Faun And Games Part 11

"I'm sorry."

"It doesn't really Matter," Imino said deliberately. "There are far too many might-he's for Xanth to accommodate."

Ilura had completed her daydream. "Come foals; we must be off."

"Already'?" Imino asked.

"About time!" Imina said.

"I had a very nice dream of your sire," Ilura said. "I think he may be almost ready to consider something."

They galloped off into the yellow color. Forrest and Imbri watched them go. "Those were might-he's," he said.

"Yes. It's a shame they aren't real."

"How do we find Cathryn Centaur?"

"I think we just ask for her."

"Can we just ask for the faun I need?"

She turned to him, startled. "We could certainly try."

He faced nothing. "I want to trade with the faun I need."

Nothin, happened.

"I suspect he isn't close enough to hear," Imbri said. "Have you noticed that all the creatures we have encountered here are equine crossbreeds?"

"I hadn't noticed," he said, surprised. "Could it be coincidence?"

"It could be. But I think there must be sections of Ptero for different types of creatures, and this happens to be the equine section. That would explain why we landed here: I'm equine, so was drawn here. So there would be no fauns close by. Cathryn Centaur must know where they are."

"That makes sense to me. Very well, let's trade with Cathryn."

Imbri stood facing nowhere. "I would like to trade with Cathryn Centaur."

Another lady centaur appeared, emerging from the forest. She was brown of mane and fur, with large white wings. "Why h.e.l.lo, mare," she said.

"I never expected to be summoned."

"Why not?" Imbri asked.

"Because there is no service anyone can do me, so I can't trade. Didn't you know that?"

"I am from far away. I know very little about this region."

"But the conventions are similar throughout our world. You don't mean to say-" She broke off, looking startled.

"Yes, we are from Xanth," Imbri said.

"That is extremely unusual, as there is virtually no physical contact between Xanth and Ptero."

"But considerable emotional contact."

Cathryn nodded agreement. "All we might-he's long to achieve Xanth proper. But so few of us ever do. Now I suppose if you offer me some way to go there, then we can indeed deal. But as it is impossible to travel there physically, I suspect that your mission is of some other nature."

"Yes. We need to locate a suitable faun to become the spirit of a vacant tree."

"Ah. That's why you summoned me: because I know the best route to the faunhold."

"Yes."

"I am really sorry that we can't exchange services, because I can certainly start you on your way there."

"Start us? You can't direct us all the way there?"

"Correct: I can't. It is beyond my range."

"Range?"

"Oh, I see," Cathryn said sympathetically. "You are from afar, and don't understand our system."

"Yes, I don't. But I am willing to trade, if it's a matter of that."

"I'm afraid it is. We are unable to interact significantly without the exchange of equivalent services."

Forrest stepped into the dialogue. "There must be some service you need or desire, that we might do."

Cathryn glanced at him. "I doubt it. I am really quite satisfied, apart from my natural longing to become real. This is a pleasant enough realm, and far better than utter nonexistence. I would gladly show you around it, If-"

"If we could do you some service in exchange," he finished.

"Exactly. But as it is, I see no cause for further a.s.sociation. So if you will excuse me, I shall take off." She spread her wings.

"Walt!" Imbri cried. "There must be something!"

Cathryn paused. "I would be pleased if there were, for you seem like interesting folk, and I'm sure your need must be extreme, for you to make the great effort to come here. But it would be unkind to pretend there is anything feasible."

"Every creature has some secret deep desire," Imbri said. "I am in a position to know."

The centaur seemed genuinely curious. "How could you be in such a position?"

"I was a night mare for a hundred and seventy years, punishing folk for their darkest desires, and a day mare for thirty years, rewarding their brightest desires. I have never encountered anyone who was wholly satisfied with his lot. Some don't know their deepest desires, but all have them."

"And maybe some demons prey on that," Forrest said, thinking of D. Sire.

"Then I think I must be the exception," Cathryn said, "because I am satisfied, as satisfied as it is possible for a might-be to be."

They seemed to be getting nowhere. But Forrest remembered something.

"The Good Magician's list," he said. "Maybe that has the answer." He dug into his knapsack and brought it out.

Now he thought he could almost read the first two words of the Good Magician's illegible scribble. "Dear Horn," he said, squinting. "Does that make any sense?"

"Oh!" Cathryn said, putting a hand to her ample breast.

"You have found your secret desire," Imbri said.

"I suppose I have," the centaur confessed. "I never realized it before."

Forrest put the paper away. "What is the dear horn?"

