“’Ere then.” Mudge eyed the bird suspiciously. “Wot’s to prevent you runnin’ us in circles an’ then flyin’ off whenever it suits your fancy?”
The heron looked back at him. “If I run you in circles, you might end up back here. That thought shudders my blood. I’d rather take you as far from my home as I possibly can. Mashupro will do.”
The otter nudged Jon-Tom. “There be an ’onest reply. ’E’ll guide us true or I ain’t the Lover o’ a Thousand Tearful Females.”
“You ain’t.” Jon-Tom climbed back up into the pilot’s chair. “Besides, I thought it was ‘Terrified,’ not ‘Tearful.’”
Mudge leaned toward Pivver. “See there, Your Sleekness, ’ow too much book learnin’ can ruin even a simple dumb ’uman like ’im?”
Concentrating on the swamp buggy’s limited but sensitive controls, Jon-Tom made sure it was in neutral before essaying the alcohol fuel song a second time. Putting up the duar, he composed a silent prayer prior to turning the ignition. The engine roared deafeningly to life. Keeping a tight grip on the stick, he eased it gingerly forward.
In this manner they accelerated gradually. After a while the princesses soon felt confident enough to let go of seats and struts and even to stand so the wind could blow freely through their fur. Jon-Tom continued to let out the throttle until they were virtually flying across the marsh. Using the tip of his beak as a pointer, Felgrin was able to indicate the course without speaking.
Back on the partially trashed islet, its recently refeathered inhabitants assembled to evaluate the remains of several trees and homes as the noisy, smelly craft vanished into the southern reaches of the Karrakas.
“Felgrin will serve them well,” one of the spoonbills avowed.
“What a strange lot!” A female egret adjusted her wispy vest. “I’ve never seen a group of travelers anything like them.”
“That spellsinger,” murmured her companion. “A human, and so tall! What marvels he must be capable of conjuring.”
“And what calamities.” Nearby, Singwit kicked at a clump of shattered house siding. “We’d best get to work.”
“It could’ve been worse.” A purple gallinule was turning over fragments of ceiling with one of his oversized feet. “No one was killed, and we are only temporarily inconvenienced.”
“That’s right,” several others readily agreed. “No serious harm done.”
“I was going to remodel the old nest anyway,” announced a hornbill cheerfully.
Two days later the delayed effects of Jon-Tom’s spellsong began to manifest themselves.
Perching on a favorite hooknut branch that hung out over the water, Singwit courteously regurgitated the silver-sided cichlid he’d half swallowed while he addressed his friend. It wasn’t polite to swallow and speak at the same time.
“Are you feeling unwell, Davil?”
The roseate spoonbill’s beak clacked uncertainly. “Why wouldn’t I be, Singwit?” All spoonbills had a tendency to lisp.
“Because you’re on fire,” the heron calmly informed him.
“Weally? I don’t feel wike I’m on fire.”
“Look at yourself.”
Raising one wing, the spoonbill saw the unmistakable track of bright orange flames running from tip to shoulder. Flames mottled the other wing as well as most of his body.
“Funny. I don’t feel even swightly overheated.” One wingtip cautiously caressed the other. “It’s not paint, or chalk.”
“Your natural coloring has been changed.” Singwit glared southward. “That damn spellsinger!”
“Oh, I don’t know.” Thrusting one wing skyward, the spoonbill watched as it caught and reflected the sunlight. “I kind of like it. Thpeaking of which, you ought to see yourthelf.”
“Mythelf?” The heron turned wary. “What about myself?” Fearful of what he might see but incapable of not looking, he lowered his gaze.
The feathers of his wings and torso now boasted a brightly tinted, alternating pattern of emerald green and ice-blue diamonds.
The spoonbill pointed to where a pair of female egrets sat in another fishing tree. “Look at Erelmin.”
Boldly streaked with black and yellow bands, the pure white feathers of the egret so singled out gave her the look of a giant streamlined hornet. Her companion flaunted pink and orange pin stripes on a background of electric crimson.
