A Spell for Chameleon (Xanth 1) (31 page)

The vine twisted into shuddering convolutions like a dying serpent, oozing orange sap from the end, but it was now harmless. The tree keened again, cowed. Bink almost felt sorry for it.

They took this vine to Fanchon, looped it about her foot, and hauled her unceremoniously away from the tree. So simple with the right equipment!

"Now,"
Trent said briskly as Fanchon slowly recovered her vital energy. "I propose an extended trace between us, until we three escape the wilderness of Xanth. We seem to have problems separately."

This time Fanchon acquiesced.

The first thing Fanchon did when she recovered was fetch the magic gourd Bink had told her about. "This could be useful," she said, wrapping it in a great leaf from a blanket plant.

"Now we must plan the best route out of here,"
Trent said. "I believe we are south of the chasm, so that will balk us if we go north--unless we remain on the coast. I don't think that is wise."

Bink remembered his experience crossing the chasm at the other side. "No, we don't want to stay on the beach," he agreed. The Sorceress Iris had complicated things there--but there could be equivalent menaces here.

"Our alternative is to cut inland,"
Trent said. "I am not familiar with this specific locale, but I believe Humfrey was building a castle due east of here."

"He completed it," Fanchon said.

"Fine," Bink said. "You can change us into big birds, maybe rocs, and we'll carry you there."

Trent shook his head negatively. "This is not feasible.''

"But you changed us before, and we helped you. We made the truce; we wouldn't drop you."

Trent smiled. "It is not a question of trust, Bink. I trust you; I have no question at all about your basic integrity, or Fanchon's. But we are in a peculiar circumstance--''

"Fancy the Evil Magician paying a call on the Good Magician!" Fanchon said. "What a scene that would make."

"No, you would be disappointed,"
Trent said. "Humfrey and I have always gotten along well. We leave each other alone professionally. I should be happy to meet him again. But he would be obliged to convey the news of my return to Xanth to the King, and once he knew my general whereabouts he would use his magic to keep track of me."

"Yes, I see the problem," she said. "No sense tipping your hand to the enemy. But we could fly somewhere else."

"We can fly nowhere,"
Trent insisted. "I can not afford to advertise my presence in Xanth--and neither can you."

"That's right," Bink agreed. "We're exiles. And the penalty for violating exile--"

"Is death," Fanchon finished. "I never thought--we're all in trouble."

"If you had forgotten such details two days ago,"
Trent observed wryly, "we would not be here now." Fanchon looked unusually sober, as if there were some special significance to the remark. Oddly, the expression made her look less ugly than usual. Probably, Bink thought, he was merely getting used to her.

"What are we going to do?" Bink asked. "The whirlpool brought us in under the Shield; we've already agreed we can't go back that way. We can't stay here on the beach--and we can't let the citizens know we're back, even though we entered only by freak accident."

"We'll have to conceal our identities," Fanchon decided. "There are places in Xanth where we would be unknown."

"That doesn't sound like much of a life," Bink said. "Always in hiding--and if anyone asked Magician Humfrey where we were--"

"Who'd do that?" Fanchon demanded. "One year's service just to check up on someone in exile?"

"That is our only present margin of security,"
Trent said. "The fact that Humfrey will not bother to check without a potential fee. However, we can worry about such things after we escape the wilderness. Perhaps by then some new avenues will have appeared. I can change you into unrecognizable forms, if necessary, and camouflage myself. It may all prove to be academic."

Because they might never make it through the wilderness, Bink thought.

They traveled along the beach until they found a region of sparse forest and field that seemed less hazardous than the rest. They spaced themselves out somewhat whenever anything dangerous appeared, so that they would not all be caught together. The selection worked well enough; at first the magic they encountered was largely innocuous, as if the concentration were all at the beach. There were spells designed to make passing animals sheer off, or color shows whose purpose was unclear. Bink had been through worse on his trip to the Good Magician's castle. Maybe the wilderness was overrated.

Fanchon spotted a fabric plant and efficiently fashioned togas for them all. The men tolerated this with good humor, having become accustomed to nudity. Had Fanchon been a provocatively proportioned woman there might have been more reason--and less desire--for bodily concealment. Still, Bink remembered how she had professed modesty in the prison pit so as to gain a private section in which to hide the bricks. She probably had her reasons this time, too.

There were several patches of spell-cast coldness, and one of heat; the clothing would have helped protect against these, but they were easy to avoid. The assorted carnivorous trees were readily spotted and bypassed; staying off attractive paths was second nature to them all now.

One region was distinctly awkward, however. It was dry and sandy, with little apparent nutrient in the soil, yet it was covered by luxuriant waist-high broad-leaved plants. The region seemed harmless, so they strode straight through the center. Then all three travelers felt a sudden and almost uncontrollable call of nature. They had to scatter, barely getting separated in time to perform.

These were very practical plants, Bink abruptly realized. Their spells compelled passing animals to deposit nutritious fluids and solids on the soil, greatly promoting plant growth. Fertilizer magic!

Farther along, one animal neither fled their approach nor acted hostile. This was a knee-high, snuffling quadruped with a greatly extended snout.
Trent drew his sword as it ambled toward them, but Fanchon stopped him. "I recognize that one," she said. "It's a magic-sniffer."

"It smells by magic?" Bink asked.

"It smells magic," she said. "We used to use one on my folks' farm, to sniff out magic herbs and things. The stronger the magic, the more it reacts. But it's harmless."

"What does it feed on""
Trent asked, keeping his hand on his sword.

"Magic berries. Other magic doesn't seem to affect it one way or the other; it is just curious. It doesn't differentiate by type of spell, just intensity."

They stood and watched. Fanchon was nearest to the sniffer, so it approached her first. It snorted, making a flutelike sound. "See, I have some magic; it likes me," she said.

