Roc and a Hard Place

1
PROBLEM
 
 
It was a nice castle, with high turrets, solid walls, a deep moat, and an elevated office suite whose picture window overlooked the nearby community of nymphs. Fire cracker plants grew around the wall, useful for starting fires in the mornings, and the crackers tasted good too. The connected orchard had pie trees of the most sinfully delicious varieties. The mistress of the household was exactly as beautiful, devoted, and accommodating as her husband desired. A man could hardly ask for a better situation.
Except for one or two small things. “Where is your worser half?” Veleno muttered, looking apprehensively around.
“Don't worry,” the Demoness Metria replied with a smile as her scant clothing shimmered into nothingness. “I sent Mentia off to see the Demon Grossclout about our other problem.”
“Other problem?”
She pretended not to hear. “Grossclout's such an intractable cuss that it should take her days to pry any kind of an answer from him.”
“That's a relief!” he said, looking more than relieved. “It's not that I want to be critical, but—”
“But Mentia is slightly crazy,” Metria finished. “And you I married me, not my worser half. But because she did fission off from me, being disgusted by my new goody-goody attitude after I got half your soul, we can't keep her away. She's the half of me you naturally don't like—the soulless half, dedicated to making your life half-muled.”
“Half-whatted?”
“Horsed, equined, donkeyed, asinined—”
He kissed her. “I think I could fathom the word if I concentrated. Let's make hay while the sun shines.”
She looked perplexed. “Hay? I thought you had something else in mind.” A tantalizing wisp of strategically placed clothing appeared.
“I love it when you tease me,” he said, picking her up and carrying her to the master bedroom.
She assumed the form of a nymph. “Eeeeek!” she cried faintly, kicking her marvelous bare legs in the nymphly way. “Whatever am I going to do?”
“You're going to make me deliriously happy, you luscious creature.”
She inhaled, enhancing what hardly needed it. “O, sigh, how can I escape this hideous fate?” she wailed cutely, kissing him on eye, ear, nose, and throat.
They fell together on the bed, in a tangle of limbs, faces, kisses, and whatnot. “You are the best thing that ever happened to me,” Veleno gasped around the activity. “You're just the most wonderful, beautiful, lovable, exciting, fantastic person in all Xanth!”
“You damn me with faint praise,” she muttered, clasping him with such ardor that description would be improper.
Another demoness popped into the chamber. “Oh, there you are, Metria!” she exclaimed. “No wonder I couldn't find you around the grounds. I have brought you what you most vitally need.”
Veleno stiffened, but not in the way he desired. “Oh, no!”
Metria looked up from what was occupying her. “At the least opportune time, of course. Do you mind, worser half? I happen to be busy at the moment.”
Mentia peered closely. “Oh? Doing what?”
“Making my husband deliriously happy, of course, as only a demoness can.”
“When not being annoyingly interrupted,” Veleno muttered.
Mentia peered again. “Sorry. I thought that was a grimace of pain on what's-his-name's face. Are you sure you are doing an adequate job, better half?”
“Of course I'm sure!” Metria said indignantly. “He has not complained once in seven hundred and fifty times during the past year.”
“Oh? What about that groan he groaned just now?”
“That was when you appeared!”
“Well, if you feel that way. I'll just depart with what I brought, and never never return.”
“Oop, no!” Metria cried with alarm. “I need it!”
Her husband, somewhat bemused by the interruption, put in two more words. “Need what?”
“Never mind,” Metria said. “It's a soldier matter.”
“A what matter?” he asked.
“Secluded, cloistered, isolated, remote, detached, obscure—”
“Private?”
“Whatever,” she agreed crossly.
“But what could be private from your husband?” he asked somewhat querulously.
“Yes, whatever could you be suspiciously concealing from your trusting spouse?” Mentia echoed.
“Can't we have this discussion some other time?” Metria demanded, frustrated.
“Of course, dear,” Mentia agreed. “I'll pop back in during the next century.” She began to fuzz out.
“No, wait!.” Metria cried. “Now will do after all.”
“Why, how nice,” Mentia said, smiling with something more than good nature. “But don't you think you should introduce us first?”
“Whatever for? He knows who the mischief you are, from ever since you returned from that madness with the gargoyle.”
“Yes, but he may have forgotten. I've been away a whole hour, you know.”
“That long?” Veleno inquired with resignation.
Metria gritted her teeth. There was nothing half so annoying as half a demoness! But she knew her worser half would not give over until she had her half-baked way. “Veleno, this is the Demoness Mentia, my soulless worser half, who represents what I was like before I got half-souled, except that she has no problem with vocational.”
“With what?”
“Idiom, language, speech, expression, locution, utterance, articulation—”
“Words?”
“Whatever. Instead, she's slightly crazy.”
“Yes, it's my talent,” Mentia agreed proudly.
“And, Mentia, this is my husband Veleno, formerly a nymphomaniac, but he hasn't touched a nymph since I married him and took half his soul.”
“Yes, but hasn't he looked at nymphs out the window, with a glint in his—?”
“Pleased to meet you,” Veleno gritted, drawing free a hand and extending it. “Now will you begone?”
“Charmed, I'm sure,” Mentia said, forming a pair of pincers on the end of her arm.
“Ixnay,” Metria murmured warningly. “Mortals are protected from harm in this castle.'”
“Oh, that's right,” Mentia agreed, disappointed. The pincers became an ordinary hand, which shook Veleno's hand. “That was one of the conditions of the restoration. Well, now that your mortal man and 1 have been properly introduced, I will give you what you most need, Metria.”
At last! But Metria still wasn't easy about this. “Veleno, dearest, why don't you take a little snooze for the moment?” Metria suggested dulcetly, covering his eyes with her hand.
“But what could you need that I have not provided?” he asked, frowning.
“Yes, I'm sure he will be really, truly interested in this very important secret matter,” Mentia said, sitting on the edge of the bed, so that her thigh touched Veleno.
“Oh, all right,” Metria said, really crossly.
“Have no concern, dear, I will explain it excruciatingly clearly,” Mentia said. “What I bring is information to help abate your incapacity, so you won't be a failure anymore.”
“What incapacity?” Veleno demanded. “My wife has made me deliriously happy almost continuously since we married.”
“That is the problem,” Mentia said. “She has helped you with the chore of summoning the stork seven hundred and fifty—” she peered again “—and a half times this year, and more times during the prior year when I was too busy to be with her, unfortunately, and yet the stork has not gotten the message. She is clearly inadequate in this department.”
Veleno pondered, slowly realizing the truth of this statement. “That hadn't occurred to me,” he said. “I was too delirious to think of the stork. But how could it fail to get the messages?”
“That is precisely what Metria wants to know,” Mentia said. “Whatever could be wrong with her to bomb so badly in so many attempts? Whatever could make her such a sore loser? Especially when I could so readily have—”
“Nuh-uh!” Metria and Veleno said together.
“So she sent me to ask the most intelligent creature she knows, the Demon Grossclout, for advice,” Mentia continued without concern, “and he instantly delegated me to convey that essential advice to her. Naturally I delayed not half a whit to honor that stricture. Her failing is simply too serious to permit any delay.”
“Thank you so much, Worser,” Metria snarled.
“You are so welcome, Better. I knew you would want to attend to your washout without delay.” Mentia's form fuzzed, and assumed the likeness of a giant lemon, then a cooked turkey. “I am thrilled to have been of so much help.”
“You haven't been of much help yet,” Metria said grimly. “What did Grossclout say?”
“Oh, that. He says you should go ask Good Magician Humfrey.”
“But Humfrey charges a year's service for a single Answer!” Metria protested. “I don't want to pay that! That's why I went to Grossclout.”
“Grossclout did add a few words,” Mentia said. “I believe those words were mush-head, cheapskate, and serve her right.”
