neetha Napew - Son Of Spellsinger

There was no need to worry about Snaugenhutt. Fit and completely sober for the first time in years, the rhino was ready to fight mountains.

No one bade them farewell as they ambled out of Poukelpo. The townsfolk had seen too many people charge bravely off into the Tamas, never to return. They went about their daily business in the manner of all desert dwellers: with care and deliberation.

The days did not strike Buncan or bis companions as particularly hot. This was more to Snaugenhutt’s benefit than anyone else’s, as he was doing all the work and lugging armor to boot. He plodded methodically northward, able to tolerate the heat so long as they rested during the hottest part of the day.

The otters busied themselves catching fresh lizard and snake to supplement their stores, while Gragelouth strained to see ahead, using his experience to select the most likely route since there were no paths or roads through the desert. Neither Buncan nor the otters ever disputed his choices. The merchant was the seasoned traveler, not they.

Several days out from Poukelpo they found themselves passing among towering, twisted formations of reflective colored sandstone. This was country, Buncan mused, to delight the eye if not the feet. Snaugenhutt’s thick, horny footpads were not troubled by the crumbly rock underfoot, and his passengers were as feathers to him. They made steady progress.

That was why it was such a surprise when he began to sway unsteadily.

A concerned Buncan leaned out and forward. “Something the matter, Snaugenhutt?” Behind him his companions strained to hear.

Viz had been scouting a little ways ahead. Now he returned to query his friend. But Snaugenhutt wasn’t listening. “Everybody off,” the tickbird said abruptly. “Off, off!” They complied; the otters with inherent grace, Buncan awkwardly, Gragelouth with so much deliberation that he barely made it before the rhino keeled over onto his side. Supplies went flying as their indestructible mount let out a vast moan. He lay there, groaning and burbling, eyes rolling back in his head as his legs feebly kicked and pawed at the dry air. His passengers gathered to stare at their stricken companion. Viz settled on Duncan’s shoulder. To his great relief the tickbird did not seem panicked. “What’s wrong with him?” he asked worriedly.

“I think the shock finally wore off.” “The shock?” Neena frowned. “Wot shock?”

“Recall our fellow traveler’s condition at the moment we were about to storm the Baron’s domicile,” a suddenly comprehending Gragelouth suggested. “It was only an unexpected fall from a great height which returned him abruptly to consciousness. That has finally worn off.”

“Wot’s worn off?” Squill made a face. “You talk in riddles, merchant.”

“I am saying that he has been functioning under the impact of that moment ever since. Until now.” The sloth dispassionately considered the unsteady heap of sudden insensibility. “It has finally worn off.”

“Got that right,” agreed Viz with feeling.

“But it’s been days,” Buncan pointed out. “How is that possible?”

“I did not think it was possible for any living being to get that drunk, either.” Gragelouth shrugged.

Squill found himself a soft patch of sand beneath the shade of a wind-polished boulder. “Looks like rest time, mates.”

“Not hardly.” Buncan moved to unlimber his duar. “We’ve got to sing away the last of his inebriation.”

“Wot, now? ‘Ere?” The otter indicated the towering buttes, the peculiar spiny plants, the tiny but highly active reptile scuttling into a hole. “Why not just wait for ‘im to sleep it off?”

“That could mean days,” Viz informed him. “I’ve seen it take that long.”

Gragelouth considered the sky. It was cloudless, intensely blue, and while not burning, decidedly less than comfortable. “Better not to linger in such a place. I, for one, am not of a mind to wait if it can be avoided.”

“Come on.” Buncan plucked experimentally at the strings. “It shouldn’t take much of a spellsong. We’re just going to cure a delayed hangover, not transform birds or call up unwilling whales.”

Neena sidled over to her brother. “Wot are you afraid o’, slime-breath? Me, I don’t want to squat ‘ere drinkin’ up our water an’ waitin’ for the Gut-that-Walks to get over ‘is beauty sleep.” She kicked at him, and he scurried to avoid her foot. Buncan noticed that she’d done her best to reapply her makeup, though it was considerably less florid than when they’d started out. The streaks of color that flowed back from her muzzle were not as bright or well-defined as before.

Why she felt the need to wear makeup into a trackless desert was a question only another female could answer.

“Let’s leave it up to the one who knows him best.” Buncan turned to the tickbird.

“Help him if you can,” Viz replied. “He’ll dehydrate lying out in the sun like that.”

“Why is he kicking and moaning?”

“D.T.’s,” the tickbird informed him curtly, adding, “You don’t want to know what a drunken rhinoceros hallucinates.”

Buncan nodded, found himself a comfortable rock to sit on after first making sure it was not home to anything small and fast that was inclined to bite him on the butt, and settled the duar across his knees. For a change he could enjoy improvising. This time their lives weren’t at risk. They were only trying to help a friend in distress.

“Got no time to waste in this place

Got to move on, got to find our space

Tis a race

We’re in, so you “ave to feel better

Get over your trouble, get to somewhere that’s wetter

Shit, you ain’t sick

You’re in the thick

O’ the trick.”

Neena tracked the musical line easily, chivvying her brother into a reluctant harmony. It was good to hear the two of them singing together again, Buncan thought, after the successful but erratic sorcery he had perpetrated with each of them individually.

He relaxed as the by now familiar silvery cloud began to take shape alongside the moaning rhino, growing thicker and more pronounced with each note, each rapped rhyme. It would be interesting to see what form the cure would take. Would it be visually intriguing, or simply straightforward and functional?

It took the form of a grotesque, misshapen outline stained green and yellow that laughed horribly out of the side of slavering, rotting jaws.

Furthermore, it was not alone.

Horrid multiples of the initial phantasm were taking shape all around them, half stolid, half invisible. Noxious ichor dripped from wicked, curving claws.

“Stop it,” wailed Gragelouth. “Make them go away!”

“Go away?” Frantic, Buncan didn’t know whether it would make things worse to cease playing or keep on. Judging by their dismayed expressions, neither did the otters. “How can we make them go away? We’re calling them up!” Something stung him on the cheek. Hard.

“Sorry.” Viz was apologetic. “I had to get your attention. You’re not calling these things up. He is.” A wingtip indicated the moaning, twitching Snaugenhutt. “They’re what he’s seeing. I know, he’s described his D.T.’s to me before. Your singing is just making them visible, giving them substance.” The tickbird’s voice was hard. “Of course, I’m not experienced in such matters, but it seems to me that if you just quit cold you’re liable to leave something like these things hanging around.”

Something that smelled like rotting flesh on burned toast was shuffling toward them, fungoid arms extended, eyeballs dangling from the ends of raw, frayed strings. It was still only half solid, and Buncan forced himself not to run.

“If we keep singing,” he muttered even as his fingers continued to draw music from the duar, “we’re liable to make it worse.”