Currant Events (34 page)

 Then they were hugging each other, and
crying, while Sherlock looked on bewildered and Zaven and Thesis kissed,
oblivious to the rest of the universe.

 In due course they untangled.
“It's a princess thing,” Ida explained to Sherlock. He nodded, but
surely remained uneasy.

 “Theoretically there is a Magician
from long ago, in the Brain Coral's pool, who is my ideal match,” Ida
said. “I am told our children will have little moons like mine. But so far
that Magician has not emerged, and I don't know when he ever will. It is an
unkind wait.”

 “Oh, yes,” Clio agreed.

 The three Princesses appeared, with
Ciriana in tow. “She needs to stay with you,” Melody said, a bit
tersely.

 “We're sorry,” Harmony added.

 “But it's necessary,” Rhythm
concluded.

 They vanished, leaving Ciriana looking somewhat
unhappy. Clio went to her. “What happened, dear?”

 “I said a word,” the child
confided tearfully.

 So the nullification wasn't perfect. It
seemed there was only so much a reverse wood chip could do. “That's all
right; you can come with us after all.” Though Clio wasn't notably easy
about that, either.

 Ida reviewed the procedure for the
others, then let them sniff from her vial of elixir. Soon they were on their
way to Ptero. They landed in a wilderness area and took stock as their bits of
soul solidified to form replicas of themselves.

 “The rules of magic are different
here,” Clio said. “Colors vary according to direction. Blue is north,
red is south, green is west, yellow is east. Also, when you travel east you go
into the past, and west takes you into the future. You age accordingly.
Sherlock and I can handle several decades, but you young lovers can't. So let's
hope that my compass arrow brought us to the time where Morgan le Fay
dwells.”

 It had. The blue arrow pointed south,
and there was a path there. It led right into a comic strip.

 “One more thing,” Clio said
grimly. “The comic strips. They are bands separating the various sections
of the planet, and they contain the most egregious awful festering puns. Stay
out of them if at all possible.”

 Then a path opened, through the comic
strip. The massed puns were squeezed to the sides, groaning in protest. The
blue arrow pointed toward it. Was it a trick? Well, there was one way to find
out.

 Clio took Ciriana's hand and led the
way through the strip, following the path. No puns impinged. They strained at
the sides, eager to get at the visitors, but were restrained.

 Beyond was a neat cottage, similar to
those on the Acquaintance Ship. Before its door stood a comely older woman in a
royal cloak. That had to be Morgan le Fay.

 “Welcome to my abode,” she
said. “I saw you coming.”

 “Beware,” Drew said
privately. “She's a mean person.”

 “Thank you for providing a way
past the comic strip,” Clio said, though she was uncertain of the woman's
motivation.

 “Unfortunately it is a one-way
path,” Morgan said.

 They turned to look. The comic strip
had closed in behind them. They were trapped, perhaps.

 “She won't let you go,” Drew
said.

 “We'll see about that,”
Sherlock said.

 “We have come to return your
spancel to you,” Clio said. “We have no other business we know of,
though if you care to answer some questions, Thesis would appreciate it.”
She drew the spancel from her pocket and proffered it to the woman.

 “Thank you, Muse,” Morgan
said, taking the spancel. “It is good to have this back at long
last.”

 “How did you come to lose
it?”

 The woman sighed. “I got so
involved with Arthur that I forgot about it. I conjured myself back home before
I remembered. By that time it was too late; I couldn't breach the king's castle
defenses a second time. Fortunately I had what I had come for: my baby. Perhaps
a servant threw the spancel out, not knowing its nature. Servants tend to be
ignorant louts.”

 That seemed to be enough of an answer.
“Thank you,” Clio said. “We'll be leaving now.” “Not
just yet, I think.”

 Clio had been afraid of that. “I don't
think we have further business here.”

 “Ah, but you do. Did you think I
would summon you here only to send you away, my purpose unfulfilled?”

 “Summon?” Clio asked, feeling
a chill. “What purpose?” “I am at present unable to go to Xanth
proper, having lost my mortal body. I need a new body.” She looked at
Thesis. “Yours should do.”

 “You can't have it,” Thesis
said.

 Morgan's smile was cruel. “And why
not?”

 “Three reasons: I am not through
with it myself. I am a zombie. And I used the spancel on it.”

 The Sorceress considered. “The
first reason is of no account to me. The second I doubt; you look fully alive.
But the third-you evidently learned more about the spancel than I
thought.”

 “I did. The spancel will not
remain long with a person it has enchanted. You would have to give it up, and
with it, much of your power.”

 Morgan considered. “Of course I
could make a new one, once I got a physical body again, and found a suitable
man to enchant and operate on. But it would be a hassle, and his screaming
might attract attention. So you do seem to have protected yourself rather
cunningly, my dear.”

 “Thank you,” Thesis said
coldly.

 “She's afraid, with reason,”
Drusie said.

 “You're like the Sea Hag!”
Clio exclaimed. “You take other people's bodies and degrade them!”

 The Sorceress nodded. “Among other
things. It is an ancient technique known to a few of the favored. But hardly my
only one. A body is not an end in itself, merely a means to power.”

 “A despicable power!”

 The Sorceress's eye fell on Ciriana.
“No you don't!” Clio said, holding the child close.

 “She is too young for my
purpose.” Morgan looked at Zaven. “So I may need to utilize a
representative to do my business in Xanth, such as locating and securing a
suitable young woman's body for me to take over. You should do for that; you
are not handsome, but my enchantment can make you so.”

 “I used the spancel too,”
Zaven said.

 The woman's eyes narrowed. Clio did not
need the little dragon's input to know that she was furious. “So you have,
I see now. So she protected you too. I underestimated her.”

 “You sure did,” Zaven said.
“I love her.”

