Strange Music

by Alan Dean Foster

  “All should join us,” the tall female was saying, “in returning to the life-water, in regaining its purity, and by so doing, cleanse themselves.” She now focused her attention on Wiegl, who suddenly wished to be elsewhere. He need not have worried. All she and her cohorts wished was to confer on him their equivalent of an aqueous blessing.

  “Will you show yourself, true to the life-water, and conclude the traditional test, that will prove your worthiness?”

  “I, uh, don’t know”—the guide’s response was conspicuously out of tune—“as I am ignorant, entirely ignorant, of what that might entail.”

  As one of her supple, muscular attendants moved aside, she took the few steps necessary to bring her to the edge of the water. “Nothing is required, but that you show your allegiance to the sea, by returning to its embrace, for the briefest of times.”

  “Oh, you mean, go for, a swim, a dip, a bath?” Wiegl glanced questioningly at his employer.

  “If this will only, take a few minutes, it might be an eye, toward future allies.” Flinx gestured at the salt water lapping gently against the rocky shore. “I will watch, and applaud the gesture, as some of my ancient ancestors, favored similar rituals.”

  Indicating to the Zeregoine leader his readiness to comply, Wiegl began to remove his lightweight outer clothing. As word of the stranger’s willingness passed among the procession, an inspirational chant rose along its length. The melody was new to Flinx, rich with exotic counterpoint between the males and females, as soothing as a lullaby.

  Beneath the overcast sky, Wiegl’s now wholly revealed fur was plainly in need of some serious grooming. Flinx smiled to himself. The short swim would do the guide good. Having entered the water ahead of him, several of the already unclothed followers were frolicking in expectation of his joining them. It was the first time Flinx had seen a group of Larians in the water. Propelled by their short but powerful tails and webbed hands and feet, they dove and darted about like seals. They would have been quite at home in the seas of Cachalot, provided the water was not too warm for them.

  As the singing from the crowd rose higher and higher, those in the inlet beckoned to Wiegl, who now stood at the water’s edge. Once again Flinx cast his talent into the assemblage, and once more encountered only joy, delight, and contentment. At the moment, he was feeling pretty good himself.

  Until two of the attendants stepped forward, slapped a metal cuff around the guide’s right ankle, and ceremoniously shoved him forward. As a startled Wiegl toppled into the water, he was followed by a heavy chain. This was attached to a cube of solid iron on which were inscribed a variety of Larian hieroglyphics and words. The holy weight took him straight to the bottom. As this was composed of dark rock spotted with a few plants, Flinx could lean out and see the guide clearly through the unpolluted water.

  Settling onto his feet at a depth of no more than four meters, Wiegl crossed his arms and stood patiently. The attendants who had preceded him swam nearby, gesturing and genuflecting in his direction. Initially flustered by the Zeregoines’ actions, Flinx now relaxed. In the crowd and in the water nothing had changed. As for Wiegl, he appeared completely at ease.

  Flinx was, too, until he felt something slip around his own right ankle.

  “Hey, wait a minute…I can’t breathe und—” Though he remembered to employ singspeech, his objection was so terse and atonal that it generated no reaction among the earnest Larians who had just snapped a metal anklet around his own leg. Before he could turn or object further, he felt himself being shoved forward. Failing to catch his balance, he went into the water headfirst.

  The coldness of it shocked him. He just did manage to gasp out a single word—“PIP!”—before the weight attached to his ankle chain dragged him under and down.

  His desperate cry was unnecessary. Having instantly detected the change in her master’s emotional state, the flying snake came rocketing out of her traveling tube. In seconds she was hovering directly above him, peering helplessly downward as he stood on the bottom flailing at the surrounding water and gazing upward with wide eyes. The salt water burned, but he was able to see with relative clarity.