"It is a special horn that when blown will locate a person's True Love.

I have no True Love; I did not realize until you spoke that I missed him."

"Then we must find this horn for you," Imbri said.

"That may be no easy thing. I have no idea where it may be. I understand it tends to get left wherever last used, forgotten. So though you have indeed discovered a service you might render me, I fear it is an impossible service."

Forrest found himself becoming canny. "Suppose we agreed to help you find that horn. Would that be a sufficient service so that we could talk freely while we were doing it"

"Why yes, I suppose it would be. But you may still be wasting your time, because it may not be possible to find it, and in that case I will not be able to guide you toward the region of the fauns."

Forrest shrugged. "We'll take that chance. Are we agreed?"

"Yes," Cathryn said, smiling.

"Then let's proceed. I'm not much, but Mare Imbri can tune in on dreams, and that may help, as the dear horn is surely an instrument for the fulfillment of dreams."

Both mares looked at him. "You're not as empty headed as the average faun," the centaur remarked.

"It's a luxury I can't afford at the moment. I must save that tree, and return to my own tree." Forrest turned to Imbri. "Can you orient on some person who knows where the dear horn is?"

"I'm not sure. But I suppose the Good Magician wouldn't have asked me to guide you, if he didn't think I had some way to do it. Let me concentrate." She closed her eyes. She looked much like a nymph that way, except that she was clothed. "Yes-I am getting a faint glimmering.

It's like the colors of the directions, only it's more like light from a distant flickering candle. I think I will be able to find it. But we will have to go straight to it, because it's very faint, and I may lose it if we delay or deviate."

"Then let's go!" Forrest said, gratified.

They set off to the north, and slightly to the east. There were numerous tracks, all hoofmarks. That reminded him of the conjecture they had made about regions. They had encountered only equine folk in this region: a unicorn, a centaur, and a winged centaur. That could be coincidence, but he doubted it, because in regular Xanth he had seldom seen such creatures. "Is this equine country?" he inquired.

"Yes," Cathryn answered. "Creatures of a kind tend to congregate, being more comfortable with similar types. There's no rule; it just happens."

"So elsewhere there will be regions of dragons, or of elves, or of human folk?"

"Or of fauns," she agreed. "Actually there may be several regions of each type, because of the time."

"Time?"

"Time is geography, so there are limits."

"I don't understand. Will I have to exchange a service in order to find out what that means?"

She laughed. "No. We are in the process of exchanging our services now. It is to my interest to facilitate your search for the dear horn, and you can surely do that better if you understand our system. I had forgotten for the moment that you are from Outside. Have you noticed something about me?"

He glanced at her. "Only that you somehow seem younger than I took you for. I was probably distracted by your-there are aspects of you that resemble a generously endowed nymph, and-"

She laughed again, making those aspects shake. "I think I might even guess which aspects you mean. But you are not imagining it. I am growing younger. I was foaled only twenty years before we met, so even a small distance to the east makes me noticeably younger."

"How can that be? Is there youth elixir in the airs"

"No. It's the direction. When we travel into the From, we become younger. If the dear horn is very far in this direction, not only will we be in ogre territory, I will be too young to take you there. I would regret that, because then we could not complete our agreement "But how can that be? East is a direction, not a time."

"Perhaps that is true where you come from. Here east is From, or what you might call the Past. It's all the same to us, of course, but I suppose it might seem odd to outsiders."

"Are you saying that if we go one direction, we get younger, and if we go the other direction, we get older?"

"That is exactly what I am saying. So I am able to go twenty years east, from where we meet, and seventy years west. For reasons of vanity I prefer to remain mostly in the early maturity section. Neither extreme youth nor extreme age appeal to me particularly."

He was amazed. "Does this apply to us too?"

"I should certainly think so. Do you feel yourself getting younger.

"No. But I wouldn't notice five or ten years, and neither would Imbri.

We're both two hundred years old."

"You are that age where?"

He was nonplussed. "Why, here, of course."

"But you must be five or six years younger than you were. See, I am becoming a teen, and younger."

He looked at her again. Indeed, now her b.r.e.a.s.t.s were smaller, her flanks were less solid, and she had acne on her face. Her mane, which had been loose, was now bound into a pony tail.

He checked himself. "No, I remain much the same faun as ever. But I would be only a hundred and ninety or so, instead of two hundred. I would have to go a long way back to get really young."

"So I gather. How far can you go in To?"

"Into what?"

"The future."

"Why, I don't know. It depends on how long my tree lives. Perhaps four hundred years."

"You are a long-lived species!"