Dragon On A Pedestal Part 4

She heard a noise in the brush and discovered a large animal grazing. It had horns like those of a sea cow, a tail like that of a centaur, and silky hair along its sides like that of a beautiful woman. In short, it was a strange, composite creature.

But Ivy was too young and inexperienced to realize how strange this animal was or to know proper fear. She marched right up to it. "What, are you?" she asked. She had always found this question useful, because, when her father was near, things always answered.

The creature raised its head and stared down at her with a huge and lovely eye. "I thought you'd never ask! I'm a yak, of course, the most talkative of wild creatures. I will talk your ear off, if you don't figure out how to stop me."

Ivy put a hand to her delicate little ear. It seemed to be securely fastened, so she relaxed. "How do I stop you?" She was rather pleased with her ability to a.s.semble a question correctly; after all, she wasn't very big. But she had discovered that she could do a lot more than she thought she could, if she only believed she could. She had decided to believe she could talk as well as a grown-up person, and now she could, almost. But she didn't do it when her folks were present, in case they should object. Grown-ups had funny notions about what children should or should not do, so she had learned caution.

The yak shook his head. "Not so readily, cute human child! That is the single thing I won't tell you! It is my nature to talk as long as I have a receptive ear--an indifferent ear will do in a pinch--regardless how anyone else feels about it. You can't shut me up unless you know how. What do you think of that?"

Ivy looked up at him. "You're a real pretty beast. I like you."

The yak was taken aback. "You aren't annoyed?"

"You talk to me. Most people don't. They don't have time. My folks don't know how well I can talk, fortunately."

The yak seemed uncertain whether she was joking. He twitched his horns. "Well, I have time. I have nothing better to do than talk. I'd rather talk than eat."

"Eat." Ivy realized she was hungry. "I want to eat."

"I will talk about eating, then. But first we must introduce ourselves more formally. What is your given name?"

"Ivy. I'm King Dor's child."

The yak's mouth curved into a tolerant smile. "Ah, royalty! You will surely have royal tastes!" He was humoring her, not believing her parentage. "What do you like?"

Ivy considered. It was not that it took her any great cogitation to come to a conclusion, but that she enjoyed this particular type of consideration. "Chocolate cake."

"I never would have guessed! As it happens, there's a chocolate moose in the vicinity, but it doesn't like getting nibbled. Once a bunch of ducks started nibbling, and it said--"

"I don't want to hurt anything," Ivy said, sad for the moose. "Now I don't know what to eat."

"Then we'll just have to explore. There's lots of succulent gra.s.s in this glade; do you like that?" By way of ill.u.s.tration, the yak took a mouthful of it.

Ivy bent down and took a similar mouthful of gra.s.s. She chewed a moment, then spat it out. "No. It's too much like spinach."

"There are also leaves," the yak said, reaching up to pull down a leafy branch. Ivy took a leaf and chewed it. "No. Too much like cabbage."

"You are hard to please!" the yak lamented cheerfully. "Let's look around more widely."

They walked back the way Ivy had come. "What's that?" she--asked, pointing to the metallic plant with the pickle smell that had refused to identify itself before.

"Why, that's an armor-dillo," the yak said. "It grows the best armor, but it stinks of the brine used to store it. Some creatures like the odor, though."

Ivy wrinkled her cute little nose. "Ugh. They must be dillies."

"They are indeed! They get pickled every night." They moved on to a plant whose huge limbs terminated in delicate human hands, each finger manicured and with bright polish on the nail. "What's that?"

"A lady-fingers plant, naturally," the Yak said. "You have hands; you can shake hands in the typical human fashion if you wish."

Ivy tried it, extending her right hand toward the nearest branch. She could tell her right hand from her left because her hands lined up the same way her feet did, and her shoes were marked R and L. The nearest lady-fingers grasped her hand immediately. But then all the other hands clamored for attention by snapping their fingers, and she had to shake them all.

At length she drew away, resolving to be more careful thereafter. She started toward a somewhat vague bush. "What's that?"

