Peace, the shade said in his mind.
The peace of the pine forest, where the sleepers never woke? Bink could not protest aloud, because of the dragon's ears. But he gathered himself for a final effort, to leap away from this dread possession. He would crash past the dragon's tail before the monster could react, and take his chance with the subterranean river.
No! Friend, I can help you! the shade cried, louder but still silently.
Somehow, insidiously, Bink began to believe. The spirit actually seemed sincere. Perhaps it was just in contrast to the alternatives: consumption by dragon or drowning in river.
Fair exchange, the shade persisted. Permit me, for one hour. I will save your life, then dissipate, my onus abated.
It had the ring of conviction. Bink faced death anyway; if the shade could somehow save him, it would certainly be worth an hour of possession. It was true that shades dissipated once their burden was lifted.
But not all shades were honest. The criminal ones sometimes were recalcitrant, choosing not to atone for their crimes in life. Instead, they added to them in death, under cover of the new identity, ruining the reputation of the unlucky person they controlled. After all, the shade had little to lose; he was already dead. Absolution would merely consign him to oblivion or to his place in the infernal regions, depending on his faith. Small wonder some chose never to die completely.
My wife, my child! the shade pleaded. They go hungry, they sorrow, ignorant of my status. I must tell them where the silver tree grows that I died to locate.
The silver tree! Bink had heard of the like. A tree with leaves of pure silver, incredibly valuable--for silver was a magic metal. It tended to repel evil magic, and armor made from it resisted magic weapons. And, of course, it could even be used as money.
No, it is for my family! the shade cried. That they may never again dwell in poverty. Do not take it for yourself!
That convinced Bink. A dishonest shade would have promised him everything; this one promised only life, not riches. Agreed, Bink thought, hoping he was not making a dreadful mistake. Trust unwisely given--
Wait until merging is complete, the shade said gratefully. I cannot help you until I become you.
Bink hoped it was no deception. But what, really, did he have to lose? And what did the shade have to gain by a lie? If it did not save Bink, it would only share the sensation of being eaten by the dragon. Then they would both be shades--and Bink would be an angry one. He wondered what one shade could do to another. Meanwhile, he waited.
At last it was done. He was Donald, the prospector. A man whose talent was flying.
"We go!" Donald cried through Bink's lips exultantly. He put his arms up as if diving and rose straight up through the crack in the ceiling, with such power that the edges of rock and dirt were flung aside.
The sheer brightness of day blinded them as they emerged. The Gap dragon took a moment to orient on this strange occurrence, then pounced. But Donald made another effort, and shot up so swiftly that the huge teeth snapped on air. He kicked the monster on the snout, hard. "Ha, gaptooth!" he yelled. "Chew on this." And he stomped on the tender portion of the dragon's nose.
The jaws gaped open, and a cloud of steam shot out. But Donald was already zooming out of reach. The dragon had no chance to catch them before they were too high.
Up, up they sailed, straight out of the canyon, above the trees and slopes. There was no effort other than mental, for this was magic flight. They leveled off, proceeding north across Xanth.
In delayed reaction, Bink realized that he had a magic talent. By proxy, certainly--but for the first time in his life he was experiencing what every other citizen of Xanth experienced. He was performing. Now he knew how it felt.
It felt wonderful.
The sun bore down from almost straight overhead, for it was now midday. They were up amid the clouds. Bink felt discomfort in his ears, but an automatic reaction by his other self popped them, making the pain abate before it intensified. He didn't know why flying should hurt his ears; maybe it was because there wasn't enough to hear up here.
For the first time, too, he saw the full upper contours of the clouds. From beneath they were generally flat, but from above they were elegantly if randomly sculptured. What seemed like tiny puffballs from the ground were big masses of fog in person. Donald flew through them with equanimity, but Bink didn't like the loss of vision. He was nervous about banging into something.
