle, an’ so’s any bleedin’ Guardian.”

“I am not piffle,” declared a voice from within. A very deep voice. A voice most carnivorous, of a timbre and resonance that inspired in the otter an urge to precipitous retreat.

“Nice goin’,” muttered his sister as they huddled together against Snaugenhutt’s bulk.

Buncan too had retreated, but not as far. He started to draw his sword, instead swung the duar around in front of him. “We must have a look. We’ve come too far and endured too much to just walk away now. At least grant us proof of the Veritable’s existence.” And maybe an explanation of what it is, he added silently.

“Go away!” The Guardian’s speech was half snarl, half cough, all menace. “I’m in a truly foul mood today. Provoke me, and I’ll come out.”

“ ‘Tis bluff.” Buncan looked sharply back at Neena. “I’ve ‘eard about these ‘orrible ‘guardian’ things all me life. Monsters that are supposed to watch over secrets an’ treasures an’ the like, wot? If they ain’t just gossip they’re always overstated. Why d’you think this one ain’t showed ‘isself? Because there ain’t much to ‘im, that’s bloomin’ why. They all rely on their reputations, they do.”

“I dunno.” Buncan turned back to the cave. “Just a look, that’s all we want!”

“Blood of my liver, you want to steal it!” came the sonorous reply. “Frankly, that’d be all right with me. I’m sick of this job. But my job it is, and I’m bound like all who preceded me to perform it to the best of my ability. So don’t make my day any more difficult, okay? Just leave.”

For one entrusted to watch over the Source of All Knowledge and the Fount of Limitless Power, this Guardian sounded quite reasonable, Buncan thought. While he had not acceded to their request, he had already deigned to converse with them.

“I’m sorry, but for the reasons I’ve already mentioned we can’t do that.”

“Can you describe the Veritable ID us without coming out?” Gragelouth inquired.

“Yeah, give us a ‘int,” barked Squill. “ “Us it animal, vegetable, or mineral?” He winked at his sister.

A thunderous roar amplified by the natural bellows of the cave rattled the ground like a seismic tremor. Small rocks tumbled from the cliff side.“SO BE IT UPON YOU! DON’T SAY YOU WEREN’T WARNED!”

As Buncan stumbled frantically backward, blazing green eyes centered on something huge and tawny exploded toward him.

CHAPTER 25

It wasn’t as bad as the pit-bull, he thought as he threw himself to his left, nor as horrifying as some gramarye wraith, but it looked quite capable of butchering each and every one of mem without pausing to take a breath, including the massive Snaugenhutt.

Its headlong charge carried it well past the diving Buncan. Gravel and dust flew from beneath its clawed feet as it landed and spun, gathering itself for a second, better-timed attack.

Because of its color and general shape, Buncan at first thought it a lion. But there was no mane, the skull was longer and decidedly flattened, the ears were positioned differently, and the forelegs were more muscular at the shoulder. More startling still, it walked on four legs instead of two and wore no clothing or decoration of any kind, both hallmarks of the civilized. Certainly a throwback, yet one capable of speech and rational thought.

It was hard to contemplate what all this might mean, because he found himself mesmerized by the pair of incredible, backward-curved canines which protruded downward from the roof of the Guardian’s mouth. Each was fully half the length of the otters’ short swords and looked just as sharp. When the Guardian yawned, its gaping upper and lower jaws formed a nearly straight line. Among all the other creatures Buncan knew of or had ever encountered, only the thylacine Bedarra could duplicate the feat, and his admittedly impressive teeth were no match for the ivory scimitars of this brute.

It glared at them. “On your own heads be this. Who’ll be the first to die?”

“Actually none of us are in any particular hurry,” squeaked Gragelouth from his position behind Snaugenhutt’s protective rump. The rhino shook himself, rattling his armor, and lowered his head. If this creature could place a bite between the iron plates, Buncan knew, those great incisors could sever the rhino’s spinal cord. Or his jugular.

As for himself or Gragelouth or the otters, those powerful jaws could snip their heads clean off. Only Viz was comparatively safe.

His fingers were tense on the duar, and he could see that Neena and Squill were ready to rap. But could they sing fast enough to save themselves? The creature’s initial charge had taken only seconds, and it was clearly infinitely more agile than the pit bull-bull. He’d been lucky to dodge it once. He doubted he could do it again.

“What do you call yourself?” He struggled to maintain a brave front, and incidentally give the otters more time to Improvise some lyrics. “Of what tribe are you? We’ve already spoke with one who calls this the Country of the Recently Forgotten.”

“That’s right, remind me.” The Guardian pawed at the gravel, his head weaving from side to side. “I haven’t mated in nearly a year, and that doesn’t make me any less Irritable.”

“I know how you feel,” mumbled Snaugenhutt even as he angled his hom.

“This Guardian is of the tribe of the sabertooths, since you’re unable to puzzle out that simple fact, and I warned you.” It raised one paw (at least it was capable of that much learned behavior, Buncan reflected) and pointed toward the cave. “In there lie the bones of those who came before you and lingered to disturb my rest. They are well gnawed. It will be good to have a fresh supply to crack.”

“Surely you cannot seriously be thinking of eating us,” Gragelouth protested. “That would be uncivilized in the extreme.”

“I lay no claim to civilization,” The lunatic canines gleamed in the mountain light. “Do I look like a vegetarian to you? I eat whatever comes my way, whether it’s capable of intelligible conversation or not. I don’t discriminate between idiots and geniuses. They all taste the same going down.”

Suddenly the Guardian winced, eyes squinting tight. Throwing back its head, it let out a deep wail. Squatting on its haunches, it ignored them as it proceeded to howl mournfully at the sky.

Some sort of pre-attack ritual chant, Buncan thought as he and the otters took the opportunity to retreat all the way to Snaugennutt’s side. At least now the sabertooth couldn’t single them out. At which point the utterly unexpected occurred.

Gragelouth started forward, hands extended.

A disbelieving Neena yelled to him. “ ‘Ave you gone mad, merchant? Get back ‘ere before you’re fish meal!”

“Cor, let the silly twit sacrifice ‘imself if ‘e wants.” Squill sniffed disdainfully. “Maybe ‘e’ll give the toothy blighter a bellyache.”

The sloth glanced over a shoulder. “I am not about to sacrifice myself, and I am quite frightened out of my wits. It is only that when you travel as widely as I do and see as much as I have you acquire all manner of odd information. While observing our assailant just now, I imagined I saw something specific.”

“Right,” agreed Neena. “Waitin’ death.”

“Something besides that.” As he continued to advance, the sabertooth ceased its dirge and lowered its gaze.

“A volunteer for the first course. That doesn’t happen very often.”

Gragelouth halted just out of immediate claw reach. “Your pardon, father-of-all-fangs, but prior to your consuming me might I have a closer look at something? A final favor, if you will.”

The sabertooth’s expression narrowed, which, given his already low sloping forehead, have him the look of a piqued executioner. “A look at what? I’ve already told you that you can’t see the Grand Veritable. I’m guarding it.”

“Not that; something more personal. Just now, when you had your head back singing, I thought I noticed something.”

The great carnivore eyed the sloth warily. With a single swipe of one great paw he could easily tear out the merchant’s throat. Therefore, there was no need to hurry.

“Just what is it you want to see?”

Gragelouth raised both hands over his head. “I am unarmed.”

The Guardian scrutinized the proffered limbs thoughtfully. “You will be shortly.”

“I mean that I have no weapons.” The soft-voiced merchant would not back down. “These others are here at my instigation.”

“I thank you in advance for supplying so large and diverse a meal.” In no great hurry now, the sabertooth lifted a paw and examined its claws.

“Having come this far in search of a dream, I cannot turn and run, I cannot back down without an answer. Do you understand?”

“I understand that you will tickle sliding down my gullet. Could you not have shaved first?” Glowing green eyes glistened in deep-set sockets.

“All I wish,” said the sloth as he warily lowered his hands, “is to have a look inside your mouth.”

The Guardian’s eye ridges rose. “You’ll see that soon enough.”

“You do not understand. It is one small portion that intrigues me.” He had moved closer, and Buncan saw that no matter how effective a spellsong he and the otters might mount, it would not be in time to save the merchant.

