Iers Anthony - pell For Chameleon

"I'll do nothing of the sort!" the Sorceress screamed. "Come to your senses, man. You have the kingdom in your grasp."

Trent turned to Bink. "The Sorceress has not suffered the conversion that experience has brought me. She will not help. The lure of power has blinded her to all else-as it almost blinded me. You will have to go for help."

"Yes," Bink agreed. He could not look at the blood coming from Chameleon.

"I will staunch her wound as well as I can," Trent said. "I believe she will live for an hour. Do not take longer than that."

"No..." Bink agreed. If she died-Suddenly Bink was a bird-a fancy-feathered, fire-winged phoenix, sure to be noticed, since it appeared in public only every five hundred years. He spread his pinions and took off into the sky. He rose high and circled, and in the distance to the east he saw the spire of the Good Magician's castle glinting magically. He was on his way.

A flying dragon appeared. "Pretty bird, I'm going to eat you up!" it said.

Bink sheered off, but the monster was before him again. "You can't escape!" it said. It opened its toothy mouth.

Was his mission of mercy to end here, so near success? Bink pumped his wings valiantly, climbing higher, hoping the heavier dragon could not achieve the same elevation. But his wounded wing-formerly the hand Trent's sword had cut-robbed him of full lifting power and balance, forcing him to rise with less velocity. The predator paralleled him without effort, staying between him and the far castle. "Give up, dumbo," it said. "You'll never make it."

Suddenly Bink caught on. Dragons did not speak like that. Not flying fire-breathers, anyway; they lacked both the cranial capacity and the coolness of brain to talk at all. They were simply too light and hot to be smart. This was no dragon-it was an illusion spawned by the Sorceress. She was still trying to stop him, hoping that if he disappeared and Chameleon died, Trent would resume his march on the throne. Trent would have done his best, and failed; realistically, he would continue toward his goal. Thus Iris could still achieve her dream of power through him. Naturally, she would never confess her own part in this mischief.

Bink would rather have dealt with a real dragon. The Sorceress's evil plot might work. Because he was a phoenix instead of a talking bird, he could not tell anyone other than the Good Magician what was happening; others would not have the capacity to understand. If he returned to Trent now, too much time would be lost-and in any event, Iris could stop him there, too. This was his own private battle, his duel with the Sorceress; he had to win it himself.

He changed course abruptly and angled directly into the dragon. If he had guessed wrong, he would light a fire in the belly of the fire-breather and lose all. But he passed right through it without resistance. Victory!

Iris shouted something most unladylike at him. What a fishwife she was when balked. But Bink ignored her and winged on.

A cloud formed before him. Uh-oh-a storm? He had to hurry.

But the cloud loomed rapidly larger. Blisters of black vapor boiled out of it, swirling funnels forming below. In moments the sheer mass of it blotted out the castle. Ugly dark satellite clouds scudded about it, menacing as the heads of goblins. A larger rotary pattern developed. The whole thing looked disconcertingly formidable.

There was no hope of rising above it. His injured wing was hurting, and the storm towered into the sky like a giant genie. Bolts of jagged lightning danced about, crackling loudly. There was the odor of metal burning. Deep in the roiling bowels of it were tangled colors and vague shapes of demonic visages. A magic tempest, obviously, girt with colored hail: the most devastating kind.

Bink dropped lower-and the cloud circulation tightened into a single descending gray tube. A super-tornado that would destroy him!

Then Bink almost fell out of the air with the shock of his realization, He could not be harmed by magic! This was a magic storm-therefore it could not touch him. He was being balked by a false threat.

Furthermore, there was no actual wind. This was another illusion. Ail he had to do was fly directly toward the castle, unswayed by optical effects. He shot straight into the cloud.

He was right again. The optical effects had been spectacular, but there was no actual storm, merely opacity and the suggestion of wetness on his feathers. Soon he would be through it, having called its bluff; then nothing could stop him from reaching the castle of the Good Magician.

But the grayness continued. How could he go to the castle when he couldn't see it? Iris couldn't fool him, but she could effectively blind him. Maybe he, personally, could not be harmed by magic--either real or illusory magic--but his talent did not seem to be concerned with the welfare of other people, no matter how Bink himself might feel about them. He would survive if Chameleon died. He might not enjoy that survival, but the technicality would have been honored.

Damn it, talent, he thought fiercely. You'd better stop being concerned with technicalities and start being concerned with my larger welfare. I'll kill myself, physically, by Mundane means, if I find my life not worth living. I need Chameleon. So you can't save me at all if you let this hostile magic stop me from saving Chameleon. Then where will you be?

The opacity continued. Apparently his talent was an unreasoning thing. And so, in the end, it was useless. Like a colored spot on a wall, it was magic without purpose.

He peered about, determined to fight it through himself. He had made it this far through life without any talent he had known about; he would have to make it similarly in the future. Somehow.

