"Tristan!" Terian cried, appalled. "You're with another woman!"
"But I love only you," he cried back, trying to disengage.
"A likely story! It seems I can't let you out of my sight half a moment without you being untrue to me."
MALES ARE LIKE THAT, Passion agreed.
"Terian! Please!" But Passion and Terian were already fading out.
"Maybe we can explain," Umlaut said.
UMLAUT CHANGES MIND.
"But I guess it's none of our business."
VISITORS DEPART.
Umlaut got back into the boat, and Para waddled out of the cave. They were, it seemed, finished here. Somehow, without meaning to, he had succeeded in making mischief for innocent people. How did he always manage to be such a klutz?
Sesame nudged him. It was Tristan's curse, not Umlaut's, she suggested, and Claire agreed. Somehow that did not make him feel much better.
Chapter 15
Six Eager Girls
They were on their way again, heading back south toward the Gap Chasm. Umlaut brought out the next letter, addressed to BUBBLES DOG.
Greetings and salutations to Bubbles,
As one member of the most superior species to another, I send barks from Mundania.
To get it off my chest, I think Bubbles is a sissy name for a canine. I won't hold it against you, however; humans choose the oddest names to saddle us with. It's not your fault. Having said that, at point of poisoned raw meat, I'll never divulge the name my human has seen fit to burden me with. I call myself Alaric, meaning "Ruler of all." It fits with my breed, which is rottweiler. Most folk around here are plain scared of me, which suits my lifestyle just fine. I'm usually given a wide berth and left alone to contemplate life. Of course I often have to perform bouts of snarling and jumping around just to keep up appearances.
It was good of your friend Kim to release you from that confining bubble. Floating around indefinitely is no life for a dog. My friend Arjayess is another decent human type like Kim. She's the only one who understands me. She feeds me well when there's a shortage of cats, mice, moles, and the sick to gnaw on. She'll romp with me when I feel like getting some exercise and keeps me in huge bones as special treats. She even knows enough to leave me alone when I give a bit of a growl because I'm feeling solitary.
Yup, that makes two special humans in our worlds. Out of... how many are there now? Could that be an exaggeration? Naw, didn't think so. Too bad they couldn't coach the rest of the canine-ignorant ones, huh?
So stick around, little buddy. Just thought I'd say hello and farewell.
Alaric Friend of Arjayess
Umlaut considered that. If there was anything to generate mayhem here, he couldn't see it. So far, most of the letters he had delivered had been downright innocuous, and the rest had not been bad. Was there really a point to this? Of course they needed to be delivered, because their recipients deserved to see them, but just how did any of them relate to solving the problem of Demon Jupiter's hurtling Red Spot? Neither the letters nor the folk receiving them seemed to have any relevance to that.
Yet the Demoness Metria was trying to prevent him from delivering them, sometimes quite deviously. That meant there was a reason. Maybe not her own reason, but one sufficient for whoever or whatever was threatening her son, Demon Ted. Could it be Demon Jupiter himself? Could he know that there was something to balk the Red Spot, and he didn't want that to be found, lest it ruin his strike? But this was the Land of Xanth. How could there be anything in it to interfere with another big-D Demon?
And Umlaut himself: He seemed pretty dull normal, until he tried to remember his past life. It was as if he had just come into existence for this purpose, to try to deliver—
The huge Gap Chasm loomed again, distracting him, and his thought evaporated. That was the trouble with thoughts, they were easily lost when any distraction came. Well, he would surely return to it in due course.
This wasn't the same place where they had used the invisible bridge, yet Para was swiftly waddling right up to the verge. "Uh—" he began uncertainly.
Then the boat went over the brink and into a sidelong gully leading down into the chasm. That wasn't necessarily better. What about the dread Gap Dragon, the one that snorted steam and could cook his meals at yea many paces? Para would never be able to run fast enough to escape that monster, "Uh, are you sure—?"
The boat did seem sure. Sammy was riding, and Claire was napping. Sesame was viewing the steep scenery with interest. They weren't worried, so why should he be? Still, he was.