Cries and exclamations were rising all over the island now, from favorite fishing haunts to the village itself. Astonishment and shock reverberated through the trees in equal measure, though the latter faded rapidly as time passed.
While it was true that these unexpected developments left no one looking as they had previously, at the same time little despair was voiced over the alterations. The least flamboyant of the new coloring was startling and distinctive, and no one, not even the youngest fledgling, had been left out.
In fact, the only complaints came from those who thought their own magical makeovers had been slighted in favor of their neighbors. While not exactly disgruntled, these individuals could be heard to voice aloud the hope that when he’d concluded his business in distant Mashupro, the spellsinger might return by the same route to pass among them again, that they might look forward to further modifications.
In the space of a few days he had reduced them from content to miserable, only to raise them up in his absence to boastful and proud. The transformation was psychological as much as physical. The isolated, lonely fishing village had become an ever-changing parade of light and color, its inhabitants now able to challenge those of any rain forest for the title of brightest or most colorful. They were properly appreciative, if for weeks afterward still more than a little stunned.
Perhaps things would have gone differently had Jon-Tom not been forced to combine new lyrics about feathers with tried and true old ones alluding to the customization of cars.
Chapter 15
SEVERAL DAYS OF RUNNING the swamp buggy at high speed brought them, if not to civilization, at least to the occasional isolated fishing shack or houseboat. From time to time they were forced to pause while their guide circled overhead in search of landmarks, only to rejoin them with fresh directions.
One more day’s traveling found them slowing as they approached Mashupro Town itself.
If not a conurbation on the order of Polastrindu, Jon-Tom had been hoping for a town at least as big as Lynchbany. In this he was quickly disappointed.
The largest buildings boasted a maximum of three floors, and most were single-storied. They clung to the southernmost edge of the Karrakas where it brushed the open sea, nestled behind a protective sandbar thick with mangrove. Cypress, swampfilter, umber mangrove, and other dense vegetation formed a small, isolated pocket of forest near the back of the town.
They entered from the main channel west of the sprawling community, Jon-Tom steering the swamp buggy in a growling arc up the narrow natural canal that formed Mashupro’s main commercial avenue. Thoughts of taking a stroll along a cobblestone or even a dirt street vanished as soon as they found themselves in among the buildings. Instead of proper streets, Mashupro offered only more water.
Goggle-eyed townies hastened to pole or paddle or row their own simple craft out of the path of the rumbling intruder. Many gestures were cast in the visitors’ direction, some of them other than complimentary. There was no panic: only a sort of languid curiosity. It was far too hot and humid to get intense about anything in Mashupro.
While it was not beautiful, or imposing, or even particularly clean, Mashupro Town did possess one characteristic that made it unique. The entire haphazard sprawl of houses and shacks, stores and saloons, was constructed on stilts which rose no less than ten nor more than twenty feet out of the water. A wagon would be as out of place in Mashupro as a frog on a glacier. This did not mean that the inhabitants were not mobile, however. They were more mobile, in fact, than the citizens of any settlement Jon-Tom had yet visited.
As they cruised slowly along the mossy byways th
e travelers observed in astonishment as one structure after another rose up on its stilts and walked to its owner’s intended destination. Not every building was in motion. Without some sort of order no one would be able to find anyone else. But it was clear that every edifice was capable of and possessed a certain degree of mobility.
“Crikey,” Mudge commented, “’ow’d you like to be the local physician, wot? Give new meanin’ to the idea o’ ’ouse calls, it bloody would.”
“I would have explained,” Naike told them, “but it is a thing difficult to believe. Better to see for oneself.” Jon-Tom nodded agreement, watching in fascination as two private homes presented themselves gracefully to the front of a grocery and the respective owners stepped from one porch to another to do their morning shopping. He was convinced he even saw both houses execute a slight architectural bow out of deference to the larger store.
“This is one town no one will ever map,” he remarked. “Any map would be out of date by midafternoon.”
