Crewel Lye (24 page)

I huffed myself up and issued a feeling groan. The advancing griffiness paused, cocking her bird-head. She had been approaching me slowly, knowing I could not escape; griffins were more efficient than dragons and never scrambled when they did not have to. When a dragon made a kill, it was apt to be messy, with blood and gobbets of flesh strewn across the landscape; when a griffin did it, there was hardly even a scream. She was hesitating, not from any nervousness, but to make quite sure there was nothing here that might soil her feathers.

“Oooh, it's so horrible!” I lamented. “If only I'd known those berries were contaminated!”

Griffins don't have visible ears; nevertheless, her head perked up. Contamination?

“Now I've got the Green-Spotted Gut Rot in my gizzard and I'm filling up with purple pus. Please slay me before I rupture!” I staggered directly toward her.

The griffiness backed off--but not too far. She had a keen eye for flesh, and mine did not look spoiled. In fact, I was about as delectable a sample of female anatomy as could be found in Xanth, surely tasty in every portion. Had I had more time to prepare, I could have smeared green juiceberries on my tender skin, staining it impressively. That was the problem with extemporaneous efforts; the verisimilitude suffers.

But I improvised, discovering the genius of desperation. “Would you believe,” I pleaded distraughtly, “that I am actually a man? My innards have been so mixed up that there's no telling what will squeeze out next! Look at this!” I used my hands to cup my well-endowed bosom. “My chest muscles are practically drooping off!”

The griffiness backed off another step, her beak curving uncertainly. I pursued her. “Oh, please--cut me open and let out the gook before it geysers out on its own!” I made as if to squeeze a breast.

The griffiness spun, spread her wings, and took off. She didn't want any gook on her! Maybe she wasn't entirely convinced, but she preferred not to take the chance.

I relaxed. That had been a close call! Surely no genuine woman would have used that particular ruse--and perhaps the griffiness had known that. I wondered how Threnody had managed to survive alone in her cabin so long. A threat to jump into the--the--somewhere to her death would not stop an animal predator. But I knew the answer--by guile and poison. She had dealt with me as she had handled any other threat, and I could no longer blame her. I would do the same in her place, wearing her body.

She had told me she was a liar--and she was; but of course, a weak creature with tasty flesh could not afford the fighting integrity of an armed barbarian warrior. Understanding this, could I fail to understand also her desire to avoid Castle Roogna and marriage to a Magician whose only real interest in her was to shore up his standing as King? If I were in her place--and it seemed I was, for the time being--I'd rather go with a man whose interest was in my--in her body. At least that was honest.

But I had more immediate concerns. I hurried back to my own body. Over two hours had passed; anything could have happened!

Fortunately, it hadn't. Pook had gathered the remains together in another leaf bag and this time had managed not to include too much dirt. If any monsters had threatened, the ghost horse had stood them off.

“I got rid of the sword,” I said. “But now we have a problem, friend. I'm in the wrong body.”

Pook nodded, having figured that out for himself.

“I really can't do much in this body,” I said. “It's weak and misshapen for barbaric purposes, and--” I shrugged. “I just prefer my own.”

The ghost horse nodded again. He never had thought much of Threnody's body.

“Of course, it could have been worse,” I said. “If you had been standing closer to me than she was, I would have switched identities with you.”

Pook snorted, revolted by the notion. I laughed, though I can't say I was totally thrilled by his reaction.

I checked my own body. It was beginning to heal. Pook had rolled the head against the neck and the arms against the shoulders; these had reattached, and most of the spilled blood had soaked back in. My eyes were no longer staring; the lids had closed in halfway normal sleep. My body would be all right in a few more hours; decapitations weren't so bad when the head was not lost. If I had had to grow a new one, I'm not sure how my memories would have fared, as they are packed mainly in the head. Looking at my body this way, seeing it undergoing the process of healing, I really appreciated my talent. Never before had I stood there and watched it from another body.