The slanting ledge-path managed to reach the base safely. Para set out across the bottom of the chasm, which was much like any other scenery, with patches of grass, copses of trees, and even a stream meandering its way as if looking for even lower ground.
Then he heard an odd sort of thumping or pounding. Whomping, that was it. He knew that it had to be the Gap Dragon. Oh, no, it had spied them! Worse, Para was waddling right toward the sound. The dragon came into sight. It was green, with stubby wings and three sets of legs. It lifted one set at a time, moving it forward in semi-inch worm style and slamming it down on the ground while another lifted. This might have seemed like a clumsy mode of locomotion, but in practice it was efficient enough. And while steam might seem less formidable than fire or even hot smoke, the puffing clouds of it surrounding the dragon seemed sufficient to bring down any fleeing prey quickly enough.
Para and the dragon rushed together—and stopped. They sniffed noses, or rather, snout sniffed prow. And that was it. The dragon did not gape his jaws, and the boat did not try either to ram or flee. It looked as if they were friends.
"Friends?" Umlaut asked Claire. She nodded.
So that was why there had been no concern. Para and the Gap Dragon knew each other. He had been worrying about nothing. As usual, it was the things he didn't worry about that made the most trouble.
"Hello, Stanley Steamer," Umlaut said, "I am Umlaut, and these are Sesame Serpent, Sammy Cat, and Claire Voyant Cat." He realized as he spoke that this was largely unnecessary; Sammy obviously knew the dragon, and Sesame probably could communicate in Serpentine. "We're on our way to deliver a letter to Bubbles Dog."
The dragon nodded; he understood human speech. But he did not get out of their way, and Para did not try to move forward. Something else was expected.
Then he had it. The Gap Dragon was friends with one of the human folk they had encountered. "We delivered another letter to Princess Ivy. She's fine. So are her children."
Stanley nodded. Then he moved out of the way, and Para resumed motion. Umlaut breathed a silent sigh of relief. It wasn't that he distrusted the judgment of the animals, just that errors or confusions sometimes occurred, and a confusion here in the bottom of the chasm could be extremely awkward.
They came to the far side. There was another slight ledge-path scraping its way upward. It looked precarious, but it turned out to be just wide enough for Para to fit on. The slope above and below it was almost sheer, so Umlaut made sure to sit in the center of the boat and not rock it. It would be so easy to overbalance and tumble out and awfully down.
At last they crested and were back on safe land. Now all they had to be concerned about was regular dangers.
"This should be fairly easy now," Umlaut said.
A cloud formed. "That's what yooouuu think!"
"Get out of here, Metria!"
"I prefer to timepiece."
He knew better but couldn't help it. "To what?"
"Chronometer, lookout, measure, clock, alarm—"
"Watch?"
"Whatever," she agreed crossly. "You will have to choose."
"Choose?"
"You'll see." The cloud dissipated, but he knew she was still watching.
He turned to Sesame. "Do you know what she means?"
Maybe she was bluffing, she said in Serpentine.
That hadn't occurred to him. If Metria could stop him with a bluff, she surely would do it.
 
; They came to a slight vale with a small red river meandering from one side to the other. It looked innocuous, but Claire suddenly took note. "Meow!"
Para skidded to a halt. "What is it?" Umlaut asked the cat.
In a moment he had it: fire ants.
"Those are bad?"
Sammy, Sesame, and Para all nodded. They did not want to pass through that column of ants.
"Well, let me see," Umlaut said, suspecting that they were making too much of it. "I've got shoes on; I'll check." He got out of the boat and walked to the column.
It did indeed consist of red ants. There were hundreds of them marching the length of the vale. They did not look fierce. "If I had a broom, I could sweep a channel clear so Para could cross," he said. He looked about for something he could fashion into a suitable sweeper.
He spied a pine tree with one low branch. That should do, if he could break it off. He put his hands on it and pushed.
"I wouldn't do that if I were you," the tree said. "Of course that's just my opinion."
"What?" Umlaut still tended to be stupid when caught by surprise. And at other times.