“A peculiar last request. Peculiar enough to be granted.” The sabertooth stretched its incredible jaws wide. “Indulge yourself. I’ll let you know before I bite.”

“Thank you.” Gragelouth stuck his head forward and down, twisting to one side to stare at the Guardian’s upper palate. Buncan and the others held their breath. “Ah, there. Just there.” His expression knotted sympathetically. “That must hurt something terrible. It is no wonder your disposition is so befouled.” He withdrew.

Instead of lunging forward, jaws agape, for the fatal bite, the sabertooth eyed the squat sloth uncertainly. “What can you know about it?”

“I can see it. Upper left canine. It goes right down into the socket. How long has that toodi been bothering you?”

“What makes you diink it bothers me?” The Guardian let out an anticipatory snarl.

Gragelouth spoke a little faster. “As I said, one acquires many odd bits of knowledge in one’s travels. It is bothering you, is it not? Did it not just cause you shooting, tiirobbing pain?”

“Don’t speak of it! You . . .” The Guardian suddenly winced. “Yes, it hurts. The pain is like a running fire in my brain.”

“For how long?”

“Soon after I ate a pair of exotic dancers who lost themselves in these mountains. A human and a cat, they were.” He looked downcast. “They tasted harmless at the time.”

“Ah.” Gragelouth nodded knowingly. “One must take care not to consume too many sugary tarts.”

“The pain comes and goes, but each time it returns it’s worse.”

“I thought as much.”

Unable to overhear the conversation clearly, Squill raised his own voice. “Oi, gray-bottom! Wot’s the bleedin’ story?”

“He has a cavity,” Grageloudi explained. “A hole in one front toodi.”

“No wonder ‘e’s in such a bad mood,” Neena declared.

‘Avin’ a chopper like that, you can only imagine the toothache it would give.”

“I’d radusr not,” said Squill.

“And I can’t,” Viz added.

Buncan moved to join Grageloudi, ignoring the otters’ warnings. “I’m sorry to hear about your problem. What if we could fix it for you?”

The Guardian growled at him. “You can’t ‘fix if for me. No one can fix it for me.” As Grageloutii took a well-considered step backward a huge paw reached out to land on his left foot, preventing him from retreating any farther. The murderous skull drew close and green eyes blazed into the merchant’s own. “Afo one.”

“Not wishing at this point in time to incite you any further, I must still point out tiiat my friends may be able to do sometiiing for you. Though young, they are purveyors of exquisite necromancy. Spellsingers.”

For just an instant, the sabertooth hesitated. “Spellsingers?” The restraining paw did not move, but the eyes rose to peer past the trapped sloth. They settled on Buncan. “Is what mis furry snack says true?”

“It’s true. How do you think we got this far if not with the help of powerful sorcery?”

“I don’t know. Blind stupidity?” He lifted his paw, releasing Grageloudi’s tingling foot. Knowing better diaa to try to run, the merchant implored the glowing Guardian.

“At least let them try. If they fail, you can still run us down one by one.”

“Spellsinging . . . I don’t know,” me sabertoodi brooded. “What if they make it worse?”

Buncan took another couple of steps forward. “Is that possible?”

Grageloudi was once more bending to peer into the Guardian’s gaping moudi. “It appears to be eating into the root. If you do not have it taken care of very soon, you will lose the entire saber. I suspect you will not grow another.”

“You’ll look bleedin’ ‘umorous witii only one o’ those stickers ‘angin’ out o’ your trap,” Squill commented.

The Guardian threw the taunting otter a murderous glare, then winced as fresh pain shot through his upper jaw. When he finally spoke again he was much subdued.

“Can you really help me?”

“We can’t make any promises.” Buncan spoke slowly, cautiously. “Sometimes the magic doesn’t work, and often it takes paths we didn’t envision. Furthermore, most of our spellsinging has been defensive in nature. We’ve never attempted anything quite so . . . constructive. We’ve only tried to do what was right, without hurting anyone or anything.” “Yeah,” added Squill energetically. “Moral shit like that, wot?”

The Guardian nodded his understanding. “I will let you try. No tricks now, I warn you! I am nearly as quick of mind as feet, and I won’t hesitate to shred the first one I suspect of something sly. But if you can mute the pain even a little, if you can help me, I would . . . I would be grateful.”

Fighting to restrain his excitement, Gragelouth inquired delicately, “If we can fix the problem permanently, will you let us see the Grand Veritable?”

The sabertooth’s green gaze shifted back to the merchant. “If you can fix this so it doesn’t hurt anymore, ever, I’ll give you the damn thing!”

The merchant’s face broke out into a wholly uncharacteristic wide smile.

“Right,” muttered Buncan. “Let’s do it.” He huddled with the otters while the others, including the tormented sabertooth, waited expectantly. Torn between a natural desire to rend and tear, which he was obligated to do, and a desperate need to alleviate the worsening pain in his jaw, the Guardian sat silent as a house pet and waited. Before long the human confronted him again. “We’re ready.” When the Guardian didn’t respond he nodded to his companions.

The rhythm was gentler than any they’d employed previously, coaxing rather than challenging, soothing instead of belligerent. No problem with that. Rap was adaptable. They’d just never had the occasion to speak softly before.

“Ain’t no gain without no pain

But the pain, in the main

She’s a tiresome refrain, the bane

Of existence

Do we make sense?

Got to chuck it out

Shouldn’t have to shout

That it’s plain that the pain

Is on the wane an’ on its way out.”

As they played and sang, a small silvery cloud, a miniature of those which formed so often when they spellsang, drifted from the duar’s nexus to the Guardian’s mouth. It swirled gently about the infected tooth, taking on multiple forms and shapes: now a small pointed instrument, now one through which glistening white liquid flowed.

An expression wondrous to behold slipped over the sabertooth’s face like a cleansing wrap, an expression not mere seen since it had been a cub. Though only the corners of his mouth curved upward, there was no mistaking the contortion for what it was: a smile.

As the silver radiance faded, the heavy paw which had temporarily pinned Gragelouth rose to feel gingerly of the area around the left saber. The merchant dared to inspect the sensitive region yet again.

“The dark gap appears to be gone.”

“It is gone!” Emitting a roar of pure delight, the Guardian leaped into the air, turned a complete somersault, and landed effortlessly on all fours. The light in his eyes burned as brightly as before: Only the motivation had changed.

Neena considered the sabertooth thoughtfully. “Mate, you really ought to learn to walk on your ‘hid legs, proper like.”

The Guardian nodded. “I know that’s how it’s done these days, but I’m one of the Forgotten, or soon-to-be. Many of the old ways are still mine. I’m comfortable with them.” He rubbed his jaw. “More comfortable than I’ve been in some time.”

“Let him be,” Snaugenhutt advised her. “Some of us just ain’t inclined to walk vertical.”

“I keep my word.” The sabertooth pointed toward his cave. “It’s just inside. Don’t want to trip over it in the dark.”

Duncan turned to gaze at the cave. After all they had been through, it seemed impossible they’d actually achieved their goal. More important, if the Guardian was not lying, it seemed that there was actually a goal to achieve. The Grand Veritable was real. Real what remained to be seen.

“You’ve done so much for me,” the sabertooth was saying. “Wait here and I’ll bring it out to you.” Springing from the rock on which he’d been sitting, he loped into the cave.

Buncan waited; they all waited. Even Gragelouth, who had to restrain himself from following the Guardian into his lair.

“Can’t be very big,” Neena observed. “Not if the cat can drag it out all by ‘imself.”

“Maybe ‘tis a pink diamond the size o’ ‘is “cad,” Squill commented hopefully.

“Or a wand.” Now that they were actually about to encounter the mysterious source of legends, Buncan recalled the odd mixture of disdain and apprehension with which Clothahump had treated the subject. “No matter how innocent or harmless it looks, we need to be careful with it.”

“ ‘Ell, you worry too much, mate.” Squill twisted completely around to groom his tail. A human attempting the same move would have to dislocate his spine. “Wotever it is, it ain’t ‘art this ‘ere kitty-cat none. I’d say ‘e’s ‘ad plenty o’ time to play with it, and if it couldn’t cure ‘is bloomin’ toothache, then I says there can’t be much power in it.”

