Vale of the Vole Part 16

"Gateway Castle is welcome," Esk said shortly, his ability exhausted.

He had some spare time, so he took a tour of the castle. The servant wench was happy to guide him. The castle was entirely underwater, with windows that showed the fish swimming by, and in its center was a ma.s.sive gla.s.s wall that circled a depression in the water. In fact, this was a whirlpool that spun its way savagely down to unseen regions beneath the bottom of the lake.

"But where does it go?" Esk asked.

"No one knows," the girl said. That was it; not only did she not know, she was not curious. Apparently that quality had been largely bred out of the curse fiends.

The woman was waiting for him at the dock. She was ancient. Her body was stooped and ugly, her hair stringy and gray, her skin so wrinkled that it almost buried her features. "Well, let's get going, youngster," she snapped.

"Uh, do you know what I asked for?"

"No. Does it matter?"

Esk sighed. Perhaps it didn't. She was unlikely to be of much use regardless.

They climbed down into the boat and took seats. Soon a bevy of girls joined them, their legs flashing prettily as they descended the ladder. "Say, it's Esk!" one exclaimed.

"And Crone Latia," another added with distaste.

"Don't let it bother you, wench," the old woman snapped. "I'm leaving Gateway."

"Oh." The girl was disconcerted. "Well, good luck, I guess.*'

"Don't be facetious."

That dampened things, and they rode in silence as the cable hauled the boat to the outer pier. Then the girls climbed out and headed off to their harvesting duties of the day, and Esk and Latia started on the way to Castle Roogna.

"I have two pills," Esk said. "They will enable us to travel without much resistance, so that we can cover the distance in a single day."

"Hrnph," she remarked. "I'll believe it when I see it."

So he gave her a pill, and took the last one himself, and she believed. They traveled rapidly northwest, but she was old, and unable to move as rapidly as he could, so they did not get the whole way after all. Esk tried to hurry her along, knowing that their trek on the following day would be much slower; he wanted to cover as much as possible while it was easy. But she would not be hurried, and when the evening came they were still some distance from Castle Roogna.

They stopped at a suitable glade near a spring, making camp. Latia mellowed some, now that they were well clear of the home of the curse fiends. "Do you know why they a.s.signed me to go with you?" she asked.

"No. I admit to being curious."

"It's because they wanted to get rid of me anyway, and they believe that I am unlikely to return from such a wild mission." She glanced sidelong at him. "What is the mission?"

"To get rid of the demons, so that the Kiss-Mee River can be made curvy again, so that the Vale of the Vole will be nice."

She snorted. "That figures. Mortals can't do anything about demons."

"Unless they get the right talisman and spell and diagram and contract."

"Those are known only to the Good Magician, who is as grumpy as I am. And they don't necessarily work as advertised."

"I know. I saw the play."

"Well, I'll try to help you, because that's what I'm here for, but I am obliged to advise you of the risk."

"The risk?" Esk asked.

"You know how we curse fiends all have the same talent? That of cursing?"

"Yes. I haven't actually seen it in action, but I understand it can be pretty bad. My grandmother was a curse fiend."

"She was?" The old woman showed greater interest "What was her name?"

"I don't know her curse fiend name. She married my grandfather, an ogre."

"Oh, that one! I remember her. A fine actress, but impatient with convention."

"You knew her?" Esk asked, amazed.

"Of course I knew her! How young do you think I am? I'm glad she managed to make a good life for herself."

"You consider marrying an ogre good?"

"Certainly. Ogres have their points."

Esk was getting to like this woman better. "So you don't look down at me because I'm the grandson of an ogre?"

"Not if you don't look down on me because of my defective talent."

"Defective talent?"

"I was about to tell you my liability. My curses have become erratic. One in three turns out to be a blessing."

Esk laughed. "A blessing! What's wrong with that?"

"It interferes with a regular existence. Once when we were stunning a marauding dragon, and combined to hit it with the strongest possible curse, my blessing played havoc with the curses, and the dragon not only survived, it got stronger. We were lucky we were close to the pier, so that we could escape underwater."