Had he been headed directly toward the castle? He thought so-but he could not be sure. He had been distracted by the developing cloud, trying to avoid it, and could have lost his bearings. Trent might better have transformed him into an unerring carrier pigeon. But that bird would not have been distinct enough to attract the attention of the Good Magician. Anyway, speculations on what he might have been were useless. He was what he was, and would have to prevail as he was. If he were now aimed wrong, he might never reach the castle -but he would keep trying.

He dropped down, seeking some landmark. But the cloud remained about him. He could not see a thing. If he went too low, he might crash into a tree. Had Iris won after all?

Then he emerged from the cloud floor. There was the castle. He zoomed toward it-and paused, dismayed again. This wasn't the residence of the Good Magician-this was Castle Roogna! He had become completely reversed, and flown across the wilderness to the west instead of eastward to the Good Magician. The Sorceress had surely known this, and kept up the blinding fog so that he would not discover his error until too late. How much precious time had he wasted? If he reversed course and flew straight to the proper castle now-assuming he could find it in the fog-could he possibly get help for Chameleon within the hour? Or would she be dead by the time help arrived, thanks to this delay?

He heard a faint snort. Immediately it was echoed by snorts all around him, coming from every direction. The base of the cloud dropped down to obscure his view again.

Something was funny here! He might not have paid any attention to the sound if there had not been such an obvious effort to mask its direction. Why should the Sorceress try to prevent him from landing at Castle Roogna? Was there healing water there, used to patch up zombies? Doubtful.

So the snort was important in some way. But what had caused it? There was no moat dragon at Roogna; zombies didn't snort very well anyway. Yet obviously something had made that sound-probably something all the way alive. Like a winged horse, or-He caught on: this was not Castle Roogna but the castle of the Good Magician after all! The Sorceress had only made it look like Roogna, to turn him back. She was mistress of illusion-and he kept being deceived by the ramifications of her power. But the hippocampus of the moat had snorted, giving it away. He had been headed in the right direction after all, perhaps guided by his talent. His talent had always operated subtly; there was no reason for it to change now.

Bink headed for the remembered sound of the first snort, tuning out all others. Abruptly the fog dissipated. Apparently the Sorceress could not maintain her illusions too near the premises of the rival Magician, whose specialty was truth.

"I'll get you yet!" her voice cried from the air behind. Then she and all her effects were gone, and the sky was clear.

Bink circled the castle, which now had its proper aspect. He was shivering with reaction; how close he had come to losing his duel with the Sorceress! If he had turned back-He found an open portal in an upper turret and angled through it. The phoenix was a powerful flier, with good control; he probably could have outdistanced a real dragon, even with his hurt wing.

It took a moment for his beady eyes to adjust to the gloom of the interior. He flapped from one room to another and finally located the Magician, poring over a massive tome. For an instant the little man reminded Bink of Trent in the Roogna library; both had serious interest in books. Had the two really been friends twenty years ago, or merely associates?

Humfrey looked up. "What are you doing here, Bink?" he inquired, surprised. He didn't seem to notice the form Bink was in.

Bink tried to talk, but could not. The phoenix was silent; its magic related to survival from fire, not to human discourse.

"Come over here by the mirror," Humfrey said, rising.

Bink came. As he approached, the magic mirror showed a scene. Evidently this mirror was a twin to the one he had broken, for he saw no cracks to indicate repair.

The picture was of the wilderness, Chameleon lying nude and lovely and bleeding despite a crude compact of leaves and moss on her abdomen. Before her stood Trent, sword drawn, as a wolf-headed man approached.

"Oh, I see," Humfrey said. "The Evil Magician has returned. Foolish of him; this time he won't be exiled, he'll be executed. Good thing you managed to warn me; he's a dangerous one. I see he stabbed the girl and transformed you, but you managed to get away. Good thing you had the sense to come here."

Bink tried to speak again, and failed again. He danced about anxiously.

"More to say? This way." The gnomelike Magician took down a book and opened it, setting it on top of his prior volume on the table. The pages were blank. "Speak," he said.

Bink tried yet again. No sound emerged, but he saw the words forming in neat script on the pages of the book:

Chameleon is dying! We must save her.

"Oh, of course," Humfrey agreed. "A few drops of healing water will take care of that. There'll be my fee, naturally. But first we'll have to deal with the Evil Magician, which means we'll have to detour to the North Village to pick up a stunner. No magic of mine can handle Trent!"

No! Trent is trying to save her! He's notHumfrey's brow wrinkled. "You are saying that the Evil Magician helped you?" he asked, surprised. "That is hard to believe, Bink."

As quickly as possible, Bink explained about Trent's conversion.

"Very well," Humfrey said with resignation. "I'll take your word that he is acting in your interest in this case. But I suspect you're a bit naive, and now I don't know who's going to pay my fee. The Evil Magician is very likely to get away anyway, while we detour. But we have to try to catch him for a fair trial. He has broken the law of Xanth, and must be dealt with immediately. It would profit us nothing if we saved Chameleon while leaving Xanth in peril from the conquering lust of the transformer."