Geis of the Gargoyle (59 page)

"Don't do that," Iris snapped.
 
"You're driving us crazy."

The ball dropped to the ground.
 
Mentia's usual shape reformed.
 
"That was the talent: that of driving people crazy."

"What are all these loose talents doing here?" Hiatus asked, bewildered.

Mentia got sensible again.
 
"This is just about the most powerful magic in Xanth, because of the focus," she said.
 
"When people fade out of the scene, it may be that their talents are left without hosts.
 
So they must drift toward the Strong magic.
 
Magic surely attracts magic.
 
So they collect here."

"That does make sense," Iris said.
 
"But it doesn't solve our problem.
 
We need nerve for Surprise."

"Maybe a variant," Gary said.
 
"Make qualities of character visible."

"Sure," Surprise said, crossing her eyes.

The talents faded.
 
New things appeared, just about as oddly scattered.
 
There were chunks of stone, splotches of mud, puddles of goo, portions of anatomy, chips of wood, and things that might have resembled squished insects if examined sickeningly close.
 
These were qualities of character?

"Some folk have strong backbone," Mentia remarked, gazing at a fragment of human spine.
 
"Some don't." She looked at some goo.
 
"But where's some nerve?"

"Let me see," the child said.
 
She looked around.
 
"Ah- there's what I need."

Gary looked.
 
He saw a bit of string at the edge of the channel.
 
He picked it up.
 
"This? It's just lying around."

"That's nothing." Hanna said derisively.
 
"Pay it no attention."

"But look what it says," Surprise said.

He looked.
 
The side of the string was printed with the word NERVE.
 
That was what Hanna had said the child lacked.
 
It seemed that it resembled a talent.

So he took it to the child.
 
She laid it on her little arm, and it sank in.
 
"Now I have plenty of nerve," she said confidently.

"Curses, foiled again," Hanna muttered.

"I think she is giving up too easily," Gayle murmured.

Gary had to agree.
 
The philter was as slippery and deceptive as any demon.

"So now at last we are ready to harness the philter," Iris

said.
 
"As I understand it, from our vision of the original conjuration of the Interface, Surprise must use her magic to pick up the demon, and the rest of us must speak the words of the conjuration.
 
Then we add the potion in the jar-"

"I don't remember the words," Hiatus said.
 
"And anyway, the philter's vision couldn't be trusted to show that part right.
 
How do we know the real words?"

"He's right," Mentia said.
 
"When you conjure a demon, you must have the ritual down perfectly, or it will turn on you and destroy you.
 
That's why Hanna is being so submissive; she's expecting us to blunder ahead, thinking we are ready, when we're not.
 
There must be a spellbook or something that tells how to do it."

"This is going on forever," Iris exclaimed.

"It has been three thousand years," Gayle pointed out.

"It will be another three thousand years, if we don't do it right."

"Point made," Mentia said.
 
"Surprise, can you do magic that will make whatever we need to do the conjuration appear? So we won't miss anything important?"

"Sure." The eyes crossed.

Nothing changed.

"Um-" Iris began.

"I did it, really I did," Surprise said.

"But the philter is covering it over with illusion," Mentia said, catching on.
 
"Iris, if you can penetrate the illusion-"

"Yes." Iris's eyes assumed a faraway look.
 
She turned around in a circle.
 
"Yes," she repeated.
 
"They are glowing, under heaped layers of illusion.
 
A little book, and a tangle of straps."

"Straps?" Mentia asked.
 
"What do straps have to do with harnessing the philter?" Then she did a double take.
 
"A harness! We need a harness! Of course.
 
Most demons are conjured for spot purposes, but this one we mean to bind into the Interface.
 
A magic harness will hold it there."

"Where are the book and harness?" Gary asked.

"Not far away," Iris said.
 
"The original folk must have dropped them after they thought the job was done, and they've never been touched since." She walked to the edge of the chamber, plunged her hand into the seeming wall, and came up with a book bound by a strap.
 
Then she went to the other side and reached up toward the ceiling, bringing down that tangle of straps from some masked alcove.
 
"Now we have it all.
 
We can do the job."

Hiatus took the book and opened it.
 
He read the instructions aloud.
 
They were surprisingly simple.
 
They had merely to take the philter, put the harness on it, pour the potion over it, and speak the words "Fil enter Interface- recompile." Then put the philter in a safe place and depart.

"Gary must speak the words," Mentia said.
 
"It's his mission."

"Why, anyone could do this," Hiatus said, looking up.
 
"Why did the Good Magician send us?"

"Not anyone could do it," Mentia said.
 
