The Flying Sorcerers

by David Gerrold

  No wonder I had seen no bonemonger here — they had all starved to death. When the local villagers wanted to indicate futility, they said, “You might as well go carve bone.”

  It was a fine time to find that out, I thought bitterly.

  Well, so I had no trade I must concentrate instead on Speaking for my village. I wondered if I dared tithe my people to pay me for the labor of Speaking for them. I had heard of villages where the Speaker collected a toll from each fully grown man. But I sensed that my tribe would object strongly. My control was still too weak for me to risk such a test of power.

  Then Wilville and Orbur would have to support me, that was all there was to it. But no, Wilville and Orbur were working for Shoogar and Purple in the lower village. Shoogar and Purple were accepting responsibility for the two of them.

  Mm. If they were taking care of my sons, they could easily accept the care of the rest of my family, including me.

  After all, it was the two villages that supported the magicians. If they were to support me too, they would in effect be paying my tithe without ever knowing it.

  Yes, it would work. I could tell Gortik that I had decided not to ply my trade until after the affair with Purple and Shoogar was settled. My skill as a diplomat would be required to help them work together in order to speed Purple’s ultimate departure.

  Yes, Gortik would accept that.

  I went to tell them what I had decided.

  I found Purple and Shoogar wrangling over a writingskin with complicated markings all over it. Wilville was sitting on a stone crying in frustration. Orbur was patting him on the back.

  The source of the trouble was a perplexing one. Purple was trying to convince Shoogar that the lines on the skin were a flying machine. Shoogar didn’t understand and neither did I.

  “Listen, lizardhead,” he was saying, “animal skins don’t fly. They need animals in them even to move.”

  The skin doesn’t fly!” Purple screamed. “It’s only something to put the flying machine lines on!”

  “Oh? Then the lines fly?”

  “No — these lines don’t, but they are a flying machine. That is, they are a —” He paused, having trouble choosing the right word,’-simulacrum.”

  “Nonsense,” said Shoogar, “if this were a simulacrum, it would be a flying machine in itself. How can it be a simulacrum and not be a flying machine?”

  “It’s a nonworking simulacrum,” insisted Purple.

  “Don’t be silly — the two terms are contradictory. It’s like saying it is a nonworking spell.”

  Purple muttered something in his demon tongue. “It’s like a doll, Shoogar, it’s —”

  “That’s what I mean!” Shoogar cut him off. “A doll is the person and the person is the doll. What more do you need to know?”

  “The doll isn’t the person. The doll is a doll!” snapped Purple.

  “And you are a frognose,” Shoogar snapped back.

  “Hah! You would be honored if a sheep emptied his bladder upon you!”

  “And you would be honored to be that bladder!”

  As one, they both rolled up their sleeves, preparatory to hurling curses.

  Without thinking, I stepped between them. Had I thought about it, I’m sure I would have been moving in the “ opposite direction. “Now stop this, you two — do you want to devastate another village?”

  “If it will remove this fungus eater from my eyesight, it will be worth it.”

  “A toad like you should be honored to live in my drop-pings.”

  “And where will you go?” I answered. “You’d both do better to wait until the waters recede before you destroy the island.”

  They hesitated. Before they could work up their fury again, I added, “Besides, you both swore oaths of fealty and truce. There will be no feuds and no duels. I will mediate all disagreements — now what is the problem?”

  Both spoke at once — like children, they were: This clotsucking dung beetle doesn’t know how to do the simplest of —”

  “Stop it! Now stop it!” I turned to Orbur, “Do you under-stand the conflict?”

  He nodded, They’re both fatheads.”

  Both magicians turned on him, spells at the ready, but Orbur didn’t blanch. He said, “Wilville and I understand what it is that Purple wants. If he’ll shut up long enough for us to do the work, we can begin building the framework for it. But not if we have to keep stopping to explain it to Shoogar, and not if we have to keep stopping to look at Purple’s drawings.”

  “But these are blue-drawings,” insisted Purple. “You need them in order to build the flying machine.”

  “Fine,” said Wilville. “Draw them when we finish. Then you’ll have the machine as a model to draw them from.”

  “But — but that’s not the way you’re supposed to do it,” Purple wailed. These are blue-drawings.”

  I looked at the animal skin. The lines were black on a brown background. Even with his seeing pieces, Purple’s eyesight was none too good. “I don’t see that the color of them is that important,” I said.

  “But it is — you’re supposed to have blue-drawings before you build the machine.”

  “It’s part of the spell, then?” I asked. Shoogar looked up.

  “Yes, I guess you could say that.”

  “Well, then why didn’t you say so?” Shoogar said.

  “I — I don’t know.”

  I looked at them both. “Then it is only a misunderstanding, isn’t it?”

  “I guess so,” said Purple, still looking confused. Shoogar nodded.

  “Fine. Then this is what we will do. Wilville and Orbur will start building the framework of the machine and Purple will do the blue-drawings. Shoogar will — well, he’ll do something, I’m sure. And I will stay here and help you organize.”

  They all looked at me. “You? Organize?”

  “You will need somebody to help round up labor for you, and materials.”