“Perhaps it is possessed of a different sort of power.” Gragelouth’s gaze was fixated on the cave mourn.

All speculation aside, there wasn’t one among them who wasn’t surprised when the sabertooth finally reemerged with the object held firmly but respectfully in his mouth.

“Well, I’ll be orificed.” Neena sat down right where she’d been standing. A puzzled Snaugenhutt simply smiled and shook his great head, while Viz let out a series of bemused whistles.

“What’s that!” A wary Buncan bent for a better look as the Guardian carefully placed the object on a smooth-surfaced boulder.

“The Grand Veritable,” the sabertooth replied. “It’s what you wanted, isn’t it? What you traveled all mis way to find?”

“Righty-ho,” said Squill, frowning at the subject under discussion, “but wot is it? Wot do it do?”

“Do?” The Guardian was openly bemused. “Why, it doesn’t ‘do’ anything. It just is. Truth, that is. The Grand Veritable is truth, just as its name implies. That’s what the Ancient Ones who set my kind to watch over it said.”

Gragelouth sat down heavily, moaning. “Solipsisms. All mis way come, all this distance traversed, great dangers and perils overcome, for that.”

The rejuvenated sabertooth growled. “Don’t underestimate it. Truth is the most valuable of all commodities . . . and the most dangerous.”

Squill gave the object a tentative kick. It did not react. “Don’t look so dangerous to me.”

The Guardian grinned. “You can’t hurt the truth that way.”

Gragelouth put one hand to his forehead. “What good is truth to me? I’m a merchant, a trader. You can’t sell truth.”

Neena let out a derisive bark. “Why not? I thought the stuff were always in short supply.”

The sloth looked up at her. “Tram’s an intangible. I do not deal in intangibles.”

She knelt next to the object. “Looks kind of . . . broken.”

“I assure you it’s not.” Bright green eyes studied Gragelouth. “I owe you much. Had I eaten you, there’s no telling how long I’d have continued to suffer. So you are a merchant in ‘tangible’ things? I know about merchants. I’ve had several for dinner. There exists a base for the Grand Veritable. Maybe you’d find it of more interest than the Veritable itself.”

The sloth blinked slowly. “I do not understand.”

“Come and have a look-see.” The sabertooth started toward the cave. So despondent was Gragelouth that he followed without thinking.

Time passed while Buncan and the others studied the Grand Veritable closely. Their examination left them no less baffled than when the Guardian had first presented it to mem.

A voice shouted from the lip of the cave. “Hoy, Snaugenhutt! Come give us a hand here, would you?” The rhino shrugged and ambled over. As it developed, the assistance of Duncan and the otters was required as well.

Deeply graven with cryptic inscriptions, the ancient pedestal was as tall as Neena. Poured in the shape of a pyramid with the top sliced off to form a resting place for the Veritable, it was so heavy it required their combined efforts to wrestle it into place on Snaugenhutt’s back, where they secured it with leather straps. Still, Squill worried about it falling off on their return journey.

“No need to concern yourself on that matter.” Grage-louth’s eyes were shining. “I will ride alongside and see to its stability.”

At least, Buncan mused, they wouldn’t have to worry about it blowing away. The pedestal was fashioned of solid, absolutely pure gold. The purest gold, Gragelouth breathlessly informed them, he had ever seen. A gold that was not of this world, but was recognizably gold nonetheless.

“No revelations,” he commented, “but for all that, a most profitable journey. Yes, most profitable.”

‘Ere now.” Squill was quick to protest. “Wot makes you think feat bit o’ furniture’s all yours?”

The merchant looked hurt. “You came seeking adventure. Surely you have had that in quantity. You also have the Veritable. The wizard of whom you spoke should find it of considerable interest. Each of us has gained what we came for. Do not mink to deprive me of my dream, however base you may find my motives.”

“Take it easy,” Buncan told him. “We don’t want your gold.”

The otters gaped at him. “We don’t?” they chorused.

“Gragelouth’s right. We’ve gained more from mis journey man mere gold could buy.”

“But,” Squill sputtered, “maybe just a little mere gold . . . ?”

Buncan had turned away from him and back to the Veritable. “I still don’t see how this thing embodies or represents truth.”

A frustrated Squill gave it anomer kick. “It don’t embody nothin’ but garbage, Buncan. Me, I’d rather ‘ave a share o’ the gold.”

Buncan knelt next to the large, rectangular metal box and ran his fingers over the surface. There were glass-covered numbers with little arrows pointing to them, round knobs and buttons, and a large window beneath which a paper scroll was prominent. A narrow metal pointer thrust hallway up the height of the scroll, which was in turn divided by innumerable little black squares, and a black rope that ended in a twin-pronged knob of some kind protruded from the rear of the box. The exterior was somewhat the worse for wear, but intact at the corners and seams. Of one dung Buncan was certain: The Grand Veritable was indubitably a device necromantic.

“Be careful,” the Guardian warned nun as he fiddled with the knobs and buttons. “It’s enchanted.”

“It’s manure,” groused Squill. Because of his long torso and short arms, he had to bend almost double in order to thrust bis hands angrily into his pockets. He leaned over Buncan’s shoulder and shouted at the bruised and scratched box.

“Go on, men; show us somethin’!” Stepping around Buncan and ignoring his protests, the otter picked up the container and shook it firmly. It made quite a bit of noise, as if mere were a number of small bits rattling around loose inside. Disgusted, he let it drop unceremoniously. “Some source o’ ultimate power!” he griped. “A smidgen overrated, wouldn’t you say?”

“Like most wondrous rumors.” There was a hint of sadness in Neena’s voice.

“Maybe we just don’t know how to make it work?” Buncan suggested.

“A spellsong?” Neena eyed the box uncertainly.

Buncan looked doubtful. “How to begin? We don’t know what it’s capable of or what it can do, if anything. So how do we design a song?”

“Why sing to that hunk o’ junk?” Squill had turned his back on the sorry-looking Veritable. “Might as well sing to the trees, or the sky. The ‘truth’ is that we’ve come all this bloomin’ way for nothin’. If the bloody thing ever did do anythin’, it don’t no more.”

“Where’s your sense of vision, of higher motives?” Buncan challenged him.

Squill squinted up at his friend. “I’m an otter, mate. We don’t ‘ave a sense o’ vision or ‘igher motives. We ‘ave fun. Gold aids an’ abets that. Junk don’t.”

“Come on Squill. Which would be more valuable to you: the truth, or a little gold?”

The otter made a truly appalling face. “Let me get back to you on that, mate.”

Disappointed, Buncan turned back to the object of controversy. “Maybe Clothahamp and Jon-Tom can do something with it.” Bending,’he carefully raised it off the rocks. It was heavy, but not unduly so.

“You don’t mean you’re goin’ to take up ridin’ space with that thing?” Squill was more outraged than angry.

“It’s my space. I’ll make room for it.” With those few remaining straps which hadn’t been used to secure the pedestal, Buncan set about tying the Grand Veritable to Snaugenhutt’s back.

They left the sabertooth on his mountain, turning somersaults and yelping with joy as he snapped at trees, rocks, and whatever else struck his fancy, biting for the sheer joy of being able to once again bite without pain.

CHAPTER 26

The journey home proved far easier and faster man it had been coming out, for they knew which areas to avoid and which to stick to. This time they encountered no caucusing whirlwinds or animate mesas. They crossed the Sprilashoone downstream of Camrioca and its doubtless still-seething Baron Krasvin. By the time they reached the Muddletup Moors they found its brooding atmosphere almost invigorating, so near were they to home. After what seemed like an age (but if you think carefully about it was really not so very long as all that), they found themselves again in the bright and friendly confines of the Beilwoods, heading south. Timswitty provided civilized comforts for a day and a night, and then it was on to Lynchbany, passing to the west of Oglagia Towne. There they parted company with Gragelouth, leaving him to see to the melting down of his beloved gold into more manageable form.

