Roc and a Hard Place

by Piers Anthony

  That did it. The King detonated. The explosion blasted a hole in the ground and sent shrapnel into the surrounding treetrunks, but of course, it didn't hurt Mentia.

  Sammy appeared. He bounded across the smoking crater and went on, unconcerned.

  Mentia followed. Suddenly the cat stopped. He was before a large dent in the forest floor that was shaped like a human posterior. Mentia knew they were in the presence of a monstrous invisible man, who was sitting on the forest floor. The smell was so bad that she abolished her nose. It was as if a garbage factory with indigestion had burned halfway down.

  “Hello, Jethro Giant,” Mentia said. “Remember me? I'm the Demoness Mentia. We met last year.”

  “Oh, yes,” Jethro agreed. “Has it been that long? I was just getting ready to get up and go.”

  “I will gladly show you the way out, if you will help me carry a few people to the edge of Xanth.”

  “That seems like an amicable deal. Stand back.”

  Mentia snatched up the cat and floated back. There was a huge grunt and heave, and two monstrous footprints replaced the bottom-shaped indentation. Then an enormous invisible hand came down to take her. “Where are your people?” Jethro asked.

  Mentia described the direction, and the giant tromped that way. In only a few steps they arrived at the glade where man, centaur, and elf waited, holding their noses as they turned greenish.

  Mentia floated down. “Think of sweet violets,” she suggested as she handed Sammy, who looked somewhat green instead of orange himself, to Jenny. “Jethro Giant is a nice guy.”

  Then the huge hand came down and picked them gently up. “Where to?” the voice sounded from far above.

  Mentia floated up to invisible ear level, and directed him toward the edge of madness. In two steps they were out of it. Then Jethro strode rapidly forward toward the edge of Xanth, and the resulting wind blew most of the odor away.

  The mortals were able to resume breathing.

  “Oh, this is interesting!” Jenny cried, peering down through the invisible hand. “Xanth looks just like a map.”

  “Oops,” Mentia said. “I forgot to set you down when we left the madness.”

  “Don't bother. I know Kim and Dug, and would like to see them again, and Sammy can help you find them. Besides, we're all going to the same place in the end. To that weird trial. It's nice being on a quest, of a sort.”

  “An elf quest? That makes so much sense, I'll have to ignore it,” Mentia said.

  “No, just put your uncrazy better half in charge,” Jenny said. “I always sort of liked her, even if she did drive me crazy.”

  “Oh? Why do you asseverate that?”

  “Why do I what that?”

  “Declare, avow, attest, proclaim, expound, announce—”

  “Assert?”

  “Whatever!”

  “Welcome back, Metria!”

  “It's nice to rejoin you, too, odd elf. What are you going to do, now that your friend Nada has found true love, or at least a husband?”

  “I don't know. Maybe I should ask Magician Trent to transform someone for me, as he did for Gloha Goblin Harpy.”

  “Yes, and in the process I wound up married too,” Metria agreed reminiscently.

  “You did it to save her from mischief.”

  “Well, my half soul gave me a conscience, so I had to.”

  “But didn't you save her before you got your conscience?”

  Metria paused, sorting it out. “Yes, I suppose so. But I wanted to find out what love was like.”

  They looked out across Xanth. “Oh, look!” Jenny exclaimed. “There's a light house.”

  Metria looked. Sure enough, the house was floating through the air, carried along by the wind. “That's a very light house,” she agreed.

  “But what's that?” Jenny asked, alarmed, as she looked in another direction.

  Metria looked again. “Oh, that's an air plain,” she explained. “Where flying centaurs can graze.”

  Indeed, four winged centaurs were standing on the cloudlike plain, picking berry, bread, and grape fruits.

  “And there's an air male,” Jenny said, as the centaur stallion waved to her with his wings. “Hi, Cheiron!”

  “Wait a half a moment!” Metria said. “How can there be four flying centaurs there? Che and Cynthia are at Castle Roogna until the trial. There should be only Cheiron and Chex.”

  “Oh, didn't you know?” Jenny asked. “The stork brought two more foals to them last year. Actually centaurs don't use storks, because their foals are too heavy, but—”

  “Two more foals?”

