The escort was a dragon horse, with the front part of a horse and the rear of a dragon. The guide was another imp. “Well, sport, let’s get on with it,” the imp exclaimed impatiently. He was a good deal larger than Grundy the golem, but smaller than a goblin, and reminded Dor somewhat of each.
There were three saddles spaced along the creature’s back. Dor took one, Millie another, and Jumper citing to the third, unable to sit in it. The imp perched on the equine head, whispering into the expressive ears.
Abruptly they were moving. The horse forelegs struck the ground powerfully, while the reptilian hind legs dug their claws in and shoved back. The monster half-galloped, half-slithered forward in great lurches. Millie screamed, and Dor was almost catapulted out of the saddle. The imp chuckled impishly. He had known this would happen.
Jumper bounded over Dor’s head, landing just behind the girl. With deft motions the spider trussed her to the saddle with silken threads so that she could not be dislodged. Then Jumper did the same for Dor. Suddenly there was no question of being shaken loose; they did not even have to hold on. “Ah, you take all the fun out of it!” the imp complained.
The dragon moved rapidly. The lurching smoothed as the creature got up speed, and became a more or less even rising and falling. Dor closed his eyes and imagined he was on a boat, sailing the waves. Up, down, sway; up, down, sway. He began to feel seasick, and had to open his eyes again.
The foliage was rushing past. This creature was really moving! It threaded neatly through seemingly impassable tangles, avoiding tangle trees and monster warrens, hardly abating its pace even for fair-sized rifts. The imp was an obnoxious little man-thing, typical of his land, spreading insults imp-partially—but he really knew his route and controlled the dragon expertly. Dor appreciated expertise wherever he found it
Which was not to say the whole trip was smooth. There were hills and dales and curves. Once the dragon splashed through a boggy lake, swimming strongly but soaking their feet and lower legs in the process. Another time it ascended a steep bank, going almost vertically before crushing it. Once a griffin rose up challengingly before it, squawking; the dragon horse neighed warningly and feinted with its hooves, and the griffin decided to give way.
Soon they neared the demesnes of the Zombie Master—and Dor realized with a start that this was the same site as that of Good Magician Humfrey’s castle, eight hundred years later. But maybe that was not strange; that place which seemed fit for one Magician might also appeal to another. If Dor were to build a castle someday for himself, he would look for an ideal site, and might be governed by considerations similar to those of some former Magician.
However, the Zombie Master had his own defenses, and these turned out to be as formidable in their fashion as those of Magician Humfrey. A pair of zombies rose up before the dragon horse—and the fearless creature sheered off, unwilling to suffer contact with this rotting flesh. Millie, seeing the zombies, screamed, and even the imp looked disgusted.
“This is as far as we go,” the imp announced. “Nothing will bother you here—except zombies. How you get in to talk with their master I don’t even care to know. Dismount and let us go home.”
Dor shrugged. Zombies posed no special horror for him, since he had more or less associated with Jonathan all his life. He didn’t like zombies, but he wasn’t afraid of them. “Very well. Tell the King we are in conference with the Zombie Master, and will send news soon.”
“Fat chance,” the imp muttered. Dor pretended not to hear that.
The three dismounted. Immediately Dor felt cramps in his legs; that ride had really battered them! Millie stood bowlegged, unable even to kick her feet properly. Only Jumper was unlinked; he had perched atop his saddle throughout, being unable to sit at all.
The dragon horse neighed, wheeled on hoof and claw and tail, and shoved off. The three were showered with dirt and twigs thrown up by its feet. It was certainly glad to get away from here!
Dor worked the knots out of his legs as well as he could, and limped up to the guard-zombies. “We come on a mission from King Roogna. Take us to your Master.”
The zombie opened its ponderous and marbled jaws. “Nooo nnn ffasssess!” it declared with fetid breath.
Dor concentrated, trying to make out the words. Was his talent operating here? These things were dead, yet fashioned from organic material. Wood was organic, and he could speak to it when it was dead. Did the spell that gave these monsters animation also give them sufficient pseudo-life to nullify his communication with inanimate things? Or was it partially operative? Probably the latter; he could converse, but with difficulty.
Jumper chittered. “I believe it said ‘No one passes,’” the web on Dor’s shoulder said.
Dor glanced at the spider, surprised. Had it come to the point where Jumper could understand Dor’s language better than Dor himself could?
Jumper chittered again. “Do not be dismayed; all of your words are strange to me; this is merely another aspect of strangeness.”
Dor smiled. “That makes sense! Very well; you can help me converse with the zombies.” He returned his attention to the guards, who had remained as silent as the grave, as patient as time. They had no living urges to impel them. “Tell your Master he has visitors. He must see us.”
