The Color of Her Panties

by Piers Anthony

  "I wonder if there are any centaurs among them?" Che murmured musingly. Jenny realized that he was thinking of the lack of any others of his own kind. His parents were the only adult winged centaurs in Xanth, and he was the only winged centaur foal. Jenny herself had a notion what it felt like to be unique in Xanth: it was lonely.

  "I never heard of winged fauns in Xanth," Gwenny remarked. "So why are they in the gourd?"

  "Maybe the regular fauns and nymphs have bad dreams about them," Jenny suggested.

  "But regular fauns and nymphs live only for the day; they can't remember prior days," Che said, "so shouldn't have bad dreams about them."

  "Well, let's ask," Jenny said. She approached a pair of them who were lying in the flowers at the edge of their glade. Then she halted. "Oops."

  "What's the matter?" Gwenny asked.

  "Adult Conspiracy. I recognize it now."

  "You mean they're—?"

  "I think so."

  "That is what fauns and nymphs do," Che said. "Once they catch each other."

  They stood and watched. "I don't want to interrupt them," Jenny said. "Do you think they'll be through soon?"

  "They look as if they're having fun," Gwenny said, surprised.

  "I suppose it should be fun, or folk wouldn't do it," Che agreed dubiously. "I confess that it seems to me that a pillow fight would be more fun."

  "Or a tsoda popka fight," Jenny said.

  Gwenny shook her head. "It must be a terrible thing to become adult and lose interest in the fun things, and have to settle for dull things like this."

  The others could only agree.

  Then the faun and nymph finished their business. They looked up. "Eeeek! Strangers!" the nymph shrieked.

  "Run!" the faun cried.

  "Wait!" Jenny exclaimed. "We only want to ask you a question."

  The two considered, then decided to wait a moment. "But no more than one moment," the nymph said firmly. "We can't spare two moments."

  "Why are the winged fauns and nymphs here in the gourd," Jenny asked quickly, trying to stay within the moment, "when there aren't any in Xanth?"

  The faun's eyes went round. "We don't remember," he said.

  Then the two were up and away. She leaped into the air, spread her wings, and flew around a tree. He pursued her. "Eeeeek!" she cried as he caught her.

  "Ask a foolish question, get a foolish answer, I guess," Jenny said. "If they can't remember any prior days, they can't remember about why they're here, either."

  They walked on. There beyond the tree were the same faun and nymph, lying together on the ground.

  "But they just did that!" Jenny said, surprised.

  "They must have forgotten," Gwenny said, laughing with more than a tinge of embarrassment.

  Then they saw another mock lens, marking another offshoot trail, and moved on along it.

  This one led to a blank wall, but when they touched the wall, they discovered that it was illusion. They stepped through it, and were in a region as gloomy as the other had been pleasant. It was night, with a huge gibbous moon hovering suspiciously low. Ahead were somber gravestones.

  "Oops, now we're in one of the scary sections," Jenny said. "Let's hurry through."

  They broke into a jog to follow the path through the center of the graveyard. But the sand crunched under their feet and made a horrible scratching noise. Then the soil of the graves stirred.

  "Eeeek!" Gwenny screamed, sounding exactly like the nymph.

  They stopped, for there before them a bony arm and hand were poking up from the ground. It moved as if casting about for something, such as maybe an ankle. Sammy hissed at it and backed away.

  They tried to retreat, but two things stopped them. "First," Che said, "the path isn't marked the other way, and we'll lose it."

  "Second," Jenny said, shivering, "bones are appearing behind us, too."

  "Third," Gwenny said, "we're—"

  "You can't say that," Che reminded her. "There are only two."

  "Oh." She looked around. "Then I have only one thing to say."

  "What is that?"

  "EEEEEEEEK!!" she screamed, twice as long and loud as before.

  Che nodded. "I believe that covers it."

  They huddled together for support against the fright while all around them things hauled themselves out of the ground. Soon there were a dozen horrendous figures.

  "The walking skeletons!" Che exclaimed. "Like Marrow Bones and Grace'l Ossein!"

