Stork Naked (23 page)

“I wondered whether I was under observation, but I didn't know how.”

“You have forgotten your mission again.”

This brought him up short. He advanced on the three, amazed that he had been distracted so often; it wasn't like him. In fact he was normally quite focused. He remembered a time when—

“Try again,” the queen advised.

Now he was really confused. “What is happening?”

“The three ench ants have the talent of aversion. They can escape notice, or be forgotten, or even repulse active interest. Each seems to have one variant; together they are virtually impregnable. This can be overridden, but the moment concentration lapses, they are lost to the attention of the other party. We use them to repel hostile raids; aggressive hills don't even know why they never get around to raiding ours. They are our prime defense.”

That explained why the hill could afford to be on an exposed location. Anything interested in attacking or eating ants would be repelled. That also explained why he had had such trouble approaching the anthill: the generalized aversion had been working on him. This was a rare and highly effective defense. “But why didn't the other hills they were at appreciate their value?”

“Because the three did not wish to be recognized. They were looking for a more compatible situation. We offered them that, completely exempt from other duty, well fed and housed, and they are satisfied.”

“You did not mention appreciation. Don't they crave that?”

“Centaur,” the queen said kindly. “They are ants. All they want is to be allowed to do their job without interference. Their job is protecting the hill.”

Che straggled with his duty. “Queen, I do not wish to question your information, yet I should verify the identity of these three directly. Can their aversion magic be turned off?”

The queen crooked an antenna at the three. They seemed to shimmer, and now he saw them more clearly. He went to them, and did not get distracted. He touched antennae with the nearest.

“What is your real identity, and how did you come here?”

“We are from a far reality,” the ench ant responded. It was a neuter worker, quite ordinary except for its aversion magic and its limited initiative. “Where we hatched, all ants are like us. But we wandered too far afield, and got on the back of a snoozing stork. Before we knew it, we were caught high in the air, and then at the Stork Works. By the time we were able to dismount safely, we were in a different reality, where no ants had our abilities. We felt lonely, so searched for ants that had at least some mind abilities.”

“The queen! She is telepathic.”

“Yes. That is not the same, but we concluded that it is close enough. She understands mind powers, and treats us well. We will remain here.”

The antenna communication did not allow for deceit. Che had no doubt that these were ants, not transformed children. “Thank you.”

“Your Simurgh must be fascinating,” the ant said. “Her mind is overwhelmingly strong. She is a very powerful queen.”

The ant had picked that up from his mind, interpreting it in ant terms. He could not conceal the truth either. “Yes.” He broke contact.

The three ench ants faded out, either gone or forgotten. Anona was gone. Che was now alone with the queen. “Before you depart,” she said.

“Yes?”

“I trust you appreciate my cooperation. It allowed you to accomplish your mission, even though the result was negative.”

“That is true. I do appreciate it. Is there some return service I can do for you?”

“There is. I have not had relations with a drone in some time. I have been busy. I believe I will take a small refreshing break.”

Suddenly he caught her meaning, which she had not signaled before. The worker ants were incapable of deception, but now he understood that the queen could communicate exactly what she chose, keeping the rest of her mind private. She was looking for a spot liaison, which by the rules of this reality and her species was legitimate. “But I am not really an ant,” he protested. “This is merely the body of a mindless drone.”

“But you provide that mind, centaur, and an apt mind it is. No ant has the intellect you do. I appreciate a male with a formidable mind.”

This, unfortunately, was typical of females, just as appreciation of physical qualities was typical of males. “I am not at all sure—”

“My time is limited,” the queen said.

“But—”

Then she became the most magnificently alluring female creature he had ever encountered. It was not mere appearance or manner; there were magic pheromones galore. There was no gainsaying her. All his concerns about his mate Cythia Centaur, or Surprise Golem, or any other relationships became abruptly moot. There was only the queen of the pique ants.

He stepped toward her, overwhelmed by her phenomenal sex appeal. There was no longer any doubt about the ant mating process. He was sure he would be aghast hereafter, but right now he had no choice.

He blinked. He was standing a short distance from the anthill, which had shrunk to diminutive size. No, it was normal; he was back in his natural centaur body. He spread his wings and took off.

“Thank you, Simurgh,” he said to the air around him.

Welcome. I concluded that your mission was done, and that you wished to depart your ant host.

“I did,” he agreed. “It's not that the queen ant was not worthy or appealing, but I have emotional complications that interfere with such a dalliance.”