"We needed you to find our way.
 
Hiatus; you asked Desiree, who directed us to Jethro Giant, who directed us here.
 
We needed Iris to counter the formidable illusions.
 
We needed Gary to read the story in the old stones.
 
And Gayle to give us the philter's true name.
 
And me to counter the demonly aspects.
 
And Surprise to do all the kinds of magic we needed along the way-and will need now, to pick up an unwilling demon.
 
We are the only ones who can do this."

Suddenly it was all making sense.
 
"Then let's do it," Gary said.
 
"If the philter is in this formation, I can find it." He touched the stone, reading it.
 
"There's a crevice here, and it's artificial." He felt around the stone pedestal, and found a loose panel.
 
He opened it, and there in a deep cubby was a flat disk, a ring with mesh across it.

They peered in at it.
 
"That's it?" Hiatus asked.
 
"That tea strainer?"

Hanna appeared.
 
"Of course not," she said severely.

"The philter is a huge mass of unfathomable complications, buried way too deep in the stone for you to ever reach.
 
This is just a decoy."

"Obviously that's it," Gary said with a smile.

"And it is a demon," Mentia said.
 
"It will bum anyone who touches it unprotected.
 
Surprise, make your hands invulnerable and take it out."

The child crossed her eyes.
 
Her hands glowed.
 
The philter assumed the form of a nickelpede, daunting her.
 
Then she exerted her nerve and reached into the cubby and brought out the little object.
 
It seemed like such a nonentity, after the phenomenal displays they had braved to reach it.

Hiatus took the harness and brought it to the philter.
 
There was a hiss, and he snatched his fingers away; it had burned him.
 
So Surprise took it with her free hand and set it over the philter, and the straps enclosed it and drew themselves tight.
 
"Ooh," Hanna said, looking pained.

Then Gary stood before the harnessed philter.
 
He took the jar of potion and unscrewed the top.

Hanna glared at him.
 
"If you pour that potion, I'll destroy you," she said fiercely.
 
Gleams of dangerous light radiated from her eyes.

Gary was daunted.
 
But he reminded himself that this had to be a bluff.
 
He continued to unscrew the lid.

Hanna became a basilisk.
 
She leaped for him, forcing him to meet her gaze.
 
Gary was terrified, not sure whether that baleful glance would turn him to stone in human form, ruining his future with Gayle.
 
But he forced his shaking arm to pour the powder over the harnessed philter.

Hanna reappeared in her usual human female guise.
 
"Then see this!" she cried, hoisting up her skirt.

But Gary had steeled himself against that freakout.
 
"Fil," he said.

"No!" Hanna cried, in evident anguish.

"Enter," Gary said.

"You are destroying me!" Hanna said, looking distraught.

"Interface," Gary said, feeling guilty despite his knowledge that she was a mere illusion Grafted to appeal to him.

"I beg of you," she said.
 
"Anything you want! Riches, power, fair women-"

He was about to retort that he was a gargoyle, who needed nothing of those things.
 
But he realized that this was another trap.
 
He couldn't say anything except the words of the conjuration, or it would be spoiled, and might not be repeatable.
 
The philter was still full of tricks.

"Recompile," he said.

Hanna faded into smoke, with a heartrendingly despairing wail.
 
The scene dissolved into a blinding flare of light.
 
Then there was an image of darkness pierced by pinpoints of light.
 
One of these expanded until it became a big bright ball, and near it was a small dark ball, and on the dark ball was a map of Xanth with a crown set on it.
 
This was the mineral kingdom, Gary realized.
 
From that map sprouted a tree, and the tree wore a crown and from it trees like it spread, covering all Xanth.
 
This was the plant kingdom.
 
Then an animal appeared, a seeming composite of all animals, and it wore a crown, and from it many types of other animals spread out, filling niches between the trees.
 
This was the animal kingdom.
 
Finally the human folk came on the scene, and made their villages, and from them spread out all the crossbreeds, and then the stone city of Hinge appeared, and from it came two invisible curtains: the Interface outside, and the limit of madness inside, and it was done.

The scenes faded.
 
The six people were left amidst the ruins of Hinge, standing on a weathered island in the middle of a tired pool, with barrenness all around.
 
Their vision of madness was done.
 
Yet somehow Gary did not feel exhilarated.
 
The philter had been a rogue demon, selfish and sometimes dangerous, but it had put up a considerable battle and almost defeated them.
 
It had shown them a significant aspect of the phenomenal history of Xanth.
 
Hanna and Desi-had they really been no more than mindless figments? Now all the philter's illusions were gone.
 
He wished it could have been otherwise.