“That's Grossclout, all right,” Metria agreed. “He still holds a grudge just because I chose to sand my nails in his dull magic classes at Demon U.”
“Actually, that was I who did that,” Mentia said, smiling reminiscently. “Back when we were inextricably bound together as alternate aspects of a single demoness. Those were the days! But I did not see fit to remind the Professor of that.” She paused reflectively. “I might be able to remember a few more of his words, if it's really important,” she offered helpfully.
“Thank you so much, no,” Metria said. “I think I have fathomed his altitude.”
“His what?”
“Manner, disposition, temperament, bent, inclination, penchant—”
“Attitude?” Veleno inquired.
“Whatever,” Metria said crossly.
“From the height of his eminence,” Mentia agreed. “Well, if you need no further assistance or advice on technique—”
“None!” Metria said.
“Too bad.” Mentia faded out.
“You want the stork to deliver a baby?” Veleno inquired as Metria resumed activity.
“Yes. It's what married couples do. Raise children.”
“But demonesses don't get babies unless they want them.”
“Precisely. I want one.” She looked away. “I suppose I should have told you, and I can't blame you for being angry”
“But I'm not angry.”
“You aren't? But it might interrupt the delirium, and give you the solid obligation of raising a child.”
“Exactly! I want a family, now that it occurs to me.”
Metria gazed at him with adoration tinged substantially with relief. “Wonderful!”
Now he was thoughtful. “The stork must figure that our signals aren't serious.”
“Which is ironic, considering how strong we have made them. I've just got to get the stork's distention!”
“The stork's what?”
“Observation, mindfulness, notice, focus, application—”
“Attention?”
“Whatever. What do you think I should do?”
He considered. “I think you should go to ask the Good Magician.”
“But then I would have to leave you alone for a year.”
“Surely you could return on occasion. It might mean you could make me deliriously happy only three or four hundred times in that year, but I think I can survive that deprivation. After all, I want you to be happy too.”
“You dear wonderful man!” she exclaimed, and proceeded to do the impossible: to make him twice as delirious as before.
* * *
But before she went, she checked around the premises, debating with herself, because her worser half had decided to unify for the occasion, now that there was a chance her life would become interesting again. ‘Do I really want to do this?' Metria asked herself.
‘Why not? It isn't as if you have anything important to do around here.' Mentia had fissioned off in disgust when Metria married, got half a soul, and fell in love, in that order. Her worser half claimed to have been on a grand adventure with a gargoyle, and helped save all Xanth from madness, but that was surely an exaggeration. She had merged as soon as Metria stopped being nauseatingly nice to her husband.
‘If you had half a soul, you would have a different alti—attitude.'
‘Praise the Demon X(A/N)th that I have not been corrupted with any portion of a soul,' Mentia agreed. Their dialogue was silent because it was internal; no one else could overhear it. She pointed with their left hand. ‘There's a sand worm; step on it.'
‘I will not,' Metria retorted. ‘That wouldn't be nice.' She lifted the worm carefully with their right hand and inspected it. It was, of course, made of sand; if direct sunlight or water touched it, it would powder or dissolve away. So she put it back in a dry shaded section, and watched it wiggle off.
‘Disgusting,' Mentia remarked to no one else in particular. ‘But you can redeem your demonly nature by squishing that June bug.'
‘No way. Kill a June bug and the year loses its most romantic month.'
Mentia grimaced with the left side of their face. ‘I'd rather have you half-bottomed than half-souled.' She looked around, using Metria's left eye. ‘I see that go-quat tree is fruiting.'
‘So is the come-quat tree,' Metria agreed. ‘Veleno likes them, when he's coming and going.'
‘Which is he doing when he's alone with you?'
‘The opposite of what he wants you to be doing.'
But Mentia could not be shamed. ‘Here is my favorite: the grapes with an attitude.'
‘Sour grapes,' Metria agreed. ‘Your kind.'
‘So why are you dawdling around here, instead of getting moving to the Good Magician's castle?'
‘I'm just not sure it's right to leave my husband on half rations.'
‘There's all the food he needs, growing right around the castle here.'
‘Half rations of delirium.'
‘Oh.' Mentia looked around again, until the left eyeball was oriented completely to the side. ‘Let's make it easy, then. See that winged nut tree?'
The right eye swiveled. ‘Of course. The nuts are almost as nutty as you are.'
‘If the right wing nut flies first, we stay right here. If the left one flies first, we pop over to see the Good Magician.'
‘That would be a crazy way to make such an important decision.'
‘Precisely. Agreed?'
Metria sighed. It was as good a way as any. ‘Agreed.'
They watched the two nuts quiver. The right one spread its wings. Then suddenly the left one lurched into the air and flew across to the nearby bolt tree. ‘How romantic,' Mentia said, amused by what the boldest bolt did with the nut.
‘Why don't you find it romantic when Veleno and I—'
‘Once is amusing. Seven hundred and fifty times is droll.'
‘Not when you're in love.'
‘I'm glad I'll never be in love. Let's be on our way.'
Metria couldn't dawdle any longer, even if it did seem somewhat nutty or screwed up.
* * *
The Good Magician's castle looked ordinary. Its wall and turrets were set within a sparkling circular moat, which in turn was inside a ring of mountains. Neither would be any problem for a demoness to pop across.
But Metria was unable to pop across. When she tried, she bounced off an invisible barrier. ‘Darn, I forgot!' she swore. ‘The old fool has a shield against demonly intrusion.'
‘That's what you consider swearing? That's not even worthy of the Juvenile Conspiracy.'
Worse, she was unable to fly or dematerialize in this vicinity. Obviously the Good Magician had improved his defenses in the past century or so. ‘We'll have to plod across the way mortals do.'
Metria plodded. As she approached the ring of mountains, she saw that they were in the shape of huge loaves of sugar. Fortunately the slope was not too steep to prevent her from climbing. It was a pain, having to leg it instead of pop or float it, but she wasn't going to let it balk her.
She crested the mountain—and abruptly lost her footing and slid helplessly down toward the moat. Here the sugar was loose and granular, offering no purchase. Soon she was unceremoniously dumped into the moat.
And promptly booted out again. She sailed back over the mountain and landed on the ground beyond. The grass hopped out of the way before her derriere struck; it was the grass hopper variety.
“That's boot rear!” she exclaimed aloud. “The moat is filled with it.”
‘I think I begin to see a pattern here,' Mentia remarked. ‘I think I'll leave you to your challenges.'
‘Oh no you don't!' Metria retorted. ‘You talked me into this nuisance; you'll help me see it through. Besides, I don't trust you with my husband while I'm away. You might promise him heaven, and give him hell, and I'd get the blame.'
‘Curses! Foiled again.'
Metria tackled the mountain again. From the outside it was solid sugar, easy to climb. As she approached the crest, she trod extremely cautiously, but found no break in the steep sandy slope. The moment she stepped on that, she would be dumped into the moat with a kick.
This was definitely a challenge. That meant that not only would she have to struggle to find her way past this one, there would be two more beyond it. “What a pity!” She swore in frustration.
‘What a pity!' her worser self mimicked. ‘That half soul has denatured you.'
‘So it made me into a nice person,' Metria retorted. ‘So what's wrong with that?'
‘It's undemonly. I'll bet you can't even say poop.'
‘Of course I can say peep!'
‘Point made.'
‘Well, if you're so demonly, how do you propose to get us across this sweet mess?'
Mentia considered. ‘The mountain is sweet, but the moat isn't. It likes to kick donkey.'
‘So it boots rear. That's its nature. Tell me something I don't already know.' Metria rubbed her booted rear; if she weren't a demoness, that would really be smarting along about now.
‘Maybe if we made it sweet, it wouldn't have so much of a kick.'
