But then something went wrong. Dawn veered off the path and had to stop, looking faint.
“What’s the matter?” Jumper asked, concerned, though part of him suspected it was another flirting ploy.
“I don’t know. Suddenly I’m out of energy.”
Then Jumper felt it too. Something was draining him. He looked around, trying to figure it out, and saw a sign: para site. He put the words together, as he had with the bicycles, and made sense of it: parasite. Something that leeched energy from a person. “We must get away from here,” he said urgently.
But Dawn was already sinking to the ground. She couldn’t walk, let alone ride. She was barely conscious. The same fate might soon overtake him. Desperate, Jumper did something he feared he might later regret: he took the transformation antidote, returning to his natural form. Then, as a big spider, he picked up the two bicycles with two legs, Dawn with a 039-40892_ch01_4P.qxp 7/30/09 12:35 PM Page 181
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third, and hobbled five-legged on along the path, away from the awful site.
As he went, his weakness diminished and he made better progress. He was escaping the site. But Dawn was still largely out of it, so he continued carry ing her. He saw a shelter ahead, perched by a lake. He went to it, and set the bikes and Dawn down before it. Then he put a leg in the lake and splashed water on Dawn. He meant to catch her face, but it soaked the rest of her body. He was messing up his rescue effort.
“Oh!” she exclaimed, waking. “You naughty boy!”
“I’m sorry. I just wanted to wake you.”
She put out a hand to touch his leg, immediately fathoming everything. “Now I understand. You rescued me from the para site. Thank you, Jumper.”
“That’s all right. Why did you call me naughty?”
She glanced down at herself. “You soaked me, so that my clothing is glued to my body. A man would have done that so he could see everything without actually undressing me.”
“Oh. I should have been more careful.”
“You were tired too. That’s why you missed my face. We had better stay here the night and recover.”
“But Sammy has gone on ahead.”
“He’ll surely find us.” She smiled. “This is the scenic route. Now you will see some real scenery. I must wash myself, and dry my clothes. Fortunately you have reverted to spider form, so you won’t get any ideas.”
“I wouldn’t—” But he couldn’t finish, because he had a notion what she meant, and was already guilty.
She touched his leg again. “I know, Jumper. But stay in that form for the night, and we’ll pretend that you are completely indifferent. Sometimes these little white lies are necessary for social purposes.”
Lies had sizes and colors? Jumper was still learning things about human culture. A white lie, it seemed, was a good, or at least necessary one. That suggested that a black lie would be bad or unnecessary. He wondered what green, yellow, blue, red, or striped lies would be.
“Oh, I like you, Jumper!” she said, still fathoming his thoughts. “But 039-40892_ch01_4P.qxp 7/30/09 12:35 PM Page 182 182
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to answer your question, no lie is good, and there are no colors. A white lie is one made to make a person feel better. So when I flash you, and we pretend it has no effect, we are making ourselves feel more comfortable about spending the night together without clothing. I am supposed to be innocent, and you are supposed to be indifferent, so it’s all right. The lie protects our reputations.”
“Reputations are important,” he said, getting it straight.
“Especially for princesses and heroes.”
“Heroes?”
“You’re the hero of this tale, Jumper. Didn’t you know?”
“No.”
“Well, the protagonist, or viewpoint character, which is much the same thing. The rest of us are merely supporting characters.”
“But I’m not special!”
She brought his foot to her face and kissed it. “Yes, you are, Jumper.”
Then she efficiently stripped off her clothing, stood gloriously bare, and jumped into the lake. Rather than continue being slightly stunned, Jumper turned away. There would be food to gather, assuming they could eat it in the dream state. If not, he would find some other chore to take up his attention. Rather than live a white lie. He saw Dawn’s wet clothing lying in a pile on the ground. It occurred to him that it would dry better if he hung it up, so he spread it across some nearby bushes. But it was now shady eve ning, with no sunlight to speed the drying. Then he got an idea. He fetched his sun glasses, which were dangling by a loop of his silk, and put them on. The glare of their sun bathed the clothes, heating them so that they steamed and dried.
“Beautiful, Jumper,” Dawn said from the water. “Maybe I won’t have to sleep nude after all. I’m disappointed.”
“I did wrong?” he asked, dismayed.
“By no means. It’s humor, with a tinge of truth.” Then she glanced down at herself and screamed.
Jumper was alarmed. “Is there a water predator?”
“No! Look at me! I’m fat!”
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Then he saw the sign they had missed before. fat farm. He went to read the fine print: “Beside the Fat River, growing Trans Fats. Beware. Just looking at them puts ten pounds on a girl.” And Dawn had done more than look; she had plunged in. She had become one bulging blubber of a girl.
“What’s that?” Dawn called from the water.
“You’re in the Fat River, not a lake,” he called back.
“Eeeeeeek!” she screamed, putting seven E’s into it. That was surely a scream for the record books. “Do something!”
Jumper read the finer print. “Antidote: visit Bare Lake, adjacent.”
