Moment Of The Magician

by Alan Dean Foster

  Besides, the image it conjured up made him distinctly uncomfortable.

  He tried to concentrate on the memory of their visitors instead. What could you call them? Earth-dwellers, rock people, stone citizens? Idly he wondered what would happen if thousands, millions of them joined together along a really big crack in the earth’s crust. Along the San Andreas Fault back home, say. What lay beneath that ancient fracture? Merely different sections of continental plate rubbing against each other? Or was it occasionally lined with millions of the geological folk joined head to tail, all preparing to produce one sudden, convulsive twist every hundred years or so?

  That thought wasn’t conducive to restful sleep either, here or on any other world. Geologic folk brought to the surface of the earth by his spellsinging: how absurd! As were so many things in heaven and earth that were no less real for their absurdity. Geological folks. Geo folk. Geolks. Since they had no name for themselves, he’d call them that. In his metnories, since it was highly unlikely he’d ever encounter them again. He drifted slowly off to sleep, wondering if he’d ever be able to go spelunking again without seeing luminous, insubstantial eyes all around him.

  Jon-Tom had hopes that the karst landscape they were passing through was an indication of drier country to come. Several days of steady travel southward quickly dispelled such hopes. The rocky spires became smaller and smaller and were not replaced by spacious, dry islands. Once again they found themselves paddling through scum-encrusted stagnant water beneath umbrellalike, drooping trees. . As they progressed he came to at least one decision: if Clothahump ever asked him again to undertake another “pleasant little journey,” he was going to insist first on getting an accurate, non-metaphorical description of the country he was going to have to cross.

  But of course, that wouldn’t matter, because he and this Markus the Ineluctable were going to become fast friends, and Jon-Tom was going to utilize their joint talents to enable him to return home. That exhilarating thought helped sustain him as he and Mudge slogged on through the relentless heat and humidity.

  At midday they usually paused for a rest and a brief snack, and also to allow the steaming sun an hour or so to fall from its zenith. The little islet they chose was not particularly inviting in appearance— full of odd-shaped, inflexible growths and gnarled protrusions—but it was the only dry land in the unstable bog they were presently traversing.

  Return home. Home meant Big Macs and Monday Night Football, throwing Frisbees at the beach and watching Saturday morning cartoons. . . the good old stuff, not the sloppy new crap. . . catching up on his back work and the movies he’d missed. If there was any back work for him to return to. As far as anyone at the university was concerned, he’d simply disappeared, dropped out, quit. He was going to have a hell of a time getting his active status restored, much less changing the incompletes he’d have received in class. Sure he was.

  All he had to do was tell them what he’d been doing these past months. Sorry, counselor, but you see, I just happened to find myself yanked through to this other world, but if my friends Clothahump and Mudge were here to explain. . . Clothahump, see, he’s a wizard. A turtle, sir, about four foot high. Mudge is taller, but that’s because he’s an otter and,. . excuse me, counselor, but who are you calling?

  No, he’d have to concoct something a bit more believable than that. Believable and elegant. Maybe he could tell them that he’d become bored with the routine of studying and had gone off to South America to expand his mind. Professors always liked to hear that you’d been expanding your mind.

  A light tremor made the ground shift slightly beneath them.

  “Your ghostly friends again,” Mudge suggested, his words garbled because his mouth was full of fish jerky.

  Jon-Tom gazed down at the slick surface they sat upon. It was bright daylight and hard to tell, but he didn’t see any sign of the geolks. Besides, he wasn’t playing anything on his duar. Maybe they were just lingering in his wake, hoping he’d play again sometime soon.

  He bent over, squinted. Very strange ground. Dead and dying vegetation, lichens and mosses, algae and crustaceans. “I don’t think the geolks are around, Mudge. Anything could shake this pile of humus we’re sitting on. Maybe it was a passing wave.”

  The otter gestured at the stagnant water surrounding them. “Ain’t no waves here, mate, except the ones you and I make with the raft.”

  A second tremor rattled their senses, much stronger than the first. Gingerly, Jon-Tom rose to a standing position.

  “Uh, Mudge, I think it might be a good idea if we got back on the raft. Real quiet- and quick-like.”

