Air Apparent (33 page)

“Perhaps we should investigate.”

“Yes. It has the aspect of being important.”

They flew to the glade, glided down, and landed beside the dome, which turned out to be huge. A flower-bordered path led to its main door. They went to that door and knocked, quite uncertain what to expect.

The door opened. No one was there; the path simply wended its pretty way inside. So they followed it on into the greenhouse. This was a vast interior, with a large skylight above.

Here the plants were more exotic, as if unable to thrive in the more moderate climate outside. Small trees bore huge flowers, and bushes supported unusual fruits. “This may be where the trees are developed, for the rest of the planet,” Sim said.

“And maybe for the rest of the Worlds of Ida, including Xanth itself,” Ilene said. “My big sister Irene can make any plant grow; she would be delighted to see this.”

“Did I hear my name?”

They looked up, startled. There on a pedestal was Princess Ida, in a manner. She wore a crown, and a tiny planet orbited her head, but she was nude and as shapely as a nymph. “Hello,” he responded belatedly.

She flung her gorgeously long hair about and kicked up a long leg to cross it over the other. The process would have freaked Sim out, had he been human; as it was, it brushed him back. She was a nymph!

Ilene, of course, was not at all fazed. “We are Sim Bird and Ilene Human,” she said. “We are part of a party visiting this world.”

“Yes, of course,” Ida said. “You will want to remain here.”

Sim recovered his voice. “We are considering it. We are under a curse that prevents us from returning to our origin world of Xanth. We can travel only upworld.”

“I’m sure that’s true,” Ida said. Sim realized with foreboding that even if it hadn’t been true before, it was true now, because Ida had accepted it. They were truly cursed.

“But some members of our party might be bored with just trees,” Ilene said, obviously thinking of Nimbus. “So we can’t be sure we want to stay here.”

“That will not be a problem,” Ida said. “You need to remain here. This world needs more nymphs and fauns for its trees, and it seems you will serve.”

“We can’t commit to this,” Sim said. “We must consult with the rest of our party.”

“They are in sleep under the acorn tree, and will not be roused until you commit.”

Sim exchanged a wary look with Ilene. This was clearly not the nice Ida they had known on Xanth. This was the Tree World Ida, with a different agenda.

“We must go to them now,” Sim said.

“You cannot,” Ida said. “The dome is locked.”

“The skylight isn’t,” Sim said.

“That is illusion. The dome is solid.”

Illusion. “Mount, Ilene,” Sim said tightly.

She got on his back immediately. He spread his wings and launched into the air. He spiraled up toward the skylight, trusting that Ilene knew what to do.

He reached the skylight and flew up through it. It had become real. Ilene had done her thing.

He flew rapidly back to where the other members of the party were. They did turn out to be sleeping. “There must be some pacifying potion in the air,” he said.

“We must rouse them and get them moving,” Ilene said. “Quickly, before it affects us.” She was a sensible girl.

He landed. “We may have to try holding our breaths.”

“If they don’t wake, we must drag them to the Factor’s body and pile them on,” she said.

“But if Hugo is sleeping too, that won’t help.”

“It may.”

The others refused to be roused. So Sim helped Ilene drag the others to the Factor’s body. It was difficult, but they managed. Now there was a human pile, still sleeping.

“Touch him too,” Ilene said tersely, putting one foot on the body’s shoulder to ensure her own contact. Then she carefully used her thumbs to draw up the man’s eyelids, making him appear to be awake. It was of course illusion.

Then Sim understood. She was making the illusion real. “Hugo,” he said urgently. “Transfer us out, immediately.”

“But—” Hugo said. Then he got a peek under mature Ilene’s lifted skirt, and started to freak out.

“Now!” Sim snapped.

There was a wrench, and they were elsewhere.

“You are some girl,” Sim told Ilene appreciatively.

“Thank you,” she said, managing a hurried blush.

After that the others began to wake. They were free of the air that had put them down. Sim explained what had happened.

“We owe you our freedom,” Wira said. “Thank you.”

Hugo shook his head. “I think I dreamed I saw—” He looked at Ilene, who was back to her normal appearance. It seemed that once she had learned to handle a given illusion, making it real, she could summon and abolish it at will. “Nothing,” he concluded, embarrassed.

