Part 19 (1/2)

Fanchon didn't trust him. ”So we help you get out--so then the truce ends and you change us into gnats. Since we're inside Xanth, we'll never be able to change back again.”

Trent snapped his fingers. ”Stupid of me to forget. Thank you for reminding me. I can use my magic now to get us out.” He looked at the quivering green tentacles. ”Of course, I'll have to wait until all the elixir is gone, for it voids my magic, too. That means the kraken will be fully recovered. I can't transform it, because its main body is too far away.”

The tentacles lifted. ”Bink, dive for it!” Fanchon cried. ”We don't want to be caught between the kraken and the Evil Magician.” She plunged into the water.

The issue had been forced. She was right: the kraken would eat them or the Magician would transform them. Right now, while the lingering elixir blunted both threats, was the time to escape. Still, he would have hesitated---if Fanchon had not already taken action. If she drowned, there would be no one on his side.

Bink charged across the sand, tripped over a tentacle, and sprawled. Reacting automatically, the tentacle wrapped itself around his leg. The leaves glued themselves to his flesh with little sucking noises. Trent drew his sword and strode toward him.

Bink grabbed a handful of sand and threw it at the Magician, but it was ineffective. Then Trent's sword slashed down--and severed the tentacle. ”You are in no danger from me, Bink,” the Magician said. ”Swim, if you wish.”

Bink scrambled up and dived into the water, taking a deep breath. He saw Fanchon's feet kicking ahead of him as she swam down, and saw the dark tube of the nether exit. It terrified him, and he balked.

His head popped through the surface. There was Trent, standing on the beach, parrying the converging tentacles with his sword. Fighting off the coils of the monster the man was the very picture of heroism. Yet the moment the combat was over, Trent would be a more dangerous monster than the kraken.

Bink decided. He took a new breath and dived again. This time he stroked right into the somber eye, and felt the current take him. Now there was no turning back.

The tunnel opened out almost immediately--into another glowing cavern. Bink had gained on Fanchon, and their heads broke the surface almost together. Probably she had been more cautious about navigating the exit.

Heads turned their way. Human heads, on human torsos--very nice feminine ones. Their faces were elfin, their tresses flowing in magical iridescence over slender bare shoulders and perfectly erect b.r.e.a.s.t.s. But the lower quarters merged into fish's tails. These were mermaids.

”What are you doing in our cave?” one of the maids cried indignantly.

”Just pa.s.sing through,” Bink said. Naturally, mermaids spoke the common language of Xanth. He would not have thought anything of it, had Trent not remarked on how Xanth language merged with all Mundane languages. Magic operated in so many ways. ”Tell us the shortest way to the surface.”

”That way,” one said, pointing left. ”That way,” another said, pointing right. ”No, that way!” a third cried, pointing straight up. There was a burst of girlish laughter.

Several mermaids plunged into the water, tails flas.h.i.+ng, and swam toward Bink In a moment he was surrounded. Up close, the creatures were even prettier than from afar. Each one had a perfect complexion, resulting from the natural action of the water, and their b.r.e.a.s.t.s floated somewhat, making them seem fuller. Maybe he had been exposed to Fanchon too long; the sight of all this loveliness gave him strange sensations of excitement and nostalgia. If he could grab them all at once---but no, they were mermaids, not his type at all.

They paid no attention to Fanchon. ”He's a man!” one cried, meaning Bink was human, not merman. ”Look at his split legs. No tail at all.”

Suddenly they were diving under to view his legs. Bink, naked, found this distinctly awkward. They began to put their hands on him, kneading the unfamiliar musculature of his legs, a great curiosity to them. Yet why weren't they looking at Fanchon's legs too? There seemed to be more mischief than curiosity here.

Trent's head broke the water behind them. ”Mermaids,” he commented. ”We'll get nothing from them.”

So it seemed. It also seemed that the Magician could not be avoided. ”I think we'd better make the truce,” Bink said to Fanchon. ”We have to extend some trust sometime.”

She looked at the mermaids, then at Trent. ”Very well,” she said ungraciously. ”For what it's worth--which isn't much.”

”A sensible decision,” Trent said. ”Our long-range objectives may differ, but our short-range one matches: survival. See, here come the tritons.”

As he spoke, a group of mermen appeared, swimming in from another pa.s.sage. This seemed to be a labyrinth of caves and water-filled apertures.

”Ho!” a triton cried, brandis.h.i.+ng his trident. ”Skewer!”

