Chameleon shied away, but Bink paused. "It is possible to harvest and carry such loops," he said. "At the North Village we use them to seal packages tight. The trick is to touch them only on the outside. We can take some of these and lay them on the ground where Trent has to step. Or we can throw them at him. I doubt he can transform them once they're detached from the living plant. Can you throw pretty well?"

"Yes."

He walked toward the bush--and spied another wilderness threat. "Look--a nest of ant lions!" he exclaimed. "If we can put them on his scent ..."

Chameleon looked at the foot-long, lion-headed ants and shuddered. "Do we have to?"

"I wish we didn't," Bink said. "They wouldn't actually eat him; he'd transform them first. But they might keep him so busy that we could overpower him. If we don't stop him somehow, he's very likely to conquer Xanth."

"Would that be bad?"

It was just one of her stupid questions; in her smart phase, or even her normal phase, she would never have asked it. But it bothered him. Would the Evil Magician really be worse than the present King? He put the question aside. "It is not for us to decide. The Council of Elders will choose the next King. If the crown starts being available by conquest or conspiracy, we'll be back in the days of the Waves, and no one will be secure. The law of Xanth must determine the possession of the crown."

"Yes," she agreed. Bink had surprised himself with an excellent statement of the situation, but of course it was beyond her present understanding.

Still, the notion of throwing Trent to the ant lions bothered him, so he went on searching. In the depths of his mind a parallel search was manifesting, concerning the morality of the present government of Xanth. Suppose Trent were right about the necessity of reopening Xanth to migration from outside? According to the centaurs, the human population had slowly declined during the past century; where had those people gone? Were new part-human monsters being formed even now, by magically enabled interbreeding? The very thought was like being entangled in a noose-loop bush; its ramifications were appalling. Yet it seemed to be so. Trent, as King, would change that situation. Was the evil of the Waves worse than the alternative? Bink was unable to form a conclusion.

They came to a large river. Bink had forded this in his sphinx stage, hardly noticing it, but now it was a deadly barrier. Little ripples betrayed the presence of lurking predators, and eerie mists played about the surface. Bink flipped a clod of mud into the water, and it was intercepted, just before it struck, by a giant crablike claw. The rest of the monster never showed; Bink was unable to determine whether it was a mercrab or a super crayfish or merely a disembodied claw. But he was sure he did not want to swim here.

There were a few round stones at the edge. The river did not have the same reason to be wary of stones that the trees did, but it was best to be careful. Bink poked at them gingerly with his staff to be sure they weren't magic lures; fortunately they weren't. He poked experimentally at a pleasant nearby water lily, and the flower snapped three inches off the tip of his pole. His caution was justified.

"All right," he said when they had a fair reserve of stones. "We'll try to ambush him. We'll arrange noose-loops across his likely path of retreat, and cover them over with leaves, and you can throw your loops at him and I'll throw stones. He'll duck the stones and loops, but he'll have to watch us both to do it, while retreating, so he may step into a hidden loop. It'll bind on his foot, and he'll be vulnerable while he tries to get it off, and maybe we can score. We'll get some material from a blanket tree to throw over his head, so he can't see us and can't transform us, or we can hold the hypnogourd in front of his face. He'll have to yield then."

"Yes," she said.

They set it up. Their covered loops extended from a hungry tangle tree to the ant-lion nest, and their ambush was in an invisible bush they discovered by sheer accident. That was about the only way such a bush could be discovered. Such plants were harmless, but could be a nuisance when stumbled into. When they hid behind it, they became invisible too, so long as they kept the bush between them and the viewer. They settled down to wait.

But Trent surprised them. While they had been setting up the trap, he had been circling around, orienting on their sounds. Now he came at them from the north. Chameleon, like most girls, had to answer calls of nature frequently, particularly when she was excited. She went behind a harmless mock-tentacle banyan tree, gave one little gasp of alarm, and disappeared. As Bink turned, he saw a lovely young winged deer bound out.

The battle was upon him! Bink charged the tree, stone in one hand, pole in the other. He hoped to knock out the Magician before Trent could throw his spell. But Trent wasn't there.

Had he jumped to a conclusion? Chameleon could have scared out a hiding doe-- "Now!" the Evil Magician cried from above. He was up in the tree. As Bink looked up, Trent gestured, not making a magical gesture, but bringing his hand down within six feet so as to cast the spell effectively. Bink jumped back--too late. He felt the tingle of transformation.

