A Spell For Chameleon Part 15

"Voluntarily? Why?"

"Well, I had two reasons."

"What two reasons?"

She looked at him. "I'm afraid you would not believe either one."

"Try me and see."

"First, the Magician Humfrey told me it was the simplest solution to my problem."

"What problem?" Bink was hardly in a good mood.

She gave him another straight look that mounted to a stare. "Must I spell it out?"

Bink found himself reddening. Obviously her problem was her appearance. Fanchon was a young woman, but she was not plain, not homely, but ugly--the living proof that youth and health were not necessarily beauty. No clothing, no makeup could help her nearly enough; only magic could do it. Which seemed to make her departure from Xanth nonsensical. Was her judgment as warped as her body?

Faced with the social necessity of changing the subject, he fixed on another objection, an aspect of his thought: "But there's no magic in Mundania."

"Precisely."

Again his logic stumbled. Fanchon was as difficult to talk with as to look at. "You mean--magic makes you--what you are?" What a marvel of tact he demonstrated!

But she did not chide him for his lack of social grace. "Yes, more or less."

"Why didn't Humfrey charge you---his fee?"

"He couldn't stand the sight of me."

Worse and worse. "Uh--what was your other reason for leaving Xanth?"

"That I shall not tell you at this time."

It figured. She had said he wouldn't believe her reasons, and he had believed the first one, so she wouldn't tell him the other. Typically female logic.

"Well, we seem to be prisoners together," Bink said, glancing around the pit again. It remained as dismal as ever. "Do you think they're going to feed us?"

"Certainly," Fanchon said. "Trent will come around and dangle bread and water at us, and ask which one would like to give him the information. That one will be fed. It will become increasingly difficult to turn him down as time pa.s.ses."

"You have a gruesomely quick comprehension."

"I am gruesomely smart," she said. "In fact, it is fair to say I am as smart as I am ugly."

Yes indeed. "Are you smart enough to figure out how to get out of here?"

"No, I don't think escape is possible," she said, shaking her head in a definite yes.

"Oh," Bink said, taken aback. Her words said no, her gesture said yes. Was she crazy? No--she knew the guards were listening, though they were out of sight. So she sent them one message while sending Bink another. Which meant she had figured out an escape already.

It was now afternoon. A shaft of sunlight spilled through the grate, finding its route past the edge of the roof. Just as well, Bink thought; it would get unbearably dank in here if the sun never reached the bottom.

Trent came to the grate. "I trust you two have made your acquaintance?" he said pleasantly. "Are you hungry?"

"Now it comes," Fanchon muttered.

"I apologize for the inconvenience of your quarters," Trent said, squatting down with perfect aplomb. It was as if he were meeting them in a clean office. "If you both will give me your word not to depart these premises or interfere with our activities in any way, I shall arrange a comfortable tent for you."

"Therein lies subversion," Fanchon said to Bink. "Once you start accepting favors, you become obligated. Don't do it."

She was making extraordinary sense. "No deal," Bink said.

"You see," Trent continued smoothly, "if you were in a tent and you tried to escape, my guards would have to put arrows in you---and I don't want that to happen. It would be most uncomfortable for you, and would imperil my source of information. So it is vital that I have you confined by one means or another. By word or bond, as it were. This pit has the sole virtue of being secure."

"You could always let us go," Bink said. "Since you aren't going to get the information anyway."

If that ruffled the Evil Magician, he did not show it. "Here is some cake and wine," Trent said, lowering a package on a cord.

Neither Bink nor Fanchon reached for it, though Bink suddenly felt hungry and thirsty. The odors of spice wafted through the pit temptingly; obviously the package contained fresh, good things.

"Please take it," Trent said. "I a.s.sure you it is neither poisoned nor drugged. I want you both in good health."

"For when you change us into toads?" Bink asked loudly. What did he have to lose, really?

"No, I am afraid you have called my bluff on that. Toads do not speak intelligibly--and it is important to me that you speak."

Could the Evil Magician have lost his talent in the course of his long Mundane exile? Bink began to feel better.

The package touched the straw. Fanchon shrugged and squatted, untying it. Sure enough---cake and wine. "Maybe one of us better eat now," she said. "If nothing happens in a few hours, the other eats."

"Ladies first," Bink said. If the food were drugged and she were a spy, she wouldn't touch it.

"Thank you." She broke the cake in half. "Pick a piece," she said.

"You eat that one," Bink said, pointing.

