Piers Anthony - Out of Phaze

At the mouth of the cave that was the Demesnes entrance, Mach paused. He stood on the side of a mountain, and could see out over the trees below. This was the north slope; theoretically most of Phaze lay before him, but all he could see was the nearest section, seemingly untouched by man.

A floating watery bubble appeared before him. Mach smiled warily. “Hello, Translucent Adept,” he said.

“And a greeting to thee, Mach of Proton,” the Adept replied. “What be thy current desire?”

“To find Fleta.”

“She was freed by thine other self; methinks she fled to the Blue Demesnes.”

“Makes sense,” Mach agreed.

“I can transport thee there, an thou prefer.”

“Thanks, Adept, but I think not. I won’t come to you unless I’m ready to do business.”

“Fair enough,” Translucent said. “The door be open always.” His bubble of water faded out.

Mach considered. He would go to the Blue Demesnes. But how? It might be a long march by foot, but he was uncertain of his powers of magic, particularly now that he was alone. His spells had worked well only when Fleta had helped him with her music, or when he had built up to them carefully. If he tried to transport himself, and garbled it, in what condition would he find himself? Also, each spell only worked once; there was no point in wasting them. So—he would go by foot.

He started walking north. It was slow, because of the slope; it was about as hard going down as it would have been going up, to his surprise. He was soon sweating, for it was the middle of the day and he was alive. In his robot body he neither tired nor sweated, but now he gloried in these physical manifestations.

A harpy flew into view. She wore a fright wig. “Phoebe!” he exclaimed.

She heard him and swerved to approach. “The imitation Adept! Alone?”

“I’m looking for Fleta,” he said. “Have you seen her?”

“Aye, a day ago. I put her on the way to the Blue Demesnes.”

Confirmation! “I’m going there now.”

“Thou wilt ne’er catch her, at the rate thou art going. She was charging north on the hoof, last I saw her.”

“I’ll keep going, though. Thank you for your information, Phoebe.”

“Nobody thanks a harpy,” she grumbled. “It be just not done.”

“Sorry.” He waved to her, and went on.

“And when thou dost catch her, ne’er let her go!” she screeched after him.

It was advice he intended to follow. He moved on down the slope, and in due course came to the level plain. Here he made better progress, finding the approximate route they had traveled before. He knew this was unicorn country, so would be free of most predators.

He was mistaken. In midafternoon, as he was trudging tiredly along, a great shadow cut across the plain. He looked up, and spied a dragon.

He hoped the monster was just passing by. But it wasn’t. Evidently it had spotted him trudging, and decided that this was suitable prey. It wasn’t a large dragon, compared to the one they had encountered south of the mountains; this might be a scavenger, seeking prey that was too weak to defend itself well.

Well, he fit the description. He was not only tired, he was exposed, for there were no trees nearby and no other cover. He had no weapon. He could neither fight nor flee effectively.

The dragon swooped. Its talons were spread; it planned to snatch him up and carry him away, perhaps biting off his head to keep him passive.

Magic! He had to use a spell to protect himself!

But what? He had only seconds to come up with one. The dragon was diving toward him at an awesome rate, its little eyes and big teeth gleaming.

Something to make it too small to harm him! “Dragon fall, become small!” he sang as it closed on him. And knew that it wasn’t going to work.

The dragon seemed to hesitate. It lost control, passing over Mach’s head, the downdraft from its wings almost blasting him off his feet. It lifted, and wobbled, seeming huge.

Huge? The thing was growing!

Mach realized that he had really blown his spell this time. It had not merely failed, it had had the opposite of the intended effect! Instead of making the dragon fall and get small, it was rising and getting larger. He had made things even worse for himself than they had been.

He scrambled through his mind, trying to come up with a better spell, trying to concentrate to make it work, trying to generate some more substantial music and having no success at any of these efforts. He watched, morbidly fascinated, as the dragon lifted and grew.

Then the monster stalled out and dropped. It flapped its wings desperately, but could not find enough purchase for them, and crashed into the ground. The contact was a hard one; Mach felt the earth shudder.

The dragon lay still. It was either dead or close to it. Mach decided not to investigate closely; the thing might not be as badly off as it seemed He took the opportunity to get himself as far from it as possible.

But he pondered. Granted that his spell had been another disaster, confirming his caution in avoiding magic where possible —why had the dragon crashed? It had gotten larger, so should have been even more formidable.

Larger? Did that mean it also increased its mass? Surely so; here in Phaze mass had no relevance, as was evident when Fleta changed from unicorn form to hummingbird form. If it got heavier as well as larger, the dynamics of its flight would change; it would require a proportionally greater wingspan to do the same job. Many of the laws of physics did not apply in the magic realm, but it seemed that some did—those not specifically countered by magic. So the dragon’s ratios had gotten wrong; it was unable to fly, because though its wings had grown with the rest of it, they needed to grow faster than the rest of it, to keep it aloft. Thus it had stalled and crashed.

His spell had done the job after all. But through no great wit or magic of his! He had once again blundered to a kind of success. He was not phenomenally pleased.

At the rate he was going, he was surely losing headway. If Fleta had galloped by here a day ago, he would be two days behind by the time he reached the Blue Demesnes. But he remained reluctant to try too much magic. Magic seemed, to him, to be fraught with the same kind of dangers as would be working with complex equipment a person did not properly understand: the consequences of some seemingly minor misjudgment could be magnified disastrously.

Still, there were dangers here, as the recent episode of the dragon showed, and if he wanted to remain long in Phaze he would need to sharpen his survival skills. So it was necessary that he tackle magic, so as to be able to use it effectively at need. And his first need was travel.

He sat down and pondered. He didn’t want to risk transporting himself; the fate of the dragon made that all too worrisome. But he could conjure something that would help him travel—

In Proton, if he wanted to travel outside, he would have requisitioned a vehicle of some sort. Could he do the same here?

What kind of vehicle would be best for mixed terrain without roads? Not a wheeled one, for there was grass and some rocks and gullies, and streams. One that floated.

An aircar, its cushion of air supporting it and moving it forward.

He thought up a suitable rhyme, then hummed to work up the music. He concentrated on what he wanted, in order to get it exactly right. Then he sang: “Bring me a car, to travel far.”

Fog appeared and swirled. It dissipated, leaving an object. Success!

Or was it? As he got a closer look, he realized that this was not a car; it was more like a boat. In fact, it was a canoe, floating placidly. There were two paddles in it.

What could he do with a canoe, here in the middle of the plain? There was no water in sight! And if there were a navigable river, he would have to follow where it went, rather than where he wanted to go. He had bungled the spell again.