‘Make it sweet? But how—' Then Metria saw the point. ‘Let's get busy.'
She formed her hands into scoops and began scooping loose sugar down the slope. Soon she managed to start an avalanche. Sugar slid grandly down and plunged into the moat.
After she had scooped as much of the mountain into the water as she could, she found that she was able to descend without sliding. She had taken the edge off the slope. She went down and stood at the bank of the moat, which now looked somewhat soggy. She poked a finger into it, and tested a drop of soggy water on her tongue. There was only a little bit of tingle. Sure enough, she had pretty much denatured its kick.
However, the moat was now a mass of sickly sweet muck. The mere touch of her feet in it was enough to make her feel somewhat sick, as if she had overeaten or overimbibed. Since demons neither ate nor drank, she knew this was more magic. She would be very uncomfortable if she waded through all that, even if she didn't get her rear booted out.
So she walked around the edge until she came to the drawbridge, which was in the down position. She had not been able to reach it before because the steep slope had dumped her where it chose to in the moat, but now it could not stop her from reaching it. She had surmounted the first challenge.
‘This becomes dull,' Mentia said. ‘I'm going to take a nap. You handle the next challenge, and I'll handle the third, okay?'
‘Okay,' Metria agreed. She wasn't concerned about her worser self, as long as she knew where Mentia was.
She set foot on the planks of the moat—and something buzzed up before her, barring the way. It seemed to be two dots, like an incomplete ellipsis, except that they were up and down instead of across. “What in tintinnabulation are you?” she demanded.
“I don't understand: What in what?” the dot formation asked.
“Bells, ringing, music, jangle, discordance, melody—”
“Try again: None of those words make sense,” the dots said angrily.
“Damnation, hell, abyss, underworld, hades, inferno, perdition—”
“Let me guess: Tarnation?”
“Whatever,” she said crossly.
“You think you're cross?” the dots demanded. “You're positively sweet, compared to me: I'm as angry as anything gets.”
She peered at the dots. “Just exactly what are you, BB brain?”
“I'm an angry punctuation mark: an irritated colon,” the dots said. “And I am going to make you pause before you continue.”
“How long a pause?”
“Just this: As long a pause as it takes.”
“As it takes to what? To refresh?”
“I thought you'd never ask: As it takes to make you give up and go away.”
“I get it! You're another challenge.”
“Too much of a challenge for you: Give it up.”
Metria tried to walk around the nasty colon, but it moved over to shove her into the moat. She tried to jump over it, still being unable to fly, but it sailed up to intercept her, its dots glowing fiercely. She tried to crawl under it, but it dropped down and made a pooping sound that warned her back. There was just no telling what it might do. She tried to push straight through it, but it got positively spastic and she had to desist.
“How am I supposed to get past you?” she demanded, annoyed.
“Either go away or bring me some relief: Those are your options.”
“Relief?” she asked blankly.
“From my syndrome: I am not irritable by choice, you know.”
“But how can I bring you relief?”
“This is for you to figure out: Cogitate, you infernal creature.”
“Do what?”
“Think, ponder, consider, contemplate, reflect: Work it out yourself, Demoness.”
Metria thought, pondered, considered, contemplated, reflected, and cogitated, though that last made her a bit queasy. But it baffled her. “It's an edema to me,” she confessed.
“Speak plainly, demoness: A what?”
“Puzzle, maze, riddle, conundrum, mystery, paradox, poser, problem, confusion, obscurity—”
“It didn't sound like any of those things to me: Try again.”
“What did it sound like to you?”
“Enemy, energy, eczema, enervate, Edam: enough of this nonsense.”
“Enema?” she inquired sweetly.
“Whatever: It hardly matters.” Then the colon did a double take, its dots vibrating. “Enema: Maybe that's the answer!” It flew off to a private place to seek relief.
Metria quickly marched across the bridge. She had conquered the second challenge.
‘Your turn, Worser,' she told her worser half.
‘Good thing you couldn't think of the word “enigma.” Sweet dreams, Better.'
‘Demons don't dream.'
‘I was being facetious.'
‘Being what?'
‘Humorous, droll, amusing, comical, funny—'
‘I was being funny too, idiot!' Metria snapped, and retired from the scene.
Mentia stepped off the bridge and came to a pile of blocks. “What are you?”
“We thought you'd never ask,” they replied. “We are building blocks.” They moved, clomping along to form a square around her. Then more blocks climbed on top of the first ones, and others climbed on top of those.
“What are you doing?” Mentia asked, bemused by this activity.
“We are building blocks, of course. We are building a building for you.”
“But I don't want a building. I'm just passing through.”
“That's what you think!” the blocks chorused as they reached a level above her head, then started crossing the top, forming a dome.
“Hey, wait a minute!” she protested.
“Construction waits for nobody, blockhead!”
“Who are you calling that?” she demanded indignantly. “I'm an airhead, not a blockhead.” Her head fuzzed into vapor.
But the blocks were silent. They had shut her in.
She realized, belatedly, that this was the third challenge. First the boot rear moat, then the irritable colon, now the building blocks. She had to get out of this sudden chamber.
She pushed at the wall, but it was firm; the blocks had locked into place. She checked the ground, but it was hard rock. Ordinarily nothing like this could inhibit any demon, but the ambient spell around the castle made her resemble an (ugh!) mortal. She discovered that she did not have a lot of experience handling purely physical things. But her memory of being sane and sensible in the Region of Madness the year before gave her the assurance that she could adjust to this problem, too.
She explored all around the chamber. Dim rays of light filtered in through the crevices between blocks, so that it wasn't completely dark. She tried to squeeze through a crevice, but she lacked even this power now. It was most frustrating.
‘I wonder what Gary Gargoyle would have done?' she asked herself. ‘He was a massive powerful stone creature who was transformed to a weak fleshly man for his adventure, so he had a real problem.'
‘Will you be quiet while I'm trying to rest?' Metria demanded crossly.
Mentia thought, pondered, considered, contemplated, reflected, and cogitated as Metria had, and finally came up with a feeble notion: Maybe she needed to think differently. She knew there was always a way to handle the challenges, and usually it required ingenuity rather than strength. So she should use her mind rather than her body.
But that was what she had been trying to do, without getting far. What use was it to think endlessly, if the only notion it produced was to think some more?
‘Not more, differently,' she reminded herself.
She considered the chamber again. She had pushed at one block and it was firm—but maybe there were others that were loose. She might push one out and crawl through the hole.
She put her hands on one block near the bottom. It was firm. She tried another. It was firmer. “Poop on you!” she said, berating it, but the block wasn't fazed.
She continued to check, but all the lower blocks were firm. This evidently wasn't the answer. She remained completely sealed in.
She sat down, leaned against the wall, and gazed at the dust motes dancing in the thin beams of light. The motes seemed to have a current, moving across the chamber. Where were they going? She focused closely, forming a very large and powerful eyeball, and traced their progress beyond the rays of light. But her effort was wasted; they didn't go anywhere. They just brushed up against the wall and slowly settled down toward the floor.
Then she had a brighter notion. The question wasn't where the motes were going, but where they were coming from! What was making that gentle draft? She traced that way, and discovered that the air was coming from one of the blocks in the ceiling dome. How could that be?
She put her hand up to that block—and her fingers passed right through it without resistance. It was illusion! She had given up too soon; had she pushed against every single block, she would have discovered that. This was the way out.
She put both hands up into the hole, then hauled herself up. In a moment her head was outside the building. She scrambled and got out, then rolled head under heels to the ground. She had navigated the third challenge!
“Why hello, D. Mentia,” a voice said.
Startled, Mentia got to her feet. There stood a rather nice young woman. “Do I know you?”
“I think so. You brought Gary Gargoyle here last year. I'm Wira, Humfrey's daughter-in-law.”