"Oh. I can see how that would be a problem."

"So if something attacks, and I curse it, that may only make the situation worse. Of course, the malfunction is fairly regular; my last two efforts were good strong curses, so I have refrained for six months from making another. The Magistrate was aware of that, and eager to get me away from Gateway."

"Smart of him," Esk said cynically. "Maybe you can bless us and make the rest of our journey easy."

"I can't curse or bless myself, only others."

"Well, maybe you should curse me, then, and if as you say it is really a blessing-"

"That would be dragon roulette," she said. "I can't be absolutely sure it's a blessing; it is merely a strong probability. Whatever it is, it will be extremely powerful, because of the acc.u.mulated backlog."

But now Esk was thoroughly intrigued. "I'll risk it. Curse me."

"No, there is that element of risk."

"But if you curse me, and it's a blessing, then you'll know your next two curses will be true curses, and you can depend on them for protection. That would be an advantage, because we have some rough country still to cover."

She was thoughtful. "There may be something in what you say. Consider it overnight, and if you still wish to experiment in the morning, I'll do it."

They slept, and in the morning it still seemed intriguing to Esk, so he repeated his request. Latia hesitated, but finally wound up and delivered a round curse.

There was a wash of something across him, that made his hair lift slightly, but it wasn't painful. "That's it?" Esk asked. "I don't feel better or worse."

"That's strange," Latia said, as mystified as he. "It never misfired like that before. Maybe my talent has finally gone into complete remission, and I can neither curse nor bless anymore,"

"Maybe," Esk agreed, with mixed relief and regret. "Well, let me do something private, then we'll get moving."

She nodded. Curse fiend conventions were akin to the human ones in this respect, rather than the centaur ones, and he was just as glad. He made his way to a private copse and got ready to do his business.

The ground gave way beneath his feet. Too late he realized that the thick brush concealed a sinkhole. He flailed, trying to catch hold of something to support him, but failed; then he plunged down into the hole.

It was a long-term sink, not a new one; light came down, and vines grew everywhere. Esk slip-slid on the smooth enamel surface to the bottom, rolling. He saw the drain; fortunately it was clogged with vines. Finally he fetched up with his face wedged against a cool surface. He blinked, and looked.

It was a hypnogourd, and his right eye was right by the peephole. Before he realized, Esk had looked in-and was caught there, his consciousness locked within the gourd.

Only interference in his line of sight to the peephole could break his trance, for that was the nature of the gourd. It was unlikely that Latia would find him in this hidden recess of the ground; the sinkhole was invisible from a short distance beyond its rim.

Now at last the nature of Latia's effort seemed clear: it was after all a potent curse, its action delayed just long enough to make it truly effective. Esk was stuck here for the duration.

Chapter 8. Diggle.

Volney swallowed one of the strength pills Ivy had given him, donned his heavy-duty talons, and started digging. The result was amazing; the earth flew back, and he made progress at twice his normal rate. If he had had a pill like this when they were trying to pa.s.s the chasm in the illusory mountain on the way to the Good Magician's castle, he would have been able to bore way down below the level of the water and pa.s.s under it. How nice of the little human girl to do him this favor; he was not really partial to human folk, but he did like Esk and now this child.

He was headed for the realms of the lesser voles. The Kingdom of Voles in Xanth comprised all manner of digging creatures, ranging from the monstrous diggles to the minuscule wiggles' larvae, with various shades of squiggles between. Back in the dawn of creation, so it was said, the Demon L(I/T)ho, Maker of Earth, devised all the species to inhabit the fertile region between the flighty surface and the depressive depths. The huge diggles took the large expanses of rock far down, and the swift squiggles took the loose superficial earth, and the wiggles took the limited veins of super-hard metallic stone. Litho's chosen creatures were the voles, and they were granted their choice of all the regions of the earth, and they prospered beyond any of the others. So while all the digging creatures were technically voles, the voles of the Vale were the archetypes, the envy of all others.

