Being a Green Mother

by Piers Anthony

  "But not all demons are bad," the guitarist said, evidently sensitive about this matter.

  Jezebel smiled. It was night now, and she was in her sultry stage. "That depends on how you see it. To some, I am the most evil of creatures, because—"

  "Well, they don't know anything!" he said. "You just never had a chance, before you got aboard Jonah."

  "True. But still, it is not wise to trust a demon before you know him well. We don't know what motivates this Natasha, and if anything happened to Orb—"

  "But it's only speculation that he's a demon!" Orb protested. "Still, maybe it would be better to be sure," the drummer said. "We don't want to interfere, but if we could just get to know him, maybe..." He trailed off.

  "I will ask him to come and meet you, next time I see him," Orb promised, knowing there was justice in their doubt. Meanwhile, she practiced the Song of Awakening, which she knew as the Song of the Morning. The others were awed as the miraculous sound filled the fish and caused the chamber to darken, then brought the beautiful dawn and the sprouting of plants and blooming of flowers. It was illusion, of course, that faded slowly after the song was done, but a marvelous one. As Orb perfected it, the effect intensified, so that it was hard not to believe in its reality.

  "You know," Betsy said, "the time may come when you do it so well that it will become real, and dawn will come a second time in one morning." She was a farm girl and really appreciated nature.

  Orb laughed, but privately she wondered. The Song of Awakening was the human version, while the Song of Morning was nature's version. There were surely ramifications that she did not know, but if she perfected them, so that her version more closely approached the natural one, it might indeed have that effect. After all, the Song of Travel enabled her to jump across the globe. The magic music did relate to real things, when properly executed.

  She thought also about Natasha. It had not been coincidence that he had rescued her from Satan, for she had sung a portion of a fragment of the Llano, and he was attuned to the Llano. But it had been a most important event in her life, for Satan had indeed trapped her and almost completed the prophecy. She had a common interest with Natasha in the Llano, as she did with the members of the Livin' Sludge and with Jezebel and Betsy—and with Jonah. That interest bound them all together, however diverse their origins and natures. But it was more than that, for Nat was a handsome and talented man, and she was without a man. She had not felt deprived, but now her interest was quickening. His Song of Awakening, presented as courtship, had indeed moved her.

  Now she remembered her childhood vision. A wedding! She had never thought of it in the excitement and horror of Satan's attempted forced ceremony; and indeed, that had not been the wedding of the dream. Mym had not been there to conduct her down the aisle. But if she—with Natasha could it be? Then what of the other part of the dream, the devastated world?

  And if Natasha were nonhuman—what then? She could not dismiss Jezebel's warning. The succubus was in a position to know. A demon was a creature of a different order from the human. The sprites were of the demon kind, and the dryads, different phyla of the Demon Kingdom. They varied as widely as did the creatures of the Animal Kingdom, or the plants of the Vegetable Kingdom, or the stones of the Mineral Kingdom. Just as she could love a pretty flower or a sparkling gem, she could love a demon like the hamadryad of the water oak. No, demons were not by definition evil! But to develop a romantic relationship with one—that was another matter.

  Was she prejudiced, she asked herself. The guitarist had a romantic relation with the succubus, and Orb could not fault it; Jezebel was a good woman in every human sense of the word, as long as her passions were under control. Why should Orb feel that the kind of relationship that was good for a fellow human being should be bad for her? She couldn't answer that, except to acknowledge that she could not accept it for herself with equanimity. Perhaps a relationship was possible, but she would first have to know for certain exactly what Nat was. If human, fine; if demon, she would have to consider longer before deciding how or whether to proceed. Yet when he had sung the Song of Awakening—ah, what a stirring there had been in her breast! There had been a seeming dawn within her awareness, as well as in the world. Who could say where this day might lead?

  "Mrs. Glotch has scheduled us for Hawaii," Betsy announced brightly, looking up from the pile of correspondence she was handling. "I've always wanted to see their pineapple farms." Orb pursed her lips. "I'm not sure that's wise. Jonah doesn't like to pass over large bodies of water."