“Nooo,” the zombie insisted. “Nooo nnnn!”
“Then we shall just have to introduce ourselves.” Dor made to pass.
The zombie raised a grisly arm to block his way. Shreds of rotten flesh festooned it, and the white bone showed through in places. Millie screamed. She certainly had no affection for any zombie at this stage of her life! But centuries of ghosthood could change a person’s perspective, Dor concluded.
Dor reached for his sword, but Jumper was there before him, trussing up the zombie in silk. In a moment the other zombie was similarly incapacitated. Dor had to admit this was the better way; zombies were messy to slay, he understood, because they could not be killed. They had to be dismembered, and even the pieces fought on. Which was one reason they would make such a good army for King Roogna, if that could only be arranged. This way, they were efficiently neutralized, and in a manner that should not offend the Zombie Master.
But they had not gone far toward the castle that stood on a mound in the forest—in Dor’s day both mound and forest were gone—before a zombie serpent challenged them. It hissed and rattled in a fashion only deviously reminiscent of a live serpent, but there was no doubt it sought to bar their progress. Jumper neutralized it as he had the others. Whatever would they have done without the big spider!
Then a zombie tangle tree menaced them. This was too much even for the spider; the tree stood four times the height of a man and had perhaps a hundred moldering tentacles. Even ft it were feasible to truss it up, the thing would have the strength to snap the strands. Therefore Dor menaced it with his gleaming sword while the others sidled past; even a zombie tree had some care for its extremities.
In this manner they achieved the castle. It, too, was an animated ruin. Stones had fallen from its walls to reveal fossilized inner supporting timbers, and shreds of cloth hung in the window apertures. There had once been a moat, but it had long since filled in with debris; a stench rose from what thick liquid remained. There was—yes, a zombie bog-monster languishing in the mire. Its slime-coated orbs focused on the intruders with as much glare as their sunken condition permitted them to mount.
The party crossed the broken-down drawbridge and pounded on the sagging door. Splinters and fragments were dislodged, but of course there was no answer. So Dor completed the demolition of the door with a few strokes of his sword, and the three marched in. Not without a qualm or two.
“Hallooo!” Dor called, and his voice reverberated through the tomblike halls. “Zombie Master! We are on a mission for the King!”
A zombie ogre appeared. Millie screamed and did a little skip back, her hair swinging almost straight up; she must have kicked her feet, forgetting that she was standing on them. Jumper braced her with one leg to prevent her falling backward into the moat, where the moat-monster was trying vainly to slaver. “Noo. Goo,” the ogre boomed hollowly, for its chest had been eviscerated by decay. Dor remembered Crunch the ogre, and retreated; a zombie ogre was still an ogre.
“We must see the Zombie Master,” Millie said, though pale with fear. In her cute way, she too, had courage.
“Soo? Ooh.” The ogre shuffled down a hall, and the party followed.
They entered a chamber like a crypt. Another zombie glanced up, resting its cadaverous hands on the table before it. “On what pretext do you intrude here?” it demanded coldly.
“We want to see the Zombie Master!” Dor exclaimed. “Now get out of the way, you bundle of bones, if you’re not going to help.”
The zombie stared somberly at him. It was an unusually well-preserved specimen, gaunt but not yet rotten. “You have no business with me. You are not yet dead.”
“Of course we’re not yet—“ Dor paused. That “yet” distracted him.
Jumper chittered. “This man is alive. He must be—“
“The Zombie Master himself!” Millie finished, horrified.
Dor sighed. He had done it again. When would he grow up and learn to check things out before making assumptions? First King Roogna, whom he had thought to be a gardener; now the Zombie Master. He fumbled for an apology. “Uh—“
“Why do the living seek me?” the Zombie Master demanded.
“Uh, King Roogna needs your help,” Dor blurted. “And I need the elixir to restore a zombie to life.”
“I do not indulge in politics,” the Zombie Master said. “And I have no interest in restoring zombies to life; that would undermine my own talent.” He made a chill gesture of dismissal and returned to his business—which was the corpse of an ant lion that he was evidently about to animate.
“Now see here—” Dor began angrily. But the zombie ogre stepped forward menacingly, and Dor was cowed. His present body was big and strong and swift, but in no way could it match the least of ogres. One swing of that huge fist—
Juniper chittered. “I think our mission has failed.”
Dor took another look at the ogre, remembering how Crunch had snapped an ironweed tree off at the base with one careless blow. This creature was not in good condition, being dead, but could probably snap an aluminumwood tree off. Mere human flesh would be no problem at all. So his second thought was much the same as his first: he could not prevail here.
