Knot Gneiss

  The Demoness had cast off the euphemism and gotten to the essence. Love without sex. That would do for a working definition.

  I want a friend. That is the only way to learn the whole of it.

  It probably was, considering that none of the human nuances of feeling came naturally to a Demon, even one with a soul. If Eris had a lover—Jumper—and a different friend, she would in time be able to work out the distinctions between the two relationships.

  You.

  What?

  Friendships are not exclusive. You can be my friend as well as Jumper’s. If I learn how to appreciate your nature, I will have 92.532 percent of the qualities Jumper values.

  “But you’re a Demoness!” Wenda exclaimed aloud. Fortunately the others were absorbed in the sights, not paying attention to her.

  A Demoness and a mortal can be lovers. Can they also not be friends?

  And of course there was a case: if the one was true, so was the other. But a Demon! It was like a roc being friends with a mite.

  I asked Jumper if he would marry me. He accepted, and we married. I am asking you: will you be my friend?

  And what could she possibly say to that? Except yes.

  Thank you. Now I will retire and consider the implications.

  So would Wenda. The Demoness was doing it for practical, perhaps cynical reason: to grasp 92.532 percent of the qualities Jumper valued. But a genuine friendship would rise above any such number. Wenda only hoped she could measure up.

  Time had passed, and now they were reaching the foliage section of the planet. It was time for a rest stop. The roc was coasting down for a landing at the base of a branch.

  They landed in a suitably-sized glade by a pleasant river. Pie trees fringed it, and there was a fragrant breeze. Innocent rabbits hopped playfully about, playing bunny games. Naturally none of them trusted that.

  “We must be ready to take off again immediately,” Wenda said with alarm. “Those could be deadly monsters.”

  “Let me see,” Angela said. She was the one who could fairly safely approach an unknown threat. She flew from her place, away from the nearest bunny.

  “Oops,” she said, correcting her course. She wee-wawed, and finally managed to fly toward the creature. Wenda thought she might have gotten dizzy from the long ride on the roc.

  They saw her reach out to touch the bunny. Angela could not be touched by ordinary folk, but she could touch them, to a degree. First she reached away from it, then tried again and managed to touch it. She looked surprised. “It really is a rabbit!” she called.

  “But what about the reversal?” Hilarion asked.

  “It’s not reversed.”

  This was significant news. Hilarion jumped to the ground, reached up, then put his hand down, and touched the turf. He did not change.

  “The reversal’s gone,” Meryl said, amazed. She flew down, touched the ground with her tail, turned away from them, then around to face them. “Gone,” she repeated.

  Wenda walked down the wing, which remained visible, and to the ground. She removed her shoes. “Am I still me?” she asked.

  “You are,” Hilarion said.

  She meant to reach down to touch the ground with her hand, but instead she reached up toward the sky. Startled, she reversed, and got down. She still didn’t change. She turned to face the roc, but found herself facing away from it.

  Then she caught on. “Direction! We’re reversing directions!” That explained the peculiar motions of the others and herself.

  She put her shoes back on, and then was able to point or walk in the directions she chose. It was contact with the ground that brought it on.

  “I wonder,” Ida said. “If the nature of the reversal is different, here on the branch, what about the wood we carried from the trunk?” She walked to the wagon and touched it. And became the ogress.

  “That wood is from the trunk,” Hilarion said. “It retains its properties. Wood from the branch will reverse directions.”

  So it seemed. Now they knew that different parts of the tree had different reversal properties.

  They completed their break, then boarded the roc again. Jumper tried at first to plow into the ground, then corrected and managed to lift. Once he was airborne, he was all right.

  “That was odd,” Hilarion remarked. “Will we face a third type of reversal in the foliage?”

  “I suspect we will,” Ida said. “That may complicate our search for the Door.”

  Wenda was very much afraid it would. Eris had mentioned that the Door would be difficult to find, and she surely knew. Wenda would not ask her to clarify, because she didn’t want the Demoness to compromise her nonengagement protocol. They would have to find it by themselves.