He rolled on the ground. In a moment he got his hands and feet under him--and discovered he was still a man. The spell had failed! He must have made it out of range in time after all, so that only one arm was in range, not his head.

He looked back at the tree---and gasped. The Evil Magician was tangled in the p.r.i.c.kles of a candystripe rose bush.

"What happened?" Bink asked, forgetting his own peril for the moment.

"A branch of the tree got in the way," Trent said, shaking his head as if dazed. He must have had a hard fall. "The spell transformed it instead of you."

Bink would have laughed at this freak accident, but now he remembered his own position. So the Magician had tried to turn him into a rose bush. He hefted his rock. "Sorry," he apologized--and hurled it at the handsome head.

But it bounced off the tough sh.e.l.l of a purple tortoise. Trent had converted the rose to the armored animal and was hidden behind it.

Bink acted without thinking. He aimed the pole like a lance, ran halfway around the tortoise, and thrust it at the Magician. But the man dodged, and again Bink felt the tingle of enchantment.

His momentum carried him beyond his enemy. He was still a man. He retreated to the invisible bush, marveling at his escape. The spell had bounced, convening the tortoise to a werehornet. The insect buzzed up angrily, but decided on escape rather than attack.

Now Trent was hot on Bink's trail. The bush became a woman-headed serpent that slithered away with an exclamation of annoyance, and Bink was exposed again. He tried to run--but was caught a third time by the magic.

Beside him a yellow toad appeared. "What is this?" Trent demanded incredulously. "I struck a pa.s.sing gnat instead of you. Three times my spell has missed you. My aim can't be that bad!"

Bink scrambled for his staff. Trent oriented on him again, and Bink knew he could neither get out of range nor bring his weapon to bear in time. He was finished, despite all his strategy.

But the winged deer charged from the side, threatening to bowl over the Magician. Trent heard her coming, and spun to focus on her. As she reached him she became a lovely iridescent b.u.t.terfly, then a very pretty wyvern. "No problem there," Trent remarked. "She's good-looking in whatever form I put her, but my spells are registering perfectly."

The small winged dragon turned on him, hissing, and suddenly she was the winged doe again. "Scat!" Trent told her, clapping his hands. Startled, the deer bounded away. She was not overly bright.

Meanwhile, Bink had taken advantage of the distraction to retreat. But he had gone toward his own carefully fashioned trap, and now he did not know precisely where the noose loops lay hidden. If he tried to cross that line, he would either trap himself or give away its presence to Trent---a.s.suming the Magician was not already aware of it.

Trent strode toward him. Bink was cornered, victim of his own machinations. He stood unmoving, knowing the Magician would turn on him the moment he tried to act. He cursed himself for not being more decisive, but he simply did not know what to. He obviously was no duelist; he had been outmaneuvered and outmagicked from the outset of this contest. He should have left the Evil Magician alone---yet he still could not see how he could have stood by and yielded Xanth up without even token protest. This was that token.

"This time, no error," Trent said, stepping boldly toward Bink. "I know I can transform you, for I have done it many times before without difficulty. I must have been overhasty today." He stopped within range, while Bink stood still, not deigning to run again. Trent concentrated--and the magic smote Bink once more, powerfully.

A flock of funnelbirds manifested around Bink. Hooting derisively, they jetted away on their fixed wings.

"The very microbes surrounding you!" Trent exclaimed. "My spell bounced right off you--again. Now I know there is something strange."

"Maybe you just don't want to kill me," Bink said.

"I was not trying to kill you--only to transform you into something harmless, so that never again could you oppose me. I never kill without reason." The Magician pondered. "Something very strange here. I don't believe my talent is misfiring; something is opposing it. There has to be some counterspell operating. You have led a rather charmed life, you know; I had thought it was mere coincidence, but now--"

Trent considered, then snapped his fingers ringingly. "Your talent! Your magic talent. That's it. You cannot be harmed by magic!"

"But I've been hurt many times," Bink protested.

"Not by magic, I'll warrent. Your talent repels all magical threats."

"But many spells have affected me. You transformed me---."