  Like a dragonfly monitoring a tiny fish, the minidrag repeatedly zoomed back and forth over her submerged master, unable to do anything for him. Meanwhile the Zeregoines on shore sang out the Larian equivalent of oohs and aahs at the antics of the iridescent, brightly colored alien flying creature, not realizing she was in a complete panic. Pip could have turned and, unleashing her poison judiciously, killed at least two dozen of them. But in scanning for an enemy, she found none. Their actions had been entirely benevolent; the feelings that radiated from them presently were wholly caring.

  Unable to source a menace, the frantic minidrag was reduced to circling above the fully submerged Flinx, who stared up at her with a sense of increasing doom.

  He struggled futilely against the single manacle. How ironic, he thought madly, if having spent the most recent and contented days of his life on a world of water, he should finally meet his end by drowning on an entirely different one.

  Lowering his gaze, he saw Wiegl peering at him anxiously. The guide’s emotions, at least, were full of concern and genuine alarm. It was becoming swiftly apparent to him that humans, whatever their other wondrous abilities and skills, were not waterfolk, had never been waterfolk, and likely never would be waterfolk.

  How long could a Larian stay submerged? a rapidly weakening Flinx wondered. Five minutes? Ten? Twenty? His lungs were burning. In seconds they would be on fire, demanding air. He closed his eyes. He would have to open his mouth, would have to try to breathe, and sucking in only salt water, would choke, unable even to cry out, unable to gasp a final farewell to Pip, or to poor Clarity, or to Mother Mastiff, or any of the—

  Something small and warm pushed itself against his mouth. Opening his eyes, he saw that Wiegl had just enough slack in his chain to struggle over to the nearby human. Stretched to its utmost, the breathing proboscis on the guide’s snout was pushing against Flinx’s lips, an oversized dark-hued worm seeking entrance.

  Holding back the gorge that started to rise in his throat, Flinx parted his lips just enough to permit the organ entrance. It was not unlike forming a watertight seal around a straw, albeit one that was part of a living being. Glancing down, he saw Wiegl looking up at him, their line of sight only slightly misaligned due to his position. Expanding his cheeks, the guide held the facial gesture for a moment, then blew.

  Air filled Flinx’s throat and lungs. He fought against inhaling sharply, forcing himself to let the flow of life-giving atmosphere enter at its own pace as Wiegl shared his stored air with his companion. It arrived with a surprising and unexpected amount of force. Perhaps, Flinx thought giddily, the Larians had the ability to draw and hold air in their lungs under pressure. That would explain the ability to remain underwater for extended periods of time. Larian lungs would be thicker and stronger than those of a human, and peppered with a higher concentration of alveoli, or whatever passed for the local equivalent.

  Sharing his air with Flinx would shorten the amount of time Wiegl could stay submerged. Flinx had just enough time to wonder how long that might be when Wiegl’s slender, deft fingers started working on his ankle. Restraint vanished as the ceremonial weight was released. Instantly, instinctively, he kicked for the surface.

  Pip greeted him by landing on his shoulder, wrapping herself lightly around his neck, and machine-gunning his dripping, gasping face with the tip of her tongue. Far more relaxed and not even struggling for breath, Wiegl surfaced nearby.

  “I did not think, that you would join me, in proving yourself, to the satisfaction of our new ‘friends.’ ”

  Dazed but conscious and thankful to still be alive, Flinx let his talent roam through the still-chanting crowd. They were as happy, as contented, and as pleased by what they had just witnessed as could be imagined. A friendly folk, were the Zeregoines, who held nothing but the best of intentions toward everyone th
ey met. All they needed, an exhausted and coughing Flinx mused, were some basic lessons in offworlder biology.

  He was all right, though. Thanks to Wiegl, he had survived. Maybe he had nearly drowned, but he was now a fully fledged, respected member of the Yolaig sect of the Zeregoines of Largess. One more sobriquet to add to his long list of unsought, unsolicited accomplishments.

