“That,” said the general proudly, “is the Mulmun. Whoever wins the battle on the first of each month retains it. It is the symbol of the springs. While we hold it, the Wittens may not come near or make use of the warm waters. We’ve held it for six months now, at great expense, but it’s been worth it.”
Jon-Tom considered as he chewed on the contents of a long, thin nut. The meat was delightfully sweet, which was good, because it had taken him at least four minutes to break the tough shell.
“I think I understand. If you didn’t possess the Mulmun, then you’d have to relinquish your absolute control of the hot springs.”
The general nodded. “We carry it with us into battle each month. Should the Wittens win, they would take it back to Witten with them and dominate the springs for a month.” He chuckled, obviously relishing his opponents’ discomforts. “They must be very filthy by now.”
“I didn’t see it during the fight.”
“Do you think we’d risk putting it in danger?” the general asked him, aghast. “The possessors display it in its special container, well out of the way of the combatants’ arms but up where all can see it for inspiration. It is quite irreplaceable, quite.”
“Ghastly piece o’ puke, ain’t it?” Mudge whispered to his friend. The otter had found something alcoholic to imbibe and was draining his mug as fast as the dainty prairie lass nearby could refill it for him.
“Christ, watch your mouth!” Jon-Tom warned him anxiously. He smiled at the general. “Being a stranger here, it’s not for me to criticize your customs.”
“Then don’t,” Pocknet advised him blandly. “Enjoy your meal and be on your way. Now, tell me about your plans.” He looked eagerly at his tall guest.
Jon-Tom regaled their hosts with tales of his many adventures, and the underground citizens listened politely, for all that they thought he was the biggest liar to come among them in many a moon. None, however, denied the amusement value of Jon-Tom’s rambling prevarications, and they applauded politely at the conclusion of each anecdote.
The dinner also featured some live entertainment. Several captive Wittens were dumped in the center of the room, hauled erect, and tied to stakes so that the ladies, when not serving the tables, could pull the unfortunate prisoners to pieces. Jon-Tom found that this diminished his appetite considerably. His hosts seemed to find it uproariously amusing.
Several times Mudge had to lean over and warn his friend to keep his opinions to himself. You don’t insult true believers in the middle of their own church. Besides, hadn’t they seen worse outrages in their travels? Tomorrow they could leave, none the worse for the experience.
So Jon-Tom smiled thinly and made a show of enjoying himself. There wasn’t a damn thing he could do about it anyway. The “entertainment” over, everyone repaired to their respective bedchambers. Their hosts even managed to rig a bed of sufficient length for Jon-Tom to stretch out upon.
Comfortable though it was, it didn’t lull him to sleep. Instead, he lay wide-awake, thinking hard about all he’d seen and heard during the day.
The situation existing between Witten and Pault, two communities of similar size and population, was intolerable to a civilized human being. It was worse than intolerable: it was sickening, disgusting, a sin against common sense! It ought not to exist. It must not be allowed to continue.
Since no one else seemed to give a damn, Jon-Tom resolved quietly to do something about it himself.
VI
IT WAS PITCH-BLACK inside the burrow when he decided it was safe to move. A good five hours had passed since they’d retired, and, Jon-Tom reasoned, most of the underground community should be resting soundly.
He fumbled along the wall until he encountered one of the ubiquitous oil-soaked torches each hall and room was equipped with, struggled with his flint until it sprang to life.
“Mudge.” He moved quietly toward the otter’s bed. “Let’s go, move it. We’re getting out of here. We’re going to help these people whether they like it or not. Mudge?”
He put out a hand, feeling for the otter’s shoulder in the dim light provided by the torch. It went all the way down to the mattress. The covers came away with a yank.
“Well, shit,” he muttered, swinging the torch to inspect the rest of the room. No sign of the otter sprawled unconscious on the floor. Nor was he asleep in jhe bathroom, or in the hall corridor outside.
No one bothered him as he stood thinking furiously in the passageway. Could the reluctant water rat have run out on him this early in their journey? Knowing Mudge, that kind of desertion couldn’t be ruled out. Or was he off somewhere within the subterranean town, carousing with newfound buddies or gambling his shorts away?