"Only to help you---or to warn you. You may not have trusted my motives, but your magic knew the truth. I never intended to harm you before, and so my spells were permitted. Now that we are dueling and I am trying to change your status for the worse, my spells bounce. In this respect your magic is more powerful than mine--as certain prior signals have indicated indirectly." Bink was amazed. "Then--then I have won. You cannot hurt me."

"Not necessarily so, Bink. My magic has brought yours to bay, and forced its unveiling, and thereby rendered it vulnerable." The Evil Magician drew his gleaming sword. "I have other talents than magic. Defend yourself--physically!"

Bink brought up his staff as Trent lunged. He barely parried the blade in time.

He was vulnerable--physically. Suddenly past confusions unraveled. He had never directly been harmed by magic. Embarra.s.sed, humiliated, yes, especially in childhood. But it was evidently physical harm he was protected against. When he had ran a race with another boy, and the boy had charged through trees and barriers to win, Bink had not suffered any physical damage, merely chagrin. And when he had chopped off his own finger, nonmagically, nothing had aided him there. Magic had healed that, but magic could not have made the injury. Similarly, he had been threatened by magic many times, and been terrified--but somehow had never had those threats materialize. Even when he had taken a lungful of Potipher's poison gas, he had been saved just in time. He had indeed led a charmed life--literally.

"Fascinating aspects to your magic," Trent said conversationally as he maneuvered for another opening. "Obviously it would be scant protection if its nature were widely known. So it arranges to conceal itself from discovery, by acting in subtle ways. Your escapes so often seemed fortuitous or coincidental." Yes, as when he escaped the Gap dragon. He had also been benefited by countermagic, coincidentally--as when he had been taken over by Donald the shade, enabling him to fly up out of the Gap safely.

"Your pride was never salvaged, merely your body," Trent continued, obviously taking his time about the fight while he worked out all the details, just in case. He was a meticulous man. "Maybe you suffered some discomfort, as in our entry into Xanth, whose purpose was to conceal the fact that nothing serious had happened to you. Rather than reveal itself, your talent allowed you to be exiled--because that was a legal or social matter, not really magical. Yet you were not hurt by the Shield--"

He had felt the tingle of the Shield as he dived through on his way out, and thought he had gotten safely through the opening. Now he knew he had taken the full force of the Shield--and survived. He could have walked through it at any time. But, had he known that, he might have done it--and given away his talent. So it had been concealed--from himself.

Yet now it had been revealed. And there was a flaw. "You were not hurt by the Shield either," Bink cried, striking hard with his staff.

"I was in direct contact with you when we entered," Trent said. "So was Chameleon. You were unconscious, but your talent still operated. To allow the two of us to die while you survived unscathed--that would have given it away. Or possibly a small field surrounds you, enabling you to protect those you touch. Or your talent looked ahead, and knew that if the magic of the Shield eliminated us at that time, you would be cast into the den of the kraken weed alone, and be unable to escape, and die there. You needed me and my power of transformation to survive the magical threats--so I was spared. And Chameleon, because you would not have worked with me if she had not done so. So we all survived, in order to promote your survival, and we never suspected the true cause. Similarly, your magic protected us all during our trek through the wilderness. I thought I needed you to protect me, but it was the other way around. My talent became a mere aspect of yours. When you were threatened by the wiggles and the invisible giant, you drew on my transformation of you to abate that threat, still without revealing ..."

Trent shook his head, still parrying Bink's clumsy attacks easily. "Suddenly it becomes less amazing--and your talent more impressive. You are a Magician, with not merely the overt complex of talents but the ramifying aspects too. Magicians are not merely more powerfully talented people; our enchantments differ in quality as well as quant.i.ty, in ways seldom appreciated by normal citizens. You are on a par with Humfrey and Iris and myself. I'd really like to know your power's full nature and extent."

"So would I," Bink gasped. His efforts were winding him, without effect on the Magician. This was true frustration.

"But alas, it seems I cannot become King while a talent like that opposes me. I sincerely regret the necessity of sacrificing your life, and want you to know this was not my intent at the outset of this encounter. I would have much preferred to transform you harmlessly. But the sword is less versatile than magic; it can only injure or kill."

Bink remembered Herman the centaur, his head flying from his body. When Trent decided that killing was necessary...