"Very nice," Trent said from above. "You trust neither me nor each other. So you are working out conventions to safeguard your interests. But it really is unnecessary; if I wanted to poison either of you, I would merely pour it on your heads."

Fanchon took a bite of cake. "This is very good," she said. She uncorked the wine and took a swig. "This too."

But Bink remained suspicious. He would wait.

"I have been considering your cases," Trent said. "Fanchon, I will be direct. I can transform you into any other life form---even another human being." He squinted down at her. "How would you like to be beautiful?"

Uh-oh. If Fanchon were not a spy, this would be a compelling offer. The ugly one converted to beauty- "Go away," Fanchon said to Trent, "before I throw a mudball at you." But then she thought of something else. "If you're really going to leave us here, at least give us some sanitary facilities. A bucket and a curtain. If I had a lovely posterior I might not mind the lack of privacy, but as it is I prefer to be modest."

"Aptly expressed," Trent said. He gestured, and the guards brought the items and lowered them through the hole in the grate. Fanchon set the pot in one corner and removed pins from her straggly hair to tack the cloth to the two walls, forming a triangular chamber. Bink wasn't sure why a girl of her appearance should affect such modesty; surely no one would gawk at her exposed flesh regardless of its rondure. Unless she really was extremely sensitive, with her remarks making light of what remained a serious preoccupation. In that case it did make sense. A pretty girl could express shock and distress if someone saw her bare torso, but privately she would be pleased if the reaction were favorable. Fanchon had no such pretense.

Bink was sorry for her, and for himself; it would have made the confinement much more interesting if his companion had been scenic. But actually he was grateful for the privacy, too. Natural functions would otherwise have been awkward. So he was full circle; she had defined the problem before he ever started thinking it out. She obviously did have a quicker mind.

"He's not fooling about making you beautiful," Bink said. "He can--"

"It wouldn't work"

"No, Trent's talent--"

"I know his talent. But it would only aggravate my problem--even if I were willing to betray Xanth."

This was strange. She did not want beauty? Then why her extraordinary sensitivity about her appearance? Or was this some other ploy to get him to tell the location of the Shieldstone? He doubted it. She obviously was from Xanth; no Outsider could have guessed about his experience with the water of the Spring of Life and the senile King.

Time pa.s.sed. Evening came. Fanchon suffered no ill effects, so Bink ate and drank his share of the meal.

At dusk it rained. The water poured through the lattice; the roof provided some shelter, but enough slanted in to wet them down thoroughly anyway. But Fanchon smiled. "Good," she whispered. "The fates are with us tonight."

Good? Bink shivered in his wet clothing, and watched her wonderingly. She sc.r.a.ped with her fingers in the softening floor of the pit. Bink walked over to see what she was up to, but she waved him away. "Make sure the guards don't see," she whispered.

Small danger of that; the guards weren't interested. They had taken shelter from the rain, and were not in sight. Even if they had been close, it was getting too dark to see.

What was so important about this business? She was scooping out mud from the floor and mixing it with the hay, heedless of the rain. Bink couldn't make any sense of it. Was this her way of relaxing?

"Did you know any girls in Xanth?" Fanchon inquired. The rain was slacking off, but the darkness protected her secret work--from Bink's comprehension as well as that of the guards.

It was a subject Bink would have preferred to avoid. "I don't see what--"

She moved over to him. "I'm making bricks, idiot!" she whispered fiercely. "Keep talking--and watch for any lights. If you see anyone coming, say the word 'chameleon.' I'll hide the evidence in a hurry." She glided back to her corner.

Chameleon. There was something about that word--now he had it. The chameleon lizard he had seen just before starting on his quest to the Good Magician--his omen of the future. The chameleon had died abruptly. Did this mean his time was come?

"Talk!" Fanchon urged. "Cover my sounds!" Then, in conversational tone: "You did know some girls?"

"Uh, some," Bink said. Bricks? What for?

"Were they pretty?" Her hands were blurred by the night, but he could hear the little slaps of mud and rustle of hay. She could be using the hay to contribute fiber to the mud brick. But the whole thing was crazy. Did she intend to build a brick privy?

"Or not so pretty?" she prompted him.

"Oh. Pretty," he said. It seemed he was stuck with this topic. If the guards were listening, they would pay more attention to him talking about pretty girls than to her slapping mud. Well, if that was what she wanted--"My fiancee, Sabrina, was beautiful--is beautiful--and the Sorceress Iris seemed beautiful, but I met others who weren't. Once they get old or married, they--"

The rain had abated. Bink saw a light approaching. "Chameleon," he murmured, again experiencing inner tension. Omens always were accurate--if understood correctly.