It will take her a while to realize you are gone, as the drone body remains.

“Bleep!” The cuss word came through verbally, though it was telepathically projected.

Or maybe not, the Simurgh concluded.

Che felt guilty. The queen had helped him, and was entitled to a return favor. He had reneged.

You wish to return for a limited time?

That brought him back to reality. “No.”

I will try to find some other intelligent male to occupy that body for the occasion she desires.

That made him feel better. However, the day was late. “I need to return to report my finding,” he said. “But what of you, Simurgh?”

First recover Surprise Golem's baby. Then calculate the correct home reality. I will be in mental touch, now that we have connected. When we are ready to return, I will carry the flightless member of your party, and we will pass the Stork Works and select our destination. All should end well.

Che hoped that would truly be the case. Somehow he lacked the confidence the Simurgh projected. After all, as far as he knew, they had not yet found the children.

Pyra walked through her sector, almost certain she would not find the children. It was evident that Demoness Fornax had enlisted more than one ally, contrary to the Demon deal, and was using the Sorceress Morgan le Fey to force the issue with Surprise Golem. Pyra had never met the Sorceress, but couldn't stand her; she made the contest unfair. But it was not her place to do anything about that.

In her role as a helpful acquaintance of Surprise it was now her job to locate and rescue the three lost children if she could. She would play that role completely. She no longer wanted to corrupt Surprise, but would have to do her best in that respect too. The difference was that now it wouldn't bother her much to lose. She knew she didn't deserve Che, and she didn't want to hurt him by taking him away from Cynthia Centaur. She had to find someone else. If only she could somehow override the love elixir and do it naturally.

She came to an arch. It was formed of translucent stone wedges with pearly surfaces that glowed faintly. “Moonstone!” she exclaimed, recognizing the type.

The scene beyond the arch was different from what was around it, and she realized that this was magic, leading to some other realm. It must be someone's secret access to a special playground or vacation spot, for the other region looked fabulously entertaining.

Could the children have gone through it? What she could see was surely appealing to little imaginations. There was even a candy stand in sight.

Pyra was not one to enter anything she did not properly understand. She brought out the Reality Mask and oriented on the arch. It showed pictures of several arches, and within each was a different scene. Some were parks, some forests, and some quite alien landscapes.

Then she caught on. “Moonstone! This is a shortcut to the moons of Princess Ida!” For there seemed to be an infinite number of ever-smaller moons, each a world in itself. This could be a route to one of them.

But who would have put such an edifice out here in nowhere? That would have required real magic, and what use was it?

Who but the Sorceress Morgan le Fey, with the considerable help of the Demoness Fornax! This was an attractive nuisance that would virtually suck the children in. Morgan would not need to do anything more; the children would be gone.

Still, there was a problem. Folk could not go to the moons of Ida physically. They had to leave their bodies behind, because the moons were too small. So the bodies slept, somewhat in the manner of those who entered the dream realm via the peephole of a gourd. If the children had entered here, where were their bodies?

Pyra walked around the arch, instead of through it. She saw that it did not lead directly to the other world; it was in the wall of a stout stone building that looked like a mausoleum. A tomb big enough to hold a number of bodies. That explained that: the bodies were stored there, and reanimated when they emerged. If they emerged.

Pyra felt a chill. Had the Sorceress disposed of the children permanently? No, because then she would not be able to bargain with them as hostages to trade for Surprise's baby. They had to be recoverable, or the deal would be no good, and Surprise would be uncorrupted. So this had to be a two-way arch. Like the piper who piped the children into the mountain, not hurting the children but teaching the cheating villagers a terrible lesson. Pyra had always rather admired that piper; he knew what was what.

She walked all the way around the building, finding no entrance other than the arch. So she couldn't go in and look for unconscious children in crypts or whatever. In any event she would not be able to wake them, without their souls. She had to find the souls first, and bring them back; then the bodies would reanimate.

Pyra nerved herself, then walked through the arch. She experienced a momentary delirium; then she was in the other world. She was now a compacted soul, vastly smaller than her physical body, but looking and feeling much the same. Even her weight; gravity was the same, though this world should be way too small to match that of Mundania and Xanth. These moons were indeed remarkable.