Sim decided not to explain; it would only generate mischief. He trusted that Ilene would remember to revert promptly in the future, when not distracted by the need to save the others from unkind captivity.

Ilene caught his eye briefly and let half a smile escape. In that instant she seemed eerily mature again. She was, indeed, some girl. He began to wonder whether her developing talent was really below Sorceress level.

They looked around at the world they had landed on. It was a greenish gourd-shaped mass, with a huge hole nearby.

Gourd-shaped? With a peephole? “This world is not for us,” Sim said grimly. “It must be Gourd Moon.”

“A dream world,” Debra agreed. “We’d never escape that.” She smiled briefly. “It would be a bad dream.”

They transferred again. This time they came to a world shaped like a tapering four-sided shaft of stone. All across its surface were smaller projections of stone.

“An obelisk,” Sim said. “A monolith.”

“Somehow I don’t think this is our world either,” Wira said.

“I wonder,” Hugo said. “We have been traveling randomly upworld, skipping countless intermediate worlds. Is it possible we’re missing the best ones? In which case we might do better by doing it the conventional way, through Princess Ida, one at a time. Eliminating the randomness.”

Wira kissed him. “You’re a genius, dear!”

It was his turn to blush, silenced. It was not the kind of compliment he was accustomed to receiving.

“That depends on the nature of Princess Ida,” Sim said. “We have learned that they are not all nice people.”

“If she’s bad, we can transfer again, as we have been doing,” the Factor said. “It remains our escape option.”

Debra kissed him. “You’re a genius, dear,” she said teasingly, emulating Wira.

He shook his head. “How I wish you weren’t cursed, so that I could have at you in my own body.”

“So do I. In my own body too.”

“Actually your centaur body is more fully formed. It doesn’t need a bra.”

She made as if to slap him, and he made as if to flinch. They liked teasing each other. Their relationship clearly made Debra more confident, and the Random Factor more human. And was Sim’s own relationship with Ilene doing the same for the two of them? It seemed likely.

“So let’s try for Princess Ida, cautiously,” Wira said.

“I can survey the terrain,” Sim offered.

“Not without me,” Ilene said. “Ida might be another nymph. Or worse, a lovely bird.”

“Don’t contact her at all,” Debra advised. “Just locate her.”

That made sense. Ilene went to Debra for lightening, so that the others would not realize she had discovered how to do it herself through illusion realism, then got on his back. He took off and ascended.

“Which way?” Sim inquired.

“Well, I could try this way,” Ilene said, sliding around so that she was clinging to his front. She was light enough now to do this without falling. She was of course fully mature again. He could feel the twin pressures of her, well, bra under her blouse. Her clothing seemed to mature along with her body.

“You’ll be dangerous when you’re older,” he said.

“I am older, for now.” She kissed him on the beak. “And some time, when you present the appearance of maturity, I’ll make you older too. For just long enough.”

She was teasing, but also not fooling. He desperately longed for that temporary maturity, for she had pretty much won his avian heart. She was human, yet there was no other bird of his species, other than his mother, as Debra had reminded him. The notion of a crossbreed couple no longer seemed at all irregular.

“Maybe the pinnacle,” he said.

“You’re so smart.”

And she had virtually complete command of his interest. Intelligence had nothing to do with it.

He flew north toward the apex. There at its tip was a curtained window, as if a lady lived there. The curtain was decorated with pictures of a crown and a tiny orbiting moon. “That’s bound to be Princess Ida,” he said.

“Bound,” she agreed, working her way around to his back. “We must tell the others.”

He turned back, flying toward the spot their party had landed. “Ilene, if we do find a suitable world—”

“I will remain with you, of course.”

“But if we find one where there are good human men—”

“Would any be as pretty or smart as you?”

“Well, no. But they would be human.”

“And if there were a beautiful bird-of-paradise, like the one the demoness emulated, and she cocked her crest at you?”

“Never! I already love you.” Oops; how had that slipped out?

“I think we have answered each other,” she said.

Indeed they had.