"Why so high?" he inquired. "I can hardly see the ground." This was an exaggeration; what he meant was that he could not make out the details he was accustomed to. Also, it would have been nice to have some of the people see him flying. He could buzz around the North Village, astounding the scoffers, qualifying for his citizenship...no, that would not be honest. Too bad the most tempting things were not right to do.
"I don't want to advertise," Donald said, "It could complicate things if people thought I was alive again."
Oh. Perhaps so. There could be renewed expectations, maybe debts to be paid, ones that mere silver would not abate. The shade's business was necessarily anonymous, at least so far as the community was concerned.
"See that glint?" Donald inquired, pointing down between two clouds. "That's the silver oak tree. It's so well hidden it can be spotted only from above. But I can tell my boy exactly where to find it. Then I can rest."
"I wish you could tell me where to find a magic talent,'' Bink said wistfully.
"You don't have one? Every citizen of Xanth has magic."
"That's why I'm not a citizen," Bink said glumly. They both spoke through the same mouth. "I'm going to the Good Magician. It he can't help me, I'll be exiled.''
"I know the feeling. I spent two years exiled in that cave."
"What happened to you?"
"I was flying home, after discovering the silver tree, and a storm came up. I was so excited by the thought of riches that I couldn't wait. I risked the trip in high winds--and got blown into the Gap. The impact was so great I landed in the cave--but I was already dead."
"I didn't see any bones."
"You didn't see any hole in the ground, either. The dirt filled in over me, and then my body got washed away by the river."
"But--"
"Don't you know anything? It's the place of death that anchors the shade, not the place of the corpse."
"Oh. Sorry."
"I hung on, though I knew it was hopeless. Then you came." Donald paused. "Look, you've done me such a favor--I'll share the silver with you. There's enough on that tree for both my family and you. Only promise not to tell anyone else where it is."
Bink was tempted, but a moment's reflection changed his mind. "I need magic, not silver. Without magic, I'll be exiled from Xanth, so I won't be able to share the silver. With magic--I don't care about wealth. So if you want to share it, share it with the tree; don't take all its leaves, but just a few at a time, and some of the silver acorns that drop, so the tree can go on living in health and perhaps reproduce itself. In the long run that will be more productive anyway."
"It was a fortunate day for me when you dropped into my cave," Donald said. He banked into a curve, going down.
Bink's ears popped again as they descended. They dropped into a forest glade, then walked half a mile to an isolated, run-down farm. It took that much motion to completely eliminate the fingering cramps in Bink's legs. "Isn't it beautiful?" Donald inquired.
Bink looked at the rickety wooden fence and sagging roof. A few chickens scratched among the weeds. But to a man who had love invested here, love enough to sustain him two years after violent death, it must be the fairest of ranches. "Um," he said.
"I know it isn't much--but after that cave, it is like heaven itself," Donald continued. "My wife and boy have magic, of course, but it isn't enough. She cures feather fade in chickens, and he makes little dust devils. She brings in barely enough to feed them. But she's a good wife, and lovely beyond belief."
Now they entered the yard. A seven-
year-old boy looked up from the picture he was making in the dirt. He reminded Bink briefly of the werewolf boy he had left--was it only six hours ago? But that impression was destroyed when this boy opened his mouth. "Go 'way!" he yelled.
"Better I don't tell him," Donald said slowly, a bit taken aback. "Two years--that's a long time for that age. He doesn't recognize this body. But see how he's grown."
They knocked on the door. A woman answered: plain, in a dingy dress, her hair swept back under a soiled kerchief. In her heyday she might have been ordinary; now hard work had made her old before her time.
She hasn't changed a bit, Donald thought admiringly. Then, aloud: "Sally!"
The woman stared at him with uncomprehending hostility.
"Sally--don't you know me? I'm back from the dead to wrap up my affairs."
"Don!" She exclaimed, her pale eyes lighting at last. Then Bink's arms enfolded her, and his lips kissed hers. He saw her through Donald's overwhelming emotion--and she was good and lovely beyond belief.
