His Eye Queue curse provided him with the answer to a question any normal ogre would not even have thought of. Biythe was here in spirit, just as he had been inside the gourd in spirit. It was very hard to tell such spirit from reality, but each person knew his own reality and was not fooled. No doubt Biythe Spirit's real body remained in the gourd, in a trance-state; since the brassies spent much of their time as statues anyway, waiting for someone to come push their button, no one had noticed the difference. Or rather, they had noticed, and been alarmed because she remained a statue while they were animate. So they knew that her vital element, her soul, was elsewhere. Yes, it all made sense. Everything in Xanth made sense, once a person penetrated the seeming nonsense that masked it. Different things made different sorts of sense for different people.
He would have to take the brass girl back. His curse not only forced intelligence on him, it forced un-ogrish moral awareness. At the moment he wasn't even certain that such awareness was a bad thing, inconvenient as it might be when there was mayhem to be wreaked.
But the tree-chopping attack party was coming again. Smash oriented on the group as it galloped just beyond view. The villagers must have gotten reinforcements. The individuals were larger than basilisks--evidently Biythe had deposited the chickatrice safely elsewhere--but smaller than sphinxes. They were hoofed. In fact--
"That's my brother!" Chem exclaimed. "Now I recognize his hoofbeat. But there's something with him--not a centaur."
Smash braced himself for what could be a complicated situation. If some monster were riding herd on his friend Chet...
They hove into view. "Holey cow!" the Siren breathed. That was exactly what it was--a cow as full of holes as any big cheese. She had holes in her body every which way through which daylight showed. She was worse than the moon! A big one was in her head, about where her brain should have been; evidently that didn't impede her much. Even her horns and tail had little holes. Her legs were so holey they seemed ready to collapse, yet she functioned perfectly well.
In fact, she carried two human riders who braced their hands and feet in her holes. She was a big cow, and her gait was bumpy, so these handholds and footholds were essential.
Now Smash recognized the riders. "Dor! Irene!" he cried happily.
"Prince Dor?" the Siren asked. "And his fiance?"
"Yes, they are taking forever about working up to marriage," Chem murmured with a certain equine snideness. "It's been four years now..."
"And Grundy the Golem!" Smash added, spying the tiny figure perched on the back of the centaur. "All my friends!"
"We're your friends, too," Tandy said, nettled. The party drew abreast of the fireoak tree. "What's this?" the golem cried. "Snow White and the Seven Dwarves?"
Smash stood among the damsels, towering over them, not comprehending the reference. But the Eye Queue curse soon clarified it, obnoxiously. Some of the Mundane settlers in Xanth had a story by that title, and, compared with Smash the Ogre, the seven females were dwarvishly short, as was even Chem the Centaur.
"It seems you have a way with women. Smash," Prince Dor said, dismounting from the holey cow and coming to greet him. "What's your secret?"
"I only agreed not to eat them," Smash said.
"To think how much simpler my life would have been if I had known that," Dor said. "I thought girls had to be courted."
"You never courted me!" Princess Irene exclaimed. She was a striking beauty by human standards, nineteen years old. The other girls all took jealously deep breaths, watching her. "I courted you! But you never would marry me."
"You never would set the date!" Dor retorted.
Her mouth opened in a pretty 0 of indignation. "You never set the date! I've been trying to--"
"They've been fighting about the date since before there was anything to date," Grundy remarked. "He doesn't even know what color her panties are."
"I don't think she knows herself," Dor retorted.
"I do, too!" Irene flashed. "They're--" She paused, then hiked up her skirt to look. "Green."
"It's only a pretext to show off her legs," Smash explained to the others.
"So I see," Tandy said enviously.
"And her panties," John said. She, like Fireoak, the Siren, and Chem, didn't wear panties, so couldn't show them off. Biythe's panties were copper-bottoms.
"You creatures are getting too smart," Irene complained. Then she did a double take, turning to Smash. "What happened to your rhymes?"
"I got cursed by the vine," the ogre explained. "It deprived me of both rhyme and stupidity in one swell foop."
"In a foop? Oh, you poor thing," she said sympathetically.