Dor turned about. He knew that they could not coerce a Magician to help; it had to be voluntary. The Zombie Master, as the others had warned, was simply not approachable.
A hero would have found some way. But Dor was just a lad of twelve, accompanied by a giant spider and a girl who screamed constantly and who would become a ghost at an early age. No heroes here! And so he accepted the gall of defeat, for both his quests. The gall of growing up, of becoming disillusioned.
Dor half-expected one of the others to protest, as Grundy the golem always did. But Millie was only a helpless maid, possessing little initiative, and Jumper was not Dor’s kind; the spider comprehended human imperatives only imperfectly.
They walked out, and the zombies did not bother them. They trekked down the hill. The dragon horse was gone, of course. They might have had it wait, but they had not expected to need it this soon. Dor’s lack of foresight had penalized him again. Not that delay made much difference, at this stage. So they would simply have to march back themselves.
They untied the two zombie guards Jumper had trussed in silk. “Nothing personal,” Dor explained to them. “Our business with your Master is finished.” They marched. Millie made a very pretty marcher, when she wasn’t screaming or kicking her feet; her hair still flung about naturally. He was getting used to her as she was now, and found her rather intriguing. In fact, he wouldn’t mind—but that wouldn’t be right. He had to guard against the thoughts his Mundane body put into his head; Mundanes weren’t very subtle.
Abruptly they happened on a campfire. This was strange, because fire was hardly used in the Land of Xanth. Few things needed cooking, and heat was more efficiently obtained by pouring a little firewater on whatever needed warming. But this was obviously an organized fire, with sticks formed into a circular pile. The flames licked merrily up through the center. Someone had been here recently; in fact the person must have departed moments before Dor and his party arrived.
“Stand where you are, stranger,” a voice called from the shadow. “I’ve got you covered with a bow.”
Millie screamed. Dor reached for his sword, then stopped; he couldn’t draw before an arrow struck him. No sense in compounding his yet-again lack of foresight by getting himself unnecessarily killed. Jumper jumped straight up and disappeared into the foliage of a tree overhanging them.
The challenger stepped forth. He was a brutish man, Mundane by the look of him, and he had not been bluffing about the bow. The string was taut, and the arrow nocked and centered on Dor’s midsection. Knowing the capabilities of his own Mundane body, Dor had little reason to doubt the competence of this challenger. It seemed as if all Mundanes were born warriors. Perhaps this was in compensation for their abysmal lack of magic. Or maybe the soft, gentle, peaceful Mundanes didn’t go out invading other lands.
“Who the hell are you, poking around my campfire?” the brute demanded. “What happened to that creep with you, the hairy thing with the legs?”
“I am Dor, on mission for the King,” Dor said. He spoke more boldly than was his wont, fresh from the pain of failure of his missions. “The others are my companions. Who are you, to challenge me thusly?”
“So you’re a Xanthie!” the man exclaimed sneeringly. “You sure could’ve fooled me; you look just like a man. You try a spell on me and I’ll drill you!”
So this really was a Mundane. Dor had never seen one in the flesh before. “You don’t have a talent?”
“Don’t get smart with me, creep!” Then the man looked at him more closely. “Say, you’re even dressed like one of us! You sure you’re not a deserter?”
“Would you like to see my talent?” Dor asked evenly.
The man considered. “Yeah, in a moment. But no tricks.” He turned his head and yelled. “Hey, Joe! Come and set guard on a pair here!”
Joe arrived. He was another brutish man, unclean and malodorous. “What’s all this noise about—“
He broke off. His lips pursed in a crude whistle. “Get a load of that babe!”
Oops, Dor thought. Millie’s talent was operating.
Millie made a token scream and stepped back. Joe stepped forward aggressively. “Boy, I could really use a number like this!” His hand shot out, catching her slender arm. This time Millie’s scream was in earnest.
Dor’s body took over. His left hand grabbed at the first Mundane’s bow while his right snapped over his shoulder to whip out the sword. Suddenly the two Mundanes were standing at bay. “Leave her be!” Dor cried.
Millie turned on him, surprised and gratified. “Why Dor—I didn’t know you cared!”
“I didn’t know either,” he muttered. And knew it was a lie. He had resolved to stop lying, but it seemed to come naturally at times like these. Was that part of growing up too: learning to lie socially? He had always cared for Millie, but had never known how to express it. Only the immediate threat to her had prompted his action.
“You won’t get away with this!” Joe said angrily. “We’ve got troops all around here, looking for plunder.”
Dor spoke to the club that dangled from the man’s waist. “Is that true, club?”
“It’s true,” the club said. “This is the advance unit of the Mundane Fifth Wave, They marched down the coast past the Gap, then cut inland. They are completely immune to reason. All they want is wealth and women and easy living, in that order. Flee whilst you can.”
