Piers Anthony - The Source of Magic

Chester and Crombie and the Magician closed in about him, all riveted to that compelling sound. "No, no!" Trolla cried despairingly behind them. "It is death you seek! Are you civilized males or are you mindless things?"

That bothered Bink, What did he want with a magical temptress? Yet still he could not resist the siren. Her lure had an unearthly quality that caught at the very root of his masculinity, beneath the center of his intelligence. He was male, therefore he responded.

"Let them go, they are lost," Trolla said despairingly. "We tried, as we have always tried-and failed."

Though he was in thrall to the siren, Bink felt simultaneous sympathy for Trolla and the girls. They offered life and love, yet were doomed to be rejected; their positive orientation could not compete with the negative compulsion of the siren. The villagers suffered as horrible a damnation as the men! Was it because they were nice girls, making only promises they could keep, while the siren had no such limit?

Crombie squawked. "As all females always fail," Grundy translated, responding to Trolla's despair. "Though why any of us should bother with this bitch-female call-" The griffin shrugged his wings and charged on.

Did even the golem feel it? He must, for he was not protesting.

They ran down a path that opened magically before them. It was a perfect path, exactly the kind that usually led to something huge, predatory, and stationary, like a tangle tree. But of course this particular tangler would not attack them, because they were males in thrall to the siren. She would dispatch them, in her own fashion.

And what might that fashion be? Bink wondered. He could not quite imagine it, but the prospect was wrenchingly exciting. "What a way to go!" he breathed.

The tree came into sight It was monstrous, even for its kind. Its dangling tentacles were as thick as the legs of a man, and extremely long and limber. Its tempting fragrance surrounded it like an evening gown, making it seem thoroughly desirable. Gentle music emanated from its foliage, no siren call, but nice: the kind of music that made a person want to lie down and listen and relax.

But no veteran of the wilderness of Xanth could be fooled for an instant. This was one of the most deadly life forms available. Even a dragon would not venture near a tangle tree!

The path passed right under it, where the curtain of tentacles parted neatly and the soft sward grew. But elsewhere around the fringe was a developing cone of bleaching bones, the remainders of the tree's past victims. Shapely female bones, Bink suspected, and felt another twinge of guilt

Yet the siren still called, and they followed. They tunneled down to single file, for the path beneath the tree was narrow. Chester galloped first, then Crombie, for their forms were fastest; Bink and the Magician followed as well as they could. There had not been occasion to mount the steeds for faster travel. Chester paused under the awful tree, and the tentacles quivered with suppressed eagerness but did not grab. So it was true: the siren's song nullified the tangle reflex! The distant music was stronger now, and more compelling: the very essence of female allure. The nymphs of the village had been pretty and sweet, but the siren's promise was vital; it was as if the sex appeal of all womankind had been distilled and concentrated and-

Ahead of Bink, the griffin suddenly halted. "Squawk!" Crombie exclaimed. "What am I doing here?" the golem translated, coming up behind, surprisingly fleet on his feet, considering his size. "The siren is nothing but a damned conniving female out for my blood!"

Literally true, but the others ignored him. Of course the siren was a conniving female, the ultimate one! What difference did that make? The call had to be honored!

The woman-hater, however, decided to be difficult. "She's trying to trap me!" he squawked. "All women are traps! Death to them all!" And he pecked viciously at the nearest thing available-which happened to be the slender extremity of a tentacle.

In a small bird, such a peck would have been a nuisance. Crombie, however, was a griffin. His beak was sword-sharp, powerful as a vise, a weapon capable of severing a man's leg at the ankle with a single bite. The tentacle, in this case, was the diameter of an ankle, and the chomp severed it cleanly. The separated end dropped to the ground, twitching and writhing like a headless green snake.

For a moment the whole tree froze in shock. No one took a bite out of a tangler! The truncated upper section of the tentacle welled dark ooze as it thrashed about as if looking for its extremity. The gentle background music soured.

"I think the truce has been broken," Bink said. But he didn't really care, for the song of the siren continued, drawing him on to better things. "Move on, Crombie; you're blocking my way."

But the soldier remained unreasonable. "Squawk! Squawk! Squawk!" he exclaimed, and before Grundy could translate, he nipped off another tentacle, then a third.

The tangle tree shuddered. Then, furious, it reacted. Its music became a deafening blare of outrage, and its tentacles grabbed for the griffin-and the centaur, man, and Magician.

"Now you've done it, birdbrain!" Chester screamed over the noise. He grabbed the first tentacle that touched him and wrung it between his two hands the way the ogre had wrung out the log. Tough as the tentacles were when grabbing, they had little resistance to cutting or compression, and this one was squished into uselessness in a moment.

Suddenly the lure of the siren was drowned out by the rage of the tree, and they were in a fight for their lives. Bink drew his sword and slashed at the tentacles that swept toward him, cutting them off. Beside him Crombie pecked and scratched viciously, all four feet operating. Long cuts appeared in the tentacles he touched, and green goo welled out. But more tentacles kept coming in, from all sides, for this was the very center of the tree's power.

Chester backed up to the trunk and operated his bow. He fired arrow after arrow through the thick upper reaches of the tentacles, paralyzing them. But-

"No, Chester!" Bink cried. "Get away from-" Too late. The tree's huge maw opened in the trunk, the bark-lips lapping forward to engulf the centaur's handsome posterior.

Bink leaped to help his friend. But a tentacle caught his ankle, tripping him. All he could do was yell: "Kick, Chester, kick!" Then he was buried in tentacles, as firm and rounded and pneumatic as the limbs of the village girls, but not nearly as nice. His sword arm was immobilized; all he could do was bite, ineffectively. That green goo tasted awful!

Chester kicked. The kick of a centaur was a potent thing. His head and shoulders went down, counterbalancing his rear, and all the power of his extraordinary body thrust through his two hind hooves. They connected inside the maw of the tree, against the wooden throat, and the ground shook with the double impact. A few old bones were dislodged from the upper foliage to rattle down to the ground. But the wooden mouth held. Sap juices flowed, commencing the digestion of the centaur's excellent flesh. Chester's instinct would have been sound for any ordinary tree, using the inert trunk as protection for his valuable but vulnerable rear, but it was disaster here.

Chester kicked again, and again, violently. Even this predator-tree could not withstand much of this punishment. Normally its prey was unconscious or helpless by the time it reached the consumption stage, not awake and kicking. Slowly, reluctantly, the bark gave way, and the centaur dragged free. His once-beautiful flank was discolored by the saliva sap, and one hoof had been chipped by the force of its contact with the wood, but at least he was alive. Now he drew his sword and strode forward to help Bink, who was not-so-slowly suffocating in the embrace of the tentacles.