  "Oh? Why not?"

  "He is cursed. He can not swim in water, and if anything should happen over the ocean, he would be in terrible trouble." Betsy's brow wrinkled. "Why? What could happen to him?"

  "Well—" But Orb found herself stumped. "What could happen to a creature cursed to be immortal until his punishment was terminated?"

  "Probably a lot of pain," Lou-Mae said. Orb nodded. That would be enough. "I suppose we'll just have to see whether Jonah will take us," she said. "If not, it's understandable, and we'll simply have to cancel the engagement."

  When the time came, they asked the big fish to go. Jonah hesitated at the verge of the ocean, then lifted high and braved it. They were on their way.

  At first it was intriguing, swimming above the great ocean, for they had never done this before. But it was a long swim, and soon the novelty dulled. They settled down to the routine of rehearsing, eating, talking, and sleeping.

  Lou-Mae came to wake Orb. "Something's wrong," she whispered urgently.

  Orb rubbed her eyes. "You quarreled with—?"

  "No, I mean with Jonah!"

  Now Orb was alert. "Jonah! How do you mean?"

  "He's swimming crazy. I think he's sick."

  What would it mean to be inside a sick fish? "Oh, I hope not!" Orb said sincerely. She flung on a housecoat and dug her toes into her slippers.

  Now it was evident: the big fish's course was erratic. He seemed uncertain where to go and kept changing course.

  "I wish we could talk to him!" Lou-Mae said nervously. "Ask him what's wrong..."

  But Orb had discovered it. "There's a storm out there; I can see the lightning flashes through his scales," she said.

  "He don't much like storms!" Lou-Mae said.

  "He's trying to avoid the rain," Orb said. "But it has closed in all around. He's cornered, as it were."

  "But he can dive down underground and—oops, we're over the ocean!"

  "Now we know why he doesn't like to swim over the ocean," Orb said.

  "What happens if he gets rained on?"

  "I don't know. He is cursed to avoid water. I suppose it would be a violation of the terms of his curse. But what that means in a practical sense..." She shrugged.

  Jezebel appeared, in her ravishing nocturnal aspect. "I have a notion. It strikes me that Jonah is much like a demon, during his curse. Demons don't die, but they can hurt. Probably every drop burns like fire. A moral would die pretty soon and be out of his pain, but for a demon it goes on and on."

  "How would that affect us?" Orb asked.

  "Well, he's sure to thrash around. You would, too, if someone kept poking you with a red-hot poker. It won't be too comfortable in here."

  The guitarist showed up, looking green. "Can't we get this tub out of the rollers?" he asked plaintively. "I get seasick."

  "Cheer up, lover, the worst is yet to come," Jezebel informed him maliciously. The news of their liaison had of course circulated quickly enough; the secret was only maintained against outsiders.

  "You're a demon!" he said.

  "I had noticed. Can I help you?"

  "Just pull out your blouse so I have somewhere to vomit," he said miserably.

  "Mortals have odd tastes," the succubus remarked as she pulled out her blouse, showing her full breasts. Others laughed appreciatively, but the guitarist for once had no interest. "Come on, sailor." She herded him off toward a bathroom.

  Orb gazed out through the scales. "
We've got to do something," she said. "It's our fault Jonah got caught here."

  The organist appeared, with Betsy. "You conjured rain, Orb; can you make it go away?"

  "I could try. But I don't know the proper theme. I might just make things worse."

  "Better not risk it," he agreed. Then he had another notion. "You can keep us off the H when you have to; can you get Jonah off his problem with water? So he can swim in it again?"

  "Again, I could try, if I knew the theme. But if I got it wrong—"

  "Well, it's the Llano he's looking for, same's us. Maybe if you—I mean we could all try the Song of Morning, and maybe—"

  "I don't know," Orb said. Then the fish lurched, throwing her against the wall. "But then again—"

  They tried it. The guitarist was too sick to participate, but the drummer and Lou-Mae and the organist joined. Orb sang the Song of Awakening, and Lou-Mae made a harmony, and the others accompanied. The magic spread out strongly, animating them all, and it developed into the best rendition yet, with the darkness closing in so absolutely that stars appeared above.