Trent made a deft maneuver. Bink flung himself aside. The point of the sword touched his hand. Blood flowed; with a cry of pain, Bink dropped his staff. He could be hurt by Mundane means, obviously. Trent had aimed for that hand, testing, making absolutely sure.

This realization broke the partial paralysis that had limited the imagination of his defense. He was vulnerable--but on a straight man-to-man basis, he did have a chance. The awesome power of the Evil Magician had daunted him, but now, in effect, Trent was merely a man. He could be surprised.

As Trent set up for the finishing thrust, Bink moved with inspired competency. He ducked under the man's arm, caught it with his b.l.o.o.d.y hand, turned, bent his knees, and heaved. It was the throw that the soldier Crombie had taught him, useful for handling an attacker with a weapon.

But the Magician was alert. As Bink heaved, Trent stepped around, keeping on his feet. He wrenched his sword arm free, threw Bink back, and oriented for the killing thrust. "Very nice maneuver, Bink; unfortunately, they also know such tactics in Mundania."

Trent thrust with instant decision, and with killing force. Bink, off balance, unable to move out of the way, saw the terrible point driving straight at his face. He was done for this time!

The winged doe shot between them. The sword plunged into her torso, the point emerging from the other side, just shy of Bink's quivering nose.

"b.i.t.c.h!" Trent yelled, though that was not the proper term for a female deer, winged or land-bound. He yanked free the b.l.o.o.d.y blade. "That strike was not meant for you!"

The doe fell, red blood spurting from her wound. She had been punctured through the belly. "I'll transform you into a jellyfish!" the Evil Magician continued in fury. "You'll smother to death on land."

"She's dying anyway," Bink said, feeling a sympathetic agony in his own gut. Such wounds were not immediately fatal, but they were terribly painful, and the result was the same in the long run. It was death by torture for Chameleon.

The omen! It had finally been completed. The chameleon had died suddenly. Or would die-- Bink launched himself at his enemy again, experiencing a vengeful rage he had never felt before. With his bare hands he would...

Trent stepped nimbly aside, cuffing Bink on the side of the neck with his left hand as he pa.s.sed. Bink stumbled and fell, half conscious. Blind rage was no subst.i.tute for cool skill and experience. He saw Trent step up to him, raising the sword high in both hands for the final body-severing blow.

Bink shut his eyes, no longer able to resist. He had done everything he could, and lost. "Only kill her too---cleanly," he begged. "Do not let her suffer."

He waited with resignation. But the blow did not fall. Bink opened his eyes---and saw Trent putting his terrible sword away.

"I can't do it," the Magician said soberly.

The Sorceress Iris appeared. "What is this?" she demanded. "Have your guts turned to water? Dispatch them both and be done with it. Your kingdom awaits!"

"I don't want my kingdom this way," Trent told her. "Once I would have done it, but I have changed in twenty years, and in the past two weeks. I have learned the true history of Xanth, and I know too well the sorrow of untimely death. My honor came late to my life, but it grows stronger; it will not let me kill a man who has saved my life, and who is so loyal to his unworthy monarch that he sacrifices his life in defense of the one who has exiled him." He looked at the dying doe. "And I would never voluntarily kill the girl who, lacking the intelligence to be cunning, yields up her own welfare for the life of that man. This is true love, of the kind I once knew. I could not save mine, but I would not destroy that of another. The throne simply is not worth this moral price."

"Idiot!" Iris screamed. "It is your own life you are throwing away."

"Yes, I suppose I am," Trent said. "But this was the risk I took at the outset, when I determined to return to Xanth, and this is the way it must be. Better to die with honor than to live in dishonor, though a throne be served up as temptation. Perhaps it was not power I sought, but perfection of self." He kneeled beside the doe and touched her, and she was the human Chameleon again. Blood leaked from the terrible wound in her abdomen. "I cannot save her," he said sadly, "any more than I could cure my wife and child. I am no doctor. Any creature into which I might transform her would suffer similarly. She must have help--magic help."

The Magician looked up. "Iris, you can help. Project your image to the castle of the Good Magician Humfrey. Tell him what has happened here, and ask him for healing water. I believe the authorities of Xanth will help this innocent girl and spare this young man, whom they wrongly exiled."

"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.

Chapter 16: King.

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 sp.a.w.ned 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 pa.s.sed 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 ma.s.s 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. All 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.

d.a.m.n 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.