The first Mundane’s mouth dropped open. “Magic! He’s really got magic!”
Dor backed away, Millie beside him. This was a tactical error, for the moment the two Mundanes were beyond sword-slash range they drew their own weapons. And set up a shout: “Enemy escaping! Cut him off!”
A shape dropped from above: Jumper. He landed almost on top of the two Mundanes and trussed them up before they knew what was happening. But the alarm had already been given, and there were sounds all around of men closing in.
“We had better use the upper reaches,” Jumper cluttered. “The Mundanes will not pursue us there.”
“But they can shoot their arrows at us!” Dor protested.
“They may not see us.” Jumper fastened safety lines to Dor and Millie, and they scrambled up the trunk of a tree.
The Mundanes were arriving. These alien men were worse than goblins! Dor was climbing rapidly, thanks to his body’s huge muscles, but Millie was slow. She would surely be caught. “I will distract them!” Jumper cluttered, and dropped low on his dragline.
Dor waited for Millie to catch up with him, then continued on up into the foliage. Just as they got to some reasonable cover, the Mundanes converged on the tree. Jumper chittered at them, swinging across to another tree.
“Get that bug!” a Mundane cried. He lunged for Jumper, but missed as the spider zipped a few feet up his line. Jumper could have escaped then, by going on up into the heights, or simply jumping over the Mundanes and running—but Dor was still struggling to haul Millie to safety. So the heroic spider dangled low, chittering in a manner that sounded challenging and insulting even without translation.
Another Mundane lunged—and missed. Mundanes just didn’t think of an enemy rising suddenly up. But there were too many; now the spider had nowhere to go. One Mundane had the wit to chop at the dragline with a sword, severing the invisible silk. Jumper dropped to the ground. Instantly the men pounced on him, grabbing him one man to a leg, much as the goblins had, so that he was helpless.
Men and goblins: was there really much difference between them? The Mundanes were bigger, but...
Dor was about to turn back, to aid his friend, but one of Jumper’s eight eyes spied him. “Don’t waste my effort!” he chittered, knowing that no one besides Dor could understand him. “Return to the Zombie Master; it is the only place you can keep the girl safe.”
Dor hadn’t thought of that. The Zombie Master might not be friendly, but at least he was not too hostile. It was the best place to be until the Mundane horde passed.
He climbed up into the protective splay of leaves, urging Millie on. His last sight of Jumper was of the men bearing him to the ground, striking his soft body brutally with their fists. They weren’t trying to kill, they were trying to hurt, to make their enemy suffer as long as possible before the end. Because Jumper had balked them from capturing the girl—and because Jumper was different. Dor winced, feeling the pain of the blows in his own gut. What would they do to his friend?
Jumper had left a network of silken lines strung through the upper foliage, guiding Dor and Millie and providing rapid transit from one great tree to another. It was amazing how much he had accomplished in the brief time he had been aloft, and with what foresight. Dor had never thought his friend was deserting him—but neither had he anticipated the sacrifice Jumper would make. He felt the unmanly tears stinging his eyes, was afraid Millie would notice them, then decided he didn’t care. Jumper—to have Jumper trapped like this, perhaps badly hurt, because of Dor’s own carelessness—
Suddenly there was a piercing terrible, great chittering from below. It translated into a sheer scream of agony, chilling in its implication.
“They are pulling off his legs!” Millie whispered in horror. “That’s what Mundanes do to spiders. The wings off butterflies—“
Dor saw that her beautiful face was streaked with helpless tears. She was not ashamed to cry!
Then something congealed in Dor. “Come on!” he snapped, and swung forward at a faster pace.
“Don’t you care, that-—?” she demanded plaintively.
“Hurry!”
Reproachfully, she hurried. Dor felt like a heel from a No. 1 shoe-tree, knowing she thought concern for his own safety motivated him, but he wasted no effort trying to explain. Jumper had eight legs; it would take the Mundanes time to get them all, and he had to use that time well.
In moments they ran out of Jumper’s lines and dropped to the ground. They were now at the base of the hill on which the Zombie Master’s castle sat. A zombie rose up to challenge them, but Dor shoved it aside so roughly that it collapsed in a jumble of shredded meat and chipped bone. He dragged Millie on.
They never paused at the chopped-open castle door. Dor charged right in. The zombie ogre rose up; Dor parried it with his blade, ducked under its arm, and plunged on through the gloomy hall. At last he burst into the Zombie Master’s chamber, where the zombie ant lion was now taking its first steps.
“Magician!” Dor cried. “You must save my friend the spider! The Mundanes are pulling out his legs!”