  Jonah's lurching stopped. He relaxed, slowly sinking down through the turbulent atmosphere.

  But what would happen when he touched the restless surface of the ocean?

  Orb peered through the scales as the magic sunrise formed. She could see that it was raining now, outside, and the rain was washing across Jonah's surface. That meant that their song was enabling the fish to tolerate water. Perhaps the sea would be tolerable, too.

  They completed the rendition. Flowers bloomed across the floor, and the chamber was fragrant.

  "Sheez, we should do this number on the tour!" the drummer exclaimed.

  Lou-Mae considered. "Why not? So it's a piece of the Llano; it's the greatest music we know. Everybody should hear it."

  Orb nodded. "I suppose we could try it." She walked to the wall, to get a better view of the exterior.

  Jonah made a shudder. "Maybe we better sing it again," Lou-Mae said.

  "Try it without me," Orb said. "I'll try to help you with the magic. If we can do it in relays, maybe we can keep him quiet without wearing ourselves out."

  Lou-Mae and the drummer and the organist tried it by themselves. It wasn't as good as before, but it did quiet the fish.

  Orb watched as Jonah sank slowly toward the heaving ocean. The key point would be when he touched. If he could do that without damage, they would be all right.

  The fish shivered. They felt it as if it were an earth tremor: minor motion, but significant alarm.

  Jezebel reappeared. "Jonah's afraid," she said.

  Orb pointed down. "Of that?"

  "I don't think so. The song's calming him. It doesn't seem that he can't touch water, just that he's afraid to. The Llano helps quell his fear, but not all the way."

  "What could a creature like him be afraid of?"

  "I don't know, but I think we'd better not dismiss it till we know what it is."

  Jonah settled onto the water. His nervousness increased despite their music. Yet the water did not seem to be hurting him. He floated like a ship, rocking gently to the swells.

  Then the big fish jerked into motion. His side fins raked through the water like oars, and the bottom portion of his tail threshed the liquid into foam. He was not swimming, so much as stroking across the water.

  "Something's out there!" Jezebel said. "I'd better take a look." She strode to the wall and through it, startling Orb. But of course she was a demoness, able to dematerialize and walk through walls so she could reach her prey. She just hadn't done it openly before.

  Almost immediately the succubus reappeared. "There's something ugly out there," she reported. "There's a glow, and what look like ghosts, and Jonah's trying to get away from them. You'd better look."

  "I can't go out there," Orb protested. "I'd drown!"

  "I can take you to the top of the fish," Jezebel said. "It's pretty flat there, and you can hold on to a fin. I really think you should go."

  Orb trusted the succubus' judgment. She took Jezebel's hand, and they walked through the wall and up, coming out on the fish's broad back. The rain was pelting down, but the skin was rough, offering good traction, and Orb had no trouble keeping her feet.

  "There," Jezebel said, pointing.

  Orb looked. She saw the glow, and it was not a healthy illumination. Grotesque shapes moved within it. She squinted, brushing the spray from her face. "What is it?"

  "I think it's demonic," Jezebel said. "But there are different kinds of demons, as you know, and some in-between forms like zombies that—"

  "Zombies?"

  "Well, I'm not sure. What do they look like to you?"

  Orb continued peering. The fish was slowing, and the shapes were gaining, spreading their unhealthy light. "Skeletons."

  "Same thing, maybe. Do you think that's what Jonah's afraid of? Looks to me he can handle water, maybe not to swim in, but to float on, but those things are walking on it, which means they're supernatural, and I'd guess they're after him. If he knew it, he'd stay well clear if he could."

  "We've got to stop them!" Orb exclaimed.

  "The super-natural's hard to stop, when it's in its element. I don't want to scare you but—"

  "With the Llano!" Orb cried. "I've got to try!"

  The succubus shrugged. "I'd help you if I could, but you know my talent isn't singing."

  Orb started singing herself, trying the Song of the Morning, the only significant fragment of the Llano she knew.