“But I never came up to the castle,” Mentia protested. “How could you have seen me?”
Wira laughed. “Not with my eyes, of course. But Gary spoke well of you.”
Mentia felt that she was getting in over her depth. ‘Metria! Wake up. We're in the castle.'
Metria joined her. ‘Just like old newspapers,' she remarked, looking around.
‘Like old whats?'
‘Ages, eons, epochs, eras, centuries—'
‘Times?'
‘Whatever. It has been nigh ninety years since I managed to sneak in here.'
“Hello, D. Metria,” Wira said.
Both of them jumped. “How did you know me?” Metria demanded.
“Father Humfrey said you would be arriving with your other self. Now I will show you into the castle.”
‘That girl's eerie,' Mentia muttered.
‘She must have developed other senses,' Metria agreed.
“True,” Wira agreed.
The two selves ceased their dialogue and followed the girl into the castle. There they were met by a woman of indeterminate age. “Mother MareAnn, here is the Demoness Metria and Mentia,” Wira said.
‘Mother MareAnn?' one of them asked silently.
“I am Humfrey's fifth and a half wife,” the woman explained. “I am taking my turn with him this month. I was his first love and last wife, because of a complicated story that wouldn't interest you. My husband will see you now. Wira will take you up to his study.”
Maybe a half wife was like a half soul: enough to do the whole job.
“This way, please,” Wira said, showing the way. She moved up a narrow winding stair without faltering; obviously she knew the premises well.
The study was a gloomy little chamber crowded with books and vials. ‘This hasn't changed a bit in ninety years,' Metria remarked.
“Of course it hasn't, Demoness,” Humfrey grumped from within. “Neither have you, except for that split personality you recently developed.”
“Nice to meet you, too, again, Magician,” Metria said. “You don't look much more than a day older, either.” Of course, she knew he had elixir from the Fountain of Youth, which he imbibed to keep himself about a century old.
“Enough of this politeness. Ask your Question.”
“How can I get the stork to take my summons seriously?”
“That will be apparent after you complete your Service. Go to the Simurgh.”
“Go where?”
“Your mind may be addled, Demoness, but not your hearing. Begone.”
“Now, just a urine-picking instant, Magician! You can't just—”
“Please, don't argue with him,” Wira whispered. “That only aggravates—”
“Pea,” Humfrey said.
“I certainly will not!” Metria declared. “Demonesses don't have to, and even if I did, I wouldn't—”
“As in vegetable,” Wira said. “Pea-picking. Now, please—”
“But he hasn't Answered me!” Metria protested. “And no one can fly to the Simurgh, not even a demoness. I demand a proper Answer!”
“After the service,” Humfrey muttered, turning a page of his giant tome.
Mentia made a sudden internal lunge and took over the body. “Yes, of course,” she said, and followed Wira out of the study.
“You're so much more sensible, Mentia, even if you don't have half a soul,” Wira remarked.
“I am more sensible because I don't have half a soul,” Mentia replied. “My better half is befuddled by love and decency. I am practical, especially in crazy situations like this. We'll just have to walk to Mount Parnassus and see what the big bird wants.”
“But she isn't there,” MareAnn said, overhearing them as they reached the foot of the stairway. “That's just her summer retreat, when the Tree of Seeds is fruiting.”
“But then we don't know where to find her.”
“Ah, but I can summon an equine who knows the way.”
“That's her talent,” Wira explained. “She summons anything related to horses, except for unicorns.”
“Why not unicorns?” Mentia asked.
“She once could summon them too, but when she went to Hell and married Humfrey she lost her innocence.” Wira blushed, for it was indelicate to refer openly to matters shrouded by the Adult Conspiracy. There might be a child in the vicinity. “Now they ignore her. It's very sad.”
Mentia had little sympathy. “My better half never cared about innocence until she got half-souled. She can't get near a unicorn either. So summon a horse who knows the way.”
MareAnn led the way out of the castle and across the moat, which now looked quite ordinary. She stood at the edge of an ordinary field that was where the sugar mountain had been. Already a group of things were galloping across the plain.
Mentia stared. There were four creatures, each with only one leg. Two had narrow heads, and two had thin tails. Their single hoofs thudded into the dirt in irregular order, clop-clop, clop-clop, stirring up clouds of dust behind. “What are those?”
“Quarter horses, of course,” MareAnn said. Then, to the horses: “Whoa!”
The four clopped to a halt before her. Each quarter had a silver disk on the side, with ribbed edges. On the front two disks, heads were inscribed; on the rear two, big birds with half-spread wings.
“Fall in,” MareAnn said.
The four creatures fell together, and suddenly were revealed as the four quarters of a regular horse, now complete. Wira stepped up to pet him, and he nuzzled her hand until she produced a lump of sugar. “Too bad you can't ride Eight Bits,” Wira remarked.
“That's his name?” Mentia asked. She was a little crazy herself, but this was more than a little crazy. “Why not?”
“Because he doesn't trust strange adults. He just falls apart and scatters to the wind's four quarters. But he does know the way, so you can follow him.”
“Maybe he should just tell us where to go, and we'll go there ourselves,” Mentia said.
“No, he can't speak,” MareAnn said. “He can understand simple directions, but that's the limit. Anything more puts a strain on him, and—”
“He falls apart,” Mentia finished, resigned to a tedious journey.
But Metria pushed to the surface. “No, there's a better way. How does Eight Bits feel about children?”
“Oh, he likes children,” MareAnn said. “Especially if they are a quarter the size of adults. But—”
Metria dissolved into smoke, then re-formed as the cutest, sweetest waif of a child anyone ever beheld. Even Wira was surprised, realizing that something was different. “I know Mentia and Metria, but who are you?”
“I am Woe Betide,” the waif said. “I have a quarter soul—half of Metria's—and I love horses, and I will just be so pathetically sad if I can't ride this one that I'll dissolve in pitiful little misery.” She wiped away a huge glistening tear with one cute sleeve.
MareAnn exchanged half a glance with Wira, because it was one way: The sightless young woman had no half to return. “Maybe so,” she agreed. She lifted the tyke to the four-quartered horse.
“Oh, goody-goody!” Woe Betide exclaimed, clapping her sweet little hands together. “Let's go.”
But Wira wasn't sanguine about this. “We shouldn't send a little child on such a wild ride alone,” she said.
“I'm not really a—” the tyke began, but then one of her selves stifled her before the horse could hear the rest.
MareAnn nodded. “Perhaps we can find an adult companion for her. I think there is a demoness who also knows the way, who still owes Humfrey part of a Service.”
“A demoness!” Woe Betide exclaimed. “They aren't trustworthy!”
Again half a glance was exchanged. “You are surely in a position to know,” MareAnn agreed. “But when performing a Service, a person is bound to do it properly. She will not be released until you are safely there.”
The child's face made a cute grimace of resignation. “Oh, all right. Who is it?”
“Helen Back.”
“Helen Back!” the child cried. “O woe betide me! She's the worst creature in demondom. Do you know what she does?”
“Yes,” MareAnn agreed. “But she will be bound not to do it for this mission.”
“I hope you're right,” the child said, looking truly woeful.
MareAnn snapped her fingers, and smoke formed. It swirled before her. “Am I released?” it inquired.
“After you accompany horse and rider safely to the Simurgh,” Wira said.
The smoke oriented on the pair. “That's no horse—that's four quarters. And that's no child—that's—”
“Woe Betide,” MareAnn and Wira said firmly together.
The smoke sighed mistily. “So it's like that. Okay, let's hit the trail.”
Woe Betide squeezed the horse's sides with her precious little legs. “Go, Eight Bits,” she said.
And suddenly they were off, in a cloud of dust that left the two standing women coughing.