She was on a pleasant pebbled path. She walked along it, and came to a fancy gate with a sign: WELCOME TO ALWAYS-ALWAYS LAND. Beyond it were innumerable fancy entertainments ranging from roller coasters to candy-cane houses. This was definitely a lure for children. Indeed, children were everywhere, running and screaming in childish glee while their parents looked somewhat harried.

She entered and looked around. Where would her (so to speak) children be? It would take forever—perhaps literally—to check every one of the distractions. She needed to locate the children in the next two hours or so, or to be certain that they were not here. She needed help.

Who would help her, and why? She was an attractive woman, apart from her fire; she could probably entice a man to do it. But he would want payment of a certain sort, and might tell her anything to get it, then be off like a ghost the moment he had it. Men were like that; she had seen it often in the Mask. A woman would be a better bet, but what did Pyra have to entice a woman? This was a problem.

She studied the assorted booths in sight. One had a man who passed his hands across the limbs and necks of the children who put them out. What was he doing? She walked close enough to observe more closely.

The sign on the booth said JASON'S BASIN—A HAIR RAISING EXPERIENCE. The proprietor—Jason, surely—stroked his fingers across flesh and left a train of shaven skin. One boy had a hairy arm; it was hairless after the stroke. Another boy put his head in, and Jason neatly shaved the hair off the back of his neck. One girl verging on teenhood sat on the counter and swung her legs inside for stroking and shaving, before her shocked mother hauled her out. Pyra smiled; teens were notorious for testing the limits of the Adult Conspiracy. Of course there wasn't any in this particular reality. Still, parents obviously tried to protect their children.

Another booth's banner said FANNIE'S FANS and had a picture of a folding fan. Children were getting ordinary-looking fans that turned out to be anything but ordinary. One labeled FANCY made sullen folk suddenly like others, becoming their fans, as it were. A FANDANGO made its users dance exuberantly three times as fast as normal, snapping their fingers sharply. A FANTASTIC made folk feel so great that they practically floated. The FANATICAL made them extremely enthusiastic. One who picked up a FANFARE suddenly spoke in trumpet tones. The children plainly enjoyed such shenanigans.

Another booth was labeled POX & BUGS. This was extremely popular with children. The pox was in the form of a big red hen that would dab children unmercifully with red pox marks unless someone made such a fierce display that it scared the chicken off. It was a chicken pox. The bugs were in the form of lice that made people lie uncontrollably. Children were running around telling the tallest stories they could imagine. Probably this wasn't allowed at home, but here they had a pretext.

Still another was labeled JAMES' SUN BEAMS. The man in this booth put on a dizzying display of beams, focusing them without a lens, directing them into dark corners to light them up, making them turn corners. Then the sun went behind a cloud, and his act was halted.

All this was fine, but it wasn't accomplishing her purpose. Shaving fingers, fans, cowardly fowl, and bending sunbeams would not find the children for her.

She looked some more. There was a stall saying LLIANE & LLIANA—ILLUSIONS GAL-LORE. They were making a thing of all the L's, but if the children had been masked by illusion, this could be relevant.

She approached. Fortunately this booth was not busy at the moment. “Hello. I am Pyra. I am looking for three lost children.”

Blonde Lliane—her name was on her cap—smiled. “Maybe you could check with the Llost & Ffound office. Children get mislaid all the time.”

“Thank you; I will do that. Can you direct me there?”

“Walk down the center aisle,” the other woman, brunette Lliana, said. “Turn right. You can't miss it; it's at the end of that aisle.”

“Thank you.” But this didn't seem enough. “I am not a child, but I am curious about your show.”

“My talent is to make illusions real,” Lliane said. “My sister's talent is to make real things illusion. We complement each other, which is why we prefer to work together. Would you like a demonstration?”

“Yes, please.” Illusions were cheap magic, but could be very effective.

“Here is a real thing,” Lliana said, picking up a red ball from a basket with several balls of different colors. “Take it, feel it, verify its reality.”

Pyra did so. The ball was quite solid.

Lliana took it back, then held it back out to Pyra. “Now try it.”

Pyra reached for the ball—and her hand passed through it. It had become illusory! “That's impressive.”

Lliane reached out to touch it. “Now try it,” she said.

Pyra touched it, and it was solid again. “That is impressive,” she said. “Can you do it to living things too?”

“No, only objects,” Lliana said. “If there's an illusion of a person, my sister can make a statue of it, but not a living creature.”

“And living things don't stand still long enough for her to make them illusion,” Lliane said.