  They saw the wisdom of the point and nodded.

  “Besides,” I added, “someone like me will always be needed to mediate your differences. Now, Wilville, you and Orbur can start building the framework or whatever it is over there and —”

  “No, Father. We were thinking of building it up on Idiot’s Crag.”

  “Appropriately named. Why there? You would have to carry all your materials up.”

  “But it is a high place, a good place to launch a flying machine. And the sea will not rise that high. We can continue to build through Wading Season, if need be.”

  “H’m. A good suggestion. Then you and Orbur can start building the framework up on Idiot’s Crag and Purple will stay here and draw his blue-drawings. And Shoogar will uh — Shoogar will cast a rune of good luck.”

  Shoogar didn’t look any too pleased with his duties, neither did Purple. They both started to object, but I wouldn’t hear any of it. I insisted that Wilville and Orbur get to work assembling their tools up on Idiot’s Crag.

  “Now then,” I said to Purple, “if I am to organize this project, I will need to know what I am organizing. What other materials will we need?”

  Purple said, “What we are building is a giant boat, one which will be at least five manlengths long, maybe six. We’ll attach —”

  “Wait, wait. A boat? I thought you intended to fly.”

  “Yes, that was what I thought too. I would have used a basket, but if I have to come down on water at all, I would rather be in a boat than in a basket.”

  “That makes sense,” I said. Even Shoogar nodded. “Now how will your boat fly?”

  “We will make huge bags in which we will trap air that is lighter than air. We will attach them to the boat — they will lift it and the boat will float through the sky.”

  Shoogar looked up at this. “Air which is lighter than air? Is that like the bubbles of noxious odor that rise from the swamps?”

  “You have tried to use swamp gas to make a flying ma-chine?”

  Shoogar nodded eagerly.
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br />   That’s more intelligent than anything I would have expected of you, Shoogar. You are more advanced than I thought — that is just what we are going to do. In principle, that is — we will not be getting our gas from a swamp.”

  “Gas?” asked Shoogar. “You use a word —”

  “Yes, gas,” said Purple, waving his hands excitedly. “Air is many gases mixed together. The gas we will use will come from water. Now, do you see this?” Purple pointed to a circle on his animal skin. “This is a big bag. We will fill —”

  “That is not a big bag!” Shoogar screamed suddenly. That is a blue-drawing!”

  At that, I took Purple aside and explained to him that he’d better not try to use his blue-drawings to explain any-thing to Shoogar. Shoogar did not like blue-drawing spells because he did not understand them.

  Purple shrugged and turned back to Shoogar, “Uh, forget the blue-drawings, Shoogar. You are right, this is not a big bag, this is a blue-drawing. But we will use big bags to lift the boat. We will fill them with my lighter-than-air gas.” He turned to me. “We will need several things. We will need a boat shell. These people here do not know how to build boats as big as you did up north, and Wilville and Orbur know much about working with wood. They can teach the local boatsmith a thing or two. We will also need cloth, fine cloth, out of which we will tailor the bags. Fortunately, the weaving here is among the finest in the region. Thirdly, we will need gas to fill the bags. I can supply that”

  Then all is settled,” I said. “We can easily build the flying machine.”

  “Wrong,” said Purple; “unfortunately, Wilville and Orbur have so far been unable to find the proper materials for a boat frame.”

  “Huh? I thought you just said —”

  “They know only how to build boats out of heavy wood,” said Purple, “and this boat must be light as well as strong. It must be made out of the lightest wood possible. Secondly, the quality of the cloth here is still unusable for the gasbags. It is too coarse. We are going to have to teach these people how to weave finer material.”

  “And what about the gas?” asked Shoogar. “Is there some reason why we can’t get that either?”

  Purple shook his head, “No, it should be an easy matter to separate the water. I can use my battery, or Trone the Coppersmith can build me a spark-wheel.”

  “Separate the water? Battery? Spark-wheel?”

  “Water is two gases. We will separate them and use one in the gasbags.”

  Shoogar shook his head at this, but if it worked, it worked.

  Apparently Purple knew what he was talking about. The rest of us would have to wait and see. I delegated Shoogar the task of obtaining samples of cloth from the various weavers in the region. He protested at first, but I took him aside and impressed upon him the importance of having the right kind of spell materials. He protested until I pointed out that he could take advantage of the fact by acquainting himself with the local spells in the process. He nodded agreeably and left.

  Wilville and Orbur had already begun to mark out the outlines of the boat with stakes and twine. It looked like a large flat-bottomed barge.

  “No, no!” screamed Purple, when they explained to him.

  “It should be narrower, and it should have a keel, like so!”

  Put away the blue-drawings,” I insisted. “We don’t need them.”

  After he calmed down, we began again — this time at the beginning. Wilville and Orbur moved the stakes in to form a narrower outline. They shook their heads. “What will keep it from capsizing?” they asked.

  “Outriggers, we will have outriggers,” Purple explained that the boat should have narrow pontoons, held out like so from the sides.

  Then what will keep the thing level when it is suspended in the air?”

  “A keel, of course — a heavier beam of wood at the bottom of the hull.”

