He hefted his spell-potion bowl carefully. “Now, there is only one thing left to do.”
I lowered the skin and said, “What’s that?”
“Why, try the spell of course!” Immediately he began singing and dancing in a circle around Hinc’s tree. On his second round, he almost tripped over his robe, but fortunately he caught himself before he fell into his bowl. Quickly he divested himself of the robe, and picking up the bowl once again began dancing around the tree and singing, “Here we go around the prickly plant, the prickly plant, the prickly plant — here we go around the prickly plant at five o’clock in the morning.”
I wondered if I should tell him that it was not a prickly plant he was deconsecrating, but a housetree, when suddenly Hinc shoved his head out of his nest and shouted, “What is that terrible noise?” He wrinkled his nose, “And what is that terrible smell?”
“It’s nothing,” Purple called as he came around again. “Go back to bed, Hinc. We’re only deconsecrating your house-tree.”
“You’re what?” Hinc’s neck-fur bristled. He dropped angrily out of the nest.
“Calm down, Hinc,” I said. “Have a drink of Quaff while we explain.” He did and we did. We told him how we were short of housetree blood, how Purple needed it desperately in order to complete his flying machine and leave this world. We told him how desperately Purple wanted to go home, and how he was doing Purple a great favor. We told him how it would only be for a day or two, and then Shoogar would be glad to reconsecrate the tree.
By the time we finished telling him, Hinc was almost as drunk as we.
He nodded agreeably as Purple gathered up his bowl again and began singing and dancing around the tree, sprinkling it gently with the potion. We watched for a bit and couldn’t help laughing.
Purple called out, “Don’t stand there laughing. Help me.”
We looked at each other and shrugged. Hinc dropped the robe he was holding about himself and easily joined Purple. After pausing for a moment to finish the Quaff I did too.
When we had finished deconsecrating Hinc’s tree, we found we had potion left, a lot of it, so we moved on to the tree of Ang the Fish-Farmer and Net-tender. He peered out of his nest at the noise and shouted, “A festival? Wait! I will join you.”
Almost immediately he dropped out of his tree, stripping off his clothes, but Purple had stopped singing. “No, it’s no good — we’re out of Quaff.”
“No! No, we’re not!” cried Ang. He disappeared back into his nest and reappeared almost immediately with another full bladder. “Here, let the celebration continue!”
After we had danced about his tree five times, Ang suddenly turned to me and asked, “By the way, Lant, what are we celebrating?”
I told him.
“Oh,” was all he said. Whatever the magician wanted was fine with him. We kept on dancing.
The noise awakened several other people nearby, and they joined us, with Quaff. We de consecrated their trees for them too, and were about to start on mine — when abruptly we were out of potion. “It’s not fair, Purple. You’ve deconsecrated everybody else’s tree — you’ve got to deconsecrate mine!”
So we made some more potion.
This time, though, we all provided the defiled water.
By this time the sun was close to rising, we could see the blue-black glare of it behind the horizon. Most of the men in the village were awake now and eagerly joining the line to put defiled water into the potion pots — of which there were several now. We passed around the ever present Quaff bladders. As soon as one was emptied, another full one seemed to appear from nowhere. The new arrivals kept bringing them. The wives watched nervously from the nests.
And then we were ready to resume the dancing and singing. We danced and sang around every tree we could, until the sun flashed over the horizon. We danced and sang in the harsh blue light until it disappeared behind a cloud bank and abruptly we were in the midst of a raging rainstorm.
“Hurrah! The deconsecration spell has worked!” We skipped down the slope and began to dance around Purple’s housetree and the seven giant airbags hanging over it. “The Gods are angry! The Gods are angry!” We sang, “It’s raining, it’s pouring! All the Gods are roaring!”
Lightning and thunder shattered the sky — the warm drops felt good against our naked fur.
And then —
A crackle of shattering brightness — our hair stood on end — a giant KKK-R-R-R-ummmmppp!!! And a ball of orange flame enveloped Purple’s airbags, housetree and all.
For a moment I stood petrified — had we gone too far? Was Elcin about to destroy this village too?
And then it was over, and silence reigned. Only the quiet spattering of raindrops.
“Well,” said Purple in the stillness. “I guess that’s how you deconsecrate a magician’s tree.”
When I awoke, the crimson sun was glaring.
Shoogar was standing above me, also glaring.
“Shoogar,” I said and groaned. The sound of my voice hurt my left eye.
“Lant,” he replied. His voice hurt my right eye.
“Shoogar,” I said.
“Lant,” he replied.
“Shoogar,” I said.
“I mean to know the meaning of your dancing this morning.”
“Not my dancing, not mine.” I lifted myself up on one arm. “It was Purple’s. He deconsecrated some housetrees so he could use their blood.”
“He what??!!”
“Shoogar,” I whispered. “Please don’t shout. He only did it for a little while. You can reconsecrate them again.”
“I can what?!!”
“You can reconsecrate them as soon as we tap their blood.
“When?!!” he screamed. I winced. “I have cloth to bless, airboat frames to bless, threads to bless, nets to bless, weaving to bless. When do I have the time to consecrate housetrees?”