The Zombie Master shook his cadaverous head and waved with an emaciated hand. “I have no interest in—“
Dor menaced him with his sword. “If you do not help this instant, I will surely slay you!” Such was his hurt and desperation, he was not bluffing, though he feared the Magician could turn him into a zombie.
Now the Zombie Master showed some spirit. “So you, a mortal, dare to threaten a Magician?”
“I am a Magician too!” Dor cried. “But even if I weren’t, I would do anything to save my friend, who sacrificed himself for me and Millie!”
Millie put a restraining hand on Dor’s arm. “Please,” she said. “You cannot threaten a Magician. Let me handle it, Dor. I am not a Magician like you, but I do have my talent.”
Dor paused, and Millie stepped close to the Zombie Master, smiling with difficulty. “Sir, I am not a forward maid, and no Sorceress, but I too would do anything to help the bold friend who preserved us. If you but knew Jumper the spider—please, now, if you have any compassion at all—“
The Magician looked at her closely for the first time. Dor remembered what her talent was, and knew how it softened men. He was just beginning to appreciate its impact on himself. The Zombie Master was after all a man, and he too had to feel the impact.
“You . . . will tarry with me?” he asked incredulously.
Dor did not like the sound of that word, tarry.
Millie spread her arms toward the Zombie Master. “Save my friend. What becomes of me is not important.”
A kind of shudder ran through the Magician. “This becomes you not, maid,” he said. “Yet—“ He turned to his ogre. “Gather my forces, Egor; go with this man and do as he desires. Save the spider.”
Dor took off, running through the gloomy halls and from the castle. The true horror was what lay ahead of him. The zombie ogre followed, crying out to the things of the castle: “Ssome ccome!”
Zombies erupted from the adjacent rooms, in their haste dripping stray clods, bones, and teeth. They closed in behind the ogre: men, wolves, bats, and other creatures too far gone to identify. In grisly procession they followed Dor down the hill.
His concern for his friend lent him swiftness, and somehow the zombies kept up. Yet even as he ran, Dor wondered whether he had not left Millie to as bad a fate as the one he strove to rescue Jumper from. The spider had sacrificed himself to save the two of them; Millie had sacrificed herself to save the spider. The full nature of Millie’s talent had never been apparent to him, though it was coming clearer; it included holding and kissing and—
His mind balked. Kissing the Zombie Master? He ran faster yet.
They burst upon the Mundanes. The first thing Dor saw was Jumper: the brutal men had hung him up by four legs, and yanked off the other four. The spider was alive, but in terrible pain after this torture.
Dor went mad. “Kill!” he screamed, and his sword was in his hand. Almost of its own volition, the blade chopped into the neck of the Mundane nearest Juniper —the one holding the spider leg that had been torn off most recently. Dor was reminded of the centipede legs spat out at the goblin banquet. But this was his friend! The keen edge sliced through the flesh with surprising ease. It passed right through the neck, and the man’s head popped off. Dor stared, momentarily numb to the implication; then he looked again at the severed leg, and whirled on the next Mundane.
Meanwhile the zombies were attacking with a will. The Mundanes panicked, becoming aware of the horror that had fallen on them. Dor had heard that Mundanes were a superstitious lot; zombies should play on that propensity. The men scattered, and in a moment there was nothing in the glade except the victors, three bodies, and Jumper.
Dor couldn’t let himself relax. “Carry the spider to the castle,” he ordered the ogre. “Carefully!” He turned to the other zombies. “Collect the severed legs and bring them along.” Would it be possible to convert them into usable zombie legs and put them back on the spider?
The ogre picked up the mutilated body. Other zombies found the missing legs, and dragged along the dead Mundanes. The strength of the zombies was surprising—or maybe it was just willpower. They brought their prizes grimly to the castle.
Millie met them at the entrance. She looked all right. Her clothes were still on, and her hair was unmussed. Dor had trouble phrasing his question. “He —did he—?”
“The Zombie Master was a perfect gentleman,” she said brightly. “We just talked. He’s an educated man. I think he’s lonely; no one ever visited with him before.”
And no wonder! Dor’s attention returned to Jumper. “He’s alive, but in terrible pain. They—they pulled off four legs!”
“The brutes!” she exclaimed with feeling. She had seemed a rather innocent, helpless maid before, but now she was reacting to stress and horror with increasing personality. “How can we help him?”
Jumper revived enough to chitter weakly. “Only time will help me. Time to regrow my lost limbs. A month or so.”
“But I must return to the King in mere days!” Dor cried. “And to my own land—“
“Return without me. Perhaps I can render some service to the Zombie Master in return for his hospitality.”