But Litho had reckoned without the demons. Just as the voles differed in type and degree, so did the demons. The original Demons were omnipotent ent.i.ties, but the lesser demons were mere nuisances, bearing about the same relation to Litho as a worm did to a vole. Unfortunately, both worm and demon could be a lot of mischief in the wrong place. That was of course what had started Volney on his quest for a.s.sistance. If only the Good human Magician had been home!

Volney made excellent progress, but he had a way to go, for first he sought the largest creatures, the diggles. They tunneled without using claws, boring through the rock magically. They could leave a tunnel behind, or leave the rock as solid as it was before, depending on their mood; normally they left it solid so that they could have the pleasure of boring through it again and again. If they agreed to come to the Vale and bore, the demons would be unable to prevent them, because a tunneling diggle was physically insubstantial. Indeed, the diggles would be able to bore new and curvaceous channels for the river faster than the demons could straighten them. The demons would have to give up the futile effort and find another place to reside.

He reached the deep level of the diggles. Now all he had to do was intercept one, and ask it to take him to its leader.

Easier thought than done. He had no notion of the schedule on which individual diggles traveled. He would just have to wait until one pa.s.sed within hailing range.

Meanwhile, time to eat. He had brought some fruit from above; he was developing a taste for it. When the Vale was restored, he would have to see about harvesting fruits and nuts there. He doffed his heavy digging claws and ate.

After a bit, his little ears perked. Voles did not depend to a great extent on sound, but at times it could be important. There was some type of sc.r.a.ping in the tunnel he had left behind.

He listened carefully, trying to identify the source of that sound. If some predator from above had happened on his tunnel and was pursuing him, he would have to fight. He had of course plugged the end of it, so that no creature would encounter it by chance, but a predator such as a big serpent could sniff it out. Actually, the advantage would be Volney's, here deep in the rock, because the predator could not maneuver, and Volney's artificial talons could gouge flesh as readily as stone. Very few creatures preyed on voles, in the deep earth. It would be another matter on the surface, where s.p.a.ce was unlimited and predators could grow to enormous size. That was why voles normally stayed clear of the surface. Besides, the light was too bright up there. He wondered how the surface creatures were able to stand it. Only his volish ability to change his fur and eyes for the surface conditions permitted him to handle it. Now, in his brown subterranean coat and gray lenses for maximum effect in near darkness, he was more comfortable.

But this did not sound like a snake. It seemed to consist of many tiny sc.r.a.pings, as of insect legs . . .

Suddenly he realized what it was. Nickelpedes!

This was disaster. He could not use his talons effectively against those little predators; nickelpedes were too small and numerous. They would scramble under his defense and start gouging nickel-sized disks from his tender anatomy. It was not possible to reason with them; all they knew was hunger. His tunnel down must have pa.s.sed close to one of their nests, so that they heard him, and scouted about until they found his hole. Now they were on his trail, following the tunnel to its end, which was where he was.

He could not hope to escape them by dashing back up his tunnel; they would swarm over his body as he pa.s.sed. He could not hide from them in the darkness, for they needed no light; indeed, bright light killed them. They were guided by touch and smell, as he was, and they could go anywhere he could dig.

He would have to go forward. If he intersected another tunnel, he could go along it and outrun them, for they were too small to travel rapidly. But what other tunnel would there be, here? He was below the normal vole level, into the diggle level, and the diggles had left this rock solid. He could tell by the sound of it when he tapped. He would have to dig his own tunnel, and that would slow him down to nickelpede velocity. Eventually he would tire, even if he took another strength pill, and they would catch him and feed on him. His situation was abruptly desperate.

The noise grew louder. One nickelpede had outdistanced the pack, and was homing in on him. Volney donned his enhanced talons, oriented, and struck savagely down. His sonar-location was accurate; the claw speared the nickelpede, killing it. The things were hard to kill; the strike had to be just right, and with sufficient power, or it merely bounced off their hard sh.e.l.ls.

One down-thousands to go! He had to move.

He took another pill. Immediately the strength spread through him. He resumed digging, knowing that this would only prolong the chase; he was too far from the surface to reach it before tiring and slowing and getting caught, and indeed, the 'pedes might well be faster than he, traveling up. But he couldn't just wait to get eaten alive!