"Now that incorrigible ogre charm is working on Irene, too," Prince Dor muttered.
"Of course it is, idiot," she retorted. "All women have a secret passion for ogres." She turned to Smash. "Now you had better introduce us all."
Smash did so with dispatch. "Tandy, Siren, John, Fireoak, Chem, Goldy, and Biythe--these are Dor, Irene, Grundy, and Chet, and vice versa."
"Moooo!" lowed the holey cow, each 0 with a big round hole in it.
"And the Holey Cow," Smash amended. Satisfied, the bovine swished her tattered tail and began to graze. The cropped grass fell out the holes in her neck as fast as she swallowed it, but she didn't seem to mind.
"I delivered your message," Chet said. "King Trent has declared this tree a protected species, and all the other trees in sight of it, and sent Prince Dor to inform the village. There will be no more trouble about that."
"Oh, wonderful!" the hamadryad cried. "I'm so happy!" She danced a little jig in air, hanging by one hand from a branch. The tree's leaves seemed to catch fire, harmlessly. Both nymph and tree were fully recovered from the indisposition of their recent separation. "I could just kiss the King!"
"Kiss me instead," Dor said. "I'm the messenger."
"Oh, no, you don't!" Irene flashed, taking him firmly by the ear.
"Kiss me instead of Dor," Chet offered. "There's no shrew guarding me."
The hamadryad dropped from her branch, flung her arms about the centaur, and kissed him. "Maybe I have been missing something," she commented. "But I don't think there are any males of my species."
"You could take up with one of the woodland fauns," Princess Irene suggested. "You do have pretty hair." The hamadryad's hair, under its red fringe, was green--as was Irene's hair.
"I'll consider it," Fireoak agreed.
"How did you gather such a bevy?" Prince Dor asked Smash. "They certainly seem affectionate, unlike some I have known." He moved with agility to avoid Irene's swift kick.
"I just picked them up along the way," the ogre said. "Each has her mission. John needs her correct name, the Siren needs a better lake--"
"They all need men," the golem put in.
"I need to go home," Biythe said.
"Oh. I'll take you there now." Smash reached for the gourd.
"She's from a hypnogourd?" Princess Irene asked. "This should be interesting. I always wondered what was inside one of those things."
Smash hooked his finger into Biythe's brassiere and lifted her high.
"Well, that's one way to pick up a girl," Dor remarked. "I'll have to try that sometime."
"Won't work," Irene said. "I don't wear a--"
"Not even a green one?" Tandy asked, brightening.
Smash looked into the gourd's peephole.
The two of them were in the brass spaceship, descending rapidly toward Xanth.
"Oh!" Biythe exclaimed, terrified. She flung her brass arms about Smash. "I'll fall! I'll fall! Save me, ogre!"
"But I have to bring it down to return to your building," Smash said. He was having difficulty because there was hardly room for two. He grabbed for a control stick, jerked it around--and the brass girl jumped.
"What are you doing with my knee?" she cried.
Oh. Smash saw now that he had hold of the wrong thing. But it was almost impossible to operate the controls with her limbs in the w
ay. The ship veered crazily, which set Biythe off again. Her nerves certainly were not made of steel! The more she kicked and screamed, the worse the ship spun, and the more frightened she became. They were now plunging precipitously toward ground.
Then they were back under the fireoak tree. "We thought you had enough time to drop her off," Tandy said. Then she paused, frowning.
Biythe was wrapped around Smash, her metal arms hugging his neck desperately, her legs clasping his side. He had firm hold of one of her knees.
"I think we interrupted something," Princess Irene remarked sardonically.
Biythe's complexion converted from brass to copper. Smash suspected his own was doing much the same, as his Eye Queue now made him conscious of un-ogrish proprieties. The two disengaged, and Smash set the brass girl down on the ground, where she sat and sobbed brass tears. "We were crashing," Smash explained lamely.
"Oh--Mundane slang," Chet said. "But I think she wasn't quite ready for it."
"It's really no business of ours what you call it," Grundy said, smirking.