"Don't go near that one!" the yak warned. "That's a trance plant. It doesn't belong here at all."

"Why not?"

"It grows elsewhere. Probably someone carried it here and set it on the ground and it rooted. Anyone who gets too close to it gets dazed."

Ivy considered. She was a pretty smart little girl when she tried to be, especially when she thought she was. Her father's friend Smash the Ogre had said she might have had an Eye Queue vine fall on her head; Smash knew about jungle vines. But that was their secret. Smash took her for walks sometimes, and he had been quick to discover that she was smarter than she seemed, sometimes, because he was that way himself, but he had promised not to tell her folks so she wouldn't get in trouble. In fact, it was because of Smash that she wanted to explore the jungle; he had told her how fascinating it was. Now she had her chance! "How did they carry the trance plant?"

The yak paused. "Why, I never thought of that! Anyone carrying it would have gone into a trance. Yet I happen to know that all trance plants grow elsewhere, and are moved to new locations. It seems to be their lifestyle. They must have some additional magic to enable them to travel." He looked ahead. "Ah, there's a foot-ball."

As he spoke, the foot-ball rolled into view. It was a sphere formed of feet. Every kind of extremity showed in it--dragon talons, bird claws, griffin paws, human feet, centaur hooves, insect legs, and so on. The feet tramped down a path wherever it rolled, so that it was easy to tell where the ball had been, but not where it was going. With so many feet, it was able to travel quite swiftly and was soon out of sight.

However, the path it left made their route easier, since there were no brambles or pitfalls in it. It didn't matter to Ivy where it led, as long as there were interesting things along it.

Ivy spotted a glittering gla.s.sy ball the size of her two fists, not round but carved with many small, flat facets. She strayed from the path long enough to pick it up. Beams of light coruscated from it as she held it in a stray shaft of sunlight. "What is this?"

"That is a very precious stone, one of the gems distributed by Jewel the Nymph," the yak said. "Crystallized carbon in spherical form: a very hard ball. Specifically, a baseball diamond."

"What's it for? It's pretty."

"People play stupid games with it. I understand the main game is very tedious--a bunch of players spread themselves out around the diamond and simply wait, and someone else throws the ball, and another stands with a stick resting on his shoulder and watches the ball go by him three or four times, and then either he gets mad and quits trying, or he runs around the diamond. Then they start over."

Ivy's smooth little brow furrowed in a fair emulation of her mother's expression at times like this. "That's no fun! Who does that?"

"Mundanes, mostly. They are strange creatures and, I suspect, not too bright. Otherwise they would take more of an interest in magic, instead of pretending it doesn't exist. What can you say about a person who refuses to believe in magic?"

"That he deserves his own dullness."

"That's a most astute remark!" The yak glanced ahead, hearing something. "Hark! I think I hear a game now!"

They walked on toward the sound. Two centaurs were doing something. "No, that's not a baseball diamond they're throwing. It must be some other game."

Indeed it was. Two wooden stakes had been pounded into the ground, and the centaurs were taking turns hurling shoes from a nearby shoe tree at them. They were the type of shoes human folk used, with shoelaces and all. One shoe would land leaning up against a stake, but the next one would knock it away. Finally one centaur managed to hang a shoe up on the stake, whereupon he clapped his hands and the other grimaced.

"Oh, that makes you look so sick you'll need a new croggle-test!" the winner teased the loser.

"Equines need regular croggle-tests," the yak explained privately to Ivy. "To make sure they haven't been infected by magic. It is very bad to be croggled."

Ivy felt a little croggled herself, though she was not an equine. Some of her best friends were magic-infected centaurs, but she knew that most centaurs rejected magic as determinedly as the Mundanes did. "What are you playing?" she called to the centaurs.

"People-shoes, of course," one of them responded absently, then trotted off to pick up his collection.

The yak shrugged. "There's no accounting for tastes," he remarked. "Some folk like to talk, some like to throw shoes."

