Golem in the Gears (11 page)

That did it. Fracto set about making water. Rain poured down, splattering across the cliff. Some splashed in, but promptly seeped out again; this cave was not only secure from light, it was safe from flooding too.

Meanwhile, day was arriving; even the full fury of the storm could not blank out all the light of the sun. "You'll dry up any minute, mist-for-brains!" Grundy shouted.

The rain poured down with double intensity. Water sheeted along the cliff and crashed in a torrent into the ground below. Puddles developed and expanded. It was, Grundy had to admit to himself, an impressive effort.

But of course that wasn't what he told Fracto. "If that's the best you can do, Cumulo-Fatso, you'd better retire to some greener pasture and sprinkle their flowers. A baby could dribble better than you can!"

It wasn't possible for the storm to get any angrier, but

it succeeded anyway. A deluge came down while Gmndy continued to hurl up insults. He hadn't had a name-calling workout like this in years!

The puddles expanded to ponds, and to little lakes. Still the water poured down. The liquid had no ready egress (Grundy smiled as that word came to him, thinking of birds and pewter) from the Gap, so it piled up. The bottom was becoming a single expanse of water, like an inlet from the sea. "Is that the best you can do, you cumbersome fractious nincompoop kinky clown of a cloud?" he demanded.

The king-cloud was so enraged that jags of lightning shot out of its posterior, illuminating the whole Chasm. Thunder crashed continuously, wind whipped violently about, and rain came down in bucketfuls. The water level rose, creeping up toward Grundy's cave.

Now, belatedly, he realized what could happen. If the rainfall continued unabated, it could flood the cave, forc- ing Snortimer out into the light, wiping him out.

Then, faintly over the constant noise of the rain, he heard splashing. He peered, and saw a distant cloud of steam. Stella Steamer was caught in the water, and by the look of it she couldn't swim. She was being carried along by the flow of it, thrashing about, trying to keep her head above the surface.

"Enough!" he cried. "I'll stop insulting you, Feculo!"

But now the cloud had the advantage, and had no inten- tion of letting it go. The water descended without pause, deepening the lake. Fracto didn't care if Stella drowned, as long as he got Grundy too!

"Stella!" Grundy screamed in dragon-tongue. "Find something to hang on to!"

But there was nothing to anchor her. Slowly she was carried on past his cave, having increasing difficulty as

the water deepened. The bed was tied to her back, ham- pering her. She was surely going to drown!

Grundy scrambled back inside the cave. "Snortimer, the water's rising, the dragon's drowning, and we'll drown too if we don't get out of here!" he exclaimed.

"I can take care of that," Snortimer said.

"You can? How?"

"I'll just pull the plug."

"The what?"

"Let's go!" Snortimer said. "But you'll have to shield me from the light!"

Grundy jumped on, spreading his body as well as he could to intercept what dim light there was, and the mon- ster scrambled out of the cave. Snortimer winced as the palest light surrounded him; then he dropped into the water and sank below. Grundy held his breath and hung on, not knowing what was happening.

Snortimer scrambled rapidly hand over hand down under the water, moving along the bottom of what was now a deep lake. In a moment he came to a large circular plate set in the ground. He braced two arms against the ground, grabbed the edge of the disk with two more, and used another to steady himself. He hauled on the disk.

Slowly the disk came up. Then it was out of its hole, and water was pouring through. Snortimer hauled it to the side and let it go; it snagged in a crack and hung there, letting the current go by.

Now the water was sucking rapidly through the hole left by the disk. Snortimer clung to the ground, and Grundy clung to Snortimer, and the water rushed by them with increasing force. Grundy didn't know how long he could hold his breath, but he had no choice. If he stopped hold- ing it, he would drown.

Surprisingly swiftly, the water sucked down through

the hole, and the lake in the Chasm drained. Soon there was nothing remaining but puddles.

Already Snortimer was scrambling in the direction the dragon had gone. "My bed!" he gasped.

His bed, of course! He had to get under cover before the cloud cleared up!

They found Stella downstream, shaking herself. Snor- timer dived under the bed that was still strapped to her back. The bed was soaking, but it represented security for the monster.

Just in time! Cumulo Fracto Nimbus, seeing the drop in the level of water, was giving it up as a bad job. Grundy was tempted to call, "Good riddance!" at the cloud, but refrained; his mouth had caused enough trouble already.

Where had all the water gone, he wondered? There had been so much of it—and now it was all belowground. Was it rushing through endless caverns, down to some sunless sea? Were there people down there, or monsters, and if so, how were they handling all that water? Probably it would not be smart to stay around long enough to find out; they might not be entirely pleased by the abrupt deluge.

Stella seemed all right; the water had drained in time, and she was of a tough species. Grundy settled on top of the squishy bed and relaxed as she whomped on.

Fracto, his rage spent, floated away, and the sun reap- peared. Slowly the bed dried out. By nightfall it no longer squished.

This night Grundy and Snortimer did not range far ahead; they decided to wait until the dragoness was ready to move in the morning. After all, there might not be another plug, ahead.

"Good luck," Stella growled. "I've got to go back on patrol." She whomped back down the Chasm.

At night, Snortimer came out and foraged for the mak-
  
\ ings of a dummy. He gathered driftwood that was bent into shapely configurations, and tied it together with vine. He was really pretty handy—which wasn't surprising, considering that he was mostly made of arms and hands.

Grundy, searching for food, suddenly felt his foot go cold. It was as if he had stepped in deep snow—but there was no snow. He checked, and discovered that he had stepped on a burr. No wonder! Those things were impos- sibly chilly.

They set up the dummy at the shore. Then Grundy imitated its voice. "Oh, help!" he wailed in the most dis- traught femalish tone. "I'm in horrible distress!"