 
Copyright © 1995 by Piers Anthony Jacob

1
PROBLEM
 
 
It was a nice castle, with high turrets, solid walls, a deep moat, and an elevated office suite whose picture window overlooked the nearby community of nymphs. Fire cracker plants grew around the wall, useful for starting fires in the mornings, and the crackers tasted good too. The connected orchard had pie trees of the most sinfully delicious varieties. The mistress of the household was exactly as beautiful, devoted, and accommodating as her husband desired. A man could hardly ask for a better situation.
Except for one or two small things. “Where is your worser half?” Veleno muttered, looking apprehensively around.
“Don’t worry,” the Demoness Metria replied with a smile as her scant clothing shimmered into nothingness. “I sent Mentia off to see the Demon Grossclout about our other problem.”
“Other problem?”
She pretended not to hear. “Grossclout’s such an intractable cuss that it should take her days to pry any kind of an answer from him.”
“That’s a relief!” he said, looking more than relieved. “It’s not that I want to be critical, but—”
“But Mentia is slightly crazy,” Metria finished. “And you I married me, not my worser half. But because she did fission off from me, being disgusted by my new goody-goody attitude after I got half your soul, we can’t keep her away. She’s the half of me you naturally don’t like—the soulless half, dedicated to making your life half-muled.”
“Half-whatted?”
“Horsed, equined, donkeyed, asinined—”
He kissed her. “I think I could fathom the word if I concentrated. Let’s make hay while the sun shines.”
She looked perplexed. “Hay? I thought you had something else in mind.” A tantalizing wisp of strategically placed clothing appeared.
“I love it when you tease me,” he said, picking her up and carrying her to the master bedroom.
She assumed the form of a nymph. “Eeeeek!” she cried faintly, kicking her marvelous bare legs in the nymphly way. “Whatever am I going to do?”
“You’re going to make me deliriously happy, you luscious creature.”
She inhaled, enhancing what hardly needed it. “O, sigh, how can I escape this hideous fate?” she wailed cutely, kissing him on eye, ear, nose, and throat.
They fell together on the bed, in a tangle of limbs, faces, kisses, and whatnot. “You are the best thing that ever happened to me,” Veleno gasped around the activity. “You’re just the most wonderful, beautiful, lovable, exciting, fantastic person in all Xanth!”
“You damn me with faint praise,” she muttered, clasping him with such ardor that description would be improper.
Another demoness popped into the chamber. “Oh, there you are, Metria!” she exclaimed. “No wonder I couldn’t find you around the grounds. I have brought you what you most vitally need.”
Veleno stiffened, but not in the way he desired. “Oh, no!”
Metria looked up from what was occupying her. “At the least opportune time, of course. Do you mind, worser half? I happen to be busy at the moment.”
Mentia peered closely. “Oh? Doing what?”
“Making my husband deliriously happy, of course, as only a demoness can.”
“When not being annoyingly interrupted,” Veleno muttered.
Mentia peered again. “Sorry. I thought that was a grimace of pain on what’s-his-name’s face. Are you sure you are doing an adequate job, better half?”
“Of course I’m sure!” Metria said indignantly. “He has not complained once in seven hundred and fifty times during the past year.”
“Oh? What about that groan he groaned just now?”
“That was when you appeared!”
“Well, if you feel that way. I’ll just depart with what I brought, and never never return.”
“Oop, no!” Metria cried with alarm. “I need it!”
Her husband, somewhat bemused by the interruption, put in two more words. “Need what?”
“Never mind,” Metria said. “It’s a soldier matter.”
“A what matter?” he asked.
“Secluded, cloistered, isolated, remote, detached, obscure—”
“Private?”
“Whatever,” she agreed crossly.
“But what could be private from your husband?” he asked somewhat querulously.
“Yes, whatever could you be suspiciously concealing from your trusting spouse?” Mentia echoed.
“Can’t we have this discussion some other time?” Metria demanded, frustrated.
“Of course, dear,” Mentia agreed. “I’ll pop back in during the next century.” She began to fuzz out.
“No, wait!.” Metria cried. “Now will do after all.”
“Why, how nice,” Mentia said, smiling with something more than good nature. “But don’t you think you should introduce us first?”
“Whatever for? He knows who the mischief you are, from ever since you returned from that madness with the gargoyle.”
“Yes, but he may have forgotten. I’ve been away a whole hour, you know.”
“That long?” Veleno inquired with resignation.
Metria gritted her teeth. There was nothing half so annoying as half a demoness! But she knew her worser half would not give over until she had her half-baked way. “Veleno, this is the Demoness Mentia, my soulless worser half, who represents what I was like before I got half-souled, except that she has no problem with vocational.”
“With what?”
“Idiom, language, speech, expression, locution, utterance, articulation—”
“Words?”
“Whatever. Instead, she’s slightly crazy.”
“Yes, it’s my talent,” Mentia agreed proudly.
“And, Mentia, this is my husband Veleno, formerly a nymphomaniac, but he hasn’t touched a nymph since I married him and took half his soul.”
“Yes, but hasn’t he looked at nymphs out the window, with a glint in his—?”
“Pleased to meet you,” Veleno gritted, drawing free a hand and extending it. “Now will you begone?”
“Charmed, I’m sure,” Mentia said, forming a pair of pincers on the end of her arm.
“Ixnay,” Metria murmured warningly. “Mortals are protected from harm in this castle.’”
“Oh, that’s right,” Mentia agreed, disappointed. The pincers became an ordinary hand, which shook Veleno’s hand. “That was one of the conditions of the restoration. Well, now that your mortal man and 1 have been properly introduced, I will give you what you most need, Metria.”
At last! But Metria still wasn’t easy about this. “Veleno, dearest, why don’t you take a little snooze for the moment?” Metria suggested dulcetly, covering his eyes with her hand.
“But what could you need that I have not provided?” he asked, frowning.
“Yes, I’m sure he will be really, truly interested in this very important secret matter,” Mentia said, sitting on the edge of the bed, so that her thigh touched Veleno.
“Oh, all right,” Metria said, really crossly.
“Have no concern, dear, I will explain it excruciatingly clearly,” Mentia said. “What I bring is information to help abate your incapacity, so you won’t be a failure anymore.”
“What incapacity?” Veleno demanShe has helped you with the chore of summoning the stork seven hundred and fifty—” she peered again “—and a half times this year, and more times during the prior year when I was too busy to be with her, unfortunately, and yet the stork has not gotten the message. She is clearly inadequate in this department.”
Veleno pondered, slowly realizing the truth of this statement. “That hadn’t occurred to me,” he said. “I was too delirious to think of the stork. But how could it fail to get the messages?”
“That is precisely what Metria wants to know,” Mentia said. “Whatever could be wrong with her to bomb so badly in so many attempts? Whatever could make her such a sore loser? Especially when I could so readily have—”
“Nuh-uh!” Metria and Veleno said together.
“So she sent me to ask the most intelligent creature she knows, the Demon Grossclout, for advice,” Mentia continued without concern, “and he instantly delegated me to convey that essential advice to her. Naturally I delayed not half a whit to honor that stricture. Her failing is simply too serious to permit any delay.”
“Thank you so much, Worser,” Metria snarled.
“You are so welcome, Better. I knew you would want to attend to your washout without delay.” Mentia’s form fuzzed, and assumed the likeness of a giant lemon, then a cooked turkey. “I am thrilled to have been of so much help.”
“You haven’t been of much help yet,” Metria said grimly. “What did Grossclout say?”
“Oh, that. He says you should go ask Good Magician Humfrey.”
“But Humfrey charges a year’s service for a single Answer!” Metria protested. “I don’t want to pay that! That’s why I went to Grossclout.”
“Grossclout did add a few words,” Mentia said. “I believe those words were mush-head, cheapskate, and serve her right.”