"In my opinion, it won't work."
"You're a talking tree?" he asked dumbly.
"I am an O-Pinion pine tree," the tree said proudly. "I have opinions on everything."
Umlaut belatedly caught on to the pun. "Well, thanks for your opinion." He broke off the branch.
"Ouch! That's just my opinion."
"I'm sure it is." Umlaut carried the branch to the narrowest part of the ant column and used the tufts of pine needles to brush the ants out of the way.
Something stung his forearm. "Ouch!" he screamed, for it burned like fire. An ant had stung him. He slapped it off, but the pain did not abate. In fact he saw that a little tongue of flame was flickering over it. No wonder it burned!
He grabbed a handful of dirt and rubbed it on the burn, but it did no good. The pain continued just as fiercely. He ran back to the boat. "Fire ant!" he cried, showing his burning arm.
Sesame dived for the end of the boat. She dug out a little wad of balm Umlaut hadn't known was there. She used her teeth to hold it while she rubbed it across the burn. In two and a quarter moments the pain faded. The balm had done the job.
"Thanks," Umlaut gasped. "An ant must have gotten on my broom. I didn't see it."
Para suddenly backed up, startling him. Then he saw why: The ants, now alerted to the presence of potential prey, were swarming toward them. They could not move very fast, but it would not do to stand and wait for them.
Sammy was agitated. The way to Bubbles Dog was across that column of fire ants. What were they going to do?
Umlaut sighed. Where was there a zombie roc bird, or a toe truck, or a tunnel, or a demoness, or something when they needed it? He was pretty sure that if they ran along beside the ant column they would find it reached all the way from the sea to the Gap Chasm, and they would not be able to cross it. So what could they do?
He came to a momentous conclusion: "I think we need help."
The others looked at him as if awed by his profundity, or whatever. He felt the heat rising to his face. He had such a genius for being if not outright stupid, at least somewhat dull. "I mean, maybe we should seek help."
They still gazed at him. Para sidled away from an extending pseudopod of the ant column. It was up to him to seek that help.
So he tried it the dull direct way. "Help!" he called.
Something flew in from the horizon. It was a bird, no, a harpy, no, a lovely butter fly-winged woman. Her dress was almost as brightly colored as her wings, and her hair matched. She came to land beside the boat. "Hello. I am Phanessa. Can I help you?"
Umlaut got out and stood before her. "I'm, uh, Umlaut, and these are my friends Para Boat, Sesame Serpent, and Sammy and Claire Cats. We need to cross the fire ant column to deliver a letter. Do you have a way we can do that?"
She glanced at the column, which showed pale flames close above it. "Why, yes, I do happen to know of a way. What will you give me for that information?"
"Give you?" Umlaut asked blankly.
"Well, you don't expect me to do it for nothing, do you?"
It was another signal of his dullness that he had rather expected it for nothing. "Uh, what do you wish?"
She looked at the boat. "I'd really like to have an interesting craft like that."
"I can't give you that! Para doesn't belong to me."
"Or a pet cat."
"Those cats don't belong to me—any—anybody, really. They're my friends."
"Or maybe a nice serpent."
"Sesame? She's her own person too."
Phanessa sighed. "Then I suppose I'll have to take you."
"Me?"
"As my boyfriend. I had hoped for one who could fly, but there aren't many winged boys in Xanth. They don't want to look like fairies."
A vision of the plight of poor Tristan Troll flitted across his mind. "I can't do that. I'm committed elsewhere,"
"Oh, that's too bad," she said sympathetically. "I hope you do make it safely past that horrible ant column." She spread her wings and flew away.
But now someone else was approaching. This was another girl, with violet hair and eyes. "Hello," she said. "I am Violet. And no, I'm not an African flower."
Somehow that didn't surprise him. He introduced himself and his friends. "We need to get across that fire ant column. Can you help with that?"
"Why, yes, I believe I can," she said. "My talent is to make living things friendly. I'm sure I could befriend the ants so they would let you pass."
"Great!" But then he got cautious. "What would you expect in return?"