But the afternoon was passing, and we needed a secure place for the night. “There are griffins in this region--and probably worse when it's dark,” I said. “If I had my body, I could handle it; but in this poor thing, I'm in trouble.” I glanced down at my present form. Oh, it was an excellent-looking form, but at the moment I didn't want to look at it, I wanted to use it.

Pook nodded again. Evidently he had sniffed monsters in the area.

“Of course, you can survive better alone,” I said. “We're a burden to you, especially in this condition. So maybe you should go your own way now.”

Pook stamped a forefoot in negation. He would not desert me in this hour of desperation. I was so grateful I almost cried, being caught unaware by the reactions of this body. I stopped myself just in time and gave him a maidenly hug of gratitude instead. He tolerated this stoically.

“Well, I've got to protect myself until I can change back,” I said. “Maybe I can climb a tree and--” But I looked at my unconscious body and at my present thin arms, and I knew I could never get us both into a tree. My barbarian body was simply too massive for my feminine body to lift. That was a confounded inconvenience; why did barbarians have to be so big?

“Maybe I could take this sword and--” But again I knew it was useless; these slender arms could never wield that great blade effectively.

I uttered an unladylike syllable of frustration. My present mouth almost choked on such a gross word. Threnody might have been quite ready to kill a man in defense of her interests, but she was not a foul talker. So I grabbed a hank of my black hair and yanked on it, venting my displeasure. All my avenues seemed blocked!

Then I spied the hole in the dead artis-tree. “I can drag my body into that,” I said. “And squeeze in myself. And you can stand guard outside. That should get us through the night. In the morning, my body should be mobile, and you can carry it to some safer place.”

Pook nodded agreement. I gripped my body by the shoulders and hauled. It was a real effort, but I managed to heave it a little. I reminded myself that Threnody had managed to drag me to the brink of the--I couldn't remember where, but surely she had dragged me, so I should be able to do it, too, in her body. I braced again, hauled again, and moved it some more. Soon I was panting, my bosom heaving prettily, but I got my body to the tree.

When I peered into the arched hole, I saw something I hadn't noticed before: there was a stairway in there! The steps led down into darkness beneath the ground. This wasn't a hole in a tree, it was an entrance to--

To what? I gazed, pondering. Steps usually meant people or some roughly similar species. They were small steps, but there was clearance for human height. Was it wise to go down there?

Pook looked around nervously, sniffing the air and rotating his ears to catch some sound that was beyond my perception. Whatever designed human beings really messed up on the ears; not only were ours less efficient than those of most animals, they weren't nearly as pretty. Pook's ears, for example, were superior to mine in just about any respect you'd care to consider.

“Something dangerous?” I asked, and he nodded affirmatively.

“Something we can't stand off?” Again the nod.

“Like a dragon?” Yes.

“Then we have no choice,” I concluded. “You range free, maybe leading it away--that's your specialty!--and I'll haul the two of us down the stairs.” It was obvious that Pook wouldn't fit in the nether passage.

I took another hold on my body, then paused. “Uh, Pook, in case this doesn't work out--”

But I couldn't finish the sentence, so I just gave him another maidenly hug about the neck and a sweet-lipped kiss on the ear and dropped only one or two tears on his hide. Then I hauled my lunky, unconscious body on into the hole and down the stairs, headfirst.

Going down was easier, because gravity helped. Gravity can be very useful magic sometimes. I paused to look back and saw Pook's silhouette above; then we rounded the curve, and the parting was complete.

I felt halfway naked without Pook, and it was much worse to feel naked in this body than in my own. I reminded myself firmly that Pook really was better off free in the forest, where he could outrun any threat. With luck, we would find the subterranean region empty and be able to rest and recover in private safety. Of course, there might be a problem about food, but we could emerge to forage in the morning. Without luck--well, what choice did we have? That evil spell-sword had really cut down our options. I had managed to use the wrong white spell to salvage something, at least.