  He was so grateful to be alive that after changing into his one set of dry clothes he did not even object when the joyful Zeregoines requested, and received, his permission to shave the mark of their sect into the only place on his body that boasted sufficient fur to show their identifying chevron. They did Wiegl simultaneously. When they had finished, and the hymnlike equivalent of a cheer went up from the procession, human and Larian compared their newly revised cranial façades.

  “It becomes you,” Wiegl sang thoughtfully, “as it makes you a member, of an exclusive group, to which only select Larians belong.” His ears and nostril bobbed to show amusement. “I think I can sing, without contradiction, to the fact that, you are surely, the first human Zeregoine.”

  Reaching up, Flinx felt gingerly of the shaved space on his forehead and wondered what Clarity would make of it. Pip lay draped limply around his shoulders like a rubbery necklace, worn out from her desperate attempts to help him and by her own overactive metabolism.

  “We know what you seek.” Flinx hoped the request he was about to make would not cause him to stumble over some unknown religious trip wire. “And we wish you success, but our own search is proving difficult. I wonder, and my companion wonders”—Wiegl looked at him sharply—“and many others wonder, if in your travels, if in your recent passing, you have encountered a great strideship, walking north?”

  The leader bent as the advisor on her right sang softly into her ear. As she listened, her breathing proboscis shifted back and forth, swaying freely while the rest of her body held steady. She straightened.

  “Normally we would not bother, to share any information with others, not of immediate interest, not in our own interest. But you now are two of us, fully vested, having passed the test, and emerged cleansed by the Mother Water.

  “There was such a ship; not great by our standard, but substantial to be sure. One such strode past us, strode going in the other direction, heading north, not two days ago.” Her tone turned disapproving, switching from flute to bassoon. “All aboard seemed trapped in time, of expectant futures and artificial reality, as if through sheer invention, they could achieve perfection. Unlike the Zeregoine, unlike our acolytes—unlike you—they drive themselves to acquire more, when the way to truth lies in acquiring less. They live not on the land but for it; their land controls them, and casts its pernicious spell, in the form of unneeded attire and objects.” A concurring threnody rose from those within earshot of their leader.

  “Toward Minord.” Flinx did not know how to sing it properly, but he was understood, if gently criticized for his delivery.

  “Toward Minord,” the leader confirmed, “Minord of the great bridge, Minord of much smoke, the Leeth of Minord. I fear its people take no interest in salvation, and seek only the offspring, of illegitimate industry. It is said the new Hobak dabbles in fantasy, and imagines himself, ruler of the world, and forgets his heritage.” She leaned toward Flinx. Pip slumbered on, so he didn’t flinch.

  “Is that where you go, new brothers, on your journey, on your brund?”

  Wiegl’s acknowledging gesture spared Flinx the necessity of a reply.

  The leader made a wide sweep with one arm. “Our hopes will go with you then, that you might through your recent learnings, bring some education to that benighted public, and to its addled officials.”

  “We’ll certainly convey, the depth of Zeregoine feeling,” Flinx assured her, “whenever the opportunity, might conveniently present itself.”

  Which would hopefully be never, Flinx thought. Proselytizing for an alien religion was not on his immediate agenda. He decided he liked the Zeregoines even if he didn’t agree with them. They were an undeniably pacific folk, overflowing with nothing but good feelings—even when they had done their best to try to drown him.

  “Two days ahead,” murmured Wiegl speculatively, “not close enough to overtake, but not far enough to lose track of, given our present position. If we make haste, we may ride in on their tails, or in the case of a strideship, one of their legs.”

  They sang their final farewells, then: Flinx and Wiegl to resume their pursuit, the Zeregoines to spread their message while seeking a final return to the life of their seagoing ancestors. Could the members of this singularly Larian sect ever see their way to blending their desire for an earlier, simpler way of life with the advantages of membership in the Commonwealth? A whale might know, Flinx felt.

  But there were no wise cetaceans to consult here. Certainly there were sea creatures of size, though he and Wiegl were traveling too far inland to encounter any. He still had only his own knowledge to consult with, in concert with that of a single and not entirely reputable local.

