“Don’t call me Frogkisser,” snapped Anya.
“Lady Frogkisser?”
“My name is Anya,” said Anya crossly. She was cold and very wet, and she really didn’t need yet another transformee begging to be helped. Particularly one who wanted to be turned back into an animal.
Ardent circled back to Anya. The fur on his back had gone down, and he was no longer barking. Even so, he kept one eye on Champion Smooth Stone Oysterbreaker.
“They’re special,” the dog whispered to Anya as he drew close. “Yarrow River otters. Got magic, like us royal dogs. Used to police the river, in the old times, and serve the Bill of Rights and Wrongs.”
“I don’t want to know anything more about that stupid Bill,” said Anya. “All I want is to get to the Good Wizard’s demesne and get dry and eat something!”
“But will you help me?” asked the otter. She held out her paws beseechingly. “Look at me, I’m all stretched and horrible, and I have to walk upright most of the time! It’s awful!”
“Oh yes, I suppose so,” said Anya grumpily. “What’s one more? I can’t guarantee the lip balm will work on you, though I suppose it will. Transmogrification is transmogrification, after all, whichever way it goes.”
“Oh, thank you!” cried the otter. She threw herself down at Anya’s feet. “When we find a river, I will catch you a fish. Several fish!”
“I’d eat them too,” said Anya. “Raw, if necessary. Oh, get up!”
The otter-maid stood up and bowed.
“Ardent the royal dog, Shrub the transformed newt, Prince Denholm the temporary frog,” said Anya, introducing everyone. She looked at the otter. “We’re going to need a shorter name for you, Champion Smooth Stone Oysterbreaker. How about … Champ?”
The otter wrinkled her nose. Her face was a disturbing mixture of human and otter, but her nose was still more like the animal’s, and she had fine whiskers that quivered with that wrinkle.
“That doesn’t sound right.”
“Um … what about Smooth or maybe—”
“Smoothie!” said the otter. She clapped her hand-paws together and beamed at Anya, showing lots of fine sharp teeth. “I like it!”
She did look very smooth and sleek, Anya thought. Otters were beautiful animals, and even stretched out and made somewhat human, Smoothie had a great deal of their natural allure.
But also their fish breath, noted the princess, wrinkling her nose slightly. She hoped Smoothie didn’t notice her reaction.
“Do you know if there are any weasels following us, Smoothie?” asked Anya. A nasty thought occurred to her as she said that, and she hastily added, “Or following you?”
“No, they’re too stupid for that,” said the transformed otter disdainfully. “I slipped away during the fighting with the robbers. They’ll never find us in this rain.”
Smoothie had barely finished speaking when Ardent stiffened again and whipped his head around, his ears up and nose sniffing. Even as he did that, there was a ferocious squeal and something erupted out of a sheet of rain and launched itself straight at Anya.
It flew through the air, a leap of a dozen feet or more over Ardent’s head as he leaped up too, his jaws snapping on empty air. Anya only had time to brace herself and get her arms up before it hit her. Bowled over backwards, she found herself on the ground, desperately trying to stop her throat from being ripped open by the long, many-toothed jaws of what could only be one of the Duke’s weasel soldiers.
Anya gasped and choked as the thing’s horribly yellowed teeth got closer and closer, despite everything she could do. Desperately, she tucked in her chin to protect her throat, her arms shaking with the effort of holding the thing off.
From the corner of her right eye she could see Ardent, his own jaws closed tight around one of the weasel creature’s taloned hands, trying to pull it back. On her left, Smoothie’s sharp mouth was clamped tight on the weasel’s other arm, and she was holding on with her paw-hands as well.
But even Ardent, otter, and princess together couldn’t get the weasel off Anya. Its thin, furry body, stretched into a vaguely human shape, was just too strong.
Anya knew she had to do something. Her arms would be unable to keep up the strain. In a few more seconds the thing’s jaws would snap shut on her throat and that would be it.
Summoning all her strength, she drew her knees up under the monster and kicked it as hard as she could with both feet, at the same time pushing back with every ounce of the remaining strength in her arms.
