Piers Anthony - The Source of Magic

Bink thought. "I suppose he would just return to his game."

"And what of us?"

"Well, the brain coral might be in trouble. I know I would be upset if someone had balked me for centuries! But the coral must have known the risk before it meddled."

"It did. The Demon lacks human emotion. He accepts the coral's interference as part of the natural hazard of the game; he will not seek revenge. Still, there could be a consequence."

"If Xanth lacks human emotion," Bink said slowly, "what would stop him from carelessly destroying us all? It would be one dispassionate, even sensible way of ensuring that he would not be trapped here again."

"Now you are beginning to comprehend the coral's concern," Humfrey said. "Our lives may hang in the balance. Even if the Demon ignores us, and merely goes his way, there will surely be a consequence."

"I should think so," Bink agreed. "If Xanth is the source of all magic in our land-" He interrupted himself, appalled. "It could mean the end of magic! We would become-"

"Exactly. Like Mundania," Humfrey concluded. "Perhaps it would not happen right away; it might take a while for the accumulated magic of a thousand years to fade. Or the loss might be instantaneous and absolute. We just don't know. But surely there would be a disaster of greater or lesser magnitude. Now at last you understand the burden the coral has borne alone. The coral has saved our land from a fate worse than destruction."

"But maybe the Demon wouldn't go," Bink said. "Maybe he likes it here-"

"Would you care to gamble your way of life on that assumption?"

"No!"

"Do you still condemn the coral for opposing you?"

"No, I suppose I would have done the same, in its place."

"Then you will depart without freeing the Demon?"

"I'm not sure," Bink said. "I agreed to listen to the coral's rationale; I have done so. But I must decide for myself what is right"

"There is a question, when the whole of our Land's welfare is at stake?"

"Yes. The Demon's welfare is also at stake."

"But all this is just a game to X(A/N)th. It is life to us."

"Yes," Bink agreed noncommittally. The Magician saw that argument was useless. "This is the great gamble we did not wish to take-the gamble of the outcome of an individual crisis of conscience. It rests in your hands. The future of our society."

Bink knew this was true. Nothing Humfrey or the brain coral might try could affect him before he uttered the words to free the Demon. He could ponder a second or an hour or a year, as he chose, free of duress. He did not want to make a mistake.

"Grundy," Bink said, and the golem ran up to him, not affected by the Thought vortices. "Do you wish to free the Demon Xanth?"

"I can't make decisions like that," Grundy protested. "I'm only clay and string, a creature of magic."

"Like the Demon himself," Bink said. "You're non-human, not quite alive. You might be construed as a miniature Demon. I thought you might have an insight."

Grundy paced the cave floor seriously. "My job is translation. I may not experience the emotion you do, but I have an awful clear notion of the Demon. He is like me, as a dragon is to a nickelpede. I can tell you this: he is without conscience or compassion. He plays his game rigorously by its rules, but if you free him you will have no thanks from him and no reward. In fact, that would be cheating on his part, to proffer you any advantage for your service to him, for that might influence you. But even if reward were legitimate, he wouldn't do it. He'd as soon step on you as smell you."

"He is like you," Bink repeated. "As you were before you began to change. Now you are halfway real. You care-somewhat."

"I am now an imperfect golem. Xanth is a perfect Demon. For me, humanization is a step up; for him it would be a fall from grace. He is not your kind."

"Yet I am not concerned with kind or thanks, but with justice," Bink said. "Is it right that the demon be freed?"

"By his logic, you would be an utter fool to free him."

The Good Magician, standing apart, nodded agreement.

"Jewel," Bink said.

The nymph looked up, smelling of old bones. "The Demon frightens me worse than anything," she said. "His magic-with the blink of one eye, he could click us all out of existence."

"You would not free him, then?"

"Oh, Bink-I never would." She hesitated prettily. "I know you took the potion, so this is unfair-but I'm so afraid of what that Demon might do, I'd do anything for you if only you didn't free him."

Again the Good Magician nodded. Nymphs were fairly simple, direct creatures, unfettered by complex overlays of conscience or social strategy. A real woman might feel the same way Jewel did, but she would express herself with far more subtlety, proffering a superficially convincing rationale. The nymph had named her price.

So the logical and the emotional advisers both warned against releasing the Demon X(A/N)th. Yet Bink remained uncertain. Something about this huge, super-magical, game-playing entity-

And he had it. Honor. Within the Demon's framework, the Demon was honorable. He never breached the code of the game-not in its slightest detail, though there were none of his kind present to observe, and had not been for a thousand years. Integrity beyond human capacity. Was he to be penalized for this?

"I respect you," Bink said at last to Humfrey. "And I respect the motive of the brain coral." He turned to the golem. "I think you ought to have your chance to achieve full reality." And to the nymph: "And I love you, Jewel." He paused, "But I would have respect for nothing, and love for nothing, if I did not respect and love justice. If I let personal attachments and desires prevail over my basic integrity of purpose, I would lose my claim to distinction as a moral creature. I must do what I think is right."

The others did not respond. They only looked at him.

"The problem is," Bink continued after a moment, "I'm not certain what is right. The rationale of the Demon Xanth is so complex, and the consequence of the loss of magic to our world is so great-where is right and wrong?" He paused again. "I wish I had Chester here to share his emotion and reason with me."

"You can recover the centaur," Humfrey said. "The waters of the coral lake do not kill, they preserve. He is suspended in brine, unable to escape, but alive. The coral can not release him; that brine preserves it similarly. But you, if you save the magic of our land, you can draw on the phenomenal power of this region and draw him forth."

"You offer another temptation of personal attachment," Bink said. "I can not let it influence me!" For now he realized that he had not yet won the battle against the brain coral. He had prevailed physically, but intellectually the issue remained in doubt. How could he be sure the decision he made was his own?

Then he had a bright notion. "Argue the other case, Magician! Tell me why I should free the Demon."

Startled, Humfrey demurred. "You should not free the Demon!"

"So you believe. So the coral believes. I can not tell whether that belief is really yours, or merely a function of the will of your master. So now you argue the opposite case, and I'll argue the case for leaving him chained. Maybe that way the truth will emerge."

"You are something of a demon yourself," Humfrey muttered.

"Now I submit that these friends of mine are more important than an impersonal Demon," Bink said. "I don't know what's right for X(A/N)th, but I do know that my friends deserve the best. How can I justify betraying them by freeing the Demon?"

Humfrey looked as if he had swallowed the evil eye, but he came back gamely enough. "It is not a question of betrayal, Bink. None of these creatures would ever have experienced magic, if it had not been for the presence of the Demon. Now his period of incarceration has been fulfilled, and he must be released. To do otherwise would be to betray your role in the Demon's game."