Upon greeting her long-absent, wayward son, Talea alternated hugs and kisses with blows of such ferocity that it was uncertain as to whether she would love or beat him to death. Squill and Neena received similar attention from Mudge and Weegee (bear in mind that otters can deliver attention of bom kinds at twice the rate of the fastest human).

When everyone’s respective offspring had recovered from their shower of affection and concurrent beating, there was a formal gathering at Clothahump’s tree. As the wizard’s dimensional expansion spell had not been designed to accommodate individuals of Snaugenhutt’s bulk, the rhino waited outside, placidly cropping the fresh grass.

The rest of them assembled in Clothahump’s central workshop, Viz sharing a perch and whispered conversation with the wizard’s famulus, Mulwit. The Grand Veritable rested, a mute and battered enigma, on the wooden workbench. Jon-Tom and his hard-shelled mentor regarded it thoughtfully.

“So this is the Grand Veritable. The Grand Veritable.” Clothahump nibbed at his lower jaw, cautiously nudged the box with a finger. When it didn’t go off he prodded it again, harder. There was no reaction. “I admit it doesn’t look like much, but then, the truth rarely does.”

“Ought to be in Lynchbany,” Squill mumbled rebelliously, “sharin’ out the gold with that greedy sloth.”

“Be glad you returned with your lives.” Jon-Tom glared at the young otter, who dropped his eyes.

“Should ‘ave you sheared,” said Weegee, “ ‘til you look like a naked mole-rat. That’d be fit punishment for the worry you gave us.”

Indifferent to this ongoing display of domestic bliss, Clothahump continued to prod and examine the mysterious device. But it was Jon-Tom who finally spoke up.

“I think there’s one thing I can say with some certainty.” Everyone looked to him. “It’s definitely a mechanism from my world.”

“I suspected as much but wished to hear you confirm it.” The wizard adjusted the glasses which rode on the forepart of his beak. “Do you have any idea as to its intended function?”

Jon-Tom looked thoughtful. “According to what the kids have told us, it’s supposed to be, or to represent, truth. In my world we have a machine called a polygraph. When I was a law student I got to see several. This is an old model, but I’m pretty sure that’s what it is.” He hesitated. “Though I suppose it could be a seismograph, or some other kind of graph.’ It’s pretty beat up.”

“The Guardian said it was enchanted,” Buncan informed them.

“Enchanted or not, the apparatuses I’m familiar with are far from perfect. All too often they fail to reveal the truth.”

At that the box gave an unexpected twitch. Jon-Tom glanced quickly at Clothahump. “You nudged it again.”

The wizard took a step backward, shaking his head. “Didn’t.”

Shimmering softly, the black cord rose into the air like an awakening cobra. The pronged knob turned slowly to face first Clothahump, then Jon-Tom. Slowly it scanned the rest of the room, weaving slightly from side to side. The guts of the machine were now pulsating a soft, luminous yellow, as though something vital had sparked to life within.

“I always tell the truth,” a voice announced through a tiny grid inset next to the glass-protected scroll. Buncan could see that the long metal needle or pointer was quivering. With indignation? he wondered.

“Then you are some kind of polygraph?” Jon-Tom inquired hesitantly.

The knob (which Buncan later learned was called a “plug” but which still looked like a snake’s head to him) pivoted to “face” the senior spellsinger. “I am the Grand Veritable. I am the Truth, and I never lie.”

Jon-Tom scratched behind one ear. “You’re a damn sight more voluble than any polygraph I ever saw. How’d you come to be here?”

“I don’t know. Truth travels everywhere. I remember a great storm, being studied and inspected, being transformed, enhanced, and enchanted, and finally ending up on a high place outside a cave. There I’ve slept for some time, until your offspring brought me hither.”

“What is your purpose?” Clothahump, Buncan noted, was treating the device as if it were some kind of highly poisonous reptile.

“To relate the truth, the whole truth, and nothing but the truth.”

Squill let out a barking laugh. “Cor, this may turn out to be a bit o’ all right after all! If only that merchant knew wot he’d passed on in favor o’ a pile o’ gold.”

“It wouldn’t matter. He’s quite content.” The Veritable’s plug swung ‘round to confront the startled otter. “He wouldn’t know what to do with me. He is a merchant, after all.”

“I know what to do with you.” Clothahump kept a wary eye on the pulsating device.

The plug turned to him. “No, you don’t. That’s a lie. You continue to believe that I’m mortally dangerous, and hide that truth from your friends.”

Everyone turned to look at Clothahump, who sputtered and harrumphed uncomfortably. Jon-Tom sought to cover his mentor’s embarrassment.

“Why haven’t you spoken before now?”

“No one addressed me, no one questioned me. But you,” and the plug darted sharply in the spellsinger’s direction, “insulted me, and I felt I had to defend myself. When all one has to offer is the truth, one can’t sit silently aside and let it be besmirched.”

Clothahump peered over the top of his glasses at his young human colleague. “Are all such devices in your world this forward?”

Jon-Tom shook his head. “Usually they’re speechless. But then, in my world I couldn’t make magic with my singing, either. I acquired certain abilities when I stepped over here. Maybe the same is true for machines. It seems to be for this one, anyway.” He considered the enchanted polygraph. “Unless it’s lying, of course.”

“I never lie,” the Veritable insisted. The plug drooped. “Sometimes I wish that I could. There are so many floating about unexposed. Lies, that is. Never enough time to deal with mem all.”

“If you’re telling the truth,” Jon-Tom reiterated. “Couldn’t we try it out?” Neena suggested. “On each other?”

“I do not know,” Clothahump said slowly, “if that is such a good idea. As I have been trying to point out all along, the truth can be a dangerous thing.”

“And that’s no lie,” the Veritable declared. “You’re very perceptive, turtle.”

“I am the greatest wizard in all the worlds.” Clothahump spoke quietly and without a hint of boastfulness. It was significant that the Veritable did not contradict him.

“I’ve got an idea.” Sudden excitement suffused Squill’s face. “ ‘Ow’s about we take this ‘ere yappin’ box into town?”

“That is not a good idea either.” Clothahump hesitated. “Still, under carefully controlled conditions, the experience could be enlightening. For everyone.”

Buncan looked to his father. “You can always spellsing any problems away, Dad.”

“Uh, yeah, right,” Jon-Tom mumbled. The Veritable piped up without prodding. “That’s a lie.” Talea glared at the box. “I wonder if the spell under which you’re enchanted could survive a few well-placed sword strokes.”

The plug stiffened. “You can’t cut down the truth.”

“I’m not sure I like the idea of a machine that’s smarter than me,” Jon-Tom opined.

“I am not smarter than you,” the Veritable declared formally. “That, too, is the truth. I just call ‘em as I see ‘em, and I’m always right.”

“Every time?”

The cord nodded. “Every time.”

“Pity we can’t unplug you for a while.” “You can’t turn the truth on and off like water, spellsinger.”

He frowned at the machine. “You don’t need to analyze everything I say.”

“Sorry. It’s what I do. Call it a job-related compulsion.”

Jon-Tom stared at the box for a long moment before turning to his mentor. “You’re right, Clothahump. You were right before the kids found this thing, and you’re right now. It’s dangerous as hell, and we’ve got to get rid of it.”

Buncan and his friends immediately protested. They found an ally in Mudge.

“ ‘Ere now, mate. Let’s not be ‘asty. It strikes me that somethin’ which can tell truth from fiction and never lie itself ought to be worth a bit o’ money.”

“A fortune,” agreed Clothahump readily.

“Then why get rid o’ it?” Squill and Neena had moved to stand next to their father. Weegee looked on and tapped one foot threateningly.

“Because it is unbelievably dangerous. Because truth kills.” He glanced up at his colleague. “An appropriate spellsong might be best, Jon-Tom. Send it away. Far away.”

“Wait a minute, now!” Mudge ignored Weegee’s warning glare. “I’ve somethin’ to say in this.”

“So does we.” Squill huddled close to his father, sister, and Buncan.

Jon-Tom eyed his son. “You side with them in this?” Buncan nodded stiffly. “Well,” the spellsinger sighed, “it’s not the first time we’ve disagreed.”

“Then let it be as you wish.” Everyone looked in surprise at Clothahump. “I wash my hands of it. Experience is the best instructor, and evidently I am not. Jon-Tom?”