  “Chelsy and Cherish. Twins. Maybe they were taking their naps when you visited the family.”

  “Maybe so,” Metria agreed doubtfully.

  Meanwhile the giant was striding obliviously on, soon leaving the floating plain behind. Jenny looked ahead.

  “Oops.”

  Metria followed her gaze a third time. “Oh, it's just a storm.”

  “Not just any storm. That's Fracto!”

  Metria peered at the cloud more closely. “Why, so it is. I remember when he was just another demon, before he specialized in cloudcraft.”

  “He always comes at the worst time, to mess up whatever others are doing.”

  “Of course. He's a demon.”

  “Are you like that?”

  “I used to be, as you know. I just had a more delicate contiguity.”

  “A more delicate what?”

  “Concurrence, immediacy, propinquity, proximity, pressure, sensation—”

  “Touch?”

  “Whatever,” she agreed crossly. “Demonesses just aren't as violent as demons, but our mischief is equivalent.” She thought of King Gromden and Threnody. Those were the bad old days, when she helped bring down kingdoms with her sex appeal. Windbag Fracto never achieved that.

  “Well, maybe he'll fail this time,” Jenny said, “because Jethro Giant is too big to be blown away.”

  “But it should be fun watching him try.”

  The storm swelled up grotesquely as the giant strode toward it. Dark clouds reached up for the sky, and down for the ground. Thunderbirds and lightning bugs spun in the swirling air currents. Rain splatted against the giant's invisible body, outlining it in glistening water.

  “I'll fetch rain coats,” Metria said, and popped off. She found an old, ancient, worn-out storm, and took a sheet of its rain, fashioning it into several capes. Because the rain was tired, it no longer had the energy to wet things down, and just hung there inertly.

  She returned with the coats. “Put these on; they will keep the wild new water off you,” she told Jenny, Arnolde, and Ichabod.

  “Oh, a translucent plastic raincoat,” Ichabod said, pleased.

  “Exactly.” Metria didn't find it necessary to clarify the precise nature of the coats.

  It was just as well they had the rain coats, because, now the giant was striding over Lake Tsoda Popka, and the storm was sucking up water from all the different-flavored little lakelets, so that it was raining popka. Jenny put out her cupped hands and caught some of it, so that she could drink.

  “Oooo, it's extra fizzy!” she said. “It must have been freshly stirred up.”

  Ichabod did the same, but as he drank, he jumped. “Who kicked me?” he demanded.

  Arnolde laughed. “You happened to catch some boot rear.”

  They passed over the With-a-Cookee River. Now assorted cookies pelted them. Jenny caught a pecan sandy and threw it away, because she cared to eat neither sand nor the other stuff. But soon she caught a spiraled punwheel and ate that.

  Arnolde caught some chocolate chip cookie crumbs, and Ichabod a piece of gingerbread. Unfortunately all the fragments were somewhat soggy from the rain.

  Fracto stormed on, but could not blow away the giant, who simply forged obliviously on, though his head was in the clouds. They passed a glittering river formed of tumbling crystals, and a huge mattress whose projecting springs were silver. “What's th
at?” Jenny asked.

  “Crystal River and Silver Springs, of course,” Arnolde replied. He was good with geography, as all centaurs were.

  “Of course,” Jenny echoed. “How silly of me not to recognize them. There's just so much of Xanth I haven't yet seen. New things keep surprising me.”

  Eventually they reached the isthmus. Jethro gently set them down by a tree covered with mouths. “This is as far as I can go,” he said. “My head is starting to poke up out of the magic.”

  Now that they were no longer moving rapidly, the smell was catching up. “That's fine, Jeth!” Jenny called. “Thanks a whole lot!” Then she stifled a gag.

  “Welcome.” The giant strode invisibly away, and the air slowly cleared.

  But the mouths on the tree had taken in some of the stench, and were mouthing gasps. “What kind of tree is that?” Jenny asked.

  “A two-lips tree, I think,” Arnolde answered.

  Then a mouth opened wide. “Repent now!” it preached.