“But I must take the Zombie Master with me, to help the King!” Yet that, too, was an impasse; the Magician had already refused to get involved in politics.
The Zombie Master was there; in his distraction Dor had not been aware of his arrival. “Why did the men torment the spider?”
“I am alien to this world,” Jumper chittered. “I am a natural creature, but in my enchantment in this realm of men I become a thing of horror. Only these friends, who know me—“ His cluttering ceased abruptly; he was unconscious.
“A thing of horror, yet with sentience and courage,” the Zombie Master murmured thoughtfully. He looked up. “I will care for this creature as long as he requires it. Egor, carry him to the guest chamber.”
The ogre picked Jumper up again and tromped away.
“I wish there were some way to cure him faster,” Dor said. “Some medicinal spell, like the healing elixir—“ He snapped his fingers. “That’s it! I know where there’s a Healing Spring, within a day’s journey of here!”
Now he had the Magician’s attention. “I could use such elixir in my art,” the Zombie Master exclaimed. “I will help you fetch it, if you will share the precious fluid with me.”
“There’s plenty,” Dor agreed. “Only there’s one catch. You can’t act against the interest of the Healing Spring, or you forfeit its benefit.”
“A fair stipulation.” The Zombie Master showed the way to an inner courtyard. A monstrous zombie bird roosted there.
Dor stared. This was a roc! The largest of all birds, restored to pseudo-life by the talent of this Magician. The entire world of the dead was under the power of this man!
“Carry this man where he will,” the Zombie Master directed the roc. “Return him safely with his burden to this spot.”
“Uh, I’ll need a jug or something—“ Dor said.
The Magician produced two jugs: one for each of them. Dor climbed onto the stinking back of the roc, anchored himself by grasping the rotting stubs of two great feathers, and tied the jugs with a length of Jumper’s silk left over from his last dragline.
The roc flapped its monstrous wings. The spread was so great, the tips touched the castle walls on either side of the courtyard. Grimy feathers flew wide, bits of meat sprayed off, and the bony substructure crackled alarmingly. But there was tremendous power remaining in this creature. A roc in its prime could carry an elephant—that was an imaginary creature the size of a small sphinx—and Dor weighed far less than that. So even this animated corpse could perform creditably enough.
They lumbered into the air, barely clearing the castle roof. There were so many holes in the great wings that Dor marveled that they did not fall apart, let alone have sufficient leverage to make flight possible. But the spell of the Zombie Master was a wondrous thing; no zombie ever quite disintegrated, though all of them seemed perpetually on the verge of doing so.
They looped above the castle. “Go east!” Dor cried.
He hoped he knew the terrain well enough by air to locate the spot. He tried to visualize the tapestry to orient himself—was he actually flying above it now? —but this world was too real for that.
Dor had only been to the Healing Spring once with his father Bink, who had needed elixir for some obscure adult purpose. On that trip Bink had reminisced about his adventures there: how he had met Dor’s mother Chameleon, she being then in the guise of Dee, her normal phase, at such and such a spot, and how he had found the soldier Crombie at this other spot, wounded, and used the elixir to restore him to health. Dor and Bink had visited briefly with a dryad, a wood nymph associated with a particular tree, resembling a pretty girl of about Millie’s present age. She had tousled Dor’s hair and wished him well. Ah, yes, it had been a fine trip! But now, high in the air, Dor could not ask the objects of the ground where the Spring was, and there were no clouds close enough to hail—hail-call, that is, not hail-stone—and his memory seemed fallible.
Then he spied a channel of especially healthy jungle, obviously benefiting from the flowing water from the Spring. “Down there,” he cried. “At the head of that stream.”
The zombie roc dropped like a stone, righted itself, glided in for a landing, tilted a little, and clipped a tree with one far-reaching wing tip. Immediately the wing crumpled, and the roc’s whole body swerved out of control. It was a crash landing that sent Dor tumbling from his perch.
He picked himself up, bruised but intact. The roc was a wreck. Both wings had been broken; there was no way the creature could fly now. How was he to get back in time to do Jumper much good? If he walked, it would take him a day in the best of conditions; carrying two heavy jugs it would be longer. Assuming he didn’t get snapped up by a tangle tree, dragon, or other monster along the way.
He reconnoitered. They had missed the Spring, but there was a handsome tree nearby on the hillside. And—he recognized it. “Dryad!” he cried, running toward it. “Remember me, Dor?”
There was no response. Suddenly he realized: this was eight hundred years earlier! The dryad would not remember him—in fact there probably was no dryad here yet, and this was probably not the same tree. Even if the time had been correct, the nymph still would hardly have recognized him in his present body. He had been boyishly foolish. Yet again.