The spellsinger glanced uncertainly at Talea, then back down at his mentor. “If you’re going to have nothing more to do with it, then neither will I.”

“Good!” Mudge stepped forward and put his arms around the device, then hesitated. “Are you goin’ to stop us from takin’ it out o’ ‘ere, mates?”

“Not at all.” Clothahump had turned away and was busying himself with his equipment. “Do with it what you will. Just keep it well away from my tree.”

“Oh, that we’ll do, sor!” With Buncan’s help the otter began wrestling the mechanism toward the doorway. Squill and Neena trailed behind. “Beggin’ your pardon if we also keep all the money we’re goin’ to make with it.”

Talea and Weegee stood together in the doorway to watch the three otters and one young human disappear down the extended hallway. Mudge’s mate glanced worriedly back over her shoulder.

“Great Clothahump, do you think they’ll be all right?”

The wizard sniffed. “I am too old to argue with children, but I sincerely hope so. Where the inimitable truth is involved, who can say what might happen?”

The two ladies, one gray of fur, toe other red of hair, were not comforted.

The next day, the expectant confidants sauntered full of anticipation into Mudge’s favorite Lynchbany watering hole. Espying several acquaintances at a central gaming table, the otter wandered over and sat down nearby, making convenient seat of the unprotesting Veritable. Buncan, Squill, and Neena hung by the bar, sipping what liquid the bartender would provide them, and watched.

An elegantly clad and coiffured weasel pushed back his dealer’s cap and gestured at the box. “What’s that, friend? Some sort of magical device?” His playing companions chuckled over their cards and dice.

“Some sort,” confessed Mudge with a smug smile.

A husky badger frowned as he tugged at his black leather vest. “You been dealing with that turtle again?”

“Actually, mates, me pups an’ their friend brought this little toy back from a far-distant land, recent-like.” He nodded in the direction of the bar. Neena waved back prettily.

“Nice-looking girl you got there, water rat,” commented the weasel approvingly. He was sucking on a stick saturated with keep-awake.

“Just keep your bleedin’ paws an’ mind on the cards, Sucrep,” said Mudge warningly. “I’ve always suspected you o’ unhealthy goin’s-on.” Reaching down, he patted the Veritable fondly. “In fact, this little box is about to answer me a question I’ve been wonderin’ about for years.”

The smirking weasel attended to his dealing. “Why you can’t get it up anymore?”

“Somethin’ not quite as personal. Mind if I buy in?”

Sucrep readily shifted to one side. “Your money is always welcome at mis table, Mudge. Especially since you leave so much of it here.”

The game continued as before, coins changing their position in front of the various players according to the flash of dice and cards. Beneath Mudge, the Veritable was silent. Mudge won some and lost some, but as was usually the case his luck attended more frequently to the latter than to the former.

A kinkajou emitted its eerie, high-pitched giggle as he collected a pot. “Thet box mey be full of megeek, but et hesn’t mede you a beeter kerd pleyer.”

“That’s true,” declared the Veritable suddenly.

Amidst general laughter Mudge leaned over and glowered at his makeshift metal pew. “I don’t recall askin’ for your opinion just yet. Whose side are you .on ‘ere, anyway?”

“You know what side,” the Veritable replied calmly.

“Can it do anything besides talk?” asked a heavy set hog curiously.

Mudge straightened and forced himself to smile. “It tells the blinkin’ truth. Always. Every time.”

“Interesting.” A wolf clad in rough muslin peered over his cards. “So it will tell us if you are cheating.” He leaned forward. “Tell me something, box.”

“ ‘Ere now.” Mudge half rose in his seat. ‘ Tis my device! I’ll be the one to ask it any bloody questions.”

“Sit down and shut up, river rat,” said the wolf dangerously. “Box?”

“I am the Grand Veritable,” announced the device stiffly.

“Right then, Grand Veritable. Has Mudge here been cheating on us?”

“Not today,” the Veritable declared positively.

“Oh well, then.” The wolf relaxed and studied his cards.

“See there?” Mudge permitted himself a sneer of self-satisfaction. “I’ve never cheated on you, Ragregren.”

As soon as he said it, he was sorry.

“That’s not true.” The Veritable was inexorable.

The wolf blinked. “What’s that?”

“Nothin’, mate. Nothin’. See to your cards.” To the Veritable the otter hissed, “Turn your bloody self off until I ask for you!”

“Sorry. The truth doesn’t work that way. Once you call it up, it just sort of sticks around.”

“I asked what was said.” Putting his cards aside (facedown), the wolf rose, an imposing figure on the far side of the table, and again addressed the box. “Grand Veritable, when has the river rat cheated us before?”

“I can only tell the truth,” the grid declared apologetically. “I cannot read the future or the past.”

“I never cheated you, Ragregren! The damned thing’s confused.”

The burly wolf was staring at him hard. “You just told us yourself that it couldn’t lie.”

“I can’t,” added the Veritable for good measure.

“Then you have cheated at this table before.” The wolf pushed his chair back.

“I bloody well ‘ave not!” Mudge was sputtering wildly. “You . . . ‘tis you who’ve done the cheatin’!”

“Don’t try to worm your way out of this, river rat. I’m not the one who’s been cheating here.”

“Not today,” declared the Veritable cheerfully.

The wolf froze. “What’s that?”

“You’ve cheated before, but you’re not cheating today. Actually, the one who is cheating today is that hog over there.”

“I beg your pardon?” said the hog. He shrank back in his seat as both Mudge and Ragregren turned to glare at him. “There must be some mistake.”

“You’ve been winning an awful lot today, Bulmont,” the wolf muttered suspiciously.

The hog drew himself up. “You’ve no right to accuse me just because I am a better dice thrower man you, Ragregren.”

“But you’re not a better dice thrower,” declared the Veritable.

“My dice are clean,” the hog protested.

“Indeed they are,” agreed the machine.

“Ah, you see?” Bulmont looked greatly relieved.

Mudge nudged his seat with a sandaled foot. “Explain yourself, not-so-Grand Veritable.”

“It’s quite simple. The weasel who calls himself Sucrep always deals appropriately to the porcine one. Therefore, the individual Bulmont need not worry about his dice, because his cards are correctly loaded even before he can throw. I suspect that at an appropriate time the two will split the hog’s winnings.”

Sucrep said nothing. He didn’t have to. The look on his face as the keep-awake stick fell from his lips was revelation enough.

“The cursed container lies!”

“I do not,” replied the Veritable quietly. “Check beneath the table where he sits. There is a hidden compartment containing the requisite additional cards.”

With a roar the wolf lunged. Displaying the agility for which his kind was noted, Sucrep dove beneath the table. Bulmont made a frantic attempt to sweep up the last pot, only to be bowled over chair and all by the infuriated badger. The kinkajou reached for the coins, froze as Mudge’s stiletto slammed into the table between two of the fruit-eater’s slim fingers.

The otter grinned thinly. “I think we’ll divide up this pot a bit differently, wot?” The kinkajou nodded slowly, men brought his other hand up and around. It held a bottle, which shattered against Mudge’s feathered cap.

“Oi!” yelled Squill. “Dad’s in trouble!” Together he, Neena, and Buncan rushed to join the fray. With a sigh, the bartender ducked down behind his heavy wooden barrier.

“You’d better stay out of this, Buncan!”

Startled at hearing his name, Buncan paused and looked around for the speaker. When the admonition was repeated, he saw that its source was the now sinister metal box.

“Why?” he demanded to know as he prepared to fend off any attackers. By this time the tavern existed in a state of utter pandemonium.

“Because you’re not half the fighter you think you are.”

“What are you talking about? I’m as good as the otters or Jon-Tom.”

“No, you’re not. You’re liable to get yourself killed. And that’s . . .”

“The truth; I know, I know.” Confused and uncertain, he hunkered down beneath the table. “ ‘Ello, mate.”

He was startled to see his friends folded up nearby. “You two too?”

Squill nodded. “We thought it best to take the bloody thing’s advice. It ‘asn’t been wrong so far. Besides, me mum’d ‘ave me arse if I let Neena be ‘urt in some bleedin’ bar brawl.”