Donald drew back, staring into the splendor of her love as he spoke. "Mark this, darling: thirteen miles north-northeast of the small millpond, beside a sharp east-west ridge, there is a silver tree. Go harvest it--a few leaves at a time, so as not to damage it. Market the metal as far away as you can, or get a friend to do it for you. Tell no one the source of your wealth. Remarry--it will make a fine dowry, and I want you to be happy, and the boy to have a father."
"Don," she repeated, tears of grief and joy in her eyes. "I don't care about silver, now that you're back."
"I'm not back! I'm dead, returning only as a shade to tell you of the tree. Take it, use it, or my struggle has been for nothing. Promise!"
"But--" she started, then saw the look on his face. "All right, Don, I promise. But I'll never love any other man!"
"My onus is abated, my deed is done," Donald said. "One more time, beloved." He bent to kiss her again--and dissipated. Bink found himself kissing another man's wife.
She knew it immediately, and jerked her face away. "Oh, sorry," Bink said, mortified. "I have to go now."
She stared at him; suddenly hard-eyed. What little joy remained in her had been wrung out by the brief manifestation of her husband. "What do we owe you, stranger?"
"Nothing. Donald saved my life by flying us away from the Gap dragon in the chasm. The silver is all yours. I will never see you again--"
She softened, comprehending that he was not going to take away the silver. "Thank you, stranger." Then, on obvious impulse: "You could share the silver, if you wanted. He told me to remarry--"
Marry her? "I have no magic," Bink said. "I am to be exiled." It was the kindest way he could think of to decline. Not all the silver of Xanth could make this situation attractive to him, on any level.
"Will you stay for a meal?"
He was hungry, but not that hungry. "I must be on my way. Do not tell your son about Donald; he felt it would only hurt the boy. Farewell"
"Farewell," she said. Momentarily he saw a hint of the beauty Donald had seen in her; then that too was lost.
Bink turned and left. On the way out of the farm he saw a whirling dust devil coming toward him, product of the boy's minor malice toward strangers. Bink dodged it and hurried away. He was glad he had done this favor for the prospector, but also relieved that it was done. He had not properly appreciated before what poverty and death could mean to a family.
Chapter 4
Illusion
Bink resumed his journey--on the wrong side of the chasm. If only Donald's farm had been to the south!
Strange, how everyone here knew about the chasm and took it for granted--yet nobody in the North Village did. Could it be a conspiracy of silence? That seemed unlikely, because the centaurs didn't seem to know about it either, and they were normally extremely well informed. It had been present for at least two years, since the shade had been there that long, and probably much longer, since the Gap dragon must have spent its whole life there.
It must be a spell--an ignorance spell, so that only those people in the immediate vicinity of the chasm were aware of it. Those who departed--forgot. Obviously there had never been a clear path from the north to the south of Xanth--not in recent years.
Well, that was not his concern. He just had to get around it. He was not going to attempt to cross it again; only a phenomenal series of coincidences had saved his skin. Bink knew that coincidence was an untrustworthy ally.
The land here was green and hilly, with head-high candy-stripe ferns sprouting so thickly that it was impossible to see very far ahead. He had no beaten trail now. He got lost once, apparently thrown off by an aversion spell. Some trees protected themselves from molestation by causing the traveler to veer aside, so as to pass some distance from them. Maybe that was how the silver oak had remained undiscovered so long. If someone got into a patch of such trees, he could be bounced far afield, or even routed in a perpetual circle. It could be difficult indeed to break out of that sort of trap, because it was not at all obvious; the traveler thought he was going where he wanted to go.
Another time he encountered a very fine path going right his way, so fine that natural caution made him avoid it. There were a number of wilderness cannibal plants that made access very attractive, right up until the moment their traps sprung.