 “Of course.” Morgan turned to
Clio. “So it seems it will have to be you, though it will be a problem to
abate your notoriety and your curse.”

 “You can't have my body
either,” Clio said more bravely than she felt. Nevertheless, she nudged
Ciriana toward Thesis, so that she would be clear of this encounter.

 “Oh? Why not?”

 “Because I will unwind anything
you do to me. You can't control me.”

 Morgan's hand shot out and caught a
hank of Clio's hair. She yanked Clio forward with surprising strength. A
stiletto appeared in her other hand, the needle-sharp point orienting on Clio's
right eye. “Really?”

 Clio wound it back to just before the
grab. “Really,” she said.

 The hand shot out again. This time Clio
knocked it aside before it reached her hair. The stiletto appeared in the other
hand. Clio's other hand grabbed it and shoved it toward the woman's own flesh.

 “Interesting,” Morgan
remarked, her wrist twisting out of Clio's grasp. “Yet there are other
ways.”

 “We really must go now,” Clio
said. She did not like the Sorceress at all.

 Morgan looked at Sherlock. “Now
here is a spectacular prospect. A mild-mannered, unassuming, unprepossessing,
decent Magician. Fortune has abruptly smiled on me.”

 “I'm not a Magician,”
Sherlock said.

 “And modest too. Oh, we shall go
far together, you and I. Once I break you in.”

 “And I'm not going anywhere with
you.”

 “Yet I think you will be amenable
to persuasion.” The Sorceress's outline shifted subtly, exuding rank sex
appeal.

 “I doubt it. I love Clio.”

 “Of course. Love is a marvelously
motivating force. But yours is not inspired by the spancel.”

 “That's right. It's natural. So
you won't persuade me to do anything to harm her.”

 The cruel smile showed again. “We
shall see.”

 “Danger!” the two dragons
cried together.

 Suddenly the floor around Clio faded
out. She was standing on a circular plate barely wider than her feet, with a
gulf descending on every side. But she wasn't actually being hurt, so she
didn't wind it back. She wanted to learn more of the nature of this ploy, so as
not to be caught by it again, whatever it might be.

 “Now here is the situation,”
Morgan said to Sherlock. “Your beloved stands perched above a dreadful
abyss. A counterspell blocks her limited talent; she can't wind her way back
out of this one. In a moment her support will crumble and she will fall into the
horror below. However, I do not wish you to be damaged. If you join her, I
shall have to cancel the spell and spare both of you while I ponder my next
effort. I advise you to let her go; I can do much more for you than she
can.” The blatant sex appeal intensified.

 This had gone far enough. Clio tried to
wind it back-and could not. The Sorceress had cleverly made her demonstrate her
talent, then countered it with her own superior magic. Ordinary folk could not
compete with Magicians or Sorceresses.

 “It's a trick!” Drew said.

 The platform crumbled. Clio screamed as
she lost her balance and started to fall into the depths. She saw Thesis and
Ciriana staring with horror.

 Sherlock leaped toward her. Morgan
flung a loop out before him. He passed through it and caught hold of Clio as
she dropped.

 Then they both found themselves on the
floor, clinging to each other. The gulf was gone.

 Ciriana was crying, and Thesis was
trying to comfort her, but lacked enough assurance.

 “It was illusion,” Drusie
said.

 “Yes, it was illusion, you little
reptile snot,” Morgan said. “She was never in physical danger. But
her curse is not restricted to that. She has fallen prey to the emotional
danger instead.”

 “What are you talking about?”
Sherlock demanded as the two of them got back to their feet.

 “Do you recognize this?” the
Sorceress asked, holding up the loop.

 “The spancel!” Thesis cried.

 “He passed through it,” Zaven
said.

 “So he did,” Morgan agreed
with satisfaction. “I wielded it, he went through it. I trust you
understand what that means.”

 Clio looked at Sherlock, appalled.
“It put you in love with her!”

 Sherlock didn't answer or look at her.
He was plainly ashamed.

 “It doesn't mean he hates you,
dear,” the Sorceress said with thinly veiled cruelty. “Merely that
his passion now answers to me. He will serve me loyally, because he can do
nothing else, and in time, if he does well, I will reward him in my fashion. I
might even marry him, once I have a physical body again.”

 “Oh, Sherlock,” Clio said,
sorry for him despite her own numb loss.

 “After all, he is worthy. I like
him already. Very much, in fact.” Morgan's smile was almost tender.
“But business before pleasure. Sherlock, take these people back to Xanth.
Let the couple go; their usefulness is past. Take Clio and the brat to the next
rendezvous her arrow indicates.”

 “You're letting me continue my
mission?” Clio asked, amazed.

 “Not exactly, my dear. It is that
I don't like to soil my hands with blood. I prefer to leave that sort of thing
to Litho. Since your next appointment is with him anyway, it behooves me to let
nature take its course, as it were. That will leave me unimplicated, and free
Sherlock of any lingering commitment he may feel to you. Then he can attend to
my whims without distraction.”

 The witch had been way ahead of them
all along. She had tricked them and won what she needed: Sherlock's commitment
to her sadistic interests.

 “Can I save her?” Sherlock
asked.

 “Why how kind of you, Magician.
You do not wish to see her die?”

 “Yes, I do not. She is a good
person.”

 “Suppose I were to take her body,
after all? Would that satisfy you?”

 Sherlock considered. “I'm not
sure. She doesn't look like you.”

 “Oh that can be fixed. I will
enchant any body I take to look like me in my prime. Have no concern.”
Then Morgan's voice sharpened. “I will consider the matter. But now, go to
Litho. By the time you reach him, I will have decided, and you will of
necessity be satisfied with my decision.”

 “Of course,” Sherlock
murmured.