They passed a chandlery as it positioned itself carefully above a damaged fishing boat and settled into place as neatly as a mother hen atop her chicks. A pair of muskrat apprentices shinnied down a rope ladder and began attaching a block and tackle to the boat’s broken mast. They paused long enough to look up and point as the swamp buggy and its regal cargo went humming past.
Want to visit the neighbors for a game of cards? Jon-Tom mused. No need to leave your house. Just find a spot convenient to all, cluster together, and set up a table on the biggest porch. Mashupro was a mobile home park to a degree no nomadic owners of Winnebagos and Bounders could ever envision. If your home became immobile here, he thought, a tire patch would do you no good. You’d need splints. At least with a Detroit diesel you didn’t have to worry about termites.
“I’ve ’eard o’ communities with codes o’ ethics,” Mudge declared as he watched two homes bow in passing, “but this is ridiculous.”
“The locals must know how to find one another.” Aleaukauna looked on longingly as they putted past a two-story general store. “Or perhaps the buildings themselves have learned how to recognize each other.”
“I wonder what sort of consciousness they must have, if they have any at all.” Jon-Tom speculatively eyed the noisy saloon they were passing. “Do they gossip about who needs varnish or get embarrassed if a neighbor has a loose plank in a sensitive spot? Do the older structures command more respect? There may be a whole complex interedificial code that doesn’t even involve the people who live within.”
“Oi, watch where you’re goin’!” Mudge yelled up at a small fishing shack. Making haste on its four tall, slim pilings for the distant sandbar, it had nearly stepped on them. Busy sorting out his tackle, the apologetic porcupine owner hadn’t been watching where he was going. Puffing on a curved pipe, he leaned over and called down to them, peering through thick bifocals.
“Sorry, friends!” He stamped one foot twice on the creaky porch beneath him. “This place is gettin’ old. Needs renovation.” With a wave he urged it past them. Jon-Tom watched as the shack ambled out into deeper water.
A nice way to go fishing. Instead of a pole and tackle box, you simply took your whole home with you. Just as the owner of the chandlery took his complete shop to each job. No need in Mashupro for children to walk to school when the school could stroll by in the morning and pick up individual students. There were, he admitted, certain advantages to such an arrangement.
As they cruised toward the harborfront he found himself wondering crazily if the smaller residences they passed were the offspring of full-sized homes. Bizarre images of copulating cottages convinced him he’d been out in the heat and humidity far too long. Did hotels give birth to motels? Could mansions sire servants’ quarters? And if so, did the local hospital assist in each delivery? What would a Mashupro restaurant that offered fast food be like? His imagination threatened to run away with his common sense. Mudge would say that was his permanent state of mind anyway.
Near the harbor they began to encounter buildings that were on the whole larger and sturdier than any they had yet passed, two-story structures that hinted at a greater permanence. Among them were the warehouses which handled goods carried across the Farraglean, small hostelries catering to sailors and travelers, public houses and bars, the normal panoply of establishments which sprang up to serve any busy port. Ships tied up directly to pilings and porches, while most of the buildings were connected by a crazy-quilt network of raised plank walkways high above the water.
Not that these structures were immobile. As Jon-Tom and his companions looked for a place to dock, three warehouses raised up without so much as disengaging their respective walkways and placed themselves in position alongside a newly arrived schooner. Can’t bring your boat sufficiently inshore to unload cargo? Just wait for the harbor to come to you.
Mashupro would be an awkward place in which to be drunk, Jon-Tom told himself. You could be staggering from one bar to another only to have them suddenly go their separate ways, taking their individual porches and walkways with them and unceremoniously dumping you in the drink.
Though he’d throttled down the swamp buggy as far as he could without bringing it to a complete stop, the whirring props still generated enough noise to draw the curious of Mashupro out of their buildings. Stares followed them until he and Mudge decided they might as well berth themselves beneath the most accessible of the waterfront structures. He found one which boasted a spiral stairway reaching down to the water, which would be far easier for the princesses to ascend than some swaying, unstable rope ladder. A curious shed sniffed at them as it ambled past.