The weasel creature lurched back, screeching. Ardent and Smoothie let go. Anya kicked it in the stomach again, and the creature fell sideways off her. The princess scrabbled aside, and Ardent and the otter-maid landed several major bites. Screeching and hissing, bleeding from several wounds, it backed off, dog and otter circling for another opportunity to bite, wary of its slashing talons.
“We are many!” howled the creature. Its voice was very high and cruel and horrid. “We serve the Duke! We will find you!”
Spinning on one paw-foot, it leaped away, down the hill, and into the cloaking rain. Ardent began to pursue it, but Anya called him back.
“No, Ardent!” she croaked as she clambered to her feet. “Let it go. There might be more. We have to get away. Only which way?”
She looked around, her heart still beating what felt like a thousand times a minute, her whole body trembling with the shock. She saw Denholm was still safe in his cage. Shrub was nearby, trying to look as if he had been just about to join in her defense. Smoothie was looking back into the rain where the weasel thing had gone, her face set in a snarl.
Ardent was staring in the opposite direction.
“What is it?” snapped Anya.
“Ah!” the dog cried, leaping up and pointing, nose out, back straight, and one paw outstretched in front.
“More weaselfolk?” asked Anya urgently.
“No!” barked Ardent happily. “The road. The rain c-c-cleared for a moment, and I saw it. That way!”
It was easier and faster walking on the road, which had once been a major royal highway. Though many of the paving stones were broken, it was still considerably broader and in better shape than any road Anya had seen before. It ran between the low hills, so there was little climbing up or down, and it even had deep, stone-lined gutters on both sides, which at the moment were running fast and spilling over, the rain continuing to come down in thick, blinding sheets.
“How far to go?” Anya asked Shrub.
She sneezed as she spoke, and then shivered. A cold was rapidly expanding its initial foothold in her nose and was getting ready to move into her chest. She was also starving and very tired. They had been walking over the dales and then along the road for hours and hours. At first they had gone as fast as they could, for fear of the weaselfolk behind them. But that pace had gradually lessened as they had grown wearier and they saw no further sign of pursuit.
It was impossible to tell what time it was without being able to see the sun, but she felt it had to be well past noon. Perhaps two or even three o’clock.
“Dunno,” said Shrub. He kept licking his huge bulbous eyes as raindrops unerringly fell directly on them. “Depends where we met the road. Got to look for a milestone, or one of the Good Wizard’s ‘Keep Out’ signs, I suppose.”
“I’m looking!” barked Ardent. Despite being sodden from nose to tail, he was still cheerful, constantly running ahead and then circling back to act the advance or rear guard, in each position sniffing everywhere and rushing any small bush or tree that might harbor a (small) enemy.
Smoothie seemed happy enough too. Every now and again she plunged into one of the gutters and undulated through the water before bursting out with a shrill cry and turning over a few stones here and there to snap up beetles and worms, well before Shrub could lumber over to try to get a share.
“If I’d known I was going on a Quest I could have packed an oilskin coat,” said Anya. “And a lot of other things.”
“Isn’t there a spell to keep off the rain?” asked Shrub.
“Of course there is!” snapped Anya. “Only I don’t know it, because I’m not in my nice warm library learning magic. Instead I’ve had to go out in this freezing rain just so I can turn all of you back.”
The truth was, as Anya knew, that even if she had been home in the library, weather magic was well beyond her abilities. It took a great deal of power to move masses of air and water vapor, and it was like sliding tiles in a puzzle, because if you moved one lot somewhere, then everything else moved. The best weather mages did things very slowly, with small nudges and encouragements, rather than wholesale shifting around of storm clouds and the like. When weather magic was done inexpertly, storms got worse, droughts lasted longer, and snow fell out of season.
When it was both amateurish and done with evil intentions, for example trying to flood an enemy’s city, it might culminate in a tidal wave that drowned your own city. As had happened with the last High King and the city of Yarrow.
It made Anya reconsider the whole idea of sorcery, just a little, thinking of things like that. A sneeze was one thing, but then there was the price Rikard had paid and was paying for his powers.