  Is that decision a consequence of friendship? Eris asked.

  Wenda was startled. It wasn’t, but maybe it should have been. Friends did not try to get friends in trouble.

  Should I risk a Demon consequence to give you the information, for the sake of friendship?

  “No!” Wenda exclaimed aloud.

  Meryl looked at her. “Are we going in the wrong direction?”

  What could she say, except the truth? “I am talking to the Demoness Eris, mentally. She asked whether she should risk a Demon consequence, for interfering with another Demon’s domain, by telling us where the Door is hiding. I told her no.”

  You’re in touch with Eris? Jumper’s thought came.

  She is, Eris responded to them both. Do you object?

  No. I am merely surprised. What do you care about her?

  I am trying to learn how to be more human, so I can better please you. I enlisted Wenda as a friend.

  Good enough, Jumper agreed. She’s the best friend a person could have.

  “You did right,” Hilarion said. “Eris has helped us tremendously, notably by enhancing Jumper. We wouldn’t want to get her in trouble for helping too much.”

  “I agree,” Ida said. “We must handle our mission ourselves. We will find that Door.”

  You are all friends! Eris exclaimed to them all, mentally.

  “Yes, we are, to an extent,” Meryl said. “We don’t know each other as well as Wenda and Jumper do, but we’re working on it.”

  But this is not rational. You could suffer mischief because of it.

  Hilarion shrugged. “Friends do.”

  Demons do not.

  “We aren’t d*mons,” Angela said, with an angelic smile.

  Indeed you are not. This passeth understanding.

  “If you explore your piece of my soul more carefully, you may be able to gain some understanding of it,” Wenda said. “We’re simply not very rational.”

  I will do that. The Demoness’s mental presence faded.

  “She must be interesting to be with,” Hilarion remarked to Jumper.

  She is. But I think this will make her more interesting.

  “More?”

  She has assumed that all I want from her personally is stork summoning. I do want that; she is phenomenally good at it. But I want more, and she doesn’t understand why or what.

  “I think she envies me,” Wenda said. “Because Jumper likes my company without storks.”

  I do, Jumper agreed. I liked you from the start, and would have accepted storks with you, but our friendship is better. That’s really why I came on this Quest: to be with you again.

  “That’s why I asked you,” Wenda confessed. “To be with you.”

  “I think we all understand,” Meryl said. “We interact, we struggle, we kiss, but these are mere superficialities. We like each other’s company.”

  There was a general murmur of assent.

  As evening approached, they were well into the foliage section. Jumper glided down for a landing on a green section that seemed to be a giant leaf, so big that it soon extended beyond the horizon. He touched ground.

  Wenda realized that she was holding her breath. But nothing happened. There seemed to be no reversal of appearance or direction. That was suspic
ious.

  Hilarion jumped down, then turned and held up a hand to help Ida down. She accepted it, and joined him on the ground. In one and a half moments they all were standing there, and Jumper changed to normal manform. “This is disgusting,” he said.

  “What?” Wenda asked, surprised.

  That isn’t what I meant to say, he thought to them all. I thought I was commenting on the pleasure of not being reversed.

  “Let me check,” Ida said. She removed her shoes and stood barefoot. “You’re crazy, you idiotic bug.” Then she put her hands to her face, evidently appalled.

  “Reversal!” Wenda said. “We are reversing what we say.” She removed her own shoes. “We are doing no such thing. We are all enemies.”

  Then they all touched the ground. “I can’t think why I associate with such a paltry lot of misfits,” Hilarion said.

  “That’s because you’re such an ugly, crude lout,” Meryl said.

  “As if you are any judge, you winged hussy,” Ida said.

  “You’re all wretches,” Angela said.

  Wenda made an effort. “We must all—say the opposite of what we mean. So that it comes out true.”

  “Reversing the reversal,” Hilarion agreed. “That is very stupid—I mean, smart of you, Wenda.”