Disconsolately he trekked down the slope. Of course this was not the same tree! The real one had been some distance from the Spring, not right beside it. And an average tree of today would be an extraordinary tree by Dor’s own tune; even plants aged considerably in eight centuries. His hopes had really fouled up his thinking! He would have to find his own way out of this mess, without help from any dryad.
Well, not entirely without help. “What is the best route out of here?” he asked the nearest stone.
“Ride that roc bird out,” the rock replied.
“But the roc’s wings are broken!”
“So sprinkle it with some elixir, idiot!”
Dor stopped dead in his tracks. So obvious! “I am an idiot!” he exclaimed.
“That’s what I said,” the stone agreed smugly.
Dor ran up to the roc, got his jugs, and ran to the Spring. “Mind if I take some of your elixir?” he inquired rhetorically.
“Yes, I mind!” the Spring replied. “All you creatures come and steal my substance, that I labor so hard to enchant, and what recompense do I get for it?”
“What recompense!” Dor retorted. “You demand the stiffest price of all!”
“What are you talking about? I never made any demands!”
Something was wrong. Then Dor caught on. Again, that eight-hundred-year factor. The Spring had not yet developed its compensatory enchantment. Well, maybe Dor could do it a favor. “Look, Spring, I intend to pay you for your substance. Give me these two jugs full of elixir, and I will tell you how to get fair recompense from all other takers.”
“Done!” the Spring cried.
Dor dipped the jugs full, noting how the bruises vanished from his body as he touched the water. This was the Spring, all right! “All you need is a supplementary enchantment, requiring that anyone who benefits from your elixir cannot thereafter act against your interests. The more your water is used, the more your power will grow.”
“But suppose someone calls my bluff?”
“It will be no bluff. You will take back your magic. It will be as if he never was healed by you.”
“Say, yes—I could do that!” the Spring said excitedly. “It would take a while, maybe a few centuries, to build that extra spell, but since it’s just a refinement of the original magic, a termination clause as it were—yes, it will work. Oh, thank you, thank you, stranger!”
“I told you I would repay you,” Dor said, gratified. Then he thought of something else. “Uh—I’m only a visitor to this land, and what I do may fade out after I leave. So you’d better get right on that spell, so you don’t lose it once I’m gone.”
“How long do I have?”
Dor did a quick calculation. “Maybe ten days.”
“I’ll fix it in my mind,” the Spring said. “I’ll memorize it so hard that nothing can shake it loose.”
“That’s good,” Dor said. “Farewell!”
“I’m not a well, I’m a spring!” But it was a good-natured correction.
“Maybe you’re a wellspring,” Dor suggested. “Because you make creatures well again.”
“Bye,” the Spring said, dismissing him.
Dor returned to the roc and sprinkled elixir from his jar on its wings. Immediately they healed; in fact, they were better than they had been. But they remained zombie wings, dead flesh. There were, after all, limits; the elixir could not restore the dead to life.
Which was why he was on this quest. Only the Zombie Master could do what needed to be done. Meanwhile, he had to get back to Jumper soon, lest the spider also require restoration from the dead.
Dor boarded, tied the jugs, and hung on. “Home, roc!” he cried.
The roc taxied about to face the channel forged by its crash landing, worked its legs to accelerate, flapped its wings, and launched violently into the air. This takeoff was far more precipitous than the first one had been; it was all Dor could do to hang on. The elixir had given the wings new power. Fortunately there were a few droplets remaining on his hands, and these healed the feathers to which he clung. Now they were great long fluffy colorful puffs of plumage suitable for ladies’ hats, easy to grasp.
The roc wheeled in the sky, then stroked powerfully for the Zombie Master’s castle. The landscape fairly whizzed by below. They reached their destination in half the time it had taken to make the outbound trip. No wonder the Magician wanted the elixir; his zombies would be twice as good now!
But a new problem manifested. From above, Dor could see that the Mundanes had rallied, and now were laying siege to the castle. There were many of them; their whole advance army must have gathered for this effort. They evidently were not cowards; they had been panicked by the ferocity of the zombies’ attack, but now they were angry at the three deaths and sought revenge. Also, they probably thought that any castle so well guarded must conceal enormous riches, so their greed had been invoked. In helping his friend Jumper, Dor had brought serious mischief to the Zombie Master. Dor was sure his father would have had more sense than that; it was yet another reminder of his own youth and inexperience and thoughtlessness. When, oh when, would he ever grow up and be adult?
The roc dived, hawklike, banked, and plopped into place in the courtyard. The landing was heavy, for the bird’s feet had not been healed; the sound carried throughout the castle.
The Zombie Master and Millie rushed up. “You got it!” Millie cried, clapping her hands.