  The otter was several syllables and three steps ahead of him. The shaking resumed and now it was constant as Jon-Tom half ran, half stumbled toward the raft.

  The island was beginning to rise beneath them.

  X

  “Damn it, mate, move your arse!” Mudge yelled as Jon-Tom fell to hands and knees. The otter extended a paw out to his friend.

  Jon-Tom tried to stand, but the surface under his feet was now shaking like Jell-O as it rose from the water. He gathered himself and leaped, landing hard on the raft. Mudge shoved frantically at the paddles, trying to push them back into the water.

  Too late. The island had risen on all sides, and they found themselves ascending into the damp air along with the beached raft. Water rushed off the black hillside, turning to foam where rising mass met the swamp. Mudge lay flat on the deck of the raft, clinging to the vines that held the logs together, while Jon-Tom wrapped both arms around one of the paddle poles. They were surrounded by strange growths which seemed to be attached to the island’s bulk even where it had rested beneath the water. They resembled the skeletons of dead cacti, hollow and light.

  Shellfish, snails, and other inhabitants of shallow-water environments scrambled for the water as their homes were lifted into the air. Jon-Tom would have joined them, but they couldn’t abandon the raft and all their supplies.

  The section of island on which they teetered finally stabilized, but the black land ahead continued rising. This substantial tower of mud and swamp ooze didn’t stop growing until it loomed threateningly over them. Innumerable bottom-dwellers, frantic fish, and trapped underwater plants dripped from the tower’s sides.

  Then the ooze opened its dozen or so eyes and stared down at the puny creatures marooned on its back.

  Mudge let go of the vines, put both hands over his eyes, and moaned, “Oh shit!” while Jon-Tom continued clinging to the paddle nearby, staring wide-eyed up at the emergent mountain of swamp muck.

  “Ho, ho, ho!” said the apparition, showing a dark, toothless mouth more than wide enough to swallow the raft and its occupants whole. “What have we here? Strangers!”

  Jon-Tom tried to smile. “Just passing through.”

  “You scratched me.” The voice was heavy, ponderous, and slow.

  “We’re sorry. We didn’t mean to.”

  “Oh, that’s all right. I liked it.” It grinned hugely, Jon-Tom noted that the size of the vast mouth wasn’t fixed. It expanded and contracted and sometimes tended to slide toward the side of the head. So did the eyes, which ballooned from tiny dots to globular bulbs the size of a car. The vast curving bulk blotted out trees and sky.

  “I am,” Jon-Tom replied carefully, “relieved to hear it.”

  “You’re nice,” said the ooze. “Different. I like different.” Eyes indicated the surrounding swamp. “Nothing here is different. Everything’s always the same. I like different.”

  Jon-Tom’s arms were cramping. Slowly, he loosened his grip on the paddle pole. “You live here in the swamp?” Now, there, he thought, was a clever question.

  The answer was not as self-evident as he believed. A slow, rippling laugh emerged from somewhere down in the depths. It sounded like distant drums.

  “Sort of. I am the swamp. I am the “ and it said something incomprehensible. Jon-Tom frowned. “Sorry. I didn’t get that last.” The intelligent ichor repeated t
he rumble, which sounded more like a volcanic belch than anything else.

  “What do you make of that, Mudge?” “Indigestion, or else its name is Brulumpus.” The otter had recovered enough courage to peek out between his shielding fingers.

  “Brulumpus,” Jon-Tom muttered to himself. He kept his eyes on those of the swamp, which wasn’t an easy task, considering how they tended to float in and out of the black goop. They moved about like marbles in oil. A queasy concept. He tried to think of something else.

  “That is me, the ” and it made the belching sound again.

  Jon-Tom let go of the pole. Despite its size and bulk, the mountain of muck did not sound threatening. If anything, it seemed to be making an effort to be friendly. Also, Clothahump had once told him never to let himself be intimidated by mere size. That was not so easy to do when a potential threat completely surrounded you.

  He tried to phrase his words carefully. The Brulumpus didn’t seem especially bright. “Very pretty swamp you are. I’m glad we haven’t bothered you.” He gestured with his left hand. “We’re on a journey south.”

