Five Portraits

by Piers Anthony

  “There is a divide in the way ahead. I regard the right way as more scenic.”

  “But the left looks like a better prospect for pools of virus.”

  “So it does,” Fornax agreed, and faded.

  When they came to the divide, Firenze went right. He had of course overheard the Demoness, and understood. There was a reason for this route.

  There was a young man walking the other way. He looked a bit confused. “Are you okay?” Firenze asked him.

  “I don’t know,” the man replied. “There was this car accident, then blankness, then—where am I?”

  “You’re Mundane!” Firenze said.

  “I don’t understand.”

  “From Mundania,” Astrid said. “Never mind. This is Xanth.”

  “Zanth?”

  “Xanth. A magic land. You will need some guidance.”

  “I will help,” Fornax said, appearing as an ordinary woman. “This way, Kribbitz.”

  The man halted in place. “You just appeared out of nowhere. And you know my nickname. I didn’t even tell you my name.”

  “Your name is Chris Kehler,” Fornax said. “Here in Xanth we know things. Walk with me and I’ll explain.”

  Plainly bemused, Chris walked with her. Astrid knew she would set him straight about how to get along in Xanth. The Demoness had intervened so that Astrid would not have to be diverted from her course. What was so important about it? It was strictly routine terrain.

  They came across a girl about Firenze’s age playing in sand. She was making surprisingly intricate figures out of the sand. “Hi,” Firenze said. “I’m Firenze, and this is—is—”

  “His mother,” Astrid said. “Astrid. We’re delousing the pun virus.”

  “I’m Sand,” the girl said. “Sand D. I’m good with sand. Mom’s a sand witch.”

  A pun, of course. “So the pun virus is not here,” Astrid said.

  “Not here,” Sand said. “It would have been awful. But it wouldn’t have wiped out Mom. She’s not a pun. She conjures sand.”

  Both Astrid and Firenze laughed. “Good thing you explained,” Firenze said. “Your dad must have been set straight early on about that.”

  “I have no dad.”

  “No dad?” he asked blankly.

  “I’m adopted.”

  Astrid was beginning to see why this route had been suggested. The girl was cute, and Firenze was obviously interested.

  “So am I!” he said. “Or about to be. But—”

  “Mom adopted me. She conjures sand, and I’m good with sand, and since I was an orphan, well, she took me in.”

  “She could adopt you without a dad? I thought that was against the rule.”

  “What rule?” Sand asked challengingly.

  Astrid exchanged a look with Firenze. Was there a rule?

  Now it was quite clear why Fornax had obliquely recommended this route. Here was a possible answer to Merge’s dilemma. Single parent adoption!

  “We don’t know of any such rule,” Astrid said. “But I have a friend whom I think would like to talk to your mother.”

  Sand frowned. “If your friend is going to criticize—”

  “No, not at all! It’s that she may be interested in adopting a little girl herself, and would like reassurance.”

  The girl smiled, relieved. “That’s different. I’m sure Mom will talk with her. Mom’s very opinionated about the subject.”

  “I will fetch my friend,” Astrid said. “Um, Firenze—”

  “I’ll wait here,” he said, glancing at Sand, who smiled shyly. They were ten years old, but it was not too young to begin appreciating the opposite gender.

  Astrid hurried back the way they had come. Fornax appeared beside her. “I took the Mundane to Kandy, who will help him get oriented. I believe Merge will be interested in what the Witch has to say.”

  “Yes. It’s odd that we never thought of single-parent adoption.”

  “It’s not the only oddity in the adoption process.”

  “Oh? What else is there?”

  “I don’t think I should comment yet.”

  So there was more complication coming. Astrid let it be.

  Soon she located Merge and Myst working together. “Merge! There may be an answer, if you want it.”

  Merge did not need to ask what she was talking about. “I want it.”

  “There’s a sand witch, no pun, a witch who conjures sand. She adopted a child.”

  “That’s nice.”