“I got it,” Dor agreed. He handed one jug to the Magician, keeping the other for himself. “Take me to Jumper.”
Millie guided him to the guest room. The big spider lay there, ichor leaking from his stumps. The variegated fur face on the back of his abdomen seemed to be making a grimace of distress. His eyes, always open, were filmed with pain. He was conscious again, but so weak he could chitter only faintly. “Good to see you again, friend! I fear the injuries have been too extensive. Legs can be regrown, but internal organs have been crushed too. I cannot—“
“Yes you can, friend!” Dor cried. “Take that!” And he poured a liberal dose of elixir over Jumper’s shuddering body.
Like magic—unsurprisingly—the spider was whole again. As the liquid coursed over the fur-face, the green and white and black brightened until they shone. As it touched each stump, the legs sprouted out, long and hairy and strong. As it was absorbed, the internal organs were restored, and the body firmed out. In a moment there was no sign that Jumper had ever been injured.
“It is amazing!” he chittered. “I did not even need to have my original legs returned! I have not felt so good since I was hatched! What is this medicine?”
“Healing elixir,” Dor explained. “I knew where there was a Spring of it—“ He broke off, overcome by emotion. “Oh, Jumper! If you had died—“ And he embraced the spider as well as he could, the tears once more overflowing his eyes. To hell with being adult!
“I think it was worth the torture,” Jumper chittered, one mandible moving against Dor’s ear. “Watch I don’t nip your antenna off.”
“Go ahead! I have plenty more healing elixir to use to grow a new ear!”
“Besides which,” Millie added, “human flesh tastes awful. Maybe even worse than goblin meat.”
The Zombie Master had followed them. “You are human, yet you hold this alien creature in such esteem you cry for him,” he remarked.
“And what’s wrong with that?” Millie demanded.
“Nothing,” the Magician said wanly. “Absolutely nothing. No one ever cried for me.”
Even in the height of his relief, Dor perceived the meaning of the Zombie Master’s words. The man had been alienated from his own kind by the nature of his magic, rendered a pariah. He identified with Jumper, another alien. That was why he had agreed to take care of Jumper. More than anything else, the Magician must want people to care for him the way Dor and Millie cared for Jumper.
“Will you help King Roogna?” Dor asked, disengaging from his friend.
“I do not indulge in politics,” the Zombie Master said, the coldness returning.
Because the King was no pariah. This Magician might assist those who showed him some human compassion, but King Roogna had not done that. “Would you at least come to meet the King, to talk with him? If you helped him, he would see that you received due honor—”
“Honor by that? Never!”
Dor found he could not argue with that. He would not have wanted that sort of honor either. If there were such a thing as dishonorable honor, that would be it. He had made another stupid error of approach, and squelched his chances—again. Some emissary he was proving to be!
But there was another problem. “You know the Mundanes of the Fifth Wave are getting ready to attack this castle?”
“I do know,” the Zombie Master agreed. “My zombie eye-flies report there are hundreds of them. Too many to overcome with my present force. I have sent the roc out to round up more bodies, to shore up my defenses. To facilitate this, the roc will not even land here at the castle; it will drop the bodies in the courtyard and proceed immediately for more.”
“The Mundanes are mad at us,” Dor said, “because we killed three of them. Maybe if we leave—“
“My zombies helped you,” the Zombie Master pointed out. “You can gain nothing other than your own demises by departing now. The Mundanes have this castle surrounded. To them, it is a repository of unguessable riches; no reasonable demurral will change their fixed minds.”
“Maybe if they saw us leave,” Dor said. “The roc could carry us out. Oh—the roc’s away for the duration.”
“It seems we must remain, at least for a time,” Jumper cluttered. “Perhaps we can assist in the defense of the castle.”
“Uh, yes, we’d better,” Dor agreed. “Since we seem to have brought this siege down upon it.” Then, for no good reason, he found himself making another appeal: “Uh, Magician—will you reconsider the matter of the zombie restorative elixir? This is not a political matter, and—“
The Zombie Master glanced at him coldly. Before the Magician could speak, Millie put her sweet little hand on his lean arm. “Please,” she breathed. She was excruciatingly attractive when she breathed that way. Yet she could not know that it was as a favor to herself, of eight hundred years later, that Dor was obtaining this precious substance.
The Zombie Master’s coldness faded. “Since she asks, and you are a good and loyal man, I do reconsider. I will develop the agent you require.” But it was evident that most of the responsibility for his change of heart was Millie’s. And her breathing.
Dor knew victory of a sort—yet it was incomplete. He was succeeding in his private personal mission, while failing in his mission for the King. Was that right? He didn’t know, but had to take what he could. “Thank you, Magician,” he said humbly.