Ivy agreed it was a strange world. She walked on.

The marvels of the Land of Xanth continued, and the little girl spent all afternoon exploring them, with the yak's helpful commentary continuing incessantly. A pa.s.sing milksnake gave her a bottle of milk to slake her thirst, and she plucked a lollypop from a pop-sickle plant. Her only bad moment came when a big B buzzed her and she stumbled off the footpath. The yak also stumbled, for it was a b.u.mble B, causing creatures to become clumsy.

Ivy wound up at the base of a large tree, feeling terrible. "Oooh, ugh!" she exclaimed. "What hit me?"

The yak looked none too sanguine himself, but he peered about, seeking the answer. He found it. "The tree!" he exclaimed painfully. "It's a torment pine! We must get away from it!"

Ivy hobbled away, and the farther from the tree she got, the less worse she felt. Finally she got back to the footpath she had b.u.mbled from and felt well again. She would be alert for any more B's, so she would not stumble into any more trees.

But night was nigh, and she was tired. Usually her mother Irene curbed her long before her explorative instincts were sated, so she got frustrated but not tired. This time it was the other way around. "I want to go to bed," she said and paused in momentary shock, realizing she had spoken heresy. No child ever wanted to go to bed! So she qualified it. "I don't want the monster under the bed to be lonely."

"Then you should go home," the yak pointed out.

"Home?" she asked, baffled. "What's that?"

The yak looked at her in perplexity. "That would be the place where your mother lives. And your father, the--" Here the yak paused to smirk. "--the King of Xanth. Where you stay when you don't have anything better to do. Where your bed is."

Still her little brow furrowed. "Where?"

The yak was puzzled. "You mean to say you don't know? How can you remember your mother and your bed without remembering your home?"

Ivy shook her head, confused.

"Where did you come from before you met me?"

She pondered. "Don't remember."

"How could you forget your own home?" the yak persisted.

"I don't know." She began to cry.

The yak was disconcerted. "Here, I'll find a bed bug. They make very nice beds." He began to cast about, looking for a bed bug.

There was the faintest of swirls in the air, not so much a breeze as the mere suggestion of motion. Ivy almost remembered being near something like this before, but not quite. The yak, intent on his mission, walked right through that swirl. He stopped, looking perplexed. "What am I doing here?" he asked, switching his tail.

"You're my friend," Ivy said, her sniffles abating for the moment. "You're looking for a--"

"I don't remember you!" the yak exclaimed. "I don't remember anything! I'm lost!" Alarmed, he galloped off, Ivy stared after him. It seemed she had found the way to shut him up--but she was not pleased. She had lost her only immediate friend.

She walked along the path, trying to catch up to the yak, but he had forgotten her and was already out of sight. Once she thought she saw him, but it was only the chocolate moose, who was going in the opposite direction and didn't wait for her.

It was darkening now, and the pleasant trees were turning ugly. She ran and tripped over a root that lifted to snag her toe. She skinned her knees in the fall and got dirt in her face. This was too much. Ivy sat in the path and wailed. She was, after all, only three years old.

Something heard the noise and came toward her, half slithering, half whomping through the underbrush. It had six legs and green, metallic scales, and it steamed, and it was hungry. Ivy heard it and looked up in time to stare into the horrendous little countenance of the rejuvenated Gap Dragon.

Chapter 4: Zora Zombie.

Irene was fuming. She had, as it turned out, wasted precious time traveling to the Good Magician's castle, and now she was losing more. Of course, she had helped the Gorgon, and that was worthwhile--but what was happening to Ivy meanwhile? The Xanth jungle was no place for a three-year-old child alone!

She glanced at the little plant perched in an upper pocket. It was a miniature variety of ivy, enchanted to relate to the child Ivy. As long as the plant was healthy, so was Ivy. If the plant wilted, that meant trouble or illness. If the plant died-- Irene shook her head. The plant was healthy; no point in worrying about what might be. She knew her daughter was all right and had known it all along. It was the future that worried her. All she had to do was find her daughter--soon.

