Vale of the Vole (20 page)

Something was definitely wrong! That pebble was guiding him into a scorching death hi a pool of molten rock! Had he not quickly retreated from the hole he was boring, he would have been fried alive—and now that he was retreating to safety, the pebble was objecting!

But the lava gave him no time to consider the implications. More of it was pouring down, hotter yet and increasingly liquid and bright. It flowed across the floor, filling a channel.

Volney decided to forget the foul taste of the pebble and retreat the way he had come. But by a most unfortunate mischance, the lava was now flowing hi a channel between him and his hole. It had cut him offl

Should he try to tunnel under it? The floor was cooler than the ceiling, so he might do this. But the way the stuff was flowing, he had no certainty that it wouldn't flow into the hole he bored and catch hull there. He couldn't risk that!

Had he been a jumping creature, like Chex Centaur, he could have hurdled it and gotten away. But he was not; that channel, narrow as it was, had become an absolute barrier to him. He would get severely burned just approaching it.

He looked back at the hole in the ceiling. It had become a fountain of lava, the fluid splattering down and spreading out along several channels like the tentacles of a glowing kraken. Soon he would be blocked off from escape in any other direction.

He hurried in the only direction he could go, past the glowing column of falling lava and down the slight incline of the floor of the cavern. There was a bright channel of lava on his right, picking its way along.

Suddenly the lava veered toward him. Volney froze, alarmed; had he not stopped, the lava would have singed his feet, for it had gone right into

the channel he was in. Then, feeling the renewed heat of its closeness, he stepped left to get around it.

The lava flowed left, cutting him off.

Volney paused again. That was almost as if—

The lava flowed back toward him.

Volney came as close as a vole could to jumping. He lifted his front feet clear of the reaching lava and stretched to the left, then dropped his front feet and sort of hunched his rear feet into them. The lava puddled where his feet had been. A tiny patch of shed hair puffed into smoke as the molten rock touched it.

He ran on, getting around the lava. But now a new channel was converging from the left. He dodged right, and the first string of lava resumed its forward flow, about to intercept him again.

It was! The lava was actively seeking him out, trying to catch him! It was limited because it had to flow downhill or on the level, but so was he.

Volney scrambled between the converging channels and managed to get beyond just before they met. This was getting very uncomfortable!

He ran on down, but the several channels of fire paced him. They were definitely trying to trap him—and if this cavern ended, he would have no way to escape. There was no time to cut a new hole for himself, assuming he could reach a wall; there were lava lines between him and any wall he saw. If he tried to dig out through the floor, the lava would simply pour in after him. He had no further doubt of that! The ceiling—no, he could not risk thatl

He saw a flicker ahead. Oh, no—more lava! In fact, more lines of lava, coming from the other direction. He was caught between them, doomed.

Then he realized that the fire ahead was a reflection. There was water there—a subterranean lake. It filled a depression in this part of the cavern, and bubbled gently.

And Volney couldn't swim.

He came to the lip of it and dipped a paw. The water was pleasantly cool; the bubbling was from air coming up through it, not from boiling. It wasn't deep; the light of the lava shone right through, showing that this was really only a large puddle. He could just about wade through it, if he had to.

The lava poured down, twin tentacles stretching forth to hiss against the lake to his left and right. Now he had no choice; he had to wade!

He waded in, and the lava did not. It didn't like the water, and drew back angrily at the brink, hardening. He felt the bubbles passing up around his body, innocently tickling him. Reprieve at last!

Then the light brightened. Volney looked back and saw with horror

that a huge sheet of lava was sliding down behind him. It intended to press right on through the lake, boiling it away, so that it could finally nail its prey! He had to get beyond!

But he could not. Already streamers of lava were flowing around the lake to either side, enclosing it. Volney tried to wade faster, but saw that he was too slow; by the time he crossed, the lava would meet itself at the far side, and the escape route would be gone. If only he could swim, then he could move rapidly enough through the water!

He tried, splashing valiantly, but only succeeded in causing an enraged hissing at the rim as the splashes landed. It was no good; he could not make sufficient progress. He had lost this race.

He looked up. That was worse; not only was the ceiling out of his reach here, it was beginning to glow on its own. That meant that the main mass of this molten monster was closing in from its horrendous pool, ready to melt through and drop directly on him.

Was there no escape? Above and around was doom; below was water. He would drown if he tried to hide under the surface; he would burn if he did not.

But there was one chance. Volney didn't even pause to consider how well it might work; since it was his only course, he plunged in.

Literally. He took a breath and ducked below the water. One of the reasons he couldn't swim was that he was too dense to float; his feet were always on the bottom. Voles had to be dense, in order to bore through rock. Now this property of his body served him well; he was able to dig in the bottom much as if he were digging into dry ground. He scooped out the muck and soon encountered the firm stone below; this pond was a mere puddle, an accumulation at a low spot.

But the bubbles were still coming up. The stone was porous, and water and air extended down into it. That was now important.

He did as much as he could on one breath, then flipped over and poked his head out of the water. The ring of fire was flaring higher, and the ceiling was glowing; not much time remained! Volney took another breath and ducked down again.

He bored down farther, stirring up muck so that the water was cloudy; it was fortunate that he required only the sensation of touch, not vision. He got as far as he could, then shot up again for more air.

This continued breath by breath. The hole deepened rapidly, but the

deadly lava loomed closer. The edge of the pool was hissing steadily as

the lava encroached, destroying it in steam; soon the lava would make its

major move and overwhelm the pond entirely.