"Oh, don't be cruel!" the Siren said. "This poor girl is terrified, and we know Smash wouldn't hurt her. Something is wrong in the gourd."
In due course they worked it out. Smash would have to return to the brass building first, then come back for Biythe, who, it seemed, was afraid of interplanetary heights.
But now dawn was coming, and other business was pressing. They had to inform the local village of the protected status of the tree and its environs, and then Chet and his party had to return to Castle Roogna. In addition, Biythe was no longer so eager to jump into the gourd, with or without the ogre. If she went alone, she might find herself crashing in the ship, and have no way to get back outside, since she was not an outside creature. It would be better to send her back later, once things were more settled.
"Oh," Chet said. "Almost forgot. I gave Tandy's message to Crombie, and he made a pointing--that's his talent, you know, pointing out things--and he concluded that if you went north, you'd face great danger and lose three things of value. But when he did a pointing back where you came from, there was something else you'd lose that was even more important. He couldn't figure out what any of the things were, but thought you'd better be advised. He says you're a spunky girl who will probably win through in the manner of your kind."
Tandy laughed. "That's my father, all right! He hates women, and he knows I'm growing up, so he's starting to hate me, too. But I'm glad to have his advice."
"What's back at your home that's worse than the jungle of Xanth?" Chet asked.
Tandy remembered the demon Fiant. "Never mind. I'm not going home until that danger is nullified. I'll just take my chances with the three things I'll lose in the jungle."
But she found the message disquieting. She had no things to lose--but she knew her father never made a mistake when he pointed something out.
Princess Irene's talent was growing plants. She grew a fine, big, mixed-fruit bush, and they dined on red, green, blue, yellow, and black berries, all juicy and luscious. Smash had always liked Irene, because no one remained hungry in her presence, and she did have excellent legs. Not that an ogre should notice, of course--yet it was hard not to imagine how delicious such firmly fleshed limbs would taste.
"Uh, before you go," the Siren said. "I understand you have a way with the inanimate, Prince Dor."
"Whatever gave you that idiotic notion, fish-tail?" a rock beside the Prince inquired. The Siren was sitting next to a bucket of water and was soaking her tail; she got uncomfortable when she spent too long out of the water.
"I picked up something, and I think it may be magical," the Siren continued. "But I'm not sure in what way, and don't want to experiment foolishly." She brought out a bedraggled, half-metallic thing.
"What are you?" Prince Dor asked the thing.
"I am the Gap Dragon's Ear," it answered. "The confounded ogre bashed me off the dragon's head."
Smash was surprised. "How did you get that?"
"I picked it up during the fight, then forgot about it, What with the pining tree and all," the Siren explained.
"The Gap Chasm does have a forgetful property," Irene said. "I understand that's Dor's fault."
"But the Gap's been forgotten for centuries, hasn't it?" the Siren asked. "We can only remember it now because we're still quite close to it; we'll forget it again when we go on north. How can Dor possibly be responsible?"
"Oh, he gets around," Irene said, giving the Prince a dark look. "He's been places none of us would believe. He even used to live with Millie, the sex-appeal maid."
"She was my governess when I was a child!" Dor protested. "Besides, she was eight hundred years old."
"And looked seventeen," Irene retorted. "You weren't conscious of that?"
Dor concentrated on the Ear. "What is your property?" he asked it.
"I hear anything relevant," it said. "I twitch when my possessor should listen. That's how the Gap Dragon always knew when prey was in the Gap. I heard it for him."
"Well, the Gap Dragon still has one ear to hear with," Dor said. "How can we hear what you hear?"
"Just listen to me, dummy!" the Ear said. "What else do you do with an ear?"
"That's a mighty impolite item," Tandy said, bothered.
"Can we test it?" the Siren asked. "Before you go, Prince Dor?"
"Oh, let me try," John said. She seemed much recovered, though her wings remained nubs. It would be long before she flew again, if ever.
The Siren gave her the Ear. John held it to her own tiny ear. She listened intently, her face showing puzzlement. "It's a rushing sound, maybe like water flowing," she reported. "Is that relevant?"
"Well, I didn't twitch," the Ear grumped. "You take your chances when there's nothing much on."