  “Forget it, dope!” Wenda snapped. Then tried again, “I mean, thank you.”

  Meryl started crying. Then she caught herself, and managed to arrange the laugh she had intended. “Or maybe just let it reverse, and understand that it is the same—I mean, the opposite.”

  “No!” Hilarion said. “I mean, yes. It may be harder—easier to just let it happen and make allowances.”

  They did that, and soon had no further problem as they routinely exchanged insults. They foraged for pies, and found a nice pond to wash in.

  “This seems like a truly wretched world,” Meryl remarked as she finished her slice of greenberry pie.

  “Horrible,” Ida agreed.

  They settled down. The consorts arrived. “Charming!” Wenda exclaimed. “How awful!” She had quite forgotten, in the distraction of the language. She was in contact with the ground.

  He paused, taken aback. In the background she heard Angela talking to Beauregard in distinctly unangelic language, setting him back too. At least Jumper would not have to explain to Eris; they had telepathy.

  “I mean, how nice,” she said quickly. Then she spoke carefully. “Charming, here the reversals are of sound. It’s easier just to understand.”

  “Understand,” he repeated uncertainly. “What kind of sound?”

  “Like this,” she said. She kissed the back of her wrist, audibly. It made a sound that would have done a stink horn proud. “Try it yourself.” For now he was sitting down on the ground.

  He kissed his own wrist. And recoiled at the obnoxious noise. Then he put his hand under his armpit and pumped his arm. It made a lovely kissing sound. He smiled; he had caught on.

  After that it was actually fun, though it sounded as if they were fighting in a garbage dump. By the time the seven minutes were up, she was asleep too.

  It had been quite a day.

  9

  FRIENDSHIP

  In the morning they exchanged further insults, boarded the roc again, and took off for the north of the tree. Their speech reverted to normal. It was almost disappointing. The insults had become fun in their perverse way.

  I am slowly coming to understand friendship, Demoness Eris thought. Thanks to your clarifications, your soul fragment, and Jumper’s efforts to explain. Friendship is not entirely rational.

  “Yes,” Wenda murmured. It was a point she had made before, evidently difficult for the Demoness to assimilate.

  I want to be your irrational friend.

  Wenda had to laugh. “Welcome.”

  I will seek an avenue to complete my comprehension. Her mental presence faded.

  Wenda wished the Demoness luck. She had had her own problems relating to human things, when she was a true woodwife. It had been her association with Jumper that enabled her to become emotionally whole before becoming physically whole, despite the fact that he was not human, but a spider. She owed him that. His presence on this quest supported her and gave her confidence to continue that she would have lacked otherwise. She owed him that too.

  Thank you, Jumper’s thought came.

  Well, it’s true.

  I know. That’s why I appreciate it. You need me in a way Eris does not.

  They slept, as there wasn’t much else to do. When Wenda woke, they were landing again, at the top of the tree.

  Now there were giant flowers that gave off a scent that made Wenda think dizzily of every kind of possible reversal, and some impossible kinds. She was used to plants, but quickly learned to avoid these. The other members of their party were overcome before they could retreat. They sat beside the wagon, little curlicues and spirals emanating from their heads. All except Angela, who was not material enough to be strongly affected.

  “I don’t see a Door,” Angela said.

  “It must be at the other end of the tree,” Wenda agreed. “We’ll have to go there. But first I think we need to find more reverse wood to shield the Not.”

  “Yes. Will old flower petals do?”

  “They may. But I have another idea. There should be fruits, and seeds. Seeds could be very strong.”

  “I will look,” Angela agreed, and flew off.

  Wenda went to Jumper where he sat in human form, smiling deliriously. “Jumper! You’re intoxicated with fumes. Snap out of it.”

  He just continued to stare vaguely into space, little squiggles surrounding his head.

  “Jumper! You’re supposed to be invulnerable. Doesn’t that include your mind?”