I reached the foot of the stairway. Now we were in a rough passage that wound among the descending roots of the artis-trees. The roots were aesthetically shaped and arranged, just as were the branches above, and it was in consequence a rather scenic passage, nicely contoured, though it was formed of packed dirt.

Where should we go from here? If anything used this stair these days, I wanted to be clear of it. I had not noticed any cobwebs as I descended with my body, and that suggested that the stairs had been recently used. Maybe there was a room along the passage where my body could be hidden.

I left that body for a moment and explored. Yes, there were occasional chambers opening from the passage. They were just rounded places that perhaps had once been used to store things. I went back and resumed the haul on my body. What an awful job it was!

Then I became aware of another presence. It was gloomy here, and getting more so as the day waned above, reducing the light leaking down the stairway. But now there was yellower light at the far end of the passage. Someone was coming!

I tried to haul my inert body the rest of the way to the chamber, but I was tired and the body seemed heavier than ever, and there wasn't enough time. The light of a lantern rounded a corner and paused.

“What have we here?” a gruff voice growled.

Oh, no! I recognized that quality of speech. This was a gnome! The gnomes lived underground, and their profession was mining; they tunneled endlessly, ferreting out pretty stones, and they weren't partial to intruders. Sometimes they ate visitors; sometimes they did worse things. Especially to attractive young women. For some obscure reason, I was now far more acutely conscious of the problems of young women than I had been before. Gnomes weren't as bad as goblins, being slightly more civilized--yes, even I, a proud but ignorant barbarian, could appreciate some aspects of civilization!--but they were bad enough. Some idiots thought of gnomes as innocent little men, like the elves; I knew better. I didn't like this at all.

“My--my friend and I--he's injured and must have shelter,” I said, hoping to rouse some element of sympathy in the gnome. It was a faint hope, but all I could muster at the moment.

It was promptly dashed. “You are intruders!” the gnome growled. I saw that he carried a wicked-looking pick in his other hand, the kind that could pry stone from bedrock. “I, Gnasty Gnomad of the Gnobody Gnomes, shall deal with you forthrightly!” Gnomes were very forthright folk; that was part of their problem. He lifted his deadly pick.

Had I been in my own body, with my trusty sword, I should hardly have been concerned. Gnasty stood only a third my normal height, was short-legged and short-armed, and the pick was relatively clumsy compared with the sword, however devastating it was against unarmed folk. But I was not in my body, and my sword remained above-ground. I could not effectively oppose the gnome physically, shamed as I am to admit it.

So I scrambled cunningly once more. “Wait, good gnome, sir!” I cried. “No need to kill us! We can be useful to you! We--” Oh, what could I offer, that I was willing to offer, in this body? Again the genius of desperation struck. “We can sing!”

“I care nothing for human hilarity,” Gnasty said, touching his squat, dark cap dourly. But he paused.

“No hilarity!” I said. “Sad, very sad! Listen!” And I used Threnody's voice, as I had done to calm the black sword, ululating fervently. It sounded as if something gross had just expired.

Gnasty Gnomad considered. “Maybe so,” he said, grudgingly impressed. “Then follow me.” He turned about and tramped back down the passage.

I returned to the dragging of my body. “Oh, leave him!” the gnome snapped. “We'll cut him up for broth.”

“No!” I cried. “He can sing too; we're a duet! Much better together!” I hoped that was true. My body's ability at singing was nil, as song is not a barbarian thing, but if Threnody animated it, her skill might compensate.

The gnome shrugged. “It better be true,” he grumped.

I hauled, and somehow got my body moved along. Fortunately, it wasn't far; down the passage was a chamber hollowed from stone, with a ventilation shaft penetrating to the surface. It had a barred wooden door. When I struggled in there with my burden, the gnome slammed and locked the door.

“But we'll need food, water!” I cried. “In order to sing well!”

“In due course, chattel,” Gnasty said and marched off.