The mermaids screamed playfully and dived out of sight. Bink avoided Fanchon's gaze; the ladies had been having entirely too much fun with him, and obviously not because of his split legs.

”Too many to fight,” Trent said. ”The elixir is gone. With your acquiescence, under out truce, I will change you both into fish, or perhaps reptiles, so that you can escape. However--”

”How will we change back?” Fanchon demanded.

”That is the key. I can not change myself. Therefore you will have to rescue me--or remain transformed. So we shall survive together, or suffer apart. Fair enough?” She looked at the tritons, who were swimming determinedly toward the three, surrounding them, tridents raised. They did not look at all playful. This was obviously a gang of bullies, showing off for the applauding spectators--the mermaids, who had now reappeared on sh.o.r.e---taking time to put on a flashy show. ”Why not change them into fish?”

”That would abate the immediate threat, could I get them all in time,” Trent agreed. ”But it still would not free us from the cave. I suspect we shall have to resort to magic on ourselves at some point, regardless. And we are intruders in their cave; there is a certain proprietary ethic--”

”All right!” she cried, as a triton heaved his three-pointed fork. ”Do it your way.”

Suddenly she was a monster---one of the worst Bink had seen. She had a huge greenish sheath around her torso, from which arms, legs, head, and tail projected. Her feet were webbed, and her head was like that of a serpent.

The triton's fork struck the Fanchon-monster's sh.e.l.l--and bounced off. Suddenly Bink saw the sense of this transformation. This monster was invulnerable.

”Sea turtle,” Trent murmured. ”Mundane. Harmless, normally--but the merfolk don't know that. I've made a study of nonmagical creatures, and have developed much respect for them. Oops!” Another trident was flying.

Then Bink was also a sea turtle. Suddenly he was completely comfortable in the water, and he had no fear of the p.r.o.nged spears. If one came at his face, he would simply pull in his head. It would not retract all the way, but the armor of the sh.e.l.l around it would intercept almost anything.

Something tugged at his carapace. Bink started dive, trying to dislodge it--then realized, in his reptilian brain, that this was something that had to be tolerated. Not a friend, but an ally--for now. So he dived, but allowed the dragging weight to persist.

Bink stroked slowly but powerfully for the underwater pa.s.sage. The other turtle had already entered it. Bink didn't worry about air; he knew he could hold his breath for as long as it took.

It did not take long. This pa.s.sage slanted up to the surface; Bink could see the moon as he broke through. The storm had abated.

Abruptly he was human again--and swimming was harder. ”Why did you change me back?” he asked. ”We weren't to sh.o.r.e yet.”

”When you are a turtle, you have the brain of a turtle, and the instincts of a turtle,” Trent explained. ”Otherwise you would not be able to survive as a turtle. Too long, and you might forget you ever were a man. If you headed out to sea, I might not be able to catch you, and so would never be able to change you back.”

”Justin Tree retained his human mind,” Bink pointed out.

”Justin Tree?”

”One of the men you changed into trees, in the North Village. His talent was throwing his voice.”

”Oh, I remember now. He was a special case. I made him into a sapient tree---really a man in tree form, not a true tree. I can do that when I put my mind to it. For a tree it can work. But a turtle needs turtle reflexes to deal with the ocean.”

Bink didn't follow all that, but he didn't care to debate it. Obviously cases differed. Then Fanchon reappeared in human form. ”Well, you honored the truce,” she said grudgingly. ”I didn't really think you would.”

”Reality must intrude sometime,” Trent said.

”What do you mean by that?” she demanded.

”I said, we are not out of danger yet. I believe that is a sea serpent on its way.”

Bink saw the huge head, and there was no question: the monster had seen them. It was big; the head was a yard across. ”Maybe the rocks--” Bink cried, orienting on the outcropping that marked the exit from the triton's cave.

”That thing's a huge, long snake,” Fanchon said. ”It could reach right down into the cave, or coil right around the rocks. We can't escape it in this form.”

”I could change you into poisonous jellyfish that the serpent would not eat,” Trent said. ”But you might get lost in the shuffle. It also may not be wise to be transformed more than once a day; I have not been able to verify this during my exile, for obvious reasons, but I am concerned that your systems may suffer a shock each time.”

”Besides which, the monster could still eat you,” Fanchon said.

”You have a very quick mind,” Trent agreed equably. ”Therefore, I shall have to do something I dislike--transform the monster.”