He looked, and on the other side of the path was another lake. “You have to skinny dip in the other lake,” he called, gesturing. Dawn didn’t argue. She hauled her massive body out and lumbered across the path to cannonball into the other lake. The splash was so great it soaked everything around it, including Jumper. Fortunately he wasn’t a girl, so it didn’t affect him.
The skinny dip worked. In half a moment Dawn was her original self again, slender everywhere except here and there. She hauled herself out immediately and grabbed a towel from a towel bush and swiftly dried herself off. “Thank you, Jumper. You saved me, again.” Now that she was herself, physically, she was calm once more.
“But why didn’t it affect you when I splashed you?”
“I think it did. But it wasn’t enough water to put on more than a few pounds, so I didn’t notice.”
He realized that was possible. The sign’s warning about just looking at a trans fat making a girl gain ten pounds was an exaggeration. It took full immersion to have full effect.
She lifted the white pan ties and held them closer to the glasses. They had no freak power, oddly, in this state. Dawn smiled. “Here’s a secret, Jumper. Bras and pan ties have no freak power by themselves. It is only when they are in contact with warm flesh that the magic manifests. I’ll show you.”
She lifted one bare leg, and then the other, putting the pan ties on. As she did, there was a powerful burst of freak power. Then she pulled the pan ties tight on her and turned around, showing her backside, and the 039-40892_ch01_4P.qxp 7/30/09 12:35 PM Page 184 184
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freak almost knocked him over. He was not as immune as he had supposed, despite Angie’s lessons. “Just be thankful for two things, Jumper,”
she said. “First, that I’m not my sister, so lack the panty power she has; I’m more of a bra’ bonnie girl. And second, that you are a spider, so have considerable natural immunity.”
“I’m thankful,” he said. But secretly he almost wished he could have been a real man, and that she was not teasing. And again, his thoughts were not secret from her, embarrassingly. She gaze
d at him, her own thoughts masked. “Actually, a girl could do worse,” she murmured.
“I don’t understand.”
She changed the subject. “Oh, there’s Sammy!”
Indeed, the cat had returned, and was now snoozing in the shelter. He must have discovered that they were no longer following.
“I think my bra is dry now,” Dawn said. “Watch if you dare.” She brought it to her front.
Jumper didn’t dare, knowing better than to try to defy her area of strength. He turned away.
“But the rest of my clothing will take longer to dry,” she said. “So let’s eat something and turn in.”
He had located a pie plant that included a shoe-fly pie, so he had the fly from that while Dawn ate a cherry pie. She seemed to find both pies funny, for some reason, but did not explain. Sammy woke long enough to lap up a milkweed pod. Then they settled down together under the shelter, Jumper folding his legs under him, Dawn lying on a pile of straw. “I don’t think this is a fully enchanted path,” she said. “So there could be danger. But you should be able to handle it, especially if it’s anything living that I can identify.” Then she closed her eyes and went to sleep. This, too, bothered him. How could a person sleep when already in the dream realm? But in two and a half moments he closed six of his eyes, leaving only two alert, and slept.
They woke to an astonishing sound. Dawn leaped up in her bra and panty. “What is that?”
“I think it’s music,” Jumper said.
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She went outside, and he followed, glad again, to an extent, that he was not a human man. She really needed to put on more clothing. In Bare Lake was a fish quartet: 1st Tuna, 2nd Tuna, Barracuda, and Bass. They were singing in the new day. With them was a dancing fin, cutting intricate patterns in the surface of the water. Jumper and Dawn watched and listened, entranced. When the song finished, the fish sank back under the water, and the fin angled to the bank. Now it could be seen that it was part of a big doll: a doll fin. The doll emerged from the water and walked on surprisingly little feet to meet them. She was not affected by the water’s skinny property, perhaps because she was a doll.
“Greetings this fine morning,” she said. “I am Little Foot. I wanted to be a marine biologist, but dancing is more fun. I hope you enjoyed our show.”
“We did,” Dawn said. “I am Dawn, and this is Jumper.”
“You have a very nice bra.”
“Thank you. I try to keep it well filled.”
Little Foot looked at Jumper. “We don’t see many spiders your size around here. Are you on leave from a scary dream?”
“No, merely on a mission,” Jumper said.
“Oh? What are you looking for?”
“Innocence,” Dawn said.
Little Foot laughed. “I don’t think you’ll find it in that outfit.” She returned to the water, and soon was nothing but a departing fin.
“She’s right,” Dawn said. Her clothing was dry, and she put it on.
“Maybe now we can complete our mission.”
They got on their bicycles and rode after Sammy, who was bounding along at his usual pace. Until they came to another lake. The path stopped at its bank, and so did the cat.
There was an island in the center, bearing a looming castle. That must be their destination.
“What do we do now?” Dawn asked, abruptly uncertain.
“We cross to the island,” Jumper said.
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“I don’t think we want to swim. There might be loan sharks, water dragons, or worse. You can never tell when a dream will turn bad.”
“I think I can manage.” Jumper spun a mass of silk, formed it into a mat, and spread the mat on the water. He stepped onto it, his weight making it dent but not sink, and spun some more. He laid another mat ahead, and moved onto it.