Thus it was three days before he made significant progress--but he remained in good form, apart from his cold. He found a few nosegays that helped clear his nose, and a pillbox bush with headache pills. At irregular intervals there were colorfruit trees, bearing greens, yellows, oranges, and blues. He had fair luck finding lodging each night, for he was obviously a fairly harmless type, but he also had to spend some hours in labor, earning his board. The people of this hinterland were minimally talented; their magic was of the "spot on a wall" variety. So they lived basically Mundane lives, and always needed chores done.
At last the land wound down to the sea. Xanth was a peninsula that had never adequately been mapped--obviously! the unmarked chasm proved that!--so its precise dimensions were unknown, perhaps unknowable. In general, it was an oval or oblong stretching north-south, connected to Mundania by a narrow bridge of land on the northwest. Probably it had been an island at one time, and so evolved its distinct type of existence free from the interference of the outside world. Now the Shield had restored that isolation, cutting off the land bridge by its curtain of death and wiping out the personnel of invading ships. If that weren't enough, there was said to be a number of ferocious sea monsters. Offshore. No, Mundania did not intrude any more.
Bink hoped the sea would permit him to get around the chasm. The Gap dragon probably could not swim, and the sea monsters should not come too close to land. There should be a narrow section where neither dragon nor sea monster prevailed. Maybe a beach he could walk across, plunging into the water if the terror of the chasm charged, and onto land if magic threatened from the sea.
There it was: a beautiful thread of white sand stretching from one side of the chasm to the other. No monsters were in sight. He could hardly believe his luck--but he acted before it could change.
Bink hit the beach running. For ten paces everything was fine. Then his foot came down on water, and he fell into the brine.
The beach was illusion. He had fallen for a most elementary trap. What better way for a sea monster to catch its prey than a vanishing beach converting to deep water?
Bink stroked for the real shoreline, which he now saw was a rocky waste upon which the waves broke and spumed. Not a safe landing at all, but his only choice. He could not go back on the "beach" he had come along; it no longer seemed to exist even in illusion. Either he had somehow been borne across the water or he had been swimming without knowing it. Either way, it was not magic he cared to get tangled up in again. Better to know exactly where he was.
Something cold and flat and immensely powerful coiled around one ankle. Bink had lost his staff when the Gap dragon ran him down, and had not yet cut a new one; all
he had was his hunting knife. It was a puny resource against a sea monster, but he had to try.
He drew the knife from its sheath, held his breath, and lashed in the vicinity of his ankle. What held him felt like leather; he had to saw at it to sever it. These monsters were tough all over!
Something huge and murky loomed at him under the water, reeling in the tongue he sawed at. Yard-long teeth flashed as the giant jaws opened.
Bink lost what little nerve he had left. He screamed.
His head was underwater. The scream was a disaster. Water rushed into his mouth, his throat.
Firm hands were pressing his back rhythmically, forcing the water out, the air in. Bink choked and hacked and coughed. He had been rescued! "I--I'm okay!" he gasped.
The hands eased off. Bink sat up, blinking.
He was on a small yacht. The sails were of brightly colored silk, the deck of polished mahogany. The mast was gold.
Gold? Gold plate, maybe. Solid gold would have been so heavy as to overbalance the ship.
Belatedly, he looked at his rescuer, and was amazed again. She was a Queen.
At least, she looked like a Queen. She wore a platinum crownlet and a richly embroidered robe, and she was beautiful. Not as lovely as Wynne, perhaps; this woman was older, with more poise. Precise dress and manner made up for the sheer voluptuous innocence of youth that Wynne had. The Queen's hair was the richest red he had ever seen--and so were the pupils of her eyes. It was hard to imagine what a woman like this would be doing boating in monster-infested surf.
"I am the Sorceress Iris," she said.
"Uh, Bink," he said awkwardly. "From the North Village." He had never met a Sorceress before, and hardly felt garbed for the occasion.
"Fortunate I happened by," Iris remarked. "You might have had difficulties."
The understatement of the year! Bink had been finished, and she had given him back his life. "I was drowning. I never saw you. Just a monster," he said, feeling inane. How could he thank this royal creature for sullying her delicate hands on something like him?