  "Who are they?" Jenny asked.

  "They are friendly refugees from the gourd," he explained. "Marrow got lost, and Esk Ogre brought him out. Then Grace'l got in trouble for ruining a bad dream, and was kicked out. Now they're a couple. They may even have summoned the stork, or whatever it is they do. Maybe they simply assemble a baby skeleton from small bones. At any rate, such folks do scare people in dreams, but that's just their job. I understand they are nice when you get to know them personally."

  "M-maybe we should make the effort," Gwenny said. Then she turned to the nearest skeleton. "H-hello. Are you f-friendly?"

  "Why, I never thought about it," the skeleton said. "I never tried to be friendly with a monster."

  "Monster?" Gwenny looked fearfully around. "Where?"

  "He means you," Che said. "Us. Because we're different."

  "Me?" Gwenny was amazed. Jenny understood why. Though Gwenny was not vain, she was a very pretty goblin girl, and could hardly be ignorant of that fact. "Maybe it's my spectacles."

  "No, it's your grisly flesh," the skeleton said. "I see that you have tried to cover it up, but enough shows to make you a truly frightful creature. Are you from another section of the dream establishment? You must be very good at terrifying dreamers!"

  "No, I'm just visiting. I'm looking for the contact lens bush. I don't suppose it's near here?"

  "As a matter of fact, it is," the skeleton said. "I understand it's the last one growing. The night mares come to it when they have trouble seeing well. I suppose going out into that horrible other realm is bad for their eyes."

  "That must be the case," Gwenny said, evidently gaining confidence. "Just let me go and get a pair, and we'll leave this area so you won't have to be appalled by the sight of us."

  "That will be much appreciated," the skeleton said, and the other skeletons nodded. "We don't mean to be impolite, but it is hard to be close to freaks like you without spooking."

  "I understand perfectly," Gwenny said.

  They walked on along the path, the skeletons making wary way for them. There in the center of the graveyard was a glittering bush—and there on the bush glittered a single pair of tiny lenses.

  "Oh, I can hardly believe it!" Gwenny said.

  They stood around the bush. "But how do I put them on?" Gwenny asked after a moment.

  "I think you just look straight ahead, and set them on your eyes," Che said. "Maybe I can help you."

  "I think I have to do it myself," Gwenny said. "So that they will work for me. If you touch them, they might decide to work for you instead."

  "Good point," he agreed, stepping back.

  Gwenny reached out and very gently took a lens. It dropped into her hand. She removed her spectacles, put them in a pocket, and brought the lens to her face—and it jumped onto the right eye. "Oh!"

  "Is something wrong?" Jenny asked, alarmed.

  "No, it's right! I can see clearly with my right eye, and fuzzily with the left. It's as if I have only half my spectacles on."

  Then she took the other lens and put it to her left eye. She blinked. "Oh, it's wonderful!"

  Jenny tried to imagine what it would be like to have such lenses. She pictured herself with a pair, walking around without her spectacles. She would feel naked, just as if all her clothes had dissolved, because she had used the spectacles ever since coming to Xanth.

  Gwenny's gaze swung around to Jenny. "Oh, you're naked!" she exclaimed.

  "No, she remains clothed," Che said, surprised.

  Jenny jump
ed. "You saw my daydream!" she exclaimed.

  "Oh, now you're clothed again," Gwenny said. "I—your dream?" "I was daydreaming," Jenny said. "And you saw it—just as the Good Magician said you would."

  "That is an excellent sign," Che said. "It means the lenses are working exactly as they are supposed to."

  "But actually seeing dreams—is that polite?" Gwenny asked.

  Jenny smiled. "That must depend on the dream."

  "Oh—and some folk will be dreaming Adult things," Gwenny said. "I wish there had been some other lenses."

  "Actually, these may be worthwhile," Che said thoughtfully. "You will face a difficult situation at Goblin Mountain. If the daydreams of people indicate their real feelings—"

  "You might be able to tell when they're not telling the truth!" Jenny said.

  "But of course folk would tell the truth," Gwenny said.