“Don’t you want to turn us back?” asked Shrub. “I wonder if I stole the Only Stone now and put it in my mouth … maybe I wouldn’t need your help at all.”
“No, of course I want to turn you back,” said Anya. She wiped her nose. “I’m sorry. I’m just tired and cold and wet. I’ll be better once we get to the Good Wizard’s. I hope I can have a hot bath.”
“A hot dinner. Or a c-c-old one. Or lukewarm,” said Ardent. “Dinner. Mmmmm.”
He licked his lips and then chased his tail suddenly for a few seconds.
“Something up front,” called Smoothie, who had just emerged from a gutter and was standing up very straight about twenty yards ahead. “Might be a sign. Or a person standing very still.”
“I’ll look, I’ll look!” cried Ardent, stopping his tail-chasing to dash forward. His paws sent up huge splashes of water as he raced through the puddles. Anya almost couldn’t see him as he disappeared into another curtain of heavy rain, but he emerged again very quickly, racing back so swiftly he sent a plume of water over Anya as he skidded to a halt.
“It’s a sign,” he said, sitting back, his tail furiously wagging backwards and forwards, splashing as much water up as was coming down. “Says ‘To the Good Wizard, by Appointment Only’ and ‘Beware the Giant.’ Different writing, though.”
“Let’s have a look,” said Anya. Sploshing along, she tried to recall everything she’d read about giants. It wasn’t much. They were generally very boastful and most were so shortsighted they were nearly blind. But they made up for this with a very keen sense of smell. They weren’t very good with numbers; they could usually only count to four, and they had to do it aloud, saying, “Fee, fi, fo, fum,” and then “many.”
That was from their entry in Bestest Beasts and How to Best Them, but Anya couldn’t remember much else. There were numerous categories of giants, and the book had special notes about each type. The least dangerous ones were “Somewhat Terrifying” and there were several gradations to “Truly Terrifying.” The worst of all, if she remembered correctly, were “Stomach-Curling Gigantaurs.” Though these latter were not strictly just giants, but very large giants that also had the heads of bulls. The stomach-curling reference was about how people felt when they first saw them.
The sign was a bit puzzling. The part about the giant had clearly been painted on, not very expertly, across the lower half of the sign. And it definitely said, “Beware the Giant,” rather than “Beware of the Giant.”
“Hmmm,” said Anya. “We’ll have to be careful.”
She looked up and a raindrop hit her in the eye. It stung, but for the first time that day she was actually pleased it was still raining.
“The rain will help. Giants are usually very shortsighted and rely on their sense of smell.”
“Do you have a plan for when we meet the giant?” asked Ardent excitedly.
“I plan to not meet the giant,” said Anya. “We’ll go slowly, keep our eyes and noses open, and if we do catch sight or sniff of the giant, we’ll either go around or, if we have to, retreat back here to head along the road to Rolanstown, I suppose. We have to get food somehow.”
“Plenty of bugs about,” said Smoothie. “Not as good as fish or oysters, but not too bad.”
Anya shuddered, sneezed, and then coughed. Weakly, she waved everybody on and shifted her staff to try to ease the ache in her shoulder. Behind her, in his dangling cage, Denholm let out a loud croak. It sounded a bit like he was laughing at her.
The road to the Good Wizard’s demesne was not an ancient royal highway. It wasn’t paved, it had no gutters, and for the most part it was really just a ten-foot-wide ribbon of mud cutting through the grassy plain. It was actually easier to walk next to the road, because the grass held the mud together, so Anya didn’t sink into unsuspected holes where the mud came up to her waist and she needed Ardent and Smoothie to pull her out. Shrub was no use. He could essentially swim through the mud, but Anya didn’t want to touch his poisonous hide, or have him hold on to her with his mouth.
Unfortunately, it took two sudden immersions in mud holes before Anya worked out it was better to walk next to the road, so she was not only sodden and cold, but encased in mud from roughly her armpits to her toes. The rain washed a good part of it off, but some of the extra-sticky mud remained.
The animals were also covered in mud, except for Smoothie. She got muddy all right, but in her case, it just couldn’t stick to her fur. She would deliberately go for a slide along the road, making cheerful chirruping noises, stand up slathered in mud, and in only a minute or two the rain would rinse her off and she’d be as sleek as ever and ready to go mud-sliding again.