"You seem like a decent boy. I would like—"
“I’m committed elsewhere," Umlaut said quickly.
Violet frowned. "I am so disappointed. Won't you reconsider?"
"Uh, no," he said, feeling somehow guilty.
"Then I suppose there is nothing for me to do but look elsewhere." Violet departed.
Umlaut shook his head. "Why is it that now that I have found the girl of my dreams, others are offering? I'm sure either of these two would have been nice, if it weren't for Surprise."
The others shrugged. It was, it seemed, just the way a fellow was fondled by the fickle finger of fortune.
Another girl approached. She looked fairly ordinary, which was to say that her hair was hair brown and her eyes were eye blue, and her figure was not the kind to madden a man's mind with half a glance. "Hello. My name is Sage. Were you calling for help?"
"Yes," Umlaut answered guardedly. "We need to cross that fire ant column?"
"I could enable you to do that," Sage said. "At least, my dragon could."
"Dragon?" He looked around a bit nervously. "Is it close?"
She laughed. "He doesn't just walk behind me, silly. He has better things to do. But if I'm in danger, he comes immediately to protect me."
Umlaut saw the ant column extending toward her. "You had better step back. Those ants—"
"Eeeek! Fire ants!" she screamed.
Suddenly there was a motion in the ground around her. Four mounds developed, and from each burst a dreadful head. "Dragons!" Umlaut cried, more than alarmed. "Run!"
"Don't be concerned," Sage said. "That's just Guardian, my four-headed dragon."
The four heads rose up on four necks. Then the ground between them humped, right under Sage, lifting her up. It was indeed a single dragon, and as the dirt fell away, she was nestled comfortably between the four extended necks. The four heads cast about and soon spotted the encroaching fire ants.
The first head oriented and blasted out a jet of fire. It bathed the ants but did not bother them at all. So that head swung aside and the second one oriented. It blew out a blast of smoke. That didn't stop the ants either; smoke was a natural concomitant of fire. So the third head oriented and issued a shaft of steam. The ants didn't like that, but the heat didn't bother them. Finally the fourth head oriented and gushed pure water. T
hat washed away the ants, and the column retreated. The dragon, satisfied, sank back into the ground, leaving only disturbed earth.
"That will do it," Umlaut said, pleased. "If Guardian cares to wash out a path for us."
"He will if I ask him to," Sage said. "But why should I do that?"
Uh-oh. "You want something."
She nodded. "At is happens, I have a crush on a handsome young magician, but I haven't told him. So I need someone else until—"
"I'm not available," Umlaut said quickly.
"Oh, well. In that case, good-bye." Sage walked away.
Umlaut looked at his friends. They looked back. They weren't blaming him, but somehow he felt blameworthy.
Soon another girl approached. She too seemed ordinary, but Umlaut knew that that was no sign she was. "Hello. I'm Janel. I heard your call. You need help?"
"I'm Umlaut. Yes, we need to get past those fire ants."
"Why, I could help you do that. My talent is persuading people. I could persuade them to let you through."
"That would be wonderful. But what would you want in return?"
She looked at him appraisingly. "You seem like a nice boy."
"I'm spoken for!"
"Oh. Still, perhaps I should persuade you to give her up in favor of—"
"Please don't do that!" Umlaut said desperately. "I love her!"
Janel considered. "I suppose it wouldn't be nice to take you, then." She walked away.
What was going on here? Every person who came was a girl, and every one of them wanted him as a boyfriend. There might have been a time when he would have loved that, but that was BS: Before Surprise.
Another girl showed up. Umlaut didn't even notice her details, though all of them were in place. "I am Annie Mation. I can make pictures come to life."
"That's surely a fine talent," Umlaut said warily, "but will it help us get beyond the fire ants, and what will it cost me?"
"All you have to do is draw a picture of something that will help you, and I can bring it to life so you can use it."
That seemed promising. Umlaut was not the best at drawing things, but if he drew a package of ant repellent and she made it real, maybe that would help. But she hadn't named her price. Somehow he knew what that would be. "I am already committed to another girl," he said.