“Why worry about her? She’s a better fighter than you,” announced the Veritable helpfully.

“Don’t act the mechanical twit,” groused the otter. “When we’re wrestlin’ I always win.” “That’s right,” agreed Neena. “She lets you win,” said the Veritable. “I do not!” Neena glared at the box but wouldn’t meet her brother’s querulous gaze.

“That is a lie,” stated the Veritable with quiet aplomb.

“I’ll show you who’s the better fighter!” In an instant, and for the first time in some while, the two otters were rolling across the floor, locked in each other’s antagonistic embrace.

“Let ‘em fight,” Buncan muttered wearily. “When they’ve had enough, I’ll spellsing them apart.”

“You cannot spellsing,” observed the Veritable. “You can only play the duar.”

“Well, at least I can do that better than anyone,” Buncan replied irritably.

“You cannot. Jon-Tom is better.”

Buncan’s eyes widened. “I’m better. He’s said so himself.”

“He flatters you to build your confidence.”

Buncan rested his chin on his knees as he turned away. The brawl surged around him. An astonishing mixture of roars, bellows, squeaks, yelps, and howls reverberated the length and breadth of the tavern. “I need the otters’ singing now, but if I keep working at it I’ll be able to spellsing all by myself someday.”

The Veritable was relentless, but not insensitive. It spoke softly. “You will never be able to spellsing by yourself, young human.”

Buncan turned sharply. “Why don’t you just shut up for a while, okay?”

“Truth is always in great demand,” the Veritable whispered, “for everyone except ourselves.”

A chair slammed into the table over his head. Being fashioned of honest wood, it did not break, unlike the wineglass which shattered like thin ice on the floor nearby. Eventually Buncan spoke again.

“I’m beginning to understand what Clothahump was talking about.”

“No, you’re not. You’re too young to understand. You’re just poking around the periphery. The meaning of truth is not so easily grasped. You seriously overestimate your perceptual and analytical capabilities as well as your martial skills and duar playing.”

“I didn’t ask you for criticism.”

“Just truth. Only truth. Always truth. Hurts, doesn’t it?”

Another chair came sliding by. It still contained its most recent occupant, who was in no condition to escape its confines. Buncan leaned out from beneath the table for a better look.

“We need to get you out of here before one of these happy, thature adults tries to make off with you. Though at this point I’m not so sure I’d fight anyone to keep you.” He quickly saw that Squill and Neena would be no help, still intent as they were on pursuing their most recent sibling altercation.

From the time they’d entered the tavern less than an hour had elapsed, and in that brief span a little truth had reduced a placid establishment and its contented patrons to bloody chaos.

The path to the front door was blocked by battling customers. That was where the police would tenter anyway. Dragging the Veritable by its cord, he worked his way around behind the bar and found himself in the company of its owner, a corpulent pangolin. Semiprecious stones and sequins sparkled among his scales.

“My beautiful gaming room!” he wailed.

“You have to help me get out of here.” Buncan hugged the Veritable close.

“No, you don’t,” the grid informed the tavern owner cheerily. “It’s not necessary.”

“Shut up.” Though he doubted it would do any good, Buncan slammed a fist down on top of the device. It made him feel better.

“What’s that?” The pangolin was eyeing the Veritable with sudden interest.

“Nothing,” Buncan growled. “A toy.”

The pangolin looked uncertain. “I can’t imagine what started this.”

“He did,” declared the Veritable. “He and his friends. Three otters.”

The proprietor’s voice rose. “So! You are the offspring of that tree-dwelling spellsinger, are you not? Wonderful! I can sue for damages. The wizard’s guild shall hear of this!”

“Watch yourself,” said Buncan warningly. “You can’t sue a spellsinger.”

“Of course you can,” chirped the box.

This time Buncan gave it a swift, hard kick. It rolled over and came to rest right side up. The radiance within was as strong and implacable as ever.

“You can’t get rid of the truth that easily, my young human friend.”

“How about if I dump you in the deepest part of the river?”

“Won’t work. The truth has a tendency to cling.”

“Truth, eh?” The pangolin looked delighted. “Then I can sue a spellsinger for damages?”

“Yes. But you wouldn’t want to.”

The narrow-faced insectivore entrepreneur blinked. “Why not?”

“Because you’ve been running a crooked house here all along.”

“I, crooked? What are you saying?”

“All these ‘decorative’ mirrors. In the walls, in the ceiling.” The plug stiffened, the prongs pointing upward. “Some are made of one-way glass. You have agents in the crawl spaces above them, spying on the games below. They report to your own plants among the players, who adjust their games accordingly. A large portion of their illegal winnings goes to the house. To you. They skim just enough off the legitimate games so that none of your patrons become suspicious.”

“Rend-in-a-box! Accursed furniture of the Nether Regions!” The enraged owner searched wildly for a weapon.

“Easy to curse the truth!” shouted the Veritable as Buncan hefted it in his arms and rushed toward the back of the tavern in hopes of finding an exit. “Hard to deal with it!”

A large bottle of amber liquid exploded against the wall to his left as he dumped the Veritable into a garbage chute and dove through behind it. It deposited both of them atop a fetid mound of quite indescribable foulness in the alley behind the establishment. Struggling to his feet, he stumbled free of the rancid hillock and gathered the Veritable in his arms.

“Which is the safest way to go?” He glanced wildly to left and right, scanning both ends of the alley.

“To your left.” The Veritable spoke without hesitation.

As he staggered off in the indicated direction, Buncan rounded a corner and found himself face-to-face with Ragregren, the wolf who’d been at Mudge’s table and who was largely responsible for initiating the melee inside. Blood trickled from a gash on his forehead and one ear dangled loose, having been bitten almost completely through. His rustic attire was in disarray, stained with liquor and blood only partially his own. One paw gripped the amputated leg of a chair, and he was breathing hard.

“You!” he rumbled darkly. “You and that, that unmentionable thing are the cause of this!” With a cry, he charged, holding the chair leg over his furry head.

Buncan ducked, and the makeshift club smashed into the wall behind him. “I thought you said this was the best way to go! You lied!”

“I never lie,” said the Veritable primly. “My hearing is most excellent. I overheard the owner giving directions to his minions. They lie in wait at the other end of mis passageway, and would most certainly have killed you had you gone that way. This one is merely likely to just beat you up.”

“You can count on it!” Ragregren raised the club over bis head and brought it down sharply. Unable to reach his sword, Buncan attempted to block the blow with the only shield at hand.

The club struck the Veritable. Buncan braced himself for the impact, but surprisingly mere was none. No shock, no recoil. The chair leg fragmented into splinters, the splinters disintegrated and became sawdust, the sawdust sifted to the ground as evanescent yellow glitter.

“Violence will never break the truth,” the Veritable declared positively. “Submerge it sometimes, blanket it sometimes, but destroy it, never.”

Buncan pursed his lips. “Neat trick.”

“Damn your eyes!” the wolf howled. “Damn you and your accursed device!” He whirled and ran down the alley in search of another weapon.

Buncan waited until Ragregren was out of sight. The distant echo of battle still resounded inside the tavern. “Is it safe to go on now?”

“Yes.”

“No, I mean really safe?”

“Really safe. Insofar as I am able to judge the truth of the situation.”

An inquisitive crowd had gathered outside the tavern. They evaporated wordlessly when a wagon full of uniformed skunks, civet cats, and zorillas arrived. The police would quickly put an end to the conflict, Buncan knew.

Among the hastily retreating spectators, one face stood out. He ran toward her, waving feebly.

“Mariana! It’s me, over here!”

She didn’t slow until they met behind a general store. One didn’t want to be anywhere in the vicinity when the police began their work. Her expression fully conveyed her reaction to his appearance.

“Buncan? What happened to you?” She nodded in the direction of the tavern. “What’s going on in there?”

“I don’t know.”

“A lie,” said the Veritable.

Ignoring the observation, she peered curiously at the machine. “What’s that?”

“Never mind. Have you any transportation?”

“My riding lizard, but . . .”