  "Goblin males?" Che asked pointedly.

  "Oh." Because male goblins were just naturally the worst of folk, being the opposite of goblin females. "But I wouldn't want to spy on anyone!"

  "Now look, Gwenny, a chief has to know what's going on," Che said. "You know that goblin males are always conspiring to do mischief. How long do you think you will last if you don't know what they're thinking?"

  "He's right," Jenny said. "You will be chief over the meanest male folk, as well as the nicest female folk. Maybe if you were an ordinary goblin girl, you could just be your nice self. But that's not your destiny. If you can't be mean, you'll have to be knowledgeable."

  Gwenny still looked doubtful, so they worked on her some more. "You should practice using those lenses now," Che said. "So you'll be able to know folk's dreams and tell whether they're your friends or your enemies."

  "And so you won't blush when you see an adult dream," Jenny added.

  "But what can I practice on?" Gwenny asked without enthusiasm. "The folk here are dreams." Then she had a second thought. "How was I able to see Jenny's daydream? I mean, she's right here in dreamland, so how could she be dreaming?"

  That set them back. But then Che came up with the answer. "We aren't dreams. We're just visiting. Our real bodies are lying in the Good Magician's castle. So we can still have dreams, through those bodies."

  That seemed to make sense. So Jenny tried to make another dream, but she couldn't. The more she concentrated on it, the more she paid attention to their here and now, rather than wandering to something else.

  "Sing," Che suggested.

  Maybe that would do it! So Jenny sang, imagining a pleasant landscape not at all like the graveyard here. It worked! Soon the landscape became real for her. Then Sammy appeared in it, preferring it to the "reality" of this dream realm. After a moment Che appeared in it too. Finally Gwenny appeared.

  Then they walked through the field of flowers toward the brilliant sunset. And beside them walked some of the skeletons, who seemed surprised.

  "But I'm not seeing your dream," Gwenny protested. "I'm in it!"

  "And so are the skeletons," Che said. "I think Jenny actually changed the scene here."

  So it seemed. "I guess we'll have to practice outside the gourd," Jenny said. "But we might as well wait here where it's nice until we are recalled to reality."

  So they settled down for a nap, inside Jenny's dream.

  Then Che had a notion. "Jenny, if you are able to bring us all into your dream here, including the skeletons—what about the Good Magician's castle?"

  "His castle? But we're already there, really."

  "That's what I mean. Can you dream us back out of the gourd, awake, so we don't have to wait here anymore?"

  Jenny thought about it. "Why, I really don't know. My dreams always end when some outside disturbance interrupts them. Just the way the gourd visions do. Or when I stop singing." That brought another realization. "But I'm not singing now! So why didn't this vision end?"

  "Probably because this is the dream realm," Che said, "When we shift from one dream setting to another here, we have neither slept nor awakened; we have merely moved within the larger dream. So your singing just facilitates that movement. But what I'm thinking of now is whether you could make a dream of us back awake in the castle, and have that come true. Because if that worked, you would be able not only to change dreams, but to get out of the dream realm on your own. That would be truly remarkable."

  "Why, I don't know," Jenny said, intrigued. "I suppose I could try it."

  "If it doesn't work, we'll be rescued anyway in a few more hours," Gwenny said. "Still, I don't want to stay here any longer than I have to."

  So Jenny sang again. This time she imagined the chamber in the Good Magician's castle, with the three of them lying on their cushions and looking into the gourds. Then she had herself look away from the peephole—and she was there. She quickly covered the peephole with her hand, then turned the gourd around so that she could not accidentally look at it again.

  But the others remained locked to their gourds. She tried to imagine them looking away, as she had done, but they did not. Then she put her hand between Che's face and his gourd, and he snapped out of it.

  "It worked!" he exclaimed.

  But Jenny had a nasty thought. "Suppose it didn't work? Could this just be a dream of us waking, and we didn't wake at all, but only thought we did."

  He put his hand before Gwenny's face, waking her. "No, I don't think so, because I had not yet entered your reality dream. I had not yet become distracted, so I was still in the flower valley. I woke from there to here."