  That got through to him. “It does not,” he agreed. He concentrated, and the squiggles faded. “Thank you for nothing.”

  “You’re my friend,” she reminded him, making due allowance for the reversal that affected him now that he was back in contact with the ground. Her shoes protected her. “Besides, we need you to take us away from here, once we find some reverse seeds.”

  “Door?” he asked.

  “No Door. I want to check the roots next.”

  “That makes no sense.” He was agreeing with her.

  Angela returned. “I found fruits! But they’re some distance away.” She pointed the direction.

  “Awful problem,” Jumper said. He assumed roc form. They got on, and he took off in the wrong direction. Oops! He corrected. The directional reversals remained in effect in the foliage region.

  They came to the fruits. There were several adorable dear eating them, spitting out the seeds. Wenda collected a considerable number of seeds and stored them in a bag, feeling their considerable reversal power. Her impression was that they featured all kinds of reversals, so that each could make a whole reverse-wood tree with all its parts.

  They returned to the wagon. Wenda made a net of thin vines, speckled with seeds, and spread it over the Knot in place of the worn-out shell. It worked; Jumper and Angela knew the difference immediately.

  Satisfied that the Door was not here, they organized for an overnight flight to the south of the tree: the roots. Jumper transformed to roc form, and they rolled the wagon on and anchored it. Then they all took their places, and the roc took off.

  The sound reversal stopped. They were normal, for the time being.

  There was nothing much to do but snooze. They did, as the roc winged steadily onward.

  Wenda woke when Charming appeared. “Charming! What are you doing here?”

  “It is dark. Conjugal time.”

  She realized it was true. She had slept through the night and day. “But we’re still in the air!” she protested.

  “Yes. Poor Eris can’t be with Jumper. But Beauregard and I have no problem.”

  Wenda saw that the others were asleep, except for Angela. So she embraced Charming. And in seven minutes he was asleep and gone. Sometimes she almost wish
ed he would stay awake another minute or two, so they could talk when the urgency of his physical interest had been abated. But that seemed to be too much to ask of marriage.

  What could she do? She went back to sleep.

  She woke in the morning. They were now flying above the base of the trunk, approaching the root. They had breakfast, washed up, and used closable privy potties Ida produced, so that the flight did not have to be interrupted.

  “What kind of reversal will we face when we touch the root?” Wenda inquired.

  Gender, Jumper replied mentally. Eris told me.

  Evidently incidental information was not a violation of the Demon Protocol. Eris couldn’t tell them where the Door was, but something they would soon discover on their own was all right.

  “We can wear shoes, and avoid it,” Hilarion said. “That I think is to be preferred.”

  “Or remain in the air,” Meryl said.

  No, Jumper thought. Eris says there are folk there we will want to interact with, and the moment we touch them, we will change, so it’s better to change at the outset and be consistent.

  “What folk?” Ida asked. “We are merely looking for the Door off this world.”

  The gnomes. They will know where the Door is.

  Oh. “So we’ll go barefoot and change orientations,” Wenda agreed, not entirely pleased. “But we must make clear to the gnomes that all we want is the Door.”

  “I lack experience with gnomes,” Meryl said. “Exactly what is it they do?”

  “They are normally miners,” Ida said, “working underground, and crafting things there. The men are rather squat and ugly, but the females, the gnomides, are petite and beautiful. They have a reputation for honesty and hard work. It won’t be like dealing with trolls or goblins.”

  “Actually the trolls of the trollway were all right,” Meryl said. “They did their business properly.”

  “They did,” Ida agreed. “But I think goblins would not.”

  “Wasn’t there a decent goblin?” Hilarion asked. “I believe I heard a story about one who married a goblin princess.”

  “That was Goody Goblin,” Ida said. “He was an exception, because he drank a reverse-wood beverage when young and got reversed. So he was nice, and reviled by other goblins. Fortunately Gwenny Gobliness was looking for a nice male, and she made a play for him, and of course took him.”