"How is that rushing noise relevant?" Dor asked the Ear.
"Obvious, stupid," the Ear said. "That's the sound of the waterfall where the fairy she wants is staying."
"It is?" John demanded, so excited that her wing-stubs fluttered. "The one with my name?"
"That's what I said, twerp."
"Do you tolerate insults from the inanimate?" the Siren asked the Prince.
"Only stupid things insult others gratuitously," Dor said.
"That's for sure, you moron," the rock agreed. Then it reconsidered. "Hey--"
The Siren laughed. "Now I understand. You have to consider the source."
Prince Dor smiled. "You resemble your sister. Of course, I've never seen her face."
"The rest will do," the Siren said, flattered. "Do only smart people compliment others gratuitously?"
"Perhaps," he agreed. "Or observant ones. But I do obtain much useful information from the inanimate. Now we must go talk with the villagers and head back to Castle Roogna. It has been nice to meet all of you, and I hope you all find what you wish."
There was a chorus of thank-you's. Prince Dor and Princess Irene remounted the holey cow. Chet kissed Chem good-bye, and Grundy the Golem scrambled onto his back. "Get moving, horsetail!" Then Grundy paused thoughtfully, exactly as the rock had. They moved off toward the village.
"Dor will make a fine King one day," the Siren remarked.
"But Irene will run the show," Chem said. "I know them well."
"No harm in that," the Siren said, and the other girls laughed, agreeing.
"We'd better get started north," Tandy said. "Now that the tree is safe."
"How can I ever thank you?" Fireoak exclaimed. "You saved my life, my tree's life. Same thing."
"Some things are simply worth doing for themselves, dear," the Siren said. "I learned that when Chem's father Chester destroyed my dulcimer, so I couldn't lure men any more." Her sunshine hair clouded momentarily.
"My father did that?" Chem asked, surprised. "I didn't know!"
"It stopped me from being a menace to navigation," the Siren said. "I was doing a lot of damage, uncaringly. It was a necessary thing. Likewise it was necessary to save the fireoak tree."
"Yes," Chem agreed. But she seemed shaken.
They bade farewell to the hamadryad, promising to visit her any time any of them happened to be in the vicinity, and started north.
At first they passed through normal Xanth countryside--carnivorous grasses, teakettle serpents whose hisses were worse than their fires, poisonous springs, tangle trees, sundry spells, and the usual ravines, mountains, river rapids, slow and quicksand bogs, illusions, and a few normally foul-mouthed harpies, but nothing serious occurred. They foraged along the way for edible things and took turns listening to the Gap Dragon's Ear, though it was not twitching; this became more helpful as they gradually learned to interpret it. The Siren heard a kind of splashing, as of someone swimming. She took this to be the merman she wanted to find. Goldy heard the sounds of a goblin settlement in operation: where she was going. Smash heard the rhyming grunts of ogres. Biythe, persuaded to try it, jumped as the Ear twitched in her hands, and she actually heard herself mentioned. The brassies missed her and feared the ogre had betrayed their trust. "I must go back!" she cried. "As soon as I recover enough of my courage. My nerves aren't iron, you know."
But when Chem tried it, her face sobered. "It must be out of order. All I get is a faint buzzing."
The Siren took back the Ear. "That's funny. I get the buzzing, too, now."
They passed the Ear around. Everyone heard the same thing, and it twitched for none of them.
Smash applied his Eye Queue curse to the Ear. "Either it is malfunctioning," he decided, "or the buzzing is somehow relevant to all of us, without being specific to any of us. No one is talking about us, no one is lurking for us, so it is just something we should know about."
"Let's assume it's not malfunctioning," Tandy said. "The last thing we need is a glitching Ear, especially when my father says there is danger ahead. So we'd better watch out for something that buzzes. It seems to be getting louder as we go."
Indeed it was. Now there were variations in it, louder buzzes in front of background ones, an elevating and lowering of pitch. It was, in fact, a whole collection of buzzes, sounding three-dimensional, as some pitches became louder and clearer, while others faded back and some faded out entirely. What did it mean?
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