Ardent also liked the mud, though he jumped and splashed in it rather than going for a slide. Shrub was happy too. He lumbered through the mud using a curious half-swimming, half-crawling motion, and kept his mouth open, picking up lots of washed-out worms and other insects.
All three of them forgot to keep a lookout for a giant.
Mud-splattered, wearier than ever, and hungrier than she had ever been in her life, Anya forgot as well. With her head hanging down, the rain slid around her ears to join in a cascade under her chin, which then unerringly found a gap in her two kirtles to chill her rapidly weakening chest. It was all she could do to put one foot in front of the other, and her staff had slid forward so far that the bundle and Denholm’s cage were essentially sitting on her shoulder rather than suspended in the air.
“FEE, FI, FO, FUM!”
The roar of the giant’s voice and the accompanying blast of fetid breath instantly drew Anya’s attention away from the all-consuming slog through mud, and banished all feelings of exhaustion, hunger, and cold.
The giant was right in front of them, straddling the road. He was a horrifying figure, easily twenty feet tall, with shoulders wider than a bull’s. It was only a small mercy that he didn’t have a bull’s head, and so was not a Gigantaur. This giant’s oversize human head was still no prize, with his too-wide mouth featuring uneven rows of snaggled, blackened, and rotting teeth. His nose had been broken so many times it zigzagged down his face, and his straggly blond hair was badly plaited into four ropes, knotted with human bones. Two of the plaits were tied under his chin in a kind of bow.
The giant wore massive ox-hide boots, each the size of Anya herself, and a loose smock made of bloodstained sailcloth, living up to the reputation giants had for not caring about their clothes. He held a rusted, crudely wrought cleaver the size of a small pony in his right hand, and in his left gripped a capacious leather bag that had probably started life as a knight’s pavilion.
“Five!” shouted Anya, her mind continuing to rocket out of the rain-, mud-, and weariness-induced stupor she’d been in a moment before.
“WHAT?” asked the
giant. He still held the cleaver high, ready to strike.
“Fee-fi-fo-fum-five!” shouted Anya. “There’s five of us, counting the prince.”
“PRINCE? I CAN’T SEE NO PRINCE,” said the giant warily. He was slightly concerned. Princes as a group could potentially include the rare and very unwelcome subspecies known as giant killers.
“He’s right behind me,” said Anya. She waved her right hand in the air to distract the giant, urging the others to go around the giant and keep going with her left.
The giant peered myopically down at the road, then bent and sniffed the air above Anya’s head. Giants’ noses were so sensitive they could smell lies.
“Prince Denholm of Gornish,” said Anya helpfully, stepping around a lie. “Right behind me. What’s your name, then?”
“WHAT? I’M BEWARE THE GIANT,” roared the giant. He wiped his eyes and looked around suspiciously, his bent nose snuffling wildly. He didn’t pay any attention to Shrub edging past the outside of one deeply planted boot, or Smoothie sliding along on her belly between his legs. “I CAN’T SEE HIM AND I CAN’T SMELL HIM! BUT YOU SPEAK TRUTH.”
“I suppose he could have one of those invisibility cloaks or maybe he’s disguised,” said Anya, which was basically the truth. She made another small shooing gesture at Ardent, who had stayed by her side.
The dog didn’t move.
The giant sniffed the air again.
“I CAN SMELL PRINCESS, RIGHT ENOUGH. THAT’D BE YOU. AND DOG. THAT’S YOU. BUT THERE’S SOMETHING ELSE … SOMETHING GREEN … ”
He bent down again, red-rimmed eyes narrowing, and sniffed very deeply.
“A FROG! YOUR PRINCE IS TRANSFORMED. HE’S NOTHING BUT A FROGGY!”
Anya gulped and thought harder still, her mind working so fast that it was surprising the raindrops weren’t turning into steam as they hit her head.
“You’re very smart. I suppose you must be a ‘Trifle Terrifying’ or … or even a ‘Moderately Terrifying’ giant?”