“You’ll find time, Shoogar. We didn’t deconsecrate that many.”
“How many?”
“Um, not that many.”
“How many is ‘not that many’?”
“Um, let me figure it out. There was Ang’s and Hinc’s and Kifs and Totty’s and Goldin’s and … um… and…”
“Come on, clothead. Remember!”
“I will, I will, don’t rush me. I think we deconsecrated mine and maybe Purple’s — but I don’t think we have to worry about Purple’s. After we deconsecrated it, there was nothing left. And I think we did Snarg’s, but not … or maybe …”
“Lant, you’re such a bloody blithering bowl of bladderworts — if you don’t remember, I’ll have to reconsecrate every tree in the whole fang-sucking village!”
“Um, I’m sure I can remember, Shoogar. Just give me time.”
Shoogar was preparing to reconsecrate every tree in the village.
But we wouldn’t let him. To do that meant that all the other work would have to wait until he could bless it. We would just have to pass out spell tokens to the housetree owners until Shoogar could redeem them. Like Purple’s, they would be promises of future spells, and he could catch up later.
“Um,” said Shoogar, surveying the village. It was obvious he didn’t like the idea. “Well, I still need to know — would you mind telling me just how you and Purple did your spell?”
“It’s all every vague. I remember we sang and danced and had a lot of fun. Purple was singing something about ‘It’s raining, it’s pouring, all the Gods are roaring.’ ”
“I can imagine.”
“Oh yes, he also sang, ‘Here we go around the prickly plant, the prickly plant, the prickly plant —’ ”
“He turned the housetrees into prickly plants?”
“Only symbologically, Shoogar —”
“Only symbologically?” He groaned. “Of course, only symbologically. How else can you turn a housetree into a prickly plant?”
He turned and stared across the hillside, toward the village of prickly plants. “Well,” he sighed, “there goes t
he neighborhood.”
The sap-gathering was well under way. I headed down to the Lower Village. Bellis the Potter would have to supply us with everything he had that we could use to hold housetree blood — we weren’t going to run out again.
When I told him, he was delighted. It meant a great deal of work, he kept bouncing up and down and shouting, “Oh, goody, goody, goody — spell tokens, spell tokens!”
I shrugged and left him. My head still hurt. I went up the river to look for Purple. I couldn’t even find where he had been working. The surf was already crashing in around his blackened housetree stump.
Half the Lower Village was underwater, the Speakers’ clearing and the graves of the two boys as well. The river had long since seeped over its banks.
Lower Village families had been trickling up the hill to occupy the housetrees we had prepared for them for some time now, but I had not realized just how high the water had risen. It had been a while since I had been to this part of the village.
I found Purple with Trone the Coppersmith. The two of them were hard at work with wood and metal. I couldn’t fathom what they were doing, but it seemed odd that Trone, a layman, should be working on a magical device.
When I pointed this out, Trone only snarled at me. Purple said, “I need his skills, Lant. He’s the only man who can make what I need. We’ve got the copper wire — now, I need a way to insulate it.”
“Insulate? I wish you’d speak like a man, Purple.”
“It means trap the magic in the wire. That way it can’t take short cuts. I can make it go round and round in a spiral, but if the wire touches itself — I wonder, maybe if I coated the wires with sap …”
“We have more housetree blood, Purple. The gathering crews are busily working in the Upper Village right now. All those trees we deconsecrated —”
“I remember, I remember.” Purple clutched at his head.
“Ooh. I’ve got a head you wouldn’t believe …”
True enough. I hadn’t believed Purple’s head the first time I saw it. But I had come on weightier matters. I said:
“Your housetree was destroyed last night, Purple —”
“No matter. There are others —”
“But your battery —?”
He held it up. “Safe!” he said. “I have kept it with me always.”
“Have you worked out a way to restore its power?”
That’s what we’re working on now.” He indicated the device on Trone’s bench. “This one is only a model, but as soon as Trone gets more copper wire, we will be building larger ones. We still have to wind these two iron uprights with copper wire. Then, between them, we will mount a long cylinder of iron so that it can spin between the two uprights. We must wind that with wire too, as much as can be fitted on. Then we must run leads for half a mile.”
“Half a mile? That’s a tradesman’s ransom in metal!”
“In your old village it may have been,” snorted Trone. “Here metal is more plentiful.”
“Besides,” said Purple, “we dare not risk bringing the electrissy maker any closer. A stray spark from it might set off all the hydrogen bags.”
“Set off?”
“Explode,” said Purple. “Catch fire.”
“You mean like the ones over your housetree?”
“Exactly,” said Purple. “Only we will be using bigger airbags for the flying machine — we must be very careful with them.”
“Oh, yes,” I said. “Oh, yes. By all means. Use a mile of wire if necessary, two miles — a dozen — as much as you need.”
Purple laughed at that. “Don’t worry, Lant. The danger will be minimal.”
“That’s what Shoogar said, just before the last con-junction.”
He missed the point, began poking at his device again.
“What is it that will make the magic?” I asked.