Tough. He should’ve stayed with his companion. Anyway, the otter was a superb tracker. Jon-Tom was willing to bet he could find a vanished friend with ease. Let him stay behind if he wanted to and do his own explaining. What Jon-Tom had in mind was bigger than either of them, something that should have been done in this part of the world a long time ago. Fortunate chance had given him the opportunity to correct a monstrously maintained wrong.
In the darkness he struggled to retrace his steps. Down a hall, and sure enough, there off to the left was the dimly lit and now-deserted officers’ mess. The dishes had been cleared from the long tables. Lingering embers still glowed and popped in the three fireplaces, sending smoke up to the surface world above. Not a soul in sight.
He tiptoed across the floor between two of the tables until he stood before the central fireplace. None of the locals could reach the mantel, but it was an easy stretch for him. The Mulmun was heavier than it looked.
Back quickly out to the hall, and then he was running at a steady pace up an ever-ascending slope, the Mulmun tied to his belt and concealed by his flapping green cape.
There were sentries on night duty, a pair of wide-eyed and fully awake gophers. They recognized the guest.
“Evenin’, sor,” said one courteously. “You’re bein’ up kind o’ late for a day-dweller.”
Jon-Tom tried to bend to his right to hide the bulge at his waist. “Can’t sleep.”
“A sensible attitude,” commented the other guard approvingly.
“Thought I’d go for a walk.” How convenient, he thought, that the voluminous cape also hid his backpack. Its presence wouldn’t square with a brief evening stroll.
The guards weren’t in the least suspicious, however. Jon-Tom backed around them, smiling brightly. “Just a quick little look around. Got to be back early to wake my friend.”
The sentries exchanged a glance. “That’s funny, sor. Your companion went off toward the springs ‘bout an hour or so ago.”
“What? My friend? Are you sure?”
“No otters livin’ in Pault,” said the first sentry. “Had to have been him, right?”
“I guess so. Yes, it must’ve been him. That’s certainly interesting. The sly little cuss neglected to mention it to me. I will have to remonstrate with him, yes indeedy. I know. I’ll bet he went for a moonlit swim. Sure, that’s it.”
“He didn’t say anything to you?” Suddenly the second sentry seemed more than casually curious. “That is odd.”
“Oh, no, no, not really,” Jon-Tom assured him as he continued backing toward the exit, now tantalizingly near. “He does things like this all the time.”
“Funny time o’ night for a day-dweller to be takin’ a bath,” the guard went on.
“You know these water rats.” Jon-Tom’s smile was frozen in place. “So damned unpredictable.” He turned and jogged out onto the surface, leaving the puzzled sentries conversing noisily behind him.
Once out of sight he increased his pace to a run. Puzzled guards could be dangerous guards, especially if their curiosity matched their confusion.
More important, what the hell was the otter doing at the springs in the middle of the night, and why didn’t he see fit to tell his traveling companion about his plans for a nocturnal excursion? It didn’t make a
ny sense, which meant it was perfectly in character for Mudge. He paused only briefly to catch his breath and retie the awkward burden of the Mulmun.
It was certainly a lovely night for a swim. The moon was high, and pale silver light bathed the boulders and rising mist. Of the otter there was no sign, and the only sounds came from the bubbling, hissing springs.
Or was there something else? It rose and fell, but it didn’t sound like water bubbling or steam venting. It issued from behind a cluster of granite spires.
Jon-Tom approached them cautiously. The sounds were familiar and yet alien. Invading Wittens, perhaps, scouting out the terrain in preparation for next month’s carnage.
He peered over the top of the rocks. It was Mudge, all right. Only, he wasn’t alone. Jon-Tom thought he recognized the prairie dog lady who’d been serving them during the ceremonial meal. Coquettish little sprite. She was being anything but coquettish at the moment, however. Mudge was moaning softly and she was emitting a rapid sequence of high-pitched squeaks and bleats. Some were undoubtedly too high-pitched for Jon-Tom’s human hearing, but he got the idea fast enough. They weren’t talking about the weather. Matter of fact, they weren’t talking at all.
“Mudge!” he whispered.