  The skeletons marched right on, their bone legs walking across the water, their skulls facing Jonah. The song had no effect.

  "Worse," Jezebel murmured. "Now I see why he slowed. There're more on the other side."

  "Maybe if I had my harp," Orb said doubtfully.

  "I can fetch it for you."

  "Thank you." Orb was too distracted to say more.

  The dancing skeletons closed in inexorably. Jonah's shuddering became more violent. Orb had no reasonable doubt, now; this was the menace the big fish feared. "Jonah, I will try to protect you," she said aloud.

  The shuddering eased. Jonah had heard and understood.

  But could she do it? The Song of the Morning hadn't worked; what would? Sometimes the magic had worked with other songs—but what applied to skeletons?

  Their forms were coming clearer as they approached. They were not simply dancing; they were doing a crazy sort of jig. She would have thought it random, if they were not all doing it together, perfectly synchronized. Their bone legs moved this way and that, and their bone bodies seemed to lose balance and almost fall over before abruptly snapping back to the vertical. The effect would have been eerie, even if performed by fully fleshed folk.

  Jezebel reappeared, leading the drummer by the hand. Orb realized that she had done an absent-minded double take when the succubus chuckled. "No, I'm not two-timing my man," Jezebel said. "We figured you could use help, and there's no way to plug in the organ up here, so I brought the drummer instead." She handed Orb her harp.

  "But the rain will ruin the drums!" Orb protested.

  "No more than it will your harp," the drummer said. "What use will either be, if Jonah gets wiped out?"

  Orb acknowledged the validity of that. "I tried the Song of the Morning, but it didn't work."

  The drummer stared at the advancing horde. "Know any songs about skeletons?" he asked with a certain bravado.

  "Just one my father used to sing me," Orb said. "A joke, a Halloween kind of round."

  "Try it," he said, setting up his drums.

  "This is ridiculous!" Orb muttered as she took up her harp. But then, so were the dancing skeletons.

  "Say, isn't that the Drunken Sailor's Hornpipe?" Jezebel asked, gazing at the dancers.

  "The what?" the drummer asked.

  "It's a dance. I learned it about fifty years ago, when I worked a dancing group."

  "You were a dancer?"

  "I didn't say that."

  "Oh." He w
as disgruntled.

  Orb started to sing and play, and the drummer picked up the beat and amplified it powerfully. "Have you seen the ghost of Tom? Round white bones with no skin on!" It was a humorously grisly song, but it held nostalgia for her, taking her back to the years of her childhood when Pacian held her and tickled her and sang to her, and the orchestra of his magic presence filled her limited universe. Oh, she loved her father! Now he was gone, and if there were skeletons where he was, surely he was singing to them, too, and making them laugh.

  Orb was uncertain how much of the wetness on her face was rain and how much was tears.

  But the song wasn't stopping the skeletons. They were coming quite close, in seeming phalanxes, and the first phalanx was now quite near Jonah's huge tail.

  Orb tried another song, one from their repertoire, with no better effect. Music simply wasn't doing it.

  One skeleton separated from the lead phalanx. It danced crazily forward, toward the tail, its bone feet treading the water as if it were completely solid.

  "That is the Drunken Sailor's Hornpipe!" Jezebel said. "See, it's one of the few dances I can do." She went into the jig, and it was the same motion, lean and lurch as the skeletons were doing. "You step here and here, around and back, and that off-balances you, so you switch feet, so," she explained as she did it, her flesh heaving dynamically.

  The closest skeleton paused, its skull facing the succubus.

  "Hey!" the drummer said. "They're dancers! So they tune into dancing!"

  The skeleton resumed its forward motion. It came to the tail and reached out to embrace it. But at the touch, Jonah jumped as if receiving an electric shock, and indeed there was a flash at the point of contact.

  Then the skeleton was gone—and one section of Jonah's tail had become skeletal.

  "Geez," the drummer said.

  "I told you he'd have reason to fear demons," Jezebel said. "They want to make him one of them—and I'll bet there are enough of them to do it."