They returned to the group and reported what they had seen, omitting their other dialogue, though its general nature could hardly be secret from the women. Women were simply too canny about romance; they could not be fooled. At least the younger children would be innocent.

Wira gazed along the broad avenue that was this facet of Obelisk. “I think that is too far for us to walk.”

“I could carry some of you, if Debra makes you light,” Sim said. “She could carry the others.”

Wira nodded. “That seems to make sense.”

Soon Debra was carrying the Factor, Wira, and Hugo, while Sim carried Ilene, Fray, and Nimbus. Fray could have reverted to her cloud form, but would not have traveled fast enough to keep up, even were the wind right. He led the way north.

“Did you kiss her?” Fray asked.

So much for the innocence of children.

“I kissed him,” Ilene answered. “He couldn’t stop me; he had to keep flying.”

“That’s so romantic!”

“Ugh,” Nimbus said.

“Oh?” said Fray. “Suppose I kiss you? Are you going to jump off and fall until you squish on the metal ground?”

“You wouldn’t dare!”

“No, you wouldn’t dare. Take that.” She kissed him.

“Double ugh!”

“Okay, I’ll do it again.” She kissed him again.

Sim felt Ilene’s knees tighten against him. She knew that Nimbus secretly liked getting kissed. The two were forming a couple that might amount to something a decade or so later.

They glided down to land beside the window at the pyramidal apex. Wira knocked on the pane.

A door appeared beside the window, large enough to admit them all. They entered. They had been standing with their heads away from the planetary surface, but as they entered the doorway their heads pointed toward the tip. Gravity had changed, as magical things could.

They entered a large chamber. There on a throne sat Princess Ida, resplendent in a royal gown. She wore a crown, and a tiny ball circled her head. “Welcome, travelers,” she said. “I am Princess Ida, governess of Obelisk World. Please introduce yourselves.”

They did so, and told their story. “So you see, we got trapped by a curse,” Sim concluded. “Now we are looking for a world where we can comfortably settle, and we thought we could check less randomly by going through you, if you don’t mind.”

Ida nodded. “You surely would not be satisfied here; almost our sole interest is creating monuments. But my moon Earth may prove to be more hospitable.”

“Earth!” Wira exclaimed.

“You have heard of it?”

“It is next to Xanth, our home realm.”

“Oh, I don’t think so. Earth is governed by the Demoness Gaia, and has very little magic. I am not sure what lies beyond it.”

The group exchanged several mixed glances: wonder, surmise, and maybe hope. Were they coming up on another Xanth? Just how similar to their own could it be?

“We’ll try it,” Wira said.

“As you wish. You will have to leave the bulk of your souls here, and they may be difficult to recover if you decide to return. They will soon dissipate and be lost.”

“We can’t return,” Hugo said. “We are cursed.”

Ida shrugged. “Then I hope you discover your compatible world.”

They linked hands and let their substance sublimate. Soon they were orienting on the new planet, which loomed larger as they approached. It was blue, with huge seas and oddly shaped masses of land.

They were able to direct their landing, and chose a peninsula that strongly resembled Xanth. It might not be Xanth, but it seemed the most likely route to Xanth.

They aimed for Castle Roogna, though aware that there would be no such castle here. Just so long as there was an equivalent.

They landed in what turned out to be the big village of Summer Haven. They did not try to speak with any natives; the language of Mundania was indecipherable to Xanthians. They scavenged for blankets to cover Sim and Debra, knowing that Mundania did not have many man-sized birds or winged centaurs. Fortunately the local people were all hurrying about their own business, paying no attention. Most were in the Mundane vehicles called cars, zooming madly from red light to red light. Sim wasn’t sure what the magic of the lights was, but it evidently had considerable stopping power.

And there, on a private estate, was a castle. The natives did not seem to notice it, but it was right where Castle Roogna existed in Xanth. That had to be it.

They went to the front gate. It was open, so they trooped into the estate and made their way to the castle. No one was around, so they entered it and went to where the chamber of Princess Ida ought to be.

They found the room. But its door was locked. So they knocked. “Princess Ida!” Wira called.

“Hello!” the answer came. She spoke Xanthian!