Well, for the moment we were secure. Too secure, perhaps, since we were prisoners. But maybe that was better than nothing.

I checked my body carefully. The healing continued apace; the head and arm were now so firmly attached that only faint scar lines showed where the severings had been. What a marvelous talent I had!

Actually, Threnody had a marvelous talent, too. I felt I should use it to rescue us from this fix. I could change into a snake and crawl out between the bars and up the stairs and out--

But my body could not follow. And I didn't want to leave it unattended. Suppose dimepedes or nickelpedes showed up, or the Gnobody Gnomes, while I was absent? So I just had to sit tight--at least until the healing was far enough along.

I settled down beside my body and slept.

By morning, my body had healed enough to return to consciousness, but still had some healing to do. I noticed that the legs were flesh again; my talent had cleared up that detail while it was at it. Good enough; I really didn't need stone feet, or even feet of clay.

However, I now had the chore of explaining things to Threnody, who had not been in a position to appreciate much of what had happened recently. I had to get things straight with her before the gnomes returned.

“Don't get excited,” I murmured in my ear. It was a dirty ear; I really should have cleaned my head more often, especially after it had rolled in the dirt. “There has been an exchange of consciousness.”

My eyes widened. My left arm jerked up before my face. My mouth opened.

“Don't scream!” I warned. “That's more trouble!”

She was smart enough to desist, but she took a while to get settled. “My arm,” she whispered, horrified. “It's all big and hairy!”

“That's not all,” I muttered. I explained the rest of it in terse whispers, bringing us up to date. “So now you must try to sing, using my voice,” I concluded.

Once she accepted the reality of our exchange of bodies, she adapted readily. She didn't like it any better than I did, and had just as much trouble with the specialized male anatomy as I had with the female anatomy, but she was a clever and realistic woman. I realized that Magician Yang must have expected me to be nearest Pook or some other creature, perhaps a living tree, when the exchange spell was activated. Surely he would not have wanted me in the body of the woman he hoped to marry. Or did he hope to marry her? Maybe he would be satisfied to have her dead, regardless of the attitude of the common folk of Xanth. At any rate. Threnody and I were for the moment unified in objecting to the present situation.

“Gnomes are no good for us,” she said. “They don't like to go on the surface by day, so have to hunt at night; they have spells to protect them from night creatures, or maybe it's just their bright torches that scare the beasts away. But they have an appetite for day-game, which they seldom have opportunity to assuage--and we are day-game.” She looked down at my body, which was now clothed in only the merest tatters of her brown dress. “If I had known this was going to happen, I'd have let you get new trousers! Can this hunk of flesh survive being cooked and eaten?”

“I'm not sure,” I said uncomfortably. “Swallowed whole by a dragon, sure; but spread among several stomachs--the more my body has to regenerate lost parts, the harder it is. Maybe if the bones were piled together--I think it's the bones that are the essence of me. But if they are kept separate--thrown away in different dumps--I don't think I'd be able to recover. I'm not like a worm, where each part becomes a new creature.”

“That's what I thought. So if I get eaten by gnomes in this body, I'm done for--and my own body can't recover from simple death. There's no chance there. We've just got to avoid being eaten.”

“I never much liked being eaten, anyway,” I confessed. “But how can we escape? Your body's a lot stronger than mine, but yours is pretty weak right now.”

 She smiled with my brute, masculine face. “I'm in a position to know.”

 “After a recovery, my body needs a lot of food and rest,” I explained. “It will be a couple of days before it's up to full snuff.”

“And without a weapon or tool to fight with or pry us out of here, even your full strength won't do much good,” she said. “We'll have to depend on my talent. My body can escape readily. But--”

“But mine can't,” I finished for her. “And we need both bodies, until we can get switched back.”

“I'm aware of the irony,” she said, grimacing. “We've got to stick together and protect each other from further harm. But how can your body escape? Undoubtedly you, as a barbarian, have had prior experience with this sort of thing. Hairbreadth escapes and whatnot.”