“That’s Grossclout, all right,” Metria agreed. “He still holds a grudge just because I chose to sand my nails in his dull magic classes at Demon U.”
“Actually, that was I who did that,” Mentia said, smiling reminiscently. “Back when we were inextricably bound together as alternate aspects of a single demoness. Those were the days! But I did not see fit to remind the Professor of that.” She paused reflectively. “I might be able to remember a few more of his words, if it’s really important,” she offered helpfully.
“Thank you so much, no,” Metria said. “I think I have fathomed his altitude.”
“His what?”
“Manner, disposition, temperament, bent, inclination, penchant—”
“Attitude?” Veleno inquired.
“Whatever,” Metria said crossly.
“From the height of his eminence,” Mentia agreed. “Well, if you need no further assistance or advice on technique—”
“None!” Metria said.
“Too bad.” Mentia faded out.
“You want the stork to deliver a baby?” Veleno inquired as Metria resumed activity.
“Yes. It’s what married couples do. Raise children.”
“But demonesses don’t get babies unless they want them.”
“Precisely. I want one.” She looked away. “I suppose I should have told you, and I can’t blame you for being angry”
“But I’m not angry.”
“You aren’t? But it might interrupt the delirium, and give you the solid obligation of raising a child.”
“Exactly! I want a family, now that it occurs to me.”
Metria gazed at him with adoration tinged substantially with relief. “Wonderful!”
Now he was thoughtful. “The stork must figure that our signals aren’t serious.”
“Which is ironic, considering how strong we have made them. I’ve just got to get the stork’s distention!”
“The stork’s what?”
“Observation, mindfulness, notice, focus, application—”
“Attention?”
“Whatever. What do you think I should do?”
He considered. “I think you should go to ask the Good Magician.”
“But then I would have to leave you alone for a year.”
“Surely you could return on occasion. It might mean you could make me deliriously happy only three or four hundred times in that year, but I think I can survive that deprivation. After all, I want you to be happy too.”
“You dear wonderful man!” she exclaimed, and proceeded to do the impossible: to make him twice as delirious as before.
* * *
But before she went, she checked around the premises, debating with herself, because her worser half had decided to unify for the occasion, now that there was a chance her life would become interesting again. ‘Do I really want to do this?’ Metria asked herself.
‘Why not? It isn’t as if you have anything important to do around here.’ Mentia had fissioned off in disgust when Metria married, got half a soul, and fell in love, in that order. Her worser half claimed to have been on a grand adventure with a gargoyle, and helped save all Xanth from madness, but that was surely an exaggeration. She had merged as soon as Metria stopped being nauseatingly nice to her husband.
‘If you had half a soul, you would have a different alti—attitude.’
‘Praise the Demon X(A/N)th that I have not been corrupted with any portion of a soul,’ Mentia agreed. Their dialogue was silent because it was internal; no one else could overhear it. She pointed with their left hand. ‘There’s a sand worm; step on it.’
‘I will not,’ Metria retorted. ‘That wouldn’t be nice.’ She lifted the worm carefully with their right hand and inspected it. It was, of course, made of sand; if direct sunlight or water touched it, it would powder or dissolve away. So she put it back in a dry shaded section, and watched it wiggle off.
‘Disgusting,’ Mentia remarked to no one else in particular. ‘But you can redeem your demonly nature by squishing that June bug.’
‘No way. Kill a June bug and the year loses its most romantic month.’
Mentia grimaced with the left side of their face. ‘I’d rather have you half-bottomed than half-souled.’ She looked around, using Metria’s left eye. ‘I see that go-quat tree is fruiting.’
‘So is the come-quat tree,’ Metria agreed. ‘Veleno likes them, when he’s coming and going.’
‘Which is he doing when he’s alone with you?’
‘The opposite of what he wants you to be doing.’
But Mentia could not be shamed. ‘Here is my favorite: the grapes with an attitude.’
‘Sour grapes,’ Metria agreed. ‘Your kind.’
‘So why are you dawdling around here, instead of getting moving to the Good Magician’s castle?’
‘I’m just not sure it’s right to leave my husband on half rations.’
‘There’s all the food he needs, growing right around the castle here.’
‘Half rations of delirium.’
‘Oh.’ Mentia looked around again, until the left eyeball was oriented completely to the side. ‘Let’s make it easy, then. See that winged nut tree?’
The right eye swiveled. ‘Of course. The nuts are almost as nutty as you are.’
‘If the right wing nut flies first, we stay right here. If the left one flies first, we pop over to see the Good Magician.’
‘That The right one spread its wings. Then suddenly the left one lurched into the air and flew across to the nearby bolt tree. ‘How romantic,’ Mentia said, amused by what the boldest bolt did with the nut.
‘Why don’t you find it romantic when Veleno and I—’
‘Once is amusing. Seven hundred and fifty times is droll.’
‘Not when you’re in love.’
‘I’m glad I’ll never be in love. Let’s be on our way.’
Metria couldn’t dawdle any longer, even if it did seem somewhat nutty or screwed up.
* * *
The Good Magician’s castle looked ordinary. Its wall and turrets were set within a sparkling circular moat, which in turn was inside a ring of mountains. Neither would be any problem for a demoness to pop across.
But Metria was unable to pop across. When she tried, she bounced off an invisible barrier. ‘Darn, I forgot!’ she swore. ‘The old fool has a shield against demonly intrusion.’
‘That’s what you consider swearing? That’s not even worthy of the Juvenile Conspiracy.’
Worse, she was unable to fly or dematerialize in this vicinity. Obviously the Good Magician had improved his defenses in the past century or so. ‘We’ll have to plod across the way mortals do.’
Metria plodded. As she approached the ring of mountains, she saw that they were in the shape of huge loaves of sugar. Fortunately the slope was not too steep to prevent her from climbing. It was a pain, having to leg it instead of pop or float it, but she wasn’t going to let it balk her.
She crested the mountain—and abruptly lost her footing and slid helplessly down toward the moat. Here the sugar was loose and granular, offering no purchase. Soon she was unceremoniously dumped into the moat.
And promptly booted out again. She sailed back over the mountain and landed on the ground beyond. The grass hopped out of the way before her derriere struck; it was the grass hopper variety.
“That’s boot rear!” she exclaimed aloud. “The moat is filled with it.”
‘I think I begin to see a pattern here,’ Mentia remarked. ‘I think I’ll leave you to your challenges.’
‘Oh no you don’t!’ Metria retorted. ‘You talked me into this nuisance; you’ll help me see it through. Besides, I don’t trust you with my husband while I’m away. You might promise him heaven, and give him hell, and I’d get the blame.’
‘Curses! Foiled again.’
Metria tackled the mountain again. From the outside it was solid sugar, easy to climb. As she approached the crest, she trod extremely cautiously, but found no break in the steep sandy slope. The moment she stepped on that, she would be dumped into the moat with a kick.
This was definitely a challenge. That meant that not only would she have to struggle to find her way past this one, there would be two more beyond it. “What a pity!” She swore in frustration.
‘What a pity!’ her worser self mimicked. ‘That half soul has denatured you.’
‘So it made me into a nice person,’ Metria retorted. ‘So what’s wrong with that?’
‘It’s undemonly. I’ll bet you can’t even say poop.’
‘Of course I can say peep!’
‘Point made.’
‘Well, if you’re so demonly, how do you propose to get us across this sweet mess?’
Mentia considered. ‘The mountain is sweet, but the moat isn’t. It likes to kick donkey.’
‘So it boots rear. That’s its nature. Tell me something I don’t already know.’ Metria rubbed her booted rear; if she weren’t a demoness, that would really be smarting along about now.
‘Maybe if we made it sweet, it wouldn’t have so much of a kick.’
