neetha Napew - The Paths Of The Perambulator

“Besides, I can always use some petty cash.” Jon-Tom felt as though he were being lectured by a maiden aunt. “And there’s nothing to hold me here. I like to travel for my own entertainment and elucidation, not just on business. There’s nothing to draw me back here, if this should turn out to be my last gallop. I’m between books.”

“Books? You read a lot, huh?” Jon-Tom asked.

She shook her head. “You have a fine facility for seeking out the inaccurate. I am a writer, and one with quite a reputation. Though you don’t strike me as the type to delve into a heavy romance, especially one featuring four-legged protagonists—though you never can tell about an individual’s reading preferences. I take it you haven’t heard of the authoress Shiraz Sassway?”

“I’m afraid not, though I haven’t had a chance to do much light reading lately,” Jon-Tom told her. “I’ve been studying hard.”

“Shame.” She looked wistful. “I’ll have to give you a copy of my latest when we return. Long-legged Love’s Lust Lost. I’m told it’s very big in the south.”

“Maybe you and I could do some research some time, luv—with other company, o’ course.” Mudge gave her a lecherous wink.

“I don’t do much research anymore, water rat. I draw instead upon previous experiences. I had an industrious youth. It’s all behind me now.”

“I’ll bet it was behind you most of the time,” Mudge put in, making sure he was out of biting range.

It was Clothahump who spoke next, however. “There are more clauses in this one document than in a binding between a witch and its familiar.”

“I’ve been cheated once or twice. Nothing personal, wiz. Don’t you read your contracts?” She looked thoughtful as she enumerated a few favorite phrases. “Packs to be arranged and bound according to my design, not yours. Weight to be predetermined—no last-minute additions, not even a sandwich. The usual hazardous-duty bonus clauses. In return, you get everything I can give. I can carry more than any horse and move faster than any donkey. I can climb grades that would give your average packhorse a stroke on the spot, and I can do it blindfolded if necessary. I can do all that on less food, which I’m not as particular about. Plain wild grains and grasses suit me when I’m packing. I’m a good scavenger, and I can survive on stuff you’d use to brace your house with.

“You’re going north. I can handle the cold better than any horse except maybe a Pryzwalski, and there ain’t any in this neck of the woods. Plus you get the benefit of all my experience. I’ve been around. I’m not citified like some of these tenderfoots who haul produce from door to door out in the suburbs.”

“W’re not exactly innocents abroad ourselves,” Jon-Tom told her.

“Glad to hear it. I’m not in the nursing business, colt. Oh, and one more thing. Absolutely no riding unless someone gets hurt too bad to hoof it. I’m a packer, not personal transport, and I don’t intend to change my ways now. If that’s what you have in mind, you need to move upstall and talk to the Appaloosas and pintos.”

“We’ll walk,” Clothahump declared. “We’ve done so before and we can do so now. There is nothing wrong with our feet, albeit that we are reduced to traveling on two instead of four. I promise you that you will only be required to haul our supplies. We will haul ourselves.” He indicated the contract.

“But before I put my name to this, I must in turn be certain of your commitment. We may well find ourselves in mortal danger at the hands of an opponent whose face and name remain a mystery to us and whose motivation is driven by an unknown madness. In addition we must somehow deal with an incredibly powerful and dangerous phenomenon that is not of this universe. Issues of great gravity are at stake here. We will in all likelihood have to face dangerous moments together, and at such times we must stand as one. I cannot have any member of our small party backing out at such times, whether for personal reasons or because of some footnote on a piece of paper.”

Dormas drew herself up until she looked every bit as proud as an Arabian. “I won’t be the one to break when push comes to pull and the Black Wind threatens to sweep us away. You can rest assured on that.” Her dark eyes swept over them to settle on Mudge. “What about you, otter? You’re not afraid?”

Mudge had resumed his place against the wall. He’d appropriated a sliver of straw from the Hinny’s bed and was chewing on it as he examined the claws of his right paw.

“Well now, lass, actually I’m terrified out o’ me gourd. But I’ve seen wot ‘Is Socerership can do, as well as me not-too-bright but well-meanin’ spellsinger friend ‘ere, and I ‘ave confidence in the both o’ them. This perambulator’s perturbin’ strikes me as a worldwide problem. Since there ain’t no runnin’ aways from it, I figure we might as well ‘ave a try at puttin’ it right. I’ve been through this sort o’ thing with this one”—and he jerked a thumb in Jon-Tom’s direction—”a couple o’ times previous. Not that I’m gettin’ used to ‘avin’ me precious self regularly threatened with dismemberment, but I ain’t surprised when somethin’ takes a try at it.

“See, I’m beginnin’ to feel that me fate is some’ow bound up with this ‘ere spellsinger chap and that I might as well trot along with ‘im. You know, sort of like bein’ in an accident where two wagons smash into one another at this intersection, and the owners can’t get themselves untangled?”

“That’s not a very sweet metaphor, Mudge,” Jon-Tom groused.

“It ain’t a very sweet relationship, mate.” He turned back to Dormas. “Anyways, seein’ as ‘ow there ain’t no place to run to for gettin’ away from the effects o’ this perambudiscombobulator, I figure I might as well tag along. Maybe there’ll be some profit in it, wot?”

“I see. Strong feelings are involved as well as strong reasons. I like that. Hand me that pen there, in the wall holder.”

Clothahump passed it over. Taking it in her teeth, she signed the contract with an unexpected flourish. The wizard nodded approvingly. Then he touched his signet ring to the blank place below her name, leaving behind the imprint of a turtle shell cut by a large letter C.

Dormas studied the signet admiringly. “A neat trick.”

“Cheaper than buying new pens,” the wizard told her. “I’d have one made up for you and sell you the necessary permanent ink spell, but your hoofprint would cover half the page. Your solicitor wouldn’t like that. He’d have less room to complain in the margins.”

She smiled, deposited the contract in a drawer, and closed it with a nudge of her muzzle. “Really, I’m not as cantankerous as I seem. On the trail you’ll find me an agreeable and pleasant companion.”

“Another one like ‘Is Magicness,” Mudge whispered to Jon-Tom. “Spirits preserve us!”

“When do we start climbing?”

“Tomorrow morning, if you are amenable.”

“Fine. I’ll be up with the sun. We can pack and be off fast.”

“Another go-getter,” Mudge muttered glumly. “Won’t I ever fall in with sensible folks wot knows ‘ow to take their time and their lives easy?”

“It’s pretty hard to relax when the stability of the entire world is at stake, Mudge.”

The otter stretched and yawned. “I don’t know as ‘ow it’s all that stable now, mate. Not that it matters very much. You know what they say: ‘Everyone’s crazy but me and thee, and I ain’t so sure about thee.’’

Jon-Tom studied him with a shrewd and familiar eye. “All that blather about your duty to Clothahump and your fellow beings—you’re really coming along to protect youself, aren’t you?”