“The spinner here,” he pointed at the iron bar which would be mounted between the other two uprights. “One must turn this core to make the magic flow. When the wire is wrapped properly, the core will resist turning. We have already mounted the crank here. For the larger ones we will use a set of bicycle pedals and a seat for the pedaller.”
“That means more work for my sons,” I said. “They will have to build a bicycle frame for your devices, won’t they?”
He frowned, “Yes, they will. I hadn’t thought of that. I’ll go and tell them.”
“Don’t bother. I’m going up there; I will mention it to them.”
“Yes,” said Trone to Purple, “you will have to stay here and help me melt this copper into wire. You work the bellows.”
Up on Idiot’s crag the women were still spinning thread, a pleasant and pastoral scene. Great loops of silvery thread shimmered out over the edge, glistening wetly in the wind.
I climbed past them to where my sons were just finishing the outriggers on the boat. Every day saw them making more and more adjustments with the masts and rigging. All they needed now were the windbags. The women, of course, did not know about Purple’s windbags. All they saw was a great flatbottomed boat with a fin on the bottom and two pontoons mounted far out on the sides.
Naturally, the women gossiped among themselves. Occasionally one of my wives would relate to me the latest rumor — the most recent being that Purple’s strange machine was going to fly off the mountain by flapping its wings. Purple was only waiting until Orbur and Wilville could cover the outriggers with fabric and feathers.
We had tried to stop the rumors by showing the loudest of the women the small airbags that Purple had made for the children. Those we said would lift the airboat. It did little good. Most of the small airbags had grown flaccid over the few days since they had been filled. They drooped.
I could see what Purple was talking about when he said it was imperative that his battery be recharged — when he took the flying machine on his long journey he would have to be constantly renewing the hydrogen in the balloons.
Wilville was applying another hardening layer of housetree blood to an aircloth-covered side. Orbur was just fastening a bicycle frame to one of the outriggers and stringing pulleys to an odd, bladed construction.
A bicycle on an airboat?
“What in the name of Ouells is that?” I asked.
“It’s an airpusher,” said one.
“A windmaker,” said the other.
“What does it do?”
“It makes wind,” said Orbur. “Shall I show you? We have the other one hooked up right — I think.” He crawled across the outrigger, into the boat, out the other side and across that outrigger.
“Hey!” cried Wilville. “Be careful!”
“Sorry,” said Orbur, still climbing.
“Is it safe to climb on those?” I asked.
“Oh, yes,” he called down, “they’re designed for it. Whoever is working the airpushers will have to climb out there to sit on the bicycle frames.”
“Oh,” I said.
He pulled himself onto the bicycle seat, explaining, “If it were in the air, I wouldn’t be able to stand on anything but the outrigger. Wilville and I have been practicing, crawling from the boat to the bicycle and back again.”
I nodded. “Yes, that makes sense.”
“Stand just behind that bladed thing there — not too close.” I did so. Wilville paused in his painting to watch.
Orbur began pedaling then — the airpusher started to spin. A wind blew against my face. Harder and harder — it was a pocket hurricane! It was coming from Orbur, coming from that whirling bladed device! I stumbled back with my arm across my eyes.
My sons laughed. Orbur released the bicycle pedals. The spinning slowed and so did the wind.
“You see,” said Wilville. “It makes wind. When we get the airboat up in the air, we will lower these slings with the pushers on the end. They hang one man height below the airframe. We will be sitting on the bike frames and we will pedal. The pulleys turn the shafts, and the blades make wind. The wind pushes the airboat, a
nd it moves.”
“Oh,” I said, “but why are there two windmakers?”
“You need two to steer.”
“But that means that someone else will have to go with Purple!”
“Two people,” corrected Wilville. “One person could not bring the airboat back alone. He would be stranded there.”
“But — but — who — who is so foolish as to?”
“Father,” said Orbur. “Haven’t you been listening to a thing we’ve said ? We are going with Purple.”
I felt suddenly stricken. “You’re what?!!”
“Somebody must — who is it that knows the airboat better than us?”
“But-but —”
Orbur climbed down off his bicycle frame, climbed down from the airboat cradle, and came up to me. Gently he put his hands on my shoulders and began to guide me down the hill. “You go home and think about it, Father. You will see that it is the wisest choice. Somebody must see that Purple leaves. Somebody must make sure.”
I went. Wilville and Orbur were right.
I trudged back down the hill toward the village. Spread below me was another facet of the airboat’s construction. Great swatches of cloth had been spread out across an unused slope and Grimm the Tailor was sewing them together to make the first of Purple’s giant airbags.
This was cloth that had already been treated in houseblood and tested for its water tightness. As it was sewn together, the seams would also be treated. The cloth was light and airy, and a gusty wind swept across the hill making ripples in its surface, despite the weights that were holding it down.
I had not realized that we were this far along. I had imagined many more hands of days before we had enough cloth. Apparently, Purple’s prophecy had been correct, “It may seem like a long time before we see any results, but when they do happen, they will seem to happen overnight.”
Now, all of a sudden, the airboat was almost complete, the first of the bags was being finished and Purple was making a large-scale gasmaker.
The Flying Sorcerers Page 23