  Gwenny sat up. "Are we out?" she asked, blinking behind her spectacles.

  "I think so," Jenny said. "Except—oh, no, I forgot to include Sammy!"

  "Sammy's here," Che said, turning the cat's gourd around.

  "But when I pictured this chamber, I didn't picture him in it! So he should be missing. Why isn't he?"

  "Because this is real," Che answered. "What you pictured of the rest of us had no relevance; we must enter your dream ourselves. You pictured me, but I wasn't there in your dream."

  "But you had to be, because I woke you!"

  "No. You were in it—and since your dream was of reality, you saw reality. You may have forgotten to imagine Sammy here, and he may not have come in by himself, but since this is not a dream but reality, he is here."

  "I suppose you're right," Jenny said, her head spinning because surely if it were just her imagination, Sammy would not be here. That seemed to be the proof of it. But she wasn't quite sure.

  Then her uncertainty found another focus. "But the lenses! Did they come through?"

  Gwenny removed her spectacles, which were back on her face, here in reality. She looked around. "I can see everything! Better than before. Only no dreams."

  "That's because none of us are daydreaming at the moment," Che said.

  Then Gwenny's gaze fell on the cat. "Now I see a chocolate mouse!" she said.

  "Sammy does like them," Jenny said. "So he must be dreaming of one now. So the lenses do work here."

  "Well, let's go down and surprise the others," Gwenny said, delighted. "They think we're still locked into the gourd."

  "That's right!" Che agreed. "We may be the first to have found a way to escape the gourd by ourselves. Actually, Jenny's the only one who can do it, but it remains a valuable discovery. We can never be trapped in the gourd, if she's along."

  "Then we had better remain friends with her," Gwenny said, laughing.

  Jenny picked Sammy up, and they headed out to surprise the others in the castle.

  CHAPTER 7.

  Panting

  Mela's legs were really getting tired as they neared the top of Iron Mountain. She had never used them this hard before, and she wished she could rest them. Legs were so inefficient, compared to a tail! But this was the route to the Good Magician's castle, according to the map, so she just had to suffer through.

  Finally they reached the top. It was bare; trees just did not seem to grow well on solid iron. Not even ironwood. But the view was t
errific. They could see Xanth spread out all around them.

  But that did not help much, because they couldn't actually see the Good Magician's castle. From this vantage, one part of Xanth looked much like another.

  It did not even seem to be a very good place to camp for the night, yet they were too tired to make the arduous trip down the west side on this day. What were they to do?

  "I wish I had a nice soft moss bed to lie on," Ida said.

  "I wish I had a nice hardwood pallet to lie on," Okra said.

  "I wish I had a seawater pond to float in," Mela said.

  Smoke formed before them. It swirled and became a female figure. "Are you travelers in distress?" she inquired.

  "Oh, hello, Metria," Mela said without enthusiasm.

  "I'm not Metria," the demoness said.

  "Well, whoever you are, we aren't looking for trouble, and we hope you will go away."

  "I'm Dana, the Good Magician's wife. I have no soul, but I try to emulate a souled person by doing a good deed every day, if I can find one to do. I thought perhaps I could help you in some way."

  Mela did not quite trust this, but did not want to annoy the demoness, because that could lead to worse mischief. So she tried to avoid disagreeing directly. "I had thought the Good Magician was married to the Gorgon." Mela had recently been told otherwise, but she distrusted the source of that information.

  "He now has six wives, counting MareAnn. We take turns with him, while the others remain in Hell. This is my month of delight."

  "The demoness Metria did say he had married other wives," Mela agreed. "But she also said that he was once a king. I find such things difficult to believe."

  "Oh, yes, he was the king of Xanth when I married him. I had a soul, then, but knew I could get rid of it only by marrying a king. Now I wish I had a soul again, though I blush to confess it." She turned an attractive pink. "But please, if there is any good deed I can do for any of you, let me do it, so that I can pretend to have a soul."

  Mela exchanged two glances with Okra and Ida. "As a matter of fact, we were making some wishes."