  “The end is near!”

  “My mistake,” the centaur said. “Those are apoca-lips.”

  Metria brought out the token with Kim's name. “That way,” she said as it tugged.

  They moved along as a group, Metria leading the way.

  Soon they came to the Interface between Xanth and Mundania. It had been intangible through most of Xanth's history, Metria understood, but since they had recompiled it last year; it had sharpened up considerably, and was now a scintillating zone of intense magic. “We had better hold hands as we cross,” Metria said, “so that we'll all return to this same spot when we cross back.”

  “Correct,” Arnolde said. “That will fix us as a party. But I am surprised that a demoness knows or cares about such intricacies.”

  “I helped fix it,” she reminded him. “It's the Interface that confines the madness in the center, as well as keeping most Mundanes out, so Xanth isn't constantly swamped by hordes of dreary unmagical beings.”

  “So it keeps magic both in and out! We really must talk at greater length, in due course,” he said.

  Metria shrugged, hardly interested. “Maybe someday.”

  “However, now that we are about to depart from Xanth, I must caution you that the magic will be limited to a narrow aisle, of which I will be the center.” He smiled briefly. “Or the centaur, as you prefer. If you wander beyond that aisle, you will lose your magic, whatever it is. Ichabod, of course, has little to fear, being naturally Mundane—”

  “Except that I might suddenly expire of old age,” the archivist said.

  “But you, Metria, could disappear entirely. So I recommend that you stay quite close to me for this interim.” He smiled. “Perhaps we shall have that dialogue sooner than anticipated.”

  “Whatever,” Metria agreed crossly.

  They passed through the Interface. There was a slight tingle, and that was all; the land beyond was much the same as regular Xanth. But Metria was keenly aware that she was now dependent for her very existence on the centaur aisle of magic.

  Chapter 8

  MUNDANIA

  “If I may make a suggestion …” Ichabod said.

  “By all means, friend,” Arnolde replied. “This is, after all, your territory.”

  “I think it would facilitate things if we had rapid Mundanian transportation.” He glanced at Arnolde. “You know how they tend to stare at you when they see you, and this time we don't have a spell of invisibility along.”

  “Excellent point! Perhaps your wheeled vehicle?”

  “That was what I was thinking. My pickup truck will carry the full party, and if we put high sides on it, oddities will not be noticed.”

  “That's right,” Metria said. “Centaurs don't exist in Mundania.”

  “Nor demonesses,” Ichabod agreed. “However, if you arrange to be garbed a bit more completely—not that I'm complaining—“

  She had left her gown translucent. She opaqued it. “Will this do?”

  “Actually, your apparel does not closely resemble that of contemporary Mundania,” he said. “Will you accept my instruction in this respect?”

  “Maybe I'd better,” she said. “But if your hands stray, I'll turn into smoke and choke you.”

  He smiled. “I'm sure it would be delightful smoke. Please assume a colored blouse, and an opaque skirt extending about halfway to the knees.”

  Metria did so. Then she formed the peculiar pointed-heel footwear Mundanes used, and arranged her hair, and reddened her lips. “I feel like a clown,” she complained.

  “You look like a fine young woman,” Ichabod assured her. “And, I might add, a remarkably attractive one.”

  Metria, about to say something appropriately sharp, suddenly discovered that her tongue had softened to, as Professor Grossclout would put it, something like mush.

  Then Ichabod turned to Jenny Elf. “No offense, but you could pass for a human child of ten,” he told her. “I think you'd do best in juvenile garb, such as T-shirt, blue jeans, and sneakers.” Then he reconsidered. “No, you would not appear childlike in such a shirt! Maybe a loose untucked plaid shirt—what's the matter?”

  For Jenny was giggling. “That's the color of Mela Merwoman's—” She dissolved into more giggles.

  “A checkered shirt,” Metria said quickly.

  “That would do,” Ichabod agreed, perplexed.

  “There seems to be something we don't know about,” Arnolde remarked. “Perhaps we have been too long in the madness.”

  “For sure,” Jenny agreed as her mirth gradually subsided.