“Can I borrow it? Just for a short while.” He glanced nervously back toward the tavern, where shrieks and screams indicated that Lynchbany’s finest had set to work among the miscreants inside. “I have to get out of town fast.” He held up the Veritable. “This is something the great Clothahump and my father need to deal with.”

She wrinkled her nose and took a step back from him. “My lizard’s not with me. I walked into town.”

“That’s a falsehood. It’s close by.”

Her pretty face twisted as she glared at the box. “Are you calling me a liar?”

“Of course. It’s my job.”

She spoke as she continued to back away. “What is this, Buncan? Some kind of depraved necromancy propounded by your father and that ridiculous turtle he works with?”

“No, no, it’s nothing like that,” he implored her. “It’s something I found, Squill and Neena and I.”

“Those otters. No wonder.” She hesitated. “Maybe you’re not responsible, then. I guess . . . I guess I could do something.”

“You’ve got to help me, Mariana. You know how deeply I feel about you.”

“Lie,” burped the box.

“It’s not! Mariana’s a good friend.”

“Another lie.” Buncan gazed at his loquacious burden in horror. “You just want to get into her pants. You’ve been dreaming of it for years.” With great difficulty the mechanism managed to inject something like an electronic leer into its artificial voice.

Mariana gaped at the Veritable, then up at Buncan. “You bastard! I thought you loved me. And here I’ve been saving myself for you.”

“Lies, lies, lies,” the box chorused happily. “You’ve already slept with more of this young human’s friends than he could imagine.”

Buncan swallowed hard. “Mariana, can this be true?”

“Of course it can be true,” declared the Veritable. “I just said it was, didn’t I?”

“Damn you!” Buncan raised the machine over his head, intending to smash it to the pavement. But when he looked to Mariana for approval she was already gone, lost in the crowded streets. Slowly he brought the box back down.

Then he started running, grim-faced, through the throng and toward the edge of town. As he ran, the Grand Veritable provided a running commentary, as it were.

“That one there, the large man, has a vial of poison in his pocket that he intends for his mate’s lover. And that one next to him is—”

“Be silent!” Without much hope but not knowing what else to do, Buncan slapped a hand over the grid.

“Sorry,” the muffled voice of the Veritable replied, “but I’m starting to feel really good. Warmed up. There are so many suppressed truths about that need telling.”

“I don’t want to hear them!”

“Yes, you do.”

“Please,” Buncan mumbled as he flew along, “have some pity.”

The Veritable’s voice was like the wind off a glacier. “There is no pity in truth. Like most people, you fear it.”

“And with good reason,” panted Buncan as he raced toward the forest.

CHAPTER 27

Somehow he made it to the familiar, tranquil glade. Jon-Tom and Clothahump weren’t present, but a perplexed Mulwit let him in and made him comfortable while they waited.

“I tried to warn you,” said Clothahump when he and Jon-Tom finally returned, “but you would not listen to me.” He took a deep breath, expanding his carapace. “Hardly anyone under a hundred ever listens to me.”

“Mttdge never listened to anyone, me included.” Jon-Tom peered anxiously into his exhausted son’s sweat-streaked, grime-laden face. Behind them the Grand Veritable once again reposed quietly on the workshop bench, a picture of mechanical innocence.

Buncan wiped dirt from his eyes. “I never realized how dangerous the truth could be.”

“Civilization is not founded on absolute truths,” Clothahump declaimed importantly, “but only on those the majority of people can deal with, and those are precious few.”

“Truth,” the Veritable observed.

“Nobody asked you,” Jon-Tom growled. Buncan kept a watchful eye on the device, as though at any moment the twin metal prongs on the plug might metamorphose into actual, dripping fangs.

“What are we going to do with it?” Jon-Tom asked his mentor.

Clothahump considered the temporarily quiescent device. “Try to magic it away, I suppose. I will make an attempt. Should that fail, perhaps a spellsong would be in order.”

“Yeah!” Buncan sat up quickly. “I could . . .!” He went silent at the look on his father’s face.

Clothahump’s magic shook and twisted the tree, and drew curious storm clouds overhead. Lightning and thunder failed to impress the Veritable, which sat unmoving atop the workbench. When the turtle eventually admitted defeat, Jon-Tom drew upon his memory for his most powerful spellsongs. These likewise had no effect. Finally he even let his wayward son have a go at the duar while he sang in place of the absent otters, all to no avail.

“You can’t wish away the truth.” The Veritable spoke up only when it was clear they’d finally thrown in the thaumaturgical towel. “Not all your spells or sorcery can make it disappear. Nor is it so easy to dump in a river,” it added pointedly.

“We must get rid of it somehow.” The wizard looked sternly at Buncan, who was appropriately contrite. “I tried to warn you about bringing it back. Most people already have all the truth they can stand. More, in fact.”

“That’s so,” agreed the Veritable.

“It induces the ill-equipped, which is to say most folk, to fight among themselves. It destroys families, whole communities. It starts wars.”

“That’s not my fault,” said the device. “I don’t make truths. I only report on mem. You can’t blame me if people prefer comfortable prevarications. Why, if everyone told the truth I’d be out of a job, and damn glad of it.”

Jon-Tom looked beaten, but no more so than his mentor. “What do we do now?”

“Leave it here. Isolate it within mis tree. Keep it away from everyone else. I have lived several hundred years and can handle the truth better than most. We must all do our best to ignore it.”

“You can’t isolate the truth, and you can’t ignore it,” declared the Veritable.

Eyes glittering, Clothahump approached the mechanism. Beneath that wizened, unexpectedly energetic gaze the plug drew back. Maybe the truth couldn’t be eliminated, but it could occasionally be cowed.

“We can but try.” The wizard beckoned to Jon-Tom. “Come, my friend. We will consult the texts and see what can be done. If anything more can be done.”

That night a lithe, muscular shadow approached Clotha-hump’s tree. Numerous spells protected the wizard’s home, but this particular intruder had prepared well for his nocturnal excursion. Proceeding directly to the object of his intentions, he swathed it in a large canvas bag and tossed it over his shoulder. Mulwit, who ought to have detected the thief, unaccountably slept through the entire intrusion.

In a distant riverbank Mudge and Talea lay entwined in a manner no humans, no matter how flexible, could have duplicated. Having recovered from the fracas at the tavern, a spent Squill and Neena gently whistled away the night in their own beds. Side by side in a tree somewhat less ensorceled than Clothahump’s, Jon-Tom and Talea alternately hugged covers and one another, while down the woody hallway Buncan tossed and turned uneasily in his sleep.

So the thief got away clean, to rejoin his colleagues in the depths of the Bellwoods.

“I told you I could do it!” Triumphantly, the coati unbagged his prize. In the dim light his companions eyed it appreciatively.

“Truly you are the greatest among thieves, O honored Chamung,” the raccoon murmured. His ringtailed companion concurred.

“I knew that if we waited, and watched, and bided our time, the opportunity for revenge would come!” The bandit leader’s teeth glinted in the light that fell between the Belltrees. “Those cursed interfering youths! I would have slit their throats, but the tree was empty save for the dotty old wizard and his apprentice. With them I have no quarrel.” He nudged the Grand Veritable with a foot.

“Now we have this: the booty they journeyed so far to acquire. I learned of it during a brawl at Nogel’s Tavern in Lynchbany, and subsequently laid my plan. They cost me my band; therefore I take their prize. Life is just!” His voice fell to a conspiratorial whisper. “Do you know what this magical device does?”

“Uh-uh,” admitted the ringtail, wondering simultaneously if he was being set up.

“It reveals the truth. All truths, apparent or hidden. With mis I will raise a great army. Beginning with Lynchbany, we will lay waste to the Bellwoods. The forest will run red with blood. Not even a great wizard can stand against the truth! I will bathe in his scraped-out shell, and sleep on the tanned skins of those three cubs, and those of their relations, and their friends. In payment for the humiliation I have suffered, then’ skulls will be impaled on the gables of my home!” Exhilarated and breathing hard, he struggled to unwind.

“Come, my loyal companions. It is time to begin.” They moved into deeper forest, heading toward town. “I will share my victory with you, as I have always shared our spoils.”‘

“Speaking to that,” chirped the Grand Veritable unexpectedly, “it is a statement which contains several blatant untruths.”

