neetha Napew - Son Of Spellsinger

Buncan chose a convenient boulder for a seat, plunked himself down, and readied the duar. His legs dangled over a drop of several fleet. The otters eyed him expectantly.

“This is your show, mate,” said Squill. “Wot’ll we sing about?” Neena adjusted her headband, primping.

“You did pretty well before. I thought you two might come up with something.”

“Not me. You’re the one who wants to save the world. As if it asked you.”

It should be profound, Buncan mused. But for the life of him he couldn’t think of anything. It was a lovely day, the river was calm, he could not espy any evil sorcerers lurking in the Bellwoods, and no one in the immediate vicinity was screaming for help. Spellsinging in such circumstances seemed suddenly superfluous.

He had to try something. If he waited, given the otters’ demonstrated reluctance to participate, they might never again prove so amenable. Especially if either Mudge or Weegee found out what they’d been up to.

“I’m hungry,” said Neena unexpectedly.

“We’ll be ‘avin’ supper soon enough,” her brother reminded her.

“Cor, but I’m ‘ungry now.” She stared at Buncan. “ ‘Ow about we try to conjure up some food? We’re right on the Shortstub. ‘Ow about we spellsing out some nice fish?”

Fish aren’t very profound, Buncan reflected. “That’s not much of a challenge,” he responded dubiously.

Her tail twitched animatedly as she jabbed a short finger in his direction. “You listen to me, Bunkles. It’s all very well an’ good to want to go off battlin’ ‘ellish ‘ordes an’ upliftin’ the downtrodden an’ all that rot, but a bloke’s liable to work up one ‘ell of an appetite in the process. So let’s see if we can manage a snack first.”

“I did say we’d start with something simple,” he mumbled.

“Mudge would approve,” Neena added.

“Sure ‘e would.” Squill whistled appreciatively. “Mudge approves o’ anythin’ ‘avin’ to do with food.”

“Food it is, then.” Buncan sighed. “I’m waiting.”

Once more the siblings conferenced. When they separated, Neena nodded at Buncan. Three feet tapped out a unified beat.

“Got no gear, got no line.

Still wanna eat, wanna eat what’s fine.

Bring it from the bottom, bring it from the depth

Bring up somethin’ swimmin’ to where we can get it

Bet it, better not let it, better not set it

Down too far, down far away, hey, hey

Wanna eat what’s fine but I gots no line.”

The otters rapped a nice, relaxed rhythm, one Buncan could follow easily. A satisfyingly bright green nimbus coalesced at the nexus of the duar’s strings as the harmonious blend of otterish voices and dual sets of strings drifted out across the placid expanse of the Shortstub.

No fish responded by breaking the opalescent surface to land at their feet. No silver-sided morsels manifested mem-selves alongside the boulder. The river flowed on undisturbed and indifferent.

Buncan’s fingers drifted from the strings. “Come on,” he urged them. “You’re not putting your hearts into this. I’ve heard Jon-Tom talk about this a lot. Making magic with music means more than just playing the chords and mouthing the words. You’ve got to put your whole soul, your deepest feelings, into what you’re doing.”

“Wot the ‘ell do you dunk we’re doin’, mate?” snapped Squill.

“Yeah. I mean, I’m really ‘ungry, I am,” his sister added.

“You have to try harder,” Buncan admonished them. “Don’t dunk about spellsinging, don’t think about magic. Just dunk about how hungry you are.”

“She’s the one who’s ‘ungry, not me,” Squill protested.

Buncan glared at him. “Well, get hungry!”

The otter looked thoughtful. “Now that you mention it, all this ‘ere work ‘tis made me a touch ravenous. Cor, I believes I can feel the pangs workin’ in me belly even us I stand ‘ere speakin’.”

Buncan smiled. “Right, that’s the spirit.” His fingers returned to the strings. “Let’s give it another try. And really put your hearts and your minds into it this time, as well as your stomachs.”

The otters put men- whiskers together and started over. Buncan could sense the difference immediately. The lyrics contained the kind of barely constrained energy only a pair of otters could muster a nervous, teeth-tingling, edgy concentration of adrenaline. Despite his skill, Buncan was suddenly hard-pressed to keep up with them.

A waxen dark-green mist appeared on the river, palpitating energy sucked hither from some cabalistic fog bank by the power of the spellsong. It eddied and intensified, a curdled haze, shifting about as unpredictably as a cloud uncertain of where the wind was preparing to blow it next.

A faint trembling began underfoot as the earth itself grew nervous. Pebbles jostled and clicked against one another and blades of grass vibrated, a thousand tiny tuning forks attuned to an unnatural disturbance of vast potency.

Maybe, Buncan thought, starting to sweat a little, maybe this could get out of hand. The otters rapped on, oblivious to his concern.

A portion of the bank beneath him collapsed and he half tumbled, half slid off the boulder, scrambling madly in search of more solid ground. That he never missed a beat on the duar was a credit more to his physical than mental resiliency. On the far side of the Shortstub, cracks appeared in the hitherto stable bank as soil and sand crumbled into the water, leaving damp V-shaped scars behind.

Something stupendous was coalescing within the fog. Something slick of flank and commodious of bulk. A fish, as Squill and Neena had demanded. A fish, but bigger than any Buncan had ever seen. Bigger than any he had ever imagined. He played on mechanically, mesmerized by the vision, unable to stop.

As it jutted out of the mist, loomed above it, seriously disturbed the waters beneath, one thing became quickly apparent. It was not a fish.

He raised his voice. “Hey! You guys can stop rapping now.” He pointed.

They’d been singin He pointed.

They’d been singin Now they turned, following his gesture. “Sister,” Squill murmured through a long, eloquent whistle, “while I’ve been on occasion amazed by your appetite, I didn’t realize you were quite this ‘ungry.”

The conjuration nearly filled the river from bank to bank. It was twenty times as long as Buncan was tall and must have weighed as much or more than the combined population of Lynchbany, with that of a few outlying farms and maybe a small suburb or two thrown in for good measure. In color it was a light blue on top, a whitish slate-gray underneath. White spots splotched the striated lower jaw. A lurch of its massive tail sent a miniature tidal wave crashing against the far bank. Water plants and fish flew in all directions.

An eye that was small only comparatively located them. The immense skull struggled to turn in their direction, but was constrained by a combination of the green fog and the narrowness of the river channel.

“LET ME GUESS.” The voice rumbled and reverberated like a great bell. “YOU THREE WOULDN’T BE RESPONSIBLE FOR MY BEING HERE, WOULD YOU?”

“Ummmm . . .” Squill jerked a finger in his sister’s direction. “It were all ‘er idea.”

“Wot?” she squeaked, outraged.

“Well, you were the one who were so bleedin’ ‘ungry!”

Instantly they were clamped in furious internecine combat, rolling about on the now soggy riverbank, flailing and kicking and scratching and biting at one another.

“Otters.” Buncan smiled wanly, as though this explained everything.

“I CAN SEE THAT.” The grievously displaced blue whale spoke with immense gravity. “THE POINT IS, I SEEM TO BE MISSING AN OCEAN. THERE’S NOT REALLY ENOUGH WATER HERE TO SUPPORT ME, AND I’M ALREADY HAVING A BIT OF DIFFICULTY BREATHING. SO IF YOU DON’T MIND . . . ?”