“Wot the bloody ’ell is that?” The otter withdrew, only to lose his footing on the round stones and stumble head over heels. His paramour scrambled in the direction of her clothing.
The otter’s sharp eyes quickly found Jon-Tom staring down at him from atop the ring of boulders. He let out a tremulous sigh.
“Bless me bottom, mate, ’tis only you. Wot are you tryin’ to do, give me ’eart failure?”
“No.” Jon-Tom wondered why he was still whispering. The little lady cowered off in a corner. “Get dressed. We’re getting out of here.”
Mudge shifted rapidly from relieved to startled. “Wot, now?” He began gathering up his clothes and weapons. “Ain’t you got no sensitivity at all, mate?”
“I’m sorry, I didn’t know. If you’d bothered to tell me your plans for the evening…”
“… You’d’ve tried to talk me out of ’em, guv’nor. I know you. Wot’s the bleedin’ ’urry, is wot I wants to know?”
“Mudge, I saw these people fight today, brother against brother, more or less. I listened to their talk and learned their sordid local history. What we’ve got here are a bunch of people so immersed in an ongoing bad habit they haven’t the foggiest notion of how to cure themselves of it.”
“Your pardon, mate,” said the otter as he slipped into his shorts, “but wot we ’ave ’ere is a bunch of people who are perfectly ’appy with their lives just as they are.”
“That’s because they can’t break out of this cycle they’ve slipped into. Mudge, there’s plenty of hot water in these springs, more than enough to supply all the needs of both towns. It’s not like they’re fighting over a limited resource.”
“Jon-Tom, I’m beginning to think that your brains are a limited resource, wot? If they ’aven’t been able to make a peace stick between them for ‘undreds of years now, wot makes you think you can suddenly up and create one?”
Jon-Tom grinned at him, fumbled beneath his cape. “Because as a third party, there was nothing to stop me from taking this.”
The lady inhaled sharply at the sight of the revered Mulmun.
“This isn’t a symbol of the springs or of communal contentment,” Jon-Tom told him in an angry whisper, “but of stubbornness and calcification in the body politic. Now that we’ve taken it, they won’t have a symbol, a totem, to fight for. They’ll have to make peace.”
The otter said nothing for a long time, just stared at his patently insane companion out of wide, disbelieving eyes.
“You pinched their Mulmunk, or whatever the ’ell they call the bloody monstrosity. You pinched it.”
“Exactly,” Jon-Tom said smugly.
“Oh, mate, ’ow I do wish you’d talk with poor ol’ Mudge before embarkin’ on these pet projects of yours.”
“They went this way, sor,” said a not-distant-enough voice. One of the guards from the entrance to Pault. The next voice they heard was also familiar. It belonged to General Pocknet.
And he wasn’t alone.
“Come on!” Jon-Tom turned and raced for the causeway that crossed the springs.
“Later, luv,” said Mudge hurriedly, bestowing a brief, parting nose-rub on his betrayed lover. Then he was flying over the rocks in pursuit of his certifiable companion.
Armed prairie dogs, some only half-clad, others wearing odd bits and pieces of armor, soon appeared in their wake. They were squeaking bloodcurdling threats and waving swords and spears over their heads.
“Wait, listen!” Jon-Tom held the Mulmun in both hands, raised it over his head. “Give me a chance to explain!”
“Shut up, mate!” Mudge snapped, trying to increase his short stride and secure his vest simultaneously. He prayed he wouldn’t stumble in his hastily donned boots. “You can’t talk to this lot.”
“I have to! I’m sure once they hear what I have to say, they’ll see that I’m only doing this for their benefit, so that they and their neighbors can begin to live together in peace and harmony.”
“Snakeshit! I’m telling you they won’t listen to you.”
“They’ll have to. I’ve got the Mulmun.”
“Well, ’tis not just that which I fear disinclines them to sweet reasonableness, mate.” Mudge looked suddenly uncomfortable. “See, that sweet little powderpuff I was dallyin’ with back there amongst the mists ’appens to be the good general’s daughter.”
“Mudge! How could you? After all the hospitality they showed us, the food and the room and—”
“Don’t get sanctimonious on me, you naked baboon,” Mudge snapped up at him. “You’re the one who stole their fuckin’ symbol. If you’d been decent enough to ’ave let me in on your private reformation, maybe we wouldn’t be in this little fix.”