The roc deposited her at Castle Zombie. "Wait here," she told it. "There'll be a return delivery." She hurried inside.

Millie the Ghost came to meet her. "Listen carefully," Irene said without preamble. "Good Magician Humfrey has been turned into a baby, and his son Hugo is lost. The Gorgon will look for Hugo, but needs a baby-sitter for Humfrey. A roc is waiting outside to take Lacuna there. Is that all right with you? Good. Go tell Lacuna. Where's Dor?"

"Out looking for Ivy," Millie said, taken aback by the rush of information. "They all are--but there's so much jungle to search--"

"I'll find him myself," Irene said impatiently. "You see to Lacuna." She hurried back outside, leaving the older woman to her confusion. Actually, she was sure Lacuna would be thrilled to get roc-transport; that was a most unusual mode of travel for ordinary people.

"Where's Dor?" Irene demanded of the nearest zombie.

The mottled face worked, trying to a.s.semble an answer. A hand came up to scratch the nose, and the nose fell off. "Wwhhooo?" the creature whistled.

"My husband!" Irene snapped. "Dor. The King, you imbecile! Where's the King?"

Decayed comprehension came. "Kkemmm," the thing said, and pointed a skeletal extremity to the north.

"Thaankss," Irene said, mimicking it, though what scant humor the action might have had was wasted on a thing whose brain was glop. She rushed north.

Soon she encountered a centaur. It was Chem. "h.e.l.lo, Irene!" the filly called.

Chem was a few years younger than Irene, but centaurs aged more slowly than human beings did, so she was now in the flush of nubility. In human terms, Chem would have been about the age of the twins. Hiatus and Lacuna, or a little older. She was certainly an attractive specimen of her kind now, with fair hair falling from her head to touch the equine shoulder, and a full and bare bosom of the centaur kind. Of course, Chem's appearance was nothing new to Irene; she had ridden the centaur from Castle Roogna to Castle Zombie, a journey of several hours by hoof and longer by foot. But she gained a clearer picture of Chem, seeing her standing alone in the forest. This filly was currently well worth the attention of a male of her species, but as far as Irene knew, there was no immediate prospect. There were not many of the magic-performing centaurs, and the other kind would not have anything to do with them. This meant, unfortunately, that Chem had a quite reasonable chance for spinsterhood, attractive though she was.

"Oh, ouch, no!" Irene exclaimed, making a connection. "That zombie said, 'Chem,' instead of 'King.'"

The centaur frowned. "What's the matter?"

"I was looking for my husband!"

"Aren't we all," Chem murmured, frowning again. But in an instant she smiled. "He's searching southside, with Chet. I can take you to them. Grundy says Ivy's not in this region anyway."

"Grundy?" Irene asked blankly.

"Me--Grundy the Golem," the little creature said from the foot of a tree, insolently pretending she did not remember him. Grundy seldom did anything politely that he could do impolitely, and prided himself on being obnoxious. But he did care, and was a reliable aid in emergencies. "I came to help search. Chem's taking me from glade to glade, and I'm asking all the local flora." He ran to rejoin Chem, who reached down to pick him up. Grundy was so small he could sit comfortably in her hand.

"Well, take me to Dor," Irene said, mounting the centaur behind the golem. She had never really liked Grundy, but had to concede that he could be useful at a time like this, and it was nice of him to volunteer.

Chem galloped south, dodging around trees and boulders and hurdling ruts. Centaurs liked to run, and they were good at it. Soon the threesome located King Dor.

Irene rattled out her story about the fate of the Good Magician. "So I've got to find my daughter myself," she concluded. She didn't even need to ask whether Dor had found Ivy; she knew he had not. She had known at the outset of this crisis, in her heart, that only she could handle it properly. Why else had she suffered the horrible vision?

"That doesn't necessarily follow," Dor said with his annoying masculine reasonableness. "Our search pattern should in due course succeed--"

"I'm her mother!" Irene cried, refuting all further argument.