  “That’s nice,” said the mountain.

  Not very bright at all, Jon-Tom mused. “Now, in order for us to be able to continue on our way, we have to have our raft here back in the water. Could you”—and he described the action with his hands— “let us down so we can get back in the water to continue our journey?”

  “Continue your journey.” The sides of the Brulumpus shimmied and Jon-Tom had to steady himself with the paddle. “But you are different. You are a change. I like different. I like changes.”

  “Yes, and we like you, too, but we really do have to be on our way. It’s very important.”

  It made no impression on the Brulumpus. “Change. A change,” it repeated ponderously. “I want you to stay and be different for me.”

  “We’d love to, but we can’t. We have to be on our way.”

  “Stay. I’ll keep you close to me always and take care of you. You want food, I can give you food.” A portion of submerged swamp rose. Trapped within the cuplike shape was a whole school of small, silvery fish. They fluttered helplessly for a moment until the swamp sank again.

  “If you are wet, I can make you dry.” Jon-Tom and Mudge winced as a thick shield of solid goo arched from the water to shield their raft from the clouds overhead. It hung there for several seconds before withdrawing.

  “I will hug you and love you and keep you,” announced the delighted Brulumpus.

  “That’s awfully sweet of you, and we’d love to take you up on it, but we really have to—”

  “Hug you and love you and please you and pet you and Jon-Tom was about to reiterate his protest when a strong paw on his wrist made him hesitate. Mudge stood on tiptoe to whisper.

  “Stow it, mate. Can’t you see you’re not gettin’ through to it? Garbage you’re tryin’ to be logical with, and it with brains to match. It ain’t goin’ to let us leave any more than the mimevines were goin’ to.” “But it has to let us go.” The duar rested comfortably against his back. “I can always try singing us out.”

  “Don’t know as ‘ow that’ll work this time, guv. I don’t know if this pile o’ shit is smart enough to be spellsung. ‘Tis friendly enough now. We sure as ‘ell don’t want to do nothin’ to upset the little darlin’. It doesn’t move real fast and it doesn’t think real fast, and it just might get irritated-like before your spellsingin’ could ‘ave any effect.”

  “Keep you happy and feed you and hug you.” The Bruiumpus kept repeating the paternal dirge over and over.

  “Then what do we do, Mudge?” “Don’t look at me, mate. I’m just suggestin’ caution, is all. You’re the would-be wizard around ‘ere. Me, I just copes with things as they come. Ordinary things, everyday things. Ill fight me way through any swamp, no matter ‘ow filthy and disease-ridden. But I’m damned if I’m goin’ to sit and argue with it.” “You’re such a great help to me, Mudge.” The otter smiled thinly. “ ‘Tis all done out ‘o gratitude for the wonderful opportunities you’ve sent me way, mate.” He put his paws to his ears to try and shut out the Brulumpus’s unbroken recitation of love.

  “Touch you and hold you and feed you. . .” “Wotever you’re goin’ to try, mate, try it soon. I ain’t certain ‘ow much longer I can stand listenin’ to that slop.” “What do you expect from slop except slop-talk?”

  Keeping Mudge’s warning in mind, he tried to decide what to try next while the Bruiumpus persisted with its affectionate litany.

  It liked them because they represented a change in monotonous surroundings, because they were different. That couldn’t last forever. Eventually it would grow bored with them. Given its low level of intelligence, however, that day might be a long time in coming. How long? No way to tell. The Bruiumpus might continue loving and holding and petting them for a couple of decades. Or even longer. If the Bruiumpus was indeed a part of the Wrounipai it might be extremely long-lived. It might not tire of them until they’d become a couple of desiccated corpses waiting to be shucked off like any other kind of boredom.

  What did it find so different, so intriguing about them? Not their appearance, surely, for there was nothing distinctive about either man or otter. Their intelligence, perhaps? Sure, that had to be it! The Wrounipai wanted more than companionship and company. It wanted to listen to some new conversation, wanted what it couldn’t get from a tree, a rock, a fish.