  “But if it is heavier, won’t it weigh down the boat too much?”

  He considered that. “You may be right. If it does, we may have to add another gasbag.”

  To tell the truth, I didn’t understand much of the discussion. It began to get too technical for me — but once Wilville and Orbur started to understand what Purple meant they began discussing the project in excited terms. The three of them argued happily back and forth, Wilville and Orbur nodding and gesticulating with every new idea.

  Indeed, at one point they began scratching diagrams in the dirt in order to help them understand. When they did this, Purple tried to bring out his blue-drawings again, but they rejected them as having little or no relevance at all to the project. It was the dirt-drawings which were necessary to the construction of the device.

  Obviously my sons understood what needed to be built and how to do it. The why of it sometimes eluded them, but Purple was willing to explain. Several times the boys suggested alternative and better ways — especially when the discussion turned to how they would rig the gasbags to the boat frame.

  “Why not sew up just one very big bag as large as all the others?” Orbur asked.

  Purple held up the hem of his robe of office in two hands and gave it a yank. It did not rip, but the weave parted easily. It looked like a piece of strainer cloth. “If all I have is one bag and this happens,” said Purple, “then I am marooned at sea, or even high in the air! But if I have many bags and this happens, I can only lose one at a time.”

  Orbur nodded excitedly. “Yes, yes, I see. I see.” They turned back to the problem of rigging the boat with a variable number of gasbags.

  When Shoogar returned from his task two days later, he bore with him a double armful of samples of different kinds of cloth. “I have visited every weaver on the island,” he puffed. “All are eager to supply our needs. This is their finest cloth.”

  That evening we met with them — it was a council of all the weavers of both the Upper and Lower Villages, and representative weavers from the four other townships of the peninsula/island. The five of us sat with them and discussed the possibilities of using each type of cloth.

  The only jarring note was Hinc — he demanded to know why I was officiating — a mere bonemonger.

  I replied that I was here as speaker, and also as organizer of the project.

  That failing, he challenged my sons, “And why are they here? I thought this was to be a council of weavers and magicians.”

  “It is — but they are helping to build the flying machine. They have as much right to participate in these discussions as you. Perhaps more.”

  Chastened, he sat down.

  Purple had two simple tests for each type of cloth. First, he would give each one a yank to see how easily the weave would spread. More than half of the samples failed this test. Purple said to the weavers who had submitted them that if they could not do better than that, then there as no point in their staying. Several left, just as glad that they wouldn’t be working with the mad magician.

  The second test was just as easy. He formed a sack out of each piece of cloth and poured water into it. He then counted slowly while the water leaked out. Clearly he was searching for the cloth that was tightest and would hold water longest. “If the cloth will hold water,” he explained, “it can be made to hold air. But if none of these cloths work, we will have to find one that will. Even if we must weave it ourselves.”

  We went through the finest goods in the region, while Purple shook his head sadly and told them that each was too coarse. None would hold water for more than a minute.

  Naturally the weavers bristled. Several more left in a huff. Had they not been facing the two greatest magicians in the world, undoubtedly they would have challenged us all to a battle for the right of survivorship at the following blue dawn.

  “Humph,” said white-furred old Lesta; “why do you want to carry water in a clothbag anyway? Why don’t you use a pot like a normal person?”

  The spell calls for a bag, you butter-wart!” snapped Shoogar. Lesta hissed back, but said nothing else.

  Purple ignored this
interchange. He lay down the last piece of cloth sadly and said, “It is as I feared — these are all too coarse for our purposes. Can’t you do better?”

  “Those are our best — and if they are the best we can do, then you will not find anyone anywhere who can match them, let alone surpass them.”

  Purple opened what he called his “impact suit and peeled it away from his arms and torso. He took off the shirt underneath — revealing (Gods protect us!) his pale, nearly hairless chest. I had known about this already from my number one wife, but the men of the other villages gasped in disbelief. The sight of Purple’s fat paunch was almost too much.

  Purple ignored it Instead he handed them the shirt — he pushed it at the man who had spoken. “Here is finer cloth,” he said.

  The man took it, he turned it over curiously and examined both sides. He rubbed it between his fingers.

  “That should prove to you that finer weaves are possible,” Purple said.

  Other weavers were reaching for it now. Quickly, the shirt was passed around the circle. It was sniffed at and tasted, touched and murmured over. The weavers were incredulous at its quality.

  At last it reached old Lesta. He held it up to the light and peered. He gave it a yank and peered at it again. He rubbed it between his fingers. He sniffed at it, made a face, and tasted it. He made another face. At last, he folded it into a sack and stepped to the center of the clearing. One of the other weavers, perceiving what he was intending, hefted a clay pot of water and poured it into the sack. It held.

  Lesta counted slowly, but only a little water seeped out — and at such a rate that it would take all day to empty the sack. “Humph,” he said and let the water splash to the ground. It glinted wetly in the red light. “You are right,” he said. “This is a fine piece of cloth — why don’t you use this?”

  “Because I haven’t got enough of it,” said Purple, retrieving his shirt. He began wringing the water out of it. “I want you to match this.”