‘Make it sweet? But how—’ Then Metria saw the point. ‘Let’s get busy.’
She formed her hands into scoops and began scooping loose sugar down the slope. Soon she managed to start an avalanche. Sugar slid grandly down and plunged into the moat.
After she had scooped as much of the mountain into the water as she could, she found that she was able to descend without sliding. She had taken the edge off the slope. She went down and stood at the bank of the moat, which now looked somewhat soggy. She poked a finger into it, and tested a drop of soggy water on her tongue. There was only a little bit of tingle. Sure enough, she had pretty much denatured its kick.
However, the moat was now a mass of sickly sweet muck. The mere touch of her feet in it was enough to make her feel somewhat sick, as if she had overeaten or overimbibed. Since demons neither ate nor drank, she knew this was more magic. She would be very uncomfortable if she waded through all that, even if she didn’t get her rear booted out.
So she walked around the edge until she came to the drawbridge, which was in the down position. She had not been able to reach it before because the steep slope had dumped her where it chose to in the moat, but now it could not stop her from reaching it. She had surmounted the first challenge.
‘This becomes dull,’ Mentia said. ‘I’m going to take a nap. You handle the next challenge, and I’ll handle the third, okay?’
‘Okay,’ Metria agreed. She wasn’t concerned about her worser self, as long as she knew where Mentia was.
She set foot on the planks of the moat—and something buzzed up before her, barring the way. It seemed to be two dots, like an incomplete ellipsis, except that they were up and down instead of across. “What in tintinnabulation are you?” she demanded.
“I don’t understand: What in what?” the dot formation asked.
“Bells, ringing, music, jangle, discordance, melody—”
“Try again: None of those words make sense,” the dots said angrily.
“Damnation, hell, abyss, underworld, hades, inferno, perdition—”
“Let me guess: Tarnation?”
“Whatever,” she said crossly.
“You think you’re cross?” the dots demanded. “You’re positively sweet, compared to me: I’m as angry as anything gets.”
She peered at the dots. “Just exactly what are you, BB brain?”
“I’m an angry punctuation mark: an irritated colon,” the dots said. “And I am going to make you pause before you continue.”
“How long a pause?”
“Just this: As long a pause as it takes.”
“As it takes to what? To refresh?”
“I thought you’d never ask: As it takes to make you give up and go away.”
“I get it! You’re another challenge.”
“Too much of a challenge for you: Give it up.”
Metria tried to walk around the nasty colon, but it moved over to shove her into the moat. She tried to jump over it, still being unable to fly, but it sailed up to intercept her, its dots glowing fiercely. She tried to crawl under it, but it dropped down and made a pooping sound that warned her back. There was just no telling what it might do. She tried to push straight through it, but it got positively spastic and she had to desist.
“How am I supposed to get past you?” she demanded, annoyed.
“Either go away or bring me some relief: Those are your options.”
“Relief?” she asked blankly.
“From my syndrome: I am not irritable by choice, you know.”
“But how can I bring you relief?”
“This is for you to figure out: Cogitate, you infernal creature.”
“Do what?”
“Think, ponder, consider, contemplate, reflect: Work it out yourself, Demoness.”
Metria thought, pondered, considered, contemplated, reflected, and cogitated, though that last made her a bit queasy. But it baffled her. “It’s an edema to me,” she confessed.
“Speak plainly, demoness: A what?”
“Puzzle, maze, riddle, conundrum, mystery, paradox, poser, problem, confusion, obscurity—”
“It didn’t sound like any of those things to me: Try again.”
“What did it sound like to you?”
“Enemy, energy, eczema, enervate, Edam: enough of this nonsense.”
“Enema?” she inquired sweetly.
“Whatever: It hardly matters.” Then the colon did a double take, its dots vibrating. “Enema: Maybe that’s the answer!” It flew off to a private place to seek relief.
Metria quickly marched across the bridge. She had conquered the second challenge.
‘Your turn, Worser,’ she told her worser half.
‘Good thing you couldn’t think of the word “enigma.” Sweet dreams, Better.’
‘Demons don’t dream.’
‘I was being facetious.’
‘Being what?’
‘Humorous, droll, amusing, comical, funny—’
‘I was being funny too, idiot!’ Metria snapped, and retired from the scene.
Mentia stepped off the bridge and came to a pile of blocks. “What are you?”
“We thought you’d never ask,” they replied. “We are building blocks.” They moved, clomping along to form a square around her. Then more blocks climbed on top of the first ones, and others climbed on top of those.
“What are you doing?” Mentia asked, bemused by this activity.
“We are building blocks, of course. We are building a building for you.”
“But I don’t want a building. I’m just passing through.”
“That’s what you think!” the blocks chorused as they reached a level above her head, then started crossing the top, forming a dome.
“Hey, wait a minute!” she protested.
“Construction waits for nobody, blockhead!”
“Who are you calling that?” she demanded indignantly. “I’m an airhead, not a blockhead.” Her head fuzzed into vapor.
But the blocks were silent. They had shut her in.
She realized, belatedly, that this was the third challenge. First the boot rear moat, then the irritable colon, now the building blocks. She had to get out of this sudden chamber.
She pushed at the wall, but it was firm; the blocks had locked into place. She checked the ground, but it was hard rock. Ordinarily nothing like this could inhibit any demon, but the ambient spell around the castle made her resemble an (ugh!) mortal. She discovered that she did not have a lot of experience handling purely physical things. But her memory of being sane and sensible in the Region of Madness the year before gave her the assurance that she could adjust to this problem, too.
She explored all around the chamber. Dim rays of light filtered in through the crevices between blocks, so that it wasn’t completely dark. She tried to squeeze through a crevice, but she lacked even this power now. It was most frustrating.
‘I wonder what Gary Gargoyle would have done?’ she asked herself. ‘He was a massive powerful stone creature who was transformed to a weak fleshly man for his adventure, so he had a real problem.’
‘Will you be quiet while I’m trying to rest?’ Metria demanded crossly.
Mentia thought, pondered, considered, contemplated, reflected, and cogitated as Metria had, and finally came up with a feeble notion: Maybe she needed to think differently. She knew there was always a way to handle the challenges, and usually it required ingenuity rather than strength. So she should use her mind rather than her body.
But that was what she had been trying to do, without getting far. What use was it to think endlessly, if the only notion it produced was to think some more?
‘Not more, differently,’ she reminded herself.
She considered the chamber again. She had pushed at one block and it was firm—but maybe there were others that were loose. She might push one out and crawl through the hole.
She put her hands on one block near the bottom. It was firm. She tried another. It was firmer. “Poop on you!” she said, berating it, but the block wasn’t fazed.
She continued to check, but all the lower blocks were firm. This evidently wasn’t the answer. She remained completely sealed in.
She sat down, leaned against the wall, and gazed at the dust motes dancing in the thin beams of light. The motes seemed to have a current, moving across the chamber. Where were they going? She focused closely, forming a very large and powerful eyeball, and traced their progress beyond the rays of light. But her effort was wasted; they didn’t go anywhere. They just brushed up against the wall and slowly settled down toward the floor.
Then she had a brighter notion. The question wasn’t where the motes were going, but where they were coming from! What was making that gentle draft? She traced that way, and discovered that the air was coming from one of the blocks in the ceiling dome. How could that be?
She put her hand up to that block—and her fingers passed right through it without resistance. It was illusion! She had given up too soon; had she pushed against every single block, she would have discovered that. This was the way out.
She put both hands up into the hole, then hauled herself up. In a moment her head was outside the building. She scrambled and got out, then rolled head under heels to the ground. She had navigated the third challenge!
“Why hello, D. Mentia,” a voice said.
Startled, Mentia got to her feet. There stood a rather nice young woman. “Do I know you?”