  “By herself. She’s not married. A single-parent adoption.”

  “Ooo!” Myst exclaimed.

  “That’s possible?” Merge said in wonder.

  “It seems there’s no rule against it. Talk to her.”

  “I will.” They hurried in that direction.

  Firenze and Sand were playing in the sand, making sand dollars that looked quite realistic. There were both coin-like dollars and paper-like dollars. The coins clinked as they handled them, and the paper bills folded without coming apart.

  “That girl really is good with sand,” Astrid murmured. Then, to the children: “This is Merge, to talk to the Sand Witch. And Myst.”

  “She’s like my little sister,” Firenze said as Myst smiled shyly.

  Sand D jumped up, shedding sand. “This way.” Then, to Myst: “What’s your talent?”

  “I can turn to mist.”

  “That’s great! So a dragon can’t chomp you.”

  The two adults followed the three children. “Firenze seems quite taken with Sand,” Merge remarked. “I didn’t realize that he was of age to notice girls.”

  “They’re just friends, surely,” Astrid said, laughing.

  They came to a small sand castle whose walls resembled sandstone. A moderately young woman stepped out to meet them as they approached it. “Mom, someone wants to ask you about adoption,” Sand said.

  “Well, I’m not giving you up, regardless,” the Witch said.

  “I’ll show you my room,” Sand said, and the three children disappeared into the house.

  “That’s not it!” Astrid said quickly. “It’s that my friend Merge, here, was going to marry a man and adopt Myst, the little girl. But it didn’t work out, and she feared she wouldn’t be able to adopt her. But if you were able to do it with Sand, maybe she can do it with Myst. So we wanted to talk with you.”

  “I can guess why it didn’t work out. That’s the trouble with men,” the Witch said. “All they want is one thing. If they don’t get it, pffft! they’re gone. If they do get it, then they want it twice a day and they think they own you. They never think of children. That’s no good.”

  “That’s no good,” Merge agreed. Her case differed in detail, but she had the sense not to argue.

  “When I met him, and showed him my house, which my daughter shaped out of the sand I conjured, all he said was ‘Does it have a bedroom?’ I said it did. He asked, ‘Does it have a mattress?’ I said it did. Then he said, ‘That’s fine. Take off your clothes.’ He didn’t care about the child at all. That’s when I dumped him.”

  “So you adopted her alone, and there was no trouble?” Merge asked.

  “None at all. Except from busybodies who think a family is incomplete without a man.”

  “Obviously that’s not the case,” Merge agreed. “Thank you, Witch; you have helped me solve my problem.”

  “It still requires a man to signal the stork,” the Witch said. “Which is too bad. But with adoption you don’t need the man.”

  The children emerged. “We’ll do it,” Merge said as Myst ran to her embrace.

  Astrid nodded. Fornax had quietly helped them solve another problem.

  Except for one. They still needed to identify and stop the Demon who was still interfering with their adoptions. He hadn’t done it in the case of Myst, as far as Astrid knew, though it might simply have been too subtle for her to pick up on. Jon hadn’t worked out, but that seemed to
have been an honest difference in child-rearing (spanking?) philosophies. But there was still another adoption to go. They needed to stop the interference before it stopped them.

  “An evening walk, alone, can refresh the mind,” Fornax murmured, and faded.

  A walk alone? Astrid didn’t see the relevance, but knew better than to argue.

  So it was that Astrid found herself walking alone, after the others had returned to the camp. The problem just wouldn’t let go of her. She just knew the anonymous Demon would try again, maybe this time successfully. But how could they stop him?

  A figure walked toward her. It was a teenage girl. “Are you the basilisk?” she asked shyly.

  “I am Astrid Basilisk,” Astrid agreed cautiously.

  The girl looked nervously around as if afraid of being overheard. “I’m Fray Cloud. Fracto’s daughter. I compressed into compact form so I could tell you.”

  Astrid hadn’t realized that Fracto had a daughter, but certainly it was possible. “Tell me what?”