If only a diggle would come! Then he could hitch a ride, and be phased through the rock as if it were air, and the miniature monsters would just have to clack their pincers emptily and remain hungry. But there was a characteristic sound the diggles made when traveling, and that sound was not here; he could not depend on finding a diggle.

The rock fairly flew out behind him. Normally he let the debris acc.u.mulate behind, blocking the tunnel loosely. But the nickelpedes would have no trouble navigating this; they would simply scramble through the crevices between the fragmented rocks. A serpent he could have balked somewhat by packing the plug more tightly, and then striking at its emerging nose. Small size was an advantage to the little gougers. If only he could pack it so tightly as to make it completely solid again-but that was beyond his power. It was a maxim among his kind: only magic could restore bored rock.

He paused for a moment, listening. The sound was there, pursuing. All he had done was maintain his lead, or perhaps improve on it a little. He had to have some better way! But what better way was there? His thinking was going in circles.

Circles . . .

Then he had a notion. He wasn't sure it would work, but it might. Certainly he had to try it.

He resumed his digging, forging through the rock, not even trying to make a plug behind. He wanted velocity, even though the nickelpedes might gain. He dug in a curve, bearing left. He stayed on the same level; that was important.

In due course he could tell by his sense of location and the manner the rock ahead vibrated that he was about to intersect his own tunnel. He dug until only the thinnest wall separated the two. Then he reached up and excavated a hole in the top, forming a vertical tunnel. He made this go straight up for a short distance, then curved it to the level, above the original tunnel. He worked as quickly as he could, though he was tiring; he had little time to spare.

Then, just as the first of the nickelpedes caught up to the end of the lower tunnel, he scooted back down. He speared the nickelpede with a claw and threw its body back. Then he resumed digging, quickly breaking through the thin wall and making a complete intersection of tunnels at the bottom level.

There were nickelpedes ma.s.sed in the other tunnel, of course. They turned, smelling him, and poured back into his new opening. But Volney scrambled up and away the moment the breakthrough was complete, into his vertical hole. He made the turn to the horizontal level, then stuffed refuse into it, plugging it behind him, so that what remained was a hole up that dead ended.

Now he settled down and waited, resting. If this worked, he had saved himself. If not . . .

It worked. The nickelpedes were not the smartest of creatures. They were tracking him mostly by following the tunnel. As long as it smelled of him, they would pursue it to its end. It was a system that was normally effective. But now the tunnel was a loop, and so it never ended. They were going around and around forever. If any tried the hole in the ceiling, they stopped when they discovered that it went nowhere; obviously he wasn't there. Some few might work their way through the plug and reach his hideout, but those few he could spear with the talon. The great majority were stuck in the trap he had devised: circularity.

Volney rested, recovering his strength. It was important that he not attract attention to himself; if he moved too much, the nickelpedes might feel the vibration and start searching for it. A few did come through to him, and these he did quietly spear. When he was sure he was sensitized to their entry, he slept; any coming through would wake him long enough for spearing.

Then, finally, he heard a diggle. His wait was over! It no longer mattered if the nickelpedes became aware of him.

He started digging, going in a direction that would put him directly in the path of the diggle. When he got there, he waited.

The diggle was traveling slowly. Its wormlike nose projected into the chamber Volney had formed. "Ho, Dig!" he cried in the language common to all the members of the great family of voles. The magic of Xanth made communication intelligible to all the members of a particular group, such as the voles, or the humanoids, or the dragons. Unfortunately it did not do the same between groups, which was why Volney was unusual; he had learned the humanoid mode. It had been a terrible struggle to master the peculiar conventions of the alien system, but he had persevered, and succeeded better than the other voles in the cla.s.s. They had known that the Good Magician was humanoid, so this study had been a necessity. If only they had also known that the Good Magician would be absent!

Meanwhile, the diggle had been considering. Diggles were not especially rapid of wit. Now it responded. "Ho, Vole!" it replied.

"Take me to your leader."