Nothing happened. But of course it could take the mon- ster time to arrive. Grundy repeated the call every hour or so, hoping it would be heard.

Dawn came, and they retreated to the bed. The night had been quiet, but the day was otherwise.

First, a little roc swooped down, evidently taking the bed for a tidbit. Too late, Grundy realized that they should have concealed it. The roc would simply lift it up and carry it away, and he dreaded to think what would happen

to Snortimer.

Grundy dashed across the sand to the spot where he had stepped on the burr. It was still there. He picked it up, though it chilled his hand to the bone, and charged back just as the roc arrived. The bird was just extending its claws toward the bed as Grundy hurled the burr at its

head.

The roc, with an automatic reflex, snapped the bun- out of the air and swallowed it. Then the bird froze, not quite literally. It forgot the bed and pumped its wings,

flying up—but there was a rather strange expression on its beak, and ice was forming on the outside of its craw. It flew away somewhat erratically.

Grundy smiled. It was a young roc, still inexperienced. A mature one would have known better than to eat the burr. Next time, this one would know better. He had just contributed to its growing pains, so to speak.

He settled down to rest, as there was nothing he could do about the bed right now. At night he could get Snor- timer to haul it across the sand to cover, for Grundy himself lacked the strength. But he remained halfway alert.

In the late afternoon he was roused by a distant scrap- ing or brushing sound. He jumped up and looked—and was dismayed. A beachcomber was coming down the beach. This was a giant comb with enormous teeth, advancing across the sand, combing out all debris. Behind it the sand was level and clean; the debris piled up in front of it, to be moved to some dumping site. Obviously the bed would be dumped along with the rest of the trash.

Desperately Grundy looked around. He remembered seeing something that might—yes! There was a small pumpkin growing at the fringe. He dashed across to it, used a sharp shell-fragment to saw it free of its vine, and shoved with all his might. The pumpkin weighed more than he did, but the beach was slightly inclined, and he was able to start it rolling just as the beachcomber arrived.

The comb caught the pumpkin and tumbled it around. The pumpkin burst, getting its innards all over the comb's teeth. That was exactly what Grundy had hoped for.

The teeth absorbed the juices of the pumpkin. Then the magic of the pumpkin acted on them. They were pumped up, swelling like balloons. In moments, the comb ground to a halt, unable to push its own fat teeth through the sand. The bed had been saved, again.

When evening came, they moved the bed to safety under a mys-tree, where any intruder would have great difficulty figuring things out. Grundy continued to imitate the calls and pleas of the dummy-damsel, though he had some private reservations about seeking the aid of a mon- ster that preferred to feed on this sort of prey.

Next day, about noon, the Monster of the Sea arrived. First a ripple developed in the water, then a wake; finally a grotesque head poked up. The Monster had a flexible pink snout, bulging nostrils, cauliflower ears and two enormous ivory tusks. His eyes seemed beady, but as he came closer Grundy realized that they were more like bloodshot saucers; it was the size of the creature that made them seem small.

Grundy glanced down and discovered that his knees hadn't changed to jelly; they merely felt that way. Did he really want to continue this mission? "That's the ugliest puss I've ever seen!" he breathed.

The Monster honked. Grundy jumped; naturally he understood the honk, and what it signified was this: "And you're the least significant twerp I've ever seen!"

Those big, convoluted ears were good at hearing! "I'm on a Quest," Grundy replied defensively in honky.

"Aren't we all!" the Monster agreed.

"You? What's your Quest?"

"I liberate damsels in distress." The Monster waded through the shallow surf toward the dummy. He had huge flippers and a serpentine tail, and he was even bigger than he had seemed. Strings of seaweed were festooned across his scales. He smelled of ill fish.

"Um, about that particular damsel—" Grundy began.

"Be with you in a moment, mini-pint," the Monster honked as he heaved himself out of the water and hauled

his blubbery body somewhat awkwardly across the sand. "First things first."

"But you see that's not really a—"

"I came to liberate her, and liberate her I shall!"

"She's a dummy. She—"

"Don't call any damsel a dummy!" the Monster chided him, continuing forward.

"But this one is really a—" Grundy said.

The Monster halted abruptly, eyes on the dummy. "That's no damsel!" he honked.

"It's a dummy, dummy!" Grundy exclaimed. "I've been trying to tell you!"

"A mock-damsel!" the Monster honked, amazed. "Who would do a thing like that?"

"Well, you see—"

"Here I swam half the length of Xanth at top velocity to reach the poor damsel before she expired, and all for nothing?"

"What good would it have done her, anyway?" Grundy exclaimed. "She'd be as well off dying of exposure, as being gobbled by you!"

"What?" the Monster honked, perplexed.

"Why euphemize? You may call it liberation, but it's their lives and your hunger you are liberating!"

"My dear insignificant golem!" the Monster honked. "Whatever gave you that idea?"

"It's true, isn't it? You consume only damsels in dis- tress?"

"I consume only plankton," the Monster honked, affronted. "Do you think there would be enough damsels in all Xanth to feed me, if your heinous charge were true?"

Grundy contemplated the enormous bulk of the crea- ture, and realized it was true. A thousand damsels would not sustain that mountain of flesh. "Plankton?"

"It's a magic food found only in the sea. Very tasty. I strain it through my teeth."

"But those tusks—"

"Are for self-defense, of course. There are some pretty bad creatures out there."

"Uh, I guess I was led astray by your reputation," Grundy said, embarrassed.

"You shouldn't credit hearsay," the Monster reproved him. "Now why is this mock-damsel here?"

"I set it up," Grundy confessed. "It was the only way to summon you."

"You perpetrated this indignity?" The saucer-eyes red- dened alarmingly.

"I need your help! It isn't only damsels that get in distress, you know."