  There had to be a way out, a way that would allow them to depart without alarming their benign captor. “Want to hear something interesting?” The mountain of muck leaned forward, drenching one end of the raft with scum and swamp water. Jon-Tom and Mudge retreated hastily to the other end. “That’s close enough. I’ll speak up if you can’t hear me clearly.” Proximity to that gaping, bottomless maw was disconcerting despite the Brulumpus’s avowed good intentions. Maybe one day soon, out of boredom, instead of hugging and petting and loving them, it might decide to taste them.

  “Go ahead,” it told Jon-Tom, “say something interesting. Say something different.”

  “Actually, we’re not all that interesting.” He tried to sound bored with himself. “We’re really very ordinary, even dull.”

  “No.” The Brulumpus wasn’t that stupid. “You are very interesting. Everything you say and do is different and interesting. I like different and interesting.”

  “Of course you do, but there’s something that’s a lot more interesting than we are. Something that’s new and interesting and different all the time.”

  The Brulumpus leaned back. Water sloshed against its flanks as it took a long time to consider this simple statement. “Something more interesting than you? Is it more lovable, too?”

  Jon-Tom hadn’t considered the last, but he was on a roll now and could hardly hesitate. “Sure. More lovable, more interesting, more different. More everything. It won’t argue with you or confuse you or even make you think. It’ll just always be there for you, interesting and lovable and changing.”

  “Where is it?”

  “I’ll bring it here for you to have, but in return, you have to promise to let us go.”

  The Brulumpus mulled the offer over. “Okay, but if you lie to me,” it said darkly, “if it’s not more everything than you are, then you’ll stay with me forever, so I can hug you and pet you and. . .”

  “I know, I know,” said Jon-Tom as he swung the duar around. He practiced a few chords. These songs would be a cinch for him to spellsing. Not only were they as deeply ingrained in his memory as any lyrics ‘he’d ever heard, they even had a compelling power in his own world.

  “Wot the ‘ell can you conjure up for this mess that fulfills all those requirements, mate?”

  “Don’t bother me, Mudge. I’m working.”

  The otter leaned back, glancing up at the thoughtful, expectant Brulumpus. “All right, guv, but you’d better satisfy this smothering pile o’ crud real soon-like, because I think it’s gettin’ to like us more by the minute. Though if
nothin’ else, your singin’ may change that.”

  Jon-Tom ignored the barb as he began to sing. Despite the threat posed by the Brulumpus, he was in fine form that day. Even Mudge had to admit that some of what the man sang actually bore some small resemblance to harmony.

  The first item that appeared in a ball of soft light on the Brulumpus’s back was a toy gyroscope. It held the creature’s attention only for a few minutes. Next Jon-Tom produced a grandfather clock. This was more intriguing to their captor, but he noted that Jon-Tom could produce the same noise as the clock’s chimes.

  Jon-Tom tried to interest it in a game of Monopoly, but the Brulumpus wasn’t interested in playing at real estate, being a considerable bit of real estate itself. With Mudge looking on warily, he produced in wild succession a food processor, a Fugelbell tree, and a performing flea circus. The Brulumpus had no use whatsoever for any of them. Mudge, however, made the acquaintance of the flea circus immediately, and dove into the water, digging and scratching frantically at himself.

  “You’ll drown the act,” Jon-Tom leaned over to tell him.

  “That ain’t all I’m goin’ to drown!” The Brulumpus boosted him back onto the raft, where he glared at the singer. “Let’s endeavor to stay clear of performin’ parasites, shall we?”

  Jon-Tom sighed. “It didn’t engage his attention very long anyway. Don’t worry. I’m just getting wanned up.”

  “Huh!” Mudge sat down and began wringing out his cap.

  The flea circus gave Jon-Tom the idea of trying to sing up something to infect the Brulumpus, but everything he could think of was more likely to afflict himself and Mudge than it was a mass of already corrupting ooze.

  So he concentrated on continuing the cornucopia of randomly interesting objects. He produced a model ship that ran by remote control, a clavier a lumifrres from an old Scriabin concert, a stack of Playboys, a coal scoop, a rocking horse. None held the attention of the Brulurnpus for more than a moment or two, and the space around the raft was beginning to resemble the back room of a Salvation Army store. Jon-Tom’s confidence was starting to slip.