Volney dug as deep as he could, then curved his tunnel, as he had

when leaving the circle for the nickelpedes. He dug horizontally, then slanted up. It was getting harder to make progress on a breath, because of the time it took him to crawl along. But if this worked—

It worked. The bubbling air was catching in the upper part of the new tunnel, forming a bubble rather than pushing on through the rock right away. Air, like water, generally took the easiest course. Each time Volney returned, there was a larger bubble, until at last it was large enough for him to fit his snout into and breathe. Now he no longer had to retreat all the way to the surface of the pond; he could recharge right here.

That was just as well, because at last the lava was striking. There was such a horrendous hissing that he heard it right through the rock. He could no longer go back there.

Volney continued his boring, operating from his new base. The work was faster, now, because of his closer air supply. He had a lot of work to do, yet, and he was not yet safe from the lava, but he knew that the corner had been turned; he was on his way to escape.

Now he pondered the matter of the guide pebble. It had led him exactly wrong! How could that be?

Had the diggle leader betrayed him and sent him to his death in the riving lava? He found that hard to accept; diggles were slow but honest, if only because the complexities of deception were too much for them to manage. This pebble was an example: a diggle could not understand intricate directions, and would inevitably get lost if it depended on instructions. But the pebbles were easy to understand: just proceed toward the good taste. Even the most worm-witted diggle could follow that system. When it got where it was going, it could take a new pebble that would guide it to the new destination. The smarter diggles would see to the distribution of the pebbles, thus directing traffic. The diggle leader had done for Volney what it did for its own kind: given him a pebble oriented on his particular destination.

How, then, could it have directed him so badly? He really needed to understand, because he wanted no more encounters with lava flows! Was it a bad stone? Yet it seemed to be working well, just wrong. It had guided him to doom, not to his destination. To the very place diggles as well as voles should avoid at all costs.

The pebble must be operating in reverse! It must have sweetened on the forbidden region and soured on the proper one. Yet why should this be?

He considered and concluded that he must have run afoul of a difference in taste. Diggles were wormlike, and their idea of a feast was a vein of coal. Voles were more like the surface creatures, and they preferred sweet foods. So to a diggle, bitter or sour might be positive, while sweet

could represent spoilage. The pebble had been warning him with an ever-sweeter taste that he was going wrong, but he had misunderstood.

What a difference taste could make! This minor distinction between diggles and voles had very nearly killed him.

Volney oriented on the bad taste. It was an awful experience, but he was glad to do it; now at last he was going right. He hoped.

Soon enough he arrived at the squiggle headquarters. Here the creatures were as much smaller than he as the diggles had been larger. They were correspondingly more alert. He did not have to wait for one to come along; they tunneled out to meet him. "What brings you here, O volish one?" they inquired, quivering their whiskers expectantly at him.

Volney explained that he was seeking help for the Vale of the Vole. Their leader was apologetic, but explained that though he personally would like to help, he hardly knew how; and that there were elements among them that thought that it was high time the lordly voles were brought down to smaller tunnels. He was the soul of discretion, but it was evident that there was considerable resentment of the voles, historically, by those who had had to yield the best pastures to them, and that history extended into the present. Thus the squiggles probably would not have helped, had they had the ability to. Volney really couldn't blame them.

However, the squiggles said, they would be happy to give him a pebble to guide him to the nearest wiggle, who happened to be a female in quest of a mate. Volney demurred; voles had no truck with wiggles! Take the pebble anyway, they urged, in case he changed his mind. So Volney, avoiding rudeness, accepted the pebble and put it in his travel pouch.

Then, with heavy gizzard because of his failure to find help, Volney bored toward the surface.

He broke ground some distance from his starting place, deep in the surface jungle, and changed to his surface suit and eyes. Because he had a good sense of direction, he knew where Castle Roogna was. He did not really enjoy pottering along on the surface, but it was faster than tunneling, and he did not have a great deal of time left; his nether excursions had taken most of his week.

He reached the agreed rendezvous spot in the orchard on schedule. Chex was already there, and so was little Ivy, who it seemed was always to be found where things were happening. "Here'ss Volney!" Ivy cried gladly, running up to give him a hug. He wasn't sure how she managed that, but she did.

"Where's Esk?" he asked.

Chex spread her hands. "There hass been no ssign of him," she said with the hiss of the surface folk. "But I'm ssure he'ss on the way."

They exchanged stories of their searches. Volney was amazed to learn that she had not only entered the gourd, but had done so physically. "I did not think that was possible," he remarked.

"Oh, ssure," Ivy said eagerly. "I've done it! I had a night mare sshoe that let me go in, and I came out at the Good Magician'ss casstle, but I losst it."

"Lost the castle?" Volney asked, startled.

"The mare sshoe, dummy! Too bad, 'causse it'ss ssort of interesting in the gourd, if you can sstand the icky sstuff like the bug housse and the lake of casstor oil. There'ss a garden of candy, and—"

"That sshould be no horror to you!" Chex exclaimed.

"Well it wass, 'causse I think if I ate any, I'd maybe get caught forever in there, so I had to pass it by, and that was the awfullesst thing I ever did!"

Chex smiled understanding^. 'The gourd iss the repossitory of bad dreamss," she reminded Ivy.

"Yeah." Then, as Chex began to speak: "Yess!" And a giggle.

Time passed, but Esk did not return. Now the tune for rendezvous was past, and they were getting alarmed. "If ssomething happened—not that anything could have!" Chex said nervously.