  “Plaid sure isn't the way to appear childlike! But I can't just make clothing from my own substance, the way Metria does. I'll have to find some.”

  “We're not all the way out of the magic yet,” Metria said.

  “Have Sammy find a shoe tree, and a clothes horse, and I'll fetch what she needs, and a jacket for you, Arnolde.”

  Sammy was off and running as she spoke. “Bring him back with you,” Jenny said, this time not trying to chase after the cat.

  Metria floated after Sammy, who brought her in turn to a shoe tree with a pair of sneakers Jenny's size, a clothes horse with good jeans, shirt, and jacket, and a scarlet ribbon worm that would do nicely to tie her hair. She gathered these up along with the cat and floated back to the waiting party.

  Then she formed herself into a high-sided tent so that Jenny could change clothes without suffering the cynosure of three or four male eyes. After all, Jenny was not a nymph.

  This accomplished, they resumed their travel in the direction the token had indicated for Kim Mundane. Gradually the terrain changed, with the trees becoming unfamiliar and somehow less interesting, as if ashamed to be without magic.

  The very air became dusky and less pleasant, losing its freshness.

  Ichabod sniffed. “The pollution gets worse every year,” he remarked. “Now we shall have to deviate from the true route, because my residence is to the side. Fortunately it is not far, and I believe we can avoid contact with the natives.”

  Even so, it was a dreary hike. Metria would have popped back to Xanth for a break, but didn't dare try to cross the dread magicless terrain between. She was stuck with the party, in her peculiar outfit, for the duration.

  At last they came to Ichabod's house, which was a dull wood and stucco structure beside a broad paved path. Beside it was a funny device with wheels.

  But as they approached it, emerging from the forest behind it, a horrible loud monster came zooming along the road.

  Jenny drew back in fright. “Is it a dragon?” she asked.

  “No, merely an automobile,” Ichabod replied confidently.

  “Do not be concerned; it will not leave the highway.”

  Jenny and Metria looked up, but saw no high way, just the low road. “He means the paved wide path you see,” Arnolde explained, realizing the source of their confusion.

  “There are a number of odd terms in Mundania.”

  “I will stand behind the house,
” Arnolde said, “so that I will not be seen. I am uncertain how far my aisle extends now; my long time in the madness may have enhanced it somewhat.”

  “Let's find out,” Metria said. “I don't want to step out of it by accident. Jenny and I can walk slowly to the edge, and when I fade she can pull me back.” The prospect made her nervous, but she did want to know the limits. It was a matter of existence and nonexistence for her, which was a new and qualmy sensation.

  “Meanwhile I will fetch money and supplies from the house,” Ichabod said. He alone was free to leave the aisle, unless his age caught up with him.

  Metria and Jenny linked hands and walked ahead of Arnolde. “It should extend fifteen paces to the front, and half that to the rear,” Arnolde called. “And only about two paces to either side.”

  Metria looked back. She judged they were a dozen paces ahead of him. She took one more, and a second, getting more nervous as she did.

  They were now close beside the paved path. Another noisy block monster zoomed across. But instead of passing on by, it suddenly squealed like a stuck oink and slewed to a halt right before them. Metria, nervous about the limit of the aisle, stood frozen.

  The monster whistled piercingly. Then it poked a human head from its side. “Hey, cutie! How about a date?”

  “I think it's talking to you,” Jenny said.

  So Metria responded. “If your dates taste as bad as your air, I don't want one.”

  The thing whistled again. “Oh, wow, we've got a live one here!” Part of its side opened, and a young man crawled out.

  “Beat it, kid,” he said to Jenny. Then, to Metria, “How about a kiss, sugarlips?”

  Metria was beginning to figure this out. The monster was actually some kind of conveyance, like a magic carpet. The man was the standard obnoxious young human male. She knew how to handle that kind.

  “Sure, buttface. Come and get it.”

  “Are you sure—?” Jenny asked worriedly.

  “We'll find out soon enough.”

  The man came up and put his arms around her. He brought his face down to hers. Just as his mouth was about to touch hers, Metria turned her-head into a mound of mush.

  His lips sucked mush. His head jerked back. “What the—?”