“No one queried you, box,” snarled Chamung.

When he looked up, it was to find that his two remaining warriors were eyeing him speculatively.

* * *

Not too many days later a thrashed, defeated figure limped into the distant town of Malderpot, having been chased from one town after another. His domes were in rags, one ear and several teeth were missing, and his formerly resplendent tail had been singed down to the bare skin.

The hidden chime tinkled as the door to the small shop closed behind him, shutting out the steady rain. Beneath one arm he carried a scratched and battered, but still intact, metal box from which issued a steady, undying saffron glow.

As the visitor warily shoved back the hood of his cape the shop’s proprietor, a slightly inebriated muskrat, emerged from behind a curtain. Though he had been drinking steadily to keep out the cold, sufficient faculties remained to nun to reveal that the coati had been through a difficult time. The muskrat perked up. Here was an individual in the final stages of physical and mental dissolution. In short, the source of a possible bargain.

The walls of the little shop were covered with strange objects, its shelves lined with tightly capped jars full of noisome organics. Mysterious devices and stuffed reptiles hung from the ceiling, dangling at the ends of strong wires.

“Thimocane, you have to help me.” The coati’s voice was shaky, and his speech was interrupted frequently by hacking coughs. “I am told that you are a wizard.”

“I used to engage in shorcery,” the muskrat admitted freely. “Now I shimply buy and shell. I’m short of shemiretired, you shee. But if you’d like to buy me a case of good liquor . . .”

“Later, later.” The coati glanced nervously over a shoulder, as though even on a rotten night like this someone might be after him. Or some thing. “I can’t buy you anything right now, or even pay for your services. I’m utterly broke.”

The muskrat raised both paws. “Then I don’t know what you’re doing here. I’m no charity.”

“Please!” The coati all but collapsed on the narrow countertop. “You’ve got to help me! If you don’t I will surely die . . . or go mad.”

“That’s the truth,” announced the box beneath his ill-kempt arm.

Intrigued, the muskrat stood on his tiptoes and leaned forward. “Now what have you there, traveler?”

“For All-Tails’ sake, don’t listen to it! Don’t pay any attention to it. Pretend it’s not there.” The coati’s expression verged on mania, the muskrat thought.

“You can’t do that.” The light within the box throbbed. “You can’t ignore the truth.”

“The truth?” The muskrat was shobering fast. “What does it mean, the truth?”

“It detects lies and gives the truth.” The coati was almost sobbing. “Always. Whether you ask the truth of it or not.” Water ran down his long snout and dripped from his black nose. “That’s all it does, is tell the bedamned truth.”

The muskrat nodded discerningly. “Now I undershtand your unfortunate condition, shir.”

“Can you help me?” the coati whispered weakly.

“Not I. This ish a matter for greater shkill than ever I posshesshed. But I know of another who might. A wizard of great shkill and experience. He dwells far to the shouth of here, a turtle named—”

“NO!” screamed the coati with sudden force. “I can’t go to him, though I almost would. You see, I stole this from him.”

Again the muskrat nodded. “Are you sure he didn’t curse it on you? I cannot believe from what I have heard of hish reputation that thish Clothahump would be sho foolish ash to deal with anything sho dangeroush.”

“Well, he did. I did steal it from him.” A little (but just a little) of Chamung’s old arrogance crept back into his voice.

“Ah. And you owe your present shituation to forces he has shent in purshuit of you?”

“No,” mumbled the coati miserably. “It’s all the fault of this damnable device. I don’t have the skill to manage it. I don’t know that anyone does.”

“Maybe you should get out of my shop.” The muskrat began to edge surreptitiously toward the curtain. “If the great Clothahump was sho afeared of thish thing that he allowed it to be shtolen, then it is tar beyond my shimple shkiils to mashter.”

“You’re my last hope.” Chamung was begging again. “I can’t go on. I’ve tried abandoning it, leaving it behind, even throwing it into a deep ravine. It follows me wherever I go: sleeping, eating, everything.”

“Once you get attached to the truth,” the box declared, “you can’t just walk away from it”

“You see to what pitiful state I, the great Chamung, king of thieves, am reduced.”

“You’re certainly in a bad way.” The muskrat interrupted his retreat.

“Truth,” quipped the box.

“There may, just may, be one way.” The shopowner was considering the Veritable thoughtfully.

A flicker of life brightened in Chamung’s eyes. “Anything! I’ll do anything.”

“There are tales of a passhage. A means of travel between our world and another. Rumors, gossips, hearshay. If you could enter that passhage and leave this infernal apparatus on the other shide . . .”

“Yes, yes?” the coati prompted him.

“It ish true that you cannot abandon the truth. But it is shometimes posshible to give it away.”

Chamung turned violently on the Grand Veritable. “Well? Does the small fat one speak the truth?”

“He does,” the box reluctantly admitted.

Upon a promise of a lifetime of devoted servitude (which covenant the muskrat thoughtfully had the Veritable verify), the small wizard (semiretired) mounted and led an expedition far to the south of the river Tailaroam, beyond the Lake Region and the Morgel Swamps. There, after a long and most arduous journey, they succeeded in abandoning the Grand Veritable in the far reaches of a certain cave.

Many days passed in retracing then: difficult route until the coati was convinced the curse of truth had been lifted from him, and true to his promise he remained in the service of the shopowner until the day he died, of an excessive imbibulation of a certain high-proof booze.

* * *

In the lightless pitch-black recesses of that singular cavern the Grand Veritable languished, barely active, until one day a pair of children much younger than Squill, Neena, or Buncan stumbled upon it. They wore old blue jeans and carried waterproof flashlights, for the cave was often full of water at that time of year.

Being well-trained children, they did not touch the box but instead brought their grandfather to see it. He was accompanied by their guide, who promptly pushed his hard hat with its carbide lamp back on his head and scratched at his receding hairline.

“Don’t recall ever seein’ that in here before. Damn teenagers is always dumpin’ then- trash around.” The old man tilted his head back, blinking as drip water splashed La his eye. “Must’ve fallen down through a sinkhole or natural pipe.”

The other man played his light over the device’s metal exterior. “Wonder what it is.”

His eldest grandson spoke up. “If it doesn’t belong to the people who own the cave, Grandpa, does that mean we can keep it?”

“Well, Ah dunno.” He looked at their guide.

The old man shrugged. “Looks like junk to me. I’d be beholden to you if you’d get rid of it for me.”

The visitor nodded, bent to examine the battered machine more closely. “Looks like some kind of measuring device. See heah.” He wiped grime from the large glass plate. “Hey, you know what? This is an old polygraph.” He chuckled. “Something Ah sure don’t need in my business.”

“Is it broke, Grandpa?” asked the other boy.

“Ah’m sure it must be, dumped heah like this in the wet and dark. But it’s almost an antique. Spruced up, it might be kind of fun to put in the office. Sure to get a few laughs from the staff.”

He was a big man, even for a Texan, and with the guide’s assistance was able to wrestle the device over to the main trail and back to the cavern’s entrance.

When the prize had been loaded in the back of the visitor’s minivan and the children were in the tiny store buying candy, the guide couldn’t help querying his guest. After all, it wasn’t every day he escorted a private party into Ae far reaches of the cave.

“If you don’t mind my askin’, mister, just what is it you do?”

“Ah’m a state senator,” the big man replied, his distinguished appearance only slightly muted by the dirt streaking his face. “From down neah Corpus.” He patted the muddy metal box fondly. “Can you imagine the kick my colleagues will get from seein’ this in mah office?”

“A lie detector in the Legislature?” Seeing that he was to be allowed in on the joke, the guide permitted himself an easy, agreeable chuckle. “Good thing it don’t work, ain’t it, Senator?”

The big, white-haired visitor smiled. “Now, suh, don’t believe everything you read in the papers, especially the local ones. Most o’ those ol’ cliches aren’t anythin’ moan than that: cliches. There’s a many good folk workin’ up in Austin, an’ a good bit o’ truth an’ honesty prowlin’ the halls o’ yoah state capital.”

Unseen by either man, the box in the back of the minivan began to glow ever so softly.