  “My father has been messing with you, like with that woman and her daughter.”

  “Tiara and Win,” Astrid agreed. “Fortunately we managed to recover them safely.”

  “He didn’t want to do it. He’s not a bad cloud, really he isn’t. But the Demon made him do it. He was going to kidnap me and bind me to this form and throw me in among the brutish trolls.” Fray shuddered. “I have half a soul, so I can suffer. I’m only seventeen!”

  “He threatened you to make your father do his bidding?” Astrid asked.

  “Yes. It was awful. Dad hated doing it, but he couldn’t let me be—be—”

  “I understand. Of course he couldn’t.”

  “But it’s wrong. So I just had to come and tell you, secretly, so you would know.”

  “I appreciate that,” Astrid said. “You’re a brave girl, Fray. But there is one thing more I need to know. Who is the Demon behind this?”

  Fray looked around again. “It is—”

  A bolt of energy struck her. It blasted her to swirling vapor. She didn’t have time to scream, let along speak the name.

  Appalled, Astrid watched the vapor dissipate. So close!

  But as the last wisps evaporated, another figure was revealed. “Gotcha!” she exclaimed.

  It was Fornax. It had been Fornax all along, pretending to be the cloud girl.

  Fornax reached out and grabbed hold of the lightning bolt, which somehow had frozen in place. It was actually more like a long trident. She hauled on it, and a rotund figure with a crown of seaweed was yanked into view before he could let go of the other end. “Neptune, you fat glob of sea sludge!” Fornax said with satisfaction. “I knew it was you.”

  “Oh for spume’s sake!” the Demon said. “You set me up!”

  “I did indeed, you barrel of rancid spit. Your corroded barnacled backside is mine. Now you and I will go private and have a little talk all about terms for not speaking your salty name in connection with a certain wager.”

  The two vanished. Astrid knew that there would be no more interference from that quarter. Fornax had laid her little trap and caught the malefacting Demon fair and square. Or maybe foul and globular.

  Once again the Demoness had come through for the children, and for Xanth.

  Chapter 16:

  Santo

  Metria was distraught, which was an unusual state for her. “He’s water under the bridge!”

  “He’s what?” Astrid asked.

  “Absent, departed, missing, nonexistent, lost—”

  “Gone?”

  “Whatever,” she agreed crossly.

  “Who is gone?”

  “Santo. I was going to rouse him for his breakfast, but he’s not there.”

  Metria had been taking care of Santo, and was in line to adopt him. What had happened? “Maybe he’s out for a walk, practicing making holes,” Astrid suggested.

  “No. I’m aware of him, and can normally find him. He’s nowhere close.”

  Astrid was suspicious. There had been subtle interference in their project all along. She thought catching Neptune had fixed it. Was there more? “Did someone abduct him?”

  “I don’t know!”

  Fornax appeared. “This one seems to be natural,” she said, and faded.

  Natural? What did that mean? That no Demon was involved? “Let’s assume that he’s not abducted, but is lost,” Astrid said. “If so, we’ll simply need to find him.”

  They acquainted the others with the problem. “Santo may have gone exploring, and gotten lost,” Astrid said.

  All the children shook their heads. “If he got lost, he’d simply make a tunnel back home,” Firenze said. “He’s not lost unless he wants to be.”

  Astrid remembered Firenze’s prior comments about Santo. “Why would he want to be?”

  “I can’t say.”

  There it was again. What did Firenze know? She couldn’t ask him directly. “Squid, do you know anything about this?”

  “A little,” the child answered. “He didn’t think he belonged.”

  “Belonged to what?”

  She shrugged. “I don’t know what.”

  “Win. What do you know?”

  “He—he thinks he’s not like us.”

  “In what way?”

  “Some way,” she said, at a loss.

  “Myst?”

  “It bothers him. Maybe he went away.”

  “Right when we’re on the verge of doing the adoptions, painting the portraits, and saving Xanth?”