“And if you’d told me about yours…”
“You’d ’ave wot, mate? ’Ave concurred in and blessed the assignation? Not bloody likely! Cor!” He pointed ahead. “Too late, they’ve gone and cut us off. We’re finished. That’s about right, it is. Me ardor gets cooled before me body’s t’ get boiled.”
“Wait, won’t you listen? Listen to me!” Jon-Tom waved the Mulmun, prompting a roar of outrage from their pursuers.
“That’s it, mate,” said Mudge sarcastically, “stir ’em up good. We wouldn’t want to put ’em in a position to grant us mercy or nothin’ like that.”
“We’re not done for yet. Look!” He nodded ahead. “Troops from Witten. Their sentries must have heard the noise and sent for reinforcements.”
“Snatched from the jaws o’ death at the last instant,” said Mudge, relieved. “You cut it too close for comfort sometimes, mate. We ’ave their bloomin’ symbol. We’ll be treated like ’eroes in Witten, we will. Mate … where are you goin’?”
Jon-Tom had turned right. Instead of running toward the succor and safety offered by the Witten soldiery, which quickly forced its way across the causeway, the spellsinger was racing up a side path that led to the top of the highest hill in sight. They climbed as they ran, leaping boiling waterfalls and mudpots. Wittens and Paultines glared at each other in the darkness, but they were too busy to fight one another now. Besides, it wasn’t the first of the month.
“Mate, slow down, wot are you doin’?” Mudge was trying to comprehend his friend’s seemingly wild, random flight while keeping an eye on their pursuit. “We can’t outrun ’em all. Turn it over to the Wittens and we’ll be bloomin’ ’eroes. Or give it back to the ruddy Paultines, but do something with that ceramic abomination!”
“I intend to, Mudge,” said Jon-Tom grimly. “That’s why I stole it. I’m going to use it to show both groups the error of their ways.”
“We’ll be feelin’ the arrows o’ their ways in a minute. I don’t know why they ’aven’t tried to bring us down already.”
“They’re afraid I’ll drop the Mulmun,” Jon-Tom told him.
“Right.” Mudge relaxed a little. “I ’adn’t thought o’ that. That ghastly thing’s our insurance, wot?”
The slope increased just ahead. Water vented from a cleft in the modest cliff. Jon-Tom started climbing with Mudge right behind him.
By the time they reached the top the opposing soldiery had reached the base. Wittens and Paultines eyed one another by the light of their torches, undecided how to react to this unprecedented situation. Some wanted to fight, but for what? For the first time in memory, the all-important Mulmun rested in the hands of an outsider.
“Now, you listen to me, all of you!” Jon-Tom held the sculpture over his head. The significance of the gesture was not lost on his pursuers. In an instant, he had absolute quiet save for the hiss of water and the crackle of torches.
“I know what this is and what it stands for. So do all of you, or rather, you think you do. You believe it stands for honor and dignity and victory in battle. You’re wrong. It doesn’t stand for a damn one of those things. Where I come from we’ve had to deal with this kind of internecine stupidity a little longer than you have, and I think we’ve learned a few things about peace and about the futility of war.”
“Give it back to us!” shouted a voice from the crowd of Paultines. It was General Pocknet. “Give it back to us and we’ll let you depart with your genitals, man! As for that one”—and he gestured toward Mudge—“him I want!”
The otter made an obscene gesture in the general’s direction, concealing himself as he did so behind Jon-Tom’s bulk.
“No, give it over to us!” shouted the leader of the Wittens. “Give it to us and you can name your reward, man. You can wipe out the memory of six months of shame for us.”
“I’ll win the day for no group.” Jon-Tom held the Mulmun firmly in one hand and used the other to encompass the valley of the springs in a single sweeping gesture.
“There’s enough warmth and water here for all to enjoy. There’s no need to go through this mad bloodletting once a month. At heart I believe all of you are good, but you’ve been suffering from a communal illness for a long time, so long that you’ve no idea how to treat it. Well, I do, and I’m going to the lot of you right now.”