  Wiegl showed some alarm as he studied his companion. “You look pale, my friend, as though still suffering, from the effects of your ‘deliverance.’ ”

  Wrapping his coat tighter around him even though he knew the action could not make it warm him any faster, Flinx smiled over at the guide. “Though we like to swim, it is better for one of my kind to be sunk in thought than sunk in water, better to be drying in the sun—if there was any sun in which to dry.” The sour grimace he cast skyward did nothing to make the interminable cloud cover part.

  He could still feel the fleshy pressure of Wiegl’s breathing organ forcing its way through his closed lips, the ecstatic relief provided to his aching esophagus by the pungent but lung-filling air it provided, and the gentle oddness of not breathing entirely on his own. Thinking back on it helped to shut out the clamminess that continued to cling to his bones as persistently as the memory of recent gagging. He shivered, and Wiegl observed the phenomenon with undisguised interest. Pip popped her head out of her breathing tube, examined him through unblinking slitted eyes, and, satisfied he was not dying, returned to her rest.

  Wiegl had saved his life. Of that Flinx had not the slightest doubt. If not for the Larian’s timely intervention, his human companion would have drowned. Why did he risk it? The guide had no way of knowing that if he interfered in the ceremony he would not be speared, or worse. An admitted gambler, he had taken a radical plunge into the unknown by sharing his breath with an alien.

  As with each impressive stride of their brund the densely vegetated low-growing landscape sped past, Flinx continued to wonder, and finally asked.

  “Why did you risk yourself to save me, back there, surrounded by zealous devotees, of a strange sect? They almost killed me, albeit unintentionally, and might easily have decided, to forcibly keep us apart, by killing, or at least maiming, you.”

  “Maybe it’s because I want to learn more about your Commonwealth. And your language. I can speak some of your terranglo, you know.”

  Following days and days of communicating via nothing but singspeech, the curt syntax of his own language hit Flinx hard. After the flowing harmony of the local means of communication, the sounds, the very cadence of terranglo, grated unexpectedly. It was the aural equivalent of walking barefoot across a field of pumice.

  “I don’t—” He caught himself. “I would prefer to talk, in your own language, as it may prove important to my undertaking, to be proficient in your tongue.”

  The guide was clearly disappointed, but complied. “There are times when singspeech gives the meaning better, of something intended, of thoughts that must be voiced, of one’s true meaning. But I occasionally find useful, your terranglo, which while harsh on the hearing, can convey certain things, and certain thinks, more swiftly. Like now,” he concluded in Flinx’s language.

  How quickly one grew used to melody, and fond of harmony, Flinx mused. “You still have not answered me, still have not told me, ha
ve not replied with an explanation, of why you saved me.” He was staring hard at the guide as the brund splashed through a wide, briskly cackling stream. “Despite your words, I cannot help but feel, that more than a desire to acquire knowledge, drove you to the act, and persuaded you of the risk. Had you returned to Borusegahm, with all of our kit, including my possessions, and told of a calamity, a catastrophe, an accidental death befalling your companion, none could know the truth, and all such would be yours to keep.”

  Wiegl was quiet for a moment, gazing out over the edge of the saddle basket at the dour landscape ahead. It duplicated the equally dour terrain on both sides of them, and echoed that which was falling behind. It did not match his mood, however, which remained thoughtful if not ebullient.

  “Better I may express it, if you will allow me, in my rudimentary terranglo, which I can only try to employ.” Turning to face his employer, his companion, his…friend?…Wiegl explained.

  “I’ve got a reputation to maintain.”

  Flinx indicated that he understood, and that he accepted the guide’s explanation. Privately he believed no such thing. From all he had been told, Wiegl the Guide had a reputation, all right. But while it spoke highly of his abilities and his competence, less was said of Wiegl’s character. Possibly because the guide preferred to affect an air of distance, and of superiority. Maybe among the Larians such individual characteristics were considered flattering. As far as that was concerned, Flinx was sure of only one thing.