  She spread her hands. “I guess.”

  “That doesn’t seem like Santo. He knows the importance of the adoptions.”

  Firenze fidgeted, then spoke. “Maybe he didn’t think he was adoptable.”

  “Of course he is! Metria will adopt him.”

  “So he went away,” Squid said.

  “So she couldn’t adopt him? I thought he liked her.”

  “He does,” Win said.

  Astrid looked at them, frustrated. “He likes her, so he’s stopping her from adopting him?”

  “Yes,” Myst said.

  “This is ridiculous!”

  The children just looked at her.

  “Why would he stop her?” Astrid demanded.

  “So as not to hurt her,” Firenze said.

  “What, he’s got a crush on her? Doesn’t see her as a mother figure?”

  “No,” Squid said.

  Astrid threw up her hands and walked away. What was she missing that the children knew or suspected?

  Fornax appeared. “Not that I want to bother you with irrelevant distractions, but it occurs to me that you have not used all the restored sequins. One might take you where you want to go.”

  “I don’t want to go anywhere!”

  The Demoness shrugged and faded.

  Astrid went and dug out the dress, which she did not wear routinely. It remained pretty, and the sequins sparkled, the new ones brighter than the used ones.

  She contemplated it. There actually was one place she wanted to go to: wherever it was that Santo had gone. So she could talk to him and find out what was bothering him. And she realized that a sequin would take her there. That had to be what Fornax had hinted.

  She discussed it with the others. “Santo has gone somewhere. I don’t know what’s on his mind, but I want to bring him back so that we can do the portraits. I think a sequin will take me there.”

  “Do you want company?” Kandy asked.

  “I think I probably need to talk to him alone.”

  “That may be best,” Kandy said.

  “Mom, this makes me nervous,” Firenze said.

  “Me too,” Astrid said. She reached down, took a sequin, and pulled it off. The dress went translucent, showing her underwear, and the men freaked out. They never seemed to learn; it was almost as if they didn’t want to learn. Well, the women would snap them out of it in a moment. She pinned the se
quin back on. Would it be the right one? If not, she would try again.

  She stood in what appeared to be a dungeon. Where in Xanth was it?

  Then she noticed that her bright sequins had gone dull. They would not work here. That told her where she was: in Hades.

  Santo must have made a tunnel to Hades, and let the portions that passed through water or molten rock fill in after him, so as to leave no followable trail. But why? Fornax surely knew, and wasn’t free to tell.

  “This is not a pleasant excursion,” Fornax murmured beside her. “I will help if I can; I think the Demon protocol allows it.”

  “This is all unpleasantly mysterious.”

  “The boy does have a case.”

  “Well, so do the rest of us. I mean to get to the bottom of this.”

  “Unkind as the revelation may be.”

  Astrid was fed up with obscurities. “Santo!” she called.

  The boy appeared. “Aunt Astrid! What are you doing here?”

  “Looking for you. We need you back at the farm for a portrait.”

  He shook his head. “I can’t do that.”

  “You can’t let us all down, after all the work we’ve done to set up for the adoptions and portraits.”

  “I’m sorry about that. But maybe they’ll work without me.”

  “Santo, what is it with you? Why are you messing things up?”

  “I’m really sorry.”

  Now she saw that he was crying. “Hold your breath,” she said as she went to him and put her arm around his shoulders.

  He melted into her, comforted. “I wish…”

  She let him go before he had to take a breath to replace what he had lost talking. “We love you and want what’s best for you, Santo. You will have to trust me. Tell me what’s wrong.”

  He broke down completely. “I can’t be adopted.”

  She knew this was critical. She had to withhold any judgment. “Why?”

  “I’m not worthy.”

  “How can you say that? You’re a fine boy who will grow into a fine young man. You have a potent talent that really helped us survive the Storage. You have friends who truly care for you. None of them think you’re not worthy. Why do you?”

  “I—I—when I grow up and it’s time to marry—”