"Women don't have to get ugly when they marry," Fanchon said. The sounds had changed; now she was concealing the evidence. "Some start out that way."

She certainly was conscious of her condition. This made him wonder again why she had turned down Trent's offer of beauty. "I met a lady centaur on my way to the Magician Humfrey," Bink said, finding it difficult to concentrate even on so natural a subject as this in the face of the oddities of his situation. Imprisoned in a pit with an ugly girl who wanted to make bricks! "She was beautiful, in a statuesque kind of way. Of course she was basically a horse---" Bad terminology. "I mean, from the rear she---well, I rode her back--" Conscious of what the guards might think he was saying--not that he should even care what they thought--he eyed the approaching light. He saw it mainly by reflections from the bars. "You know, she was half equine. She gave me a ride through centaur country."

The light diminished. It must be a guard on routine patrol. "False alarm," he whispered. Then, in conversational tone: "But there was one really lovely girl on the way to the Magician. She was--her name was..." He paused to concentrate. "Wynne. But she was abysmally stupid. I hope the Gap dragon didn't catch her."

"You were in the Gap?"

"For a while. Until the dragon chased me off. I had to go around it. I'm surprised you know of it; I had thought there was a forget spell a.s.sociated with it, because it was not on my map and I never heard of it until I encountered it. Though how it is that I remember it, in that case--"

"I lived near the Gap," she said.

"You lived there? When was it made? What is its secret?"

"It was always there. There is a forget spell--I think the Magician Humfrey put it there. But if your a.s.sociations are really strong, you remember. At least for a while. Magic only goes so far."

"Maybe that's it. I'll never forget my experience with the dragon and the shade."

Fanchon was making bricks again. "Any other girls?"

Bink had the impression she had more than casual interest in the matter. Was it because she knew the people of the chasm region? "Let's see--there was one other I met. An ordinary girl. Dee. She had an argument with the soldier I was with, Crombie. He was a woman-hater, or at least professed to be, and she walked out. Too bad; I rather liked her."

"Oh? I thought you preferred pretty girls."

"Look--don't be so d.a.m.ned sensitive!" he snapped. "You brought up the subject. I liked Dee better than--oh, never mind. I'd have been happier talking about plans to escape."

"Sorry," she said. "I--I knew about your journey around the chasm. Wynne and Dee are--friends of mine. So naturally I'm concerned."

"Friends of yours? Both of them?" Pieces of a puzzle began to fit together. "What is your a.s.sociation with the Sorceress Iris?"

Fanchon laughed. "None at all. If I were the Sorceress, do you think I would look like this?"

"Yes," Bink said. "If you tried beauty and it didn't work, and you still wanted power and figured you could somehow get it through an ignorant traveler--that would explain why Trent couldn't tempt you with the promise of beauty. That would only ruin your cover--and you could be beautiful any time you wanted to be. So you might follow me out in a disguise n.o.body would suspect, and of course you would not help another Magician take over Xanth--"

"So I'd come right out here into Mundania, where there is no magic," she finished. "Therefore no illusion." That gutted his case. Or did it? "Maybe this is the way you actually look; I may never have seen the real Iris, there on her island."

"And how would I get back into Xanth?"

For that Bink had no answer. He responded with bl.u.s.ter. "Well, why did you come here? Obviously the nonmagic aspect has not solved your problem."

"Well, it takes time--"

"Time to cancel out magic?"

"Certainly. When dragons used to fly out over Mundania, before the Shield was set up, it would take them days or weeks to fade. Maybe even longer. Magician Humfrey says there are many pictures and descriptions of dragons and other magic beasts in Mundane texts. The Mundanes don't see dragons any more, so they think the old texts are fantasy---but this proves that it takes a while for the magic in a creature or person to dissipate."

"So a Sorceress could retain her illusion for a few days after all," Bink said.

She sighed. "Maybe so. But I'm not Iris, though I certainly wouldn't mind being her. I had entirely different and compelling reasons to leave Xanth."

"Yes, I remember. One was to lose your magic, whatever it was, and the other you wouldn't tell me."

"I suppose you deserve to know. You're going to have it out of me one way or another. I learned from Wynne and Dee what sort of a person you were, and--"

"So Wynne did get away from the dragon?"

"Yes, thanks to you. She--"

A light was coming. "Chameleon," Bink said.