“Suddenly I appreciate your ability,” Dawn said, stepping gingerly onto the first mat. Sammy joined her.
They proceeded on across, slowly. Jumper took up the mat behind them and set it in front, so as not to waste silk. A prettily colored fish swam up, gazing curiously at them. Jumper looked at it with several eyes, and it immediately blushed and turned away.
“That was a coy Koi,” Dawn said. “A harmless creature.”
Oh. Jumper continued with the silk matting, and in due course got them most of the way across to the island.
Then several colored fins cut toward them. “Beware,” Dawn said, alarmed. “Those are loan sharks. They’ll take an arm and a leg if you let them.”
Jumper was not about to let them. He needed all eight legs for his present task. So he spun a lasso and whirled it around. When a fin came close, he lassoed it and gave it a good yank. Part of the shark was jerked out of the water. The thing threshed its tail and escaped, fleeing the area. The other sharks considered. Then they too departed the scene. They were interested only in easy marks.
“You’re really some creature,” Dawn said.
Jumper continued, and soon they were at the island shore. They stepped onto it and looked around.
It seemed to be a complete little land in itself, with fields and forests and even a trickling stream coming from the hill on which the castle perched. The path picked up where it had left off, wending its way toward the castle.
“Uh, Jumper,” Dawn said. “Maybe for our purpose you should turn human again. Whoever this innocence is for, I suspect he or she would not properly appreciate your natural form.”
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She was being diplomatic, which was another human quality. She was reminding him that he needed to set up for the standard white lie of his humanity. She was surely correct. A truly innocent human person could freak out at the sight of a giant spider. He took a vial and gulped down the elixir. In barely a moment he was human.
And there was a girl. “Hello, visitors,” she said brightly, “I am Sati Sfaction, here to welcome you to Dust Isle. We have a feast in preparation for you.”
Dawn stepped forward to give the girl a friendly hug. Jumper knew Dawn was actually seeking physical contact so she could learn everything about her. Such as whether she was really friend or foe. “I am Dawn, and this is my friend Jumper.”
The girl looked directly at Jumper for the first time. “Ek,” she screamed faintly, blushing, not even managing to squeeze out two E’s. Then she swooned.
For Jumper was naked. In the distraction of the island, in the absence of Wenda, they had forgotten to put clothing on him.
“Quick, spin yourself some clothing,” Dawn said. “Not that it really matters.”
This made him pause. “What?”
“Sati isn’t really an innocent girl. She’s something else. I can’t tell what.”
He spun silk and quickly wove it into a pair of shorts, which he donned. “But you can tell anything about any living thing.”
“Yes. She’s not a living thing. Not exactly.”
“Then what is she?”
“The minor De mon ess Sharon,” the girl said, sitting up. Obviously she had not freaked out, and had faked her swoon. “We are neither living nor dead; we’re eternal entities.”
“Sharon!” he exclaimed, now seeing the resemblance. “You always appear as someone’s sister.”
“This time I’m someone’s daughter. I have a role to fulfill, so for now I’m Sati. I can sense ghosts, and even lend them a physical body, for a while.”
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“You would like our friend Phanta,” Jumper said.
“A role?” Dawn asked suspiciously. “You’re Pluto’s minion, trying to mess up our mission.”
“Yes. But there are pa ram e ters.”
“There are whats?”
“Pa ram e ters. Variable guid
elines that shift with the situation. I am confined to limited devices of corruption.”
“Such as?”
“Such as making Jumper fall in love with me, so that he will give up the mission in order to win my return love.”
That put it out into the open. “But demons, capped or uncapped, have no souls,” Dawn said. “They can’t love.”
“But we can make deals,” Sharon said. “If Jumper makes the deal, I will put on such an emulation of love that he won’t be able to tell the difference.”
Which meant that he could not afford to love her. She needed to be limited to a stork object. “Let’s get on with the delivery,” he said gruffly. Sammy had been loitering. Now he moved smartly along the path toward the castle, and they followed.
“To do that,” Sharon said, “you will have to play the part.” Her countenance changed subtly, and she was the girl Sati Sfaction again.
“I’ll play my part,” Jumper said impatiently. He was annoyed with himself because he still hoped for a session alone with her, corrupting as it might be.
“Then I must introduce you to my father, King Belial,” Sati said. “I love him, of course, but he’s a domineering man who constantly spies on me. He has the talent of creating, controlling and banishing creatures of dust.”
“Dust dev ils,” Dawn said.
“Sort of. These aren’t real ones, just his artificial ones. But you can’t tell their nature from seeing them.”
“I can tell dust from a living creature,” Dawn said.
“Can you? What about that?”
They looked. A fat piglike creature was coming toward them, bearing an array of sharp quills. It emitted an odor of pine trees. “That’s a 039-40892_ch01_4P.qxp 7/30/09 12:35 PM Page 189
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porkypine,” Dawn said. “A cross between a pig and a pine tree. They’re rare.”
Then the porkypine dissolved into a cloud of dust and fell apart.
“One of Belial’s dust creatures,” Sati said, having made her point.
“He uses them to watch me. He’s afraid I might meet someone manly and do something I shouldn’t.”