“I think so. You brought Gary Gargoyle here last year. I’m Wira, Humfrey’s daughter-in-law.”
“But I never came up to the castle,” Mentia protested. “How could you have seen me?”
Wira laughed. “Not with my eyes, of course. But Gary spoke well of you.”
Mentia felt that she was getting in over her depth. ‘Metria! Wake up. We’re in the castle.’
Metria joined her. ‘Just like old newspapers,’ she remarked, looking around.
‘Like old whats?’
‘Ages, eons, epochs, eras, centuries—’
‘Times?’
‘Whatever. It has been nigh ninety years since I managed to sneak in here.’
“Hello, D. Metria,” Wira said.
Both of them jumped. “How did you know me?” Metria demanded.
“Father Humfrey said you would be arriving with your other self. Now I will show you into the castle.”
‘That girl’s eerie,’ Mentia muttered.
‘She must have developed other senses,’ Metria agreed.
“True,” Wira agreed.
The two selves ceased their dialogue and followed the girl into the castle. There they were met by a woman of indeterminate age. “Mother MareAnn, here is the Demoness Metria and Mentia,” Wira said.
‘Mother MareAnn?’ one of them asked silently.
“I am Humfrey’s fifth and a half wife,” the woman explained. “I am taking my turn with him this month. I was his first love and last wife, because of a complicated story that wouldn’t interest you. My husband will see you now. Wira will take you up to his study.”
Maybe a half wife was like a half soul: enough to do the whole job.
“This way, please,” Wira said, showing the way. She moved up a narrow winding stair without faltering; obviously she knew the premises well.
The study was a gloomy little chamber crowded with books and vials. ‘This hasn’t changed a bit in ninety years,’ Metria remarked.
“Of course it hasn’t, Demoness,” Humfrey grumped from within. “Neither have you, except for that split personality you recently developed.”
“Nice to meet you, too, again, Magician,” Metria said. “You don’t look much more than a day older, either.” Of course, she knew he had elixir from the Fountain of Youth, which he imbibed to keep himself about a century old.
“Enough of this politeness. Ask your Question.”
“How can I get the stork to take my summons seriously?”
“That will be apparent after you complete your Service. Go to the Simurgh.”
“Go where?”
“Your mind may be addled, Demoness, but not your hearing. Begone.”
“Now, just a urine-picking instant, Magician! You can’t just—”
“Please, don’t argue with him,” Wira whispered. “That only aggravates—”
“Pea,” Humfrey said.
“I certainly will not!” Metria declared. “Demonesses don’t have to, and even if I did, I wouldn’t—”
“As in vegetable,” Wira said. “Pea-picking. Now, please—”
“But he hasn’t Answered me!” Metria protested. “And no one can fly to the Simurgh, not even a demoness. I demand a proper Answer!”
“After the service,” Humfrey muttered, turning a page of his giant tome.
Mentia made a sudden internal lunge and took over the body. “Yes, of course,” she said, and followed Wira out of the study.
“You’re so much more sensible, Mentia, even if you don’t have half a soul,” Wira remarked.
“I am more sensible because I don’t have half a soul,” Mentia replied. “My better half is befuddled by love and decency. I am practical, especially in crazy situations like this. We’ll just have to walk to Mount Parnassus and see what the big bird wants.”
“But she isn’t there,” MareAnn said, overhearing them as they reached the foot of the stairway. “That’s just her summer retreat, when the Tree of Seeds is fruiting.”
“But then we don’t know where to find her.”
“Ah, but I can summon an equine who knows the way.”
“That’s her talent,” Wira explained. “She summons anything related to horses, except for unicorns.”
“Why not unicorns?” Mentia asked.
“She once could summon them too, but when she went to Hell and married Humfrey she lost her innocence.” Wira blushed, for it was indelicate to refer openly to matters shrouded by the Adult Conspiracy. There might be a child in the vicinity. “Now they ignore her. It’s very sad.”
Mentia had little sympathy. “My better half never cared about innocence until she got half-souled. She can’t get near a unicorn either. So summon a horse who knows the way.”
MareAnn led the way out of the castle and across the moat, which now looked quite ordinary. She stood at the edge of an ordinary field that was where the sugar mountain had been. Already a group of things were galloping across the plain.
Mentia stared. There were four creatures, each with only one leg. Two had narrow heads, and two had thin tails. Their single hoofs thudded into the dirt in irregular order, clop-clop, clop-clop, stirring up clouds of dust behind. “What are those?”
“Quarter horses, of course,” MareAnn said. Then, to the horses: “Whoa!”
The four clopped to a halt before her. Each quarter had a silver disk on the side, with ribbed edges. On the front two disks, heads were inscribed; on the rear two, big birds with half-spread wings.
“Fall in,” MareAnn said.
The four creatures fell together, and suddenly were revealed as the four quarters of a regular horse, now complete. Wira stepped up to pet him, and he nuzzled her hand until she produced a lump of sugar. “Too bad you can’t ride Eight Bits,” Wira remarked.
“That’s his name?” Mentia asked. She was a little crazy herself, but this was more than a little crazy. “Why not?”
“Because he doesn’t trust strange adults. He just falls apart and scatters to the wind’s four quarters. But he does know the way, so you can follow him.”
“Maybe he should just tell us where to go, and we’ll go there ourselves,” Mentia said.
“No, he can’t speak,” MareAnn said. “He can understand simple directions, but that’s the limit. Anything more puts a strain on him, and—”
“He falls apart,” Mentia finished, resigned to a tedious journey.
But Metria pushed to the surface. “No, there’s a better way. How does Eight Bits feel about children?”
“Oh, he likes children,” MareAnn said. “Especially if they are a quarter the size of adults. But—”
Metria dissolved into smoke, then re-formed as the cutest, sweetest waif of a child anyone ever beheld. Even Wira was surprised, realizing that something was different. “I know Mentia and Metria, but who are you?”
“I am Woe Betide,” the waif said. “I have a quarter soul—half of Metria’s—and I love horses, and I will just be so pathetically sad if I can’t ride this one that I’ll dissolve in pitiful little misery.” She wiped away a huge glistening tear with one cute sleeve.
MareAnn exchanged half a glance with Wira, because it was one way: The sightless young woman had no half to return. “Maybe so,” she agreed. She lifted the tyke to the four-quartered horse.
“Oh, goody-goody!” Woe Betide exclaimed, clapping her sweet little hands together. “Let’s go.”
But Wira wasn’t sanguine about this. “We shouldn’t send a little child on such a wild ride alone,” she said.
“I’m not really a—” the tyke began, but then one of her selves stifled her before the horse could hear the rest.
MareAnn nodded. “Perhaps we can find an adult companion for her. I think there is a demoness who also knows the way, who still owes Humfrey part of a Service.”
“A demoness!” Woe Betide exclaimed. “They aren’t trustworthy!”
Again half a glance was exchanged. “You are surely in a position to know,” MareAnn agreed. “But when performing a Service, a person is bound to do it properly. She will not be released until you are safely there.”
The child’s face made a cute grimace of resignation. “Oh, all right. Who is it?”
“Helen Back.”
“Helen Back!” the child cried. “O woe betide me! She’s the worst creature in demondom. Do you know what she does?”
“Yes,” MareAnn agreed. “But she will be bound not to do it for this mission.”
“I hope you’re right,” the child said, looking truly woeful.
MareAnn snapped her fingers, and smoke formed. It swirled before her. “Am I released?” it inquired.
“After you accompany horse and rider safely to the Simurgh,” Wira said.
The smoke oriented on the pair. “That’s no horse—that’s four quartereezed the horse’s sides with her precious little legs. “Go, Eight Bits,” she said.
And suddenly they were off, in a cloud of dust that left the two standing women coughing.
 
Copyright © 1995 by Piers Anthony Jacob