What magic? Bink wondered. She had never shown any talent, and never actually told him what she could do. There was still too much he did not know about her.

Satisfied, the sniffer moved on to
Trent. This time its reaction was much stronger; it danced around, emitting a medley of notes. "Sure enough,"
Trent said, with a certain justified pride. "It knows a Magician when it smells one."

Then it came to Bink--and frisked almost as much as it had for
Trent. "So much for perception," Bink said, laughing with embarrassment.

But
Trent did not laugh. "It believes you are almost as strong a magician as I am," he said, his fingers tapping his sword with unconscious significance. Then he caught himself, and seemed to be at ease again.

"I wish I were," Bink said. "But I was banished for lack of magic." Yet the Magician Humfrey had told him he had very strong magic that could not be brought out. Now his curiosity and frustration were increased by this happenstance. What kind of a talent could he have that hid itself so determinedly--or was it hidden by some outside spell?

They trudged on. They cut poles with which to poke the ground ahead for invisible barriers and pitfalls and other suspiciously unsuspect aspects of the wild. This made progress slow--but they dared not hurry. Actually, they had no reason to hurry; their only purposes were concealment and survival.

Food turned out to be no problem. They did not trust the various fruit and candy trees they saw; some might be magic, and serve the interests of their hosts rather than the interests of the consumers, though they looked similar to crop trees. But
Trent merely turned a hostile thistle tree into a luxuriant multifruit tree, and they feasted on apples, pears, bananas, blackberries, and tomatoes. It reminded Bink how great was the power of a true Magician, for
Trent's talent really embraced that of food conjuration as a mere subtalent. Properly exploited, the reach of his magic was enormous.

But they were still heading into the wilderness, not out of it. Illusions became bolder, more persistent, and harder to penetrate. There were more sounds, louder, more ominous. Now and then the ground shuddered, and there were great not-too-distant bellowings. Trees leaned toward them, leaves twitching.

"I think," Fanchon said, "we have not begun to appreciate the potency of this forest. Its whole innocuous permeability may have been merely to encourage us to get more deeply in."

Bink, looking nervously about, agreed. "We picked the safest-seeming route. Maybe that's where we went wrong. We should have taken the most threatening one."

"And gotten consumed by a tangle tree," Fanchon said.

"Let's try going back," Bink suggested. Seeing their doubt, he added: "Just to test."

They tried it. Almost immediately the forest darkened and tightened. More trees appeared, blocking the way they had come; were they illusions, or had they been invisible before? Bink was reminded of the one-way path he had walked from the Good Magician's castle, but this was more ominous. These were not nice trees; they were gnarled colossi bearing thorns and twitching vines. Branches crisscrossed one another, leaves sprouting to form new barriers even as the trio watched. Thunder rumbled in the distance.

"No doubt about it,"
Trent said. "We failed to see the forest for the trees. I could transform any in our direct path, but if some started firing thorns at us we would be in trouble regardless."

"Even if we wanted to go that way," Fanchon said, looking west. "We'd never have time to retrace it all through that resistance. Not before night."

Night--that was the worst time for hostile magic. "But the alternative is to go the way it wants us to go," Bink said, alarmed. "That may be easy now, but it surely is not our best choice."

"Perhaps the wilderness does not know us well enough,"
Trent said with a grim smile. "I do feel competent to handle most threats, so long as someone watches behind me and stands guard as I sleep."

Bink thought of the Magician's powers of magic and swordplay, and had to agree. The forest might be one giant spider web--but that spider might become a gnat, unexpectedly. "Maybe we should gamble that we can handle it," Bink said. "At least we'll find out what it is." For the first time, he was glad to have the Evil Magician along.

"Yes, there is always that," Fanchon agreed sourly.

Now that they had made the decision, progress became easier. The threatenings of the forest remained, but they assumed the aspect of background warnings. As dusk came, the way opened out into a clearing, within which stood an old, run-down stone fortress.

"Oh, no!" Fanchon exclaimed. "Not a haunted castle!"

Thunder cracked behind them. A chill wind came up, cutting through their tunics. Bink shivered. "I think we spend the night there--or in the rain," he said. "Could you transform it into a harmless cottage?"

"My talent applies only to living things,"
Trent said. "That excludes buildings--and storms."

Glowing eyes appeared in the forest behind them. "If those things rush us," Fanchon said, "you could only transform a couple before they were on us, since you can't zap them from a distance."

"And not at night,"
Trent said. "Remember-I have to see my subject, too. All things considered, I think we had better oblige the local powers that be and enter the castle. Carefully--and once inside, we should sleep in shifts. It is likely to be a difficult night."

Bink shuddered. The last place he wanted to spend the night was there--but he realized they had come far too deeply into the trap to extricate themselves readily. There was powerful magic here, the magic of an entire region. Too much to fight directly--now.

So they yielded, goaded by the looming storm. The ramparts were tall, but covered by moss and clinging vines. The drawbridge was down, its once-stout timbers rotting in place. Yet there was an ancient, lingering, rugged magnificence about it. "This castle has style,"
Trent observed.

They tapped the planks, locating a reasonably solid section on which to cross. The moat was overgrown with weeds, and its water was stagnant. "Shame to see a good castle get run down,"
Trent said. "It is obviously deserted, and has been for decades."

"Or centuries," Bink added.

"Why would a forest herd us into a derelict castle?" Fanchon asked. "Even if something really horrible lurks here--what would our deaths profit the forest? We were only passing through--and we would make it much faster if the forest just left us alone. We intend it no harm."

"There is always a rationale,"
Trent said. "Magic does not focus without purpose."

They approached the front portcullis as the storm broke. That encouraged them to step inside, though the interior was almost black.