Understandably, the majority of the population consisted of those creatures most comfortable with living in proximity to the water. The travelers saw muskrats and beavers, otters and tapirs, ocelots and primates of all kinds. There was also a large community of waterbirds. Hardly pausing long enough to bid them farewell and safe journey, Felgrin had flown off to join a trio of speckled storks. He’d fulfilled the terms of his agreement.
“i should think the locals would be more excited by our presence than they are.” Quiquell eyed the spiral staircase skeptically.
“This is the principal port on the southern Karrakas,” Ansibette reminded her. They must see many strange craft here, and many equally strange travelers.”
“Just so long as they don’t think us too strange, and get too curious.” Umagi flexed rippling royal muscles. “I don’t want to have to deal with unwanted suitors. I just want to get home.” Jon-Tom found the notion of anyone putting a move on the intimidating scion of Exalted Tuuro highly unlikely.
“Same ’ere,” barked Mudge tersely. “I don’t like bein’ the center o’ attention in a strange place. Unless”—he winked— “it ’appens to ’ave a light o’ the red persuasion ’angin’ out front.”
Jon-Tom helped Karaukul secure a line. “Mudge, you’re incorrigible.”
“Can’t be, mate. I ain’t never met the lady.”
“Lady? What lady?” Frustrated, he left the knot-tying to the more experienced and adept mongoose.
“Why, your theoretical Miss Corrigible, o’ course.”
“Commoner,” sniffed Seshenshe.
“Uncommoner, I should say.” No less one hundred percent otter than Jon-Tom’s companion, the princess of Trenku struggled to repress a grin.
Moving to the stern, Mudge clung to the propeller cage with one paw as he studied the harborfront. “Seem to be a number o’ empty boats lyin’ to, mate. Burn me for a sun-struck mole if I don’t think we can trade this berserk tin shingle for somethin’ a tad more seaworthy.”
“Why?” Aleaukauna moved to join them. “Why can we not continue on in this magical craft, which has served us so well until now?”
Jon-Tom explained. “The swamp buggy is intended for high-speed travel over flat, shallow, still water. A single modest wave would flip it, or swamp it.”
The mongoose nodded understandingly. “I see. Forgive my
ignorance. I am not a person of the water.”
Mudge turned to call back to Naike. “’Ere now, quick-tooth: ’Ow’d you and your mates manage your ocean crossin’?”
“Aboard an old merchant vessel, on which we had booked passage.” The Lieutenant neatly whipped a line around a cleat welded to the swamp buggy’s bow. “Finding one that came anywhere near this place was hard. Locating one that just happens to be going back the way we wish to return I think will prove far more difficult.” He spread both paws. “Also, we are nearly broke, and now we must secure passage not merely for four soldiers but also for two fellow travelers and six princesses who would not, I think, be comfortable traveling in steerage.”
“I should say not!” Umagi stuck out her lower jaw. As it already protruded a goodly distance, it was quite an impressive gesture. “Then we’d best arrange for some sort of charter,” said Jon-Tom. “At least on a boat of our own choosing we’ll have some privacy.”
“Ah, I like the way you think, spellsinger.” Umagi ran a hand playfully along his neck caressing him with fingers that were quite capable of unscrewing his head like a cork from a perfume bottle. Her touch, however, was light. Very assiduously, he avoided her eyes.
“Wot d’you think, mate?” Mudge wondered. “Can we make a trade?”
Jon-Tom regarded the swamp buggy. “I don’t know, Mudge. This is a craft of my world, inveigled here by spellsinging. For one thing, I’m sure my last fueling spell must be running low. I wouldn’t want to trade with someone under false pretenses.”
“That’s no problem. Let me look after the details.”
“Didn’t you hear what I said? Mudge, you never had a pretense that wasn’t false.”
The otter put a hand to his chest. “Oi! Pierced through the ’eart again!” He did not seem especially offended. “If she’ll run on any kind o’ alcohol, mate, you needn’t worry about puttin’ ’er off on some local merchant. If there’s one thing port towns keep in ample stock, ’tis an adequate quantity o’ distillates.”
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