She gave me too much credit. Most of my life had been spent peacefully growing up in Fen Village. That was why I had had to go out on my own to fill my quota of adventure. I had drowned once, gotten zonked by the stare of a stray basilisk, and had my neck broken by a falling branch, but these were mere boyhood experiences, the kind any lad had. I had never been imprisoned and threatened with getting cooked, before this journey to central Xanth.

But I did know a way. “I could assume the form of a creature with strong teeth or cutting claws. Then I could cut you into chunks small enough to pass through these bars, and carry the chunks to the surface, one at a time. After that, I could put them together and wait for you to reconstitute.”

She grimaced. “There are a squintillion problems with that! First, doesn't it hurt? And if you knocked me out first, wouldn't there be a lot of lost blood when you cut? And wouldn't it take so long--three hours--for you to change in my body and do the job that the gnomes will return and discover what we're up to? And if not, and you carry the chunks to the surface, what's to prevent some predator from consuming them up there, one at a time, while you're down here fetching another? And if all that can be overcome, how do you know your body will recover after that bad treatment, so soon after being hacked apart by the black sword? You hadn't recovered all the way from the stone-spell before, and I still feel a little stone in my toe.”

I spread my small, pretty hands. “You're thinking better than I am, I guess. You're right; it wouldn't work. We can't escape on our own. But what else can we do?”

“I think you had the right idea before. We'll have to sing our way out.”

“But can you sing well in my voice? I was never good at that sort of thing.”

“Marvels can be done with harmony,” she said. “It's one thing your weakened body can probably do as well as ever. Maybe we'd better practice.”

“But the gnomes will hear!”

“And what if they do? They want us to sing, don't they? I can't think why they want song, but we'd better oblige them.”

So we sang. Her body's voice was very good, even without the accompaniment other lute, but I knew neither words nor tune, so could only ululate in the fashion I had done before. My body's voice was deep and rough, but Threnody knew the songs. It seemed impossible at first, but she knew what she was doing; that turned out to be an improvement on my situation and an important part of singing.

“I will teach you a song, so you can sing it properly,” she said. “Then I will be the bass accompaniment. The secret is harmony and counterpoint; the two voices will complement each other and become more than they are separately. Let me see.” She pondered briefly. “Let's start with a wordless one; you just learn the melody.”

She made my voice sing the tune. As she got used to it, she made my voice perform better than it ever had sung before. It stopped barging about the basement and started marching in more disciplined fashion at ground level. I realized that my poor singing had been more a matter of attitude than ability; even the worst voice could sound halfway decent if properly managed. Then, with her voice, I was able to pick up the theme on a higher register and soon I could sing it. It was a sad but pretty thing that seemed appropriate for mourning a close friend's death or the tragedy of the human condition in general.

There was a tramping in the passage, and we broke off. Gnasty arrived, followed by several other gnomes. “See, Gnitwit,” Gnasty said. “I told you they could sing.”

Gnitwit nodded. “So you did. But will the cowboys listen?”

“Why gnot try it and see? What do you think, Gnonesuch?”

“Since the cowpokes infest our richest region,” Gnonesuch said, “anything's worth a try. If it doesn't work, we can always put them in the stew.”

Gnitwit peered at me. “She looks delectable. Look at that thigh! I get first dibs on that!”

“Gno you don't!” Gnasty snapped, as I hastily tugged the hem of my skirt down to cover the exposed thigh. “I found them; I get first pick from the stew.”

“Let's fatten them up so we can all feast,” Gnonesuch suggested.

“Good gnotion!” Gnasty agreed.

They departed, and Threnody and I practiced some more harmony. We had extra incentive now! While I sang the tune I had learned, she used my voice to fill a deep underpinning, a sort of strumming that was nothing in itself but really sounded good when it lined up with what I was singing. We were a team!