So they couldn't have done it to the children. That was a relief. “Thank you,” Pyra said. “Here is my talent: fire.” She heated herself so that the flames danced along her body.

“Too bad,” Lliana said. “This carnival already has a fire-eater.”

“Oh, I'm not looking for work here. Just for the children. Now I'll check that Lost and Found office.”

Pyra followed their instruction, and soon found it: LLOST & FFOUND—Jean Poole, proprietor. She paused, assessing it: gene pool? Surely a stage name.

“May I help you?” Jean inquired. She was young, hardly more than a girl.

“I am Pyra, looking for three lost children, ages ten, ten, and five. Have they—”

“No lost children have been turned in here today,” Jean said. “When did you last see them? They may be at a game booth, such as the Fairy Tails.”

“Stories?”

“Yes. The fairies' tails go to the Fairy Tail Tree, and children pick them for stories.”

Pyra considered. “Are the stories suitable for children?”

“Oh yes, of course.”

“These ones wouldn't be interested, then. They're naughty children.”

Jean laughed. “Sorry I couldn't help you.”

“Thanks anyway. I can't even be sure they're on this world.”

“Oh, you're a worlds-traveling tourist?”

“Not exactly.” Pyra didn't want to talk about herself, so asked the girl about herself. “Is your name a pun?”

“Only partly. My talent is to have all the talents in my ancestry. The trouble is I don't know them all, so can't use them unless I happen to discover them by accident. My father is Whurl Poole, whose talent is making whirlpools. His parents were an anonymous woman and a forget whorl that met in a love spring. My mother is Blue Jean whose talent is making pants; her father was Denim, who could turn cotton into a hard substance, and her mother Jean could sew without using her hands. My parents met after running into the same forget whorl that was one of Whurl's parents, so they may have forgotten more than they ever knew. It's a problem, because I want so much to know about my past. My magic depends on it.”

“I appreciate your problem,” Pyra said.

“I work here so I can meet many people,” Jean said. “Some of them may have known my parents, and known more about them than I do. Darn that forget whorl, even if it is my grandfather.”

“I hope that works,” Pyra said sympathetically. She was discovering that actually talking with folk and getting to know them was far more evocative than merely seeing them on the pictures of the Reality Mask.

She walked back toward the main aisle. She passed a booth whose banner said DON'T BE A LITERALIST. She paused, curious despite her need to get on with her search.

“Have some milk,” the man in the booth said. “It's the cream of the crop.” He proffered a glass.

Pyra accepted it and sipped it. It was indeed cream. “You're the literalist,” she said, catching on.

“Yes, any figure of speech I use becomes literal,” he agreed. “So I am being careful not to say to say that you look good enough to eat.”

“Thank you for not saying that,” Pyra said, smiling. She moved on.

Then she saw a nearby stall containing a handsome but clearly disconsolate man. The sign said FINN THE AMAZING FIRE-EATER. So why wasn't he eating fire? She had a certain interest in the subject.

She approached the booth. “Finn?” she inquired.

The man looked up. He had flame-colored eyes and appealingly scorched skin around his mouth. She liked his look. “No show today,” he mumbled, and returned his head to his hands.

“I know something about fire. What happened?”

He looked up again, sadly. “You really want to know? It's a dull story.”

She flashed him a fetching smile, exerting the female aspect of her nature. “I really want to know.”

He reacted as he had to, becoming more accommodating. “I eat and breathe fire. That's how I earn my keep. But I'm a fraud.”

“How could you do it, if you're a fraud?”

“My magic is really to breathe combustible fumes. I have a magic sparker to ignite them. Then I can do clever things with the flames. But my sparker is used up, and I don't know where to find another. I'm finished. I dread telling the boss; I'll get fired. Ha-ha.” But he wasn't laughing.

This continued to be interesting. “Maybe I can help.”

“Do you have a sparker?”

“In a manner of speaking. Blow some fumes.”

He pursed his lips and blew out a small jet of gas. Pyra passed one hand near, and the jet ignited. Suddenly it was a column of fire.

“You did it!” Finn exclaimed, the flames playing around his teeth. “You lighted my fire!” His reassessing glance at her body hinted that there was more than one interpretation of his statement. Neither interpretation bothered her at all. She liked to verify that she could still fascinate the male eye when she chose. There was a certain pride of power in being female.

“I'll make you a deal. I'll light your fire if you will help me search for three lost children.”