Indeed, they came down somewhat hard, having misjudged the oddly contoured terrain of Torus, which curved away to east and west and upward to north and south. Imbri landed solidly on her four hoofs, but Forrest fell on his back, and the two girls tumbled in spread limbed disarray that would have been embarra.s.sing if they hadn"t been in blue jeans.
As they got to their a.s.sorted feet, they discovered that the glade was not nearly as nice as it had seemed from afar. It was bare of gra.s.s, and littered with bones. "What kind of place is this?" Dawn asked nervously.
Eve touched a bone. "Uh-oh," she said. "This bone belonged to an animal that was eaten by a tangle tree."
"But that means-" Dawn said, looking quickly around.
Now they all saw it: the single tree in the center was the largest, awfullest tangle tree Forrest had ever seen. It had an enormous number of tentacles, and these were now quivering as the tree realized that prey was near.
"We have about half an instant to get out of here," Forrest said, starting to run.
But a tentacle lashed out and struck his knapsack. There was a dragon claw on the end that hooked right in. In only a quarter of an instant Forrest was hauled into the air.
Imbri galloped over. "I"ll rescue you," she cried in a dreamlet. "I"ll bite through the vine before it hauls you into the maw."
"You can"t!" Dawn cried. "That tentacle is armored with dragon scales!"
She was correct. Imbri reared up on her hind feet and clamped her teeth on the tentacle just over For-rest"s head. There was a clang as enamel ground against metal. Then Imbri dropped down, unsuccessful.
"Get away from here, the rest of you!" Forrest cried.
"Not while you"re in trouble," Eve said. "We"ll stop it somehow."
"You can"t stop an armored tangle tree!"
But the two girls, heedless of their own safety, drew two sharp little knives he hadn"t known they carried, and reached up to stab at the tentacle from either side. One must have gotten a point past the armor, because suddenly the tree squealed in pain or outrage, and the tentacle hauled Forrest up twice as high. Then two more tentacles whipped out and wrapped around the girls. They screamed as they too were hauled into the air.
"Ooooh, this is worse than I thought," Eve cried, as she reached up to touch a metal scale. "The tree has eaten many dragons, and saved their scales to make it impervious."
Dawn reached up similarly. "And it has healing elixir in its sap, so that it heals as fast as it is injured."
"Look at that trunk!" Eve cried. "It has mirrors to make it almost invisible."
"And it has the strength of a sphinx," Dawn said, gleaning more information from the living part of the tentacle she touched.
"If the trunk is also protected by dragon scales," Eve said, "then it can"t be burned, even by salamander fire."
"And it has a voice, and can talk," Dawn said.
"For sure," the tree said. "Now which of you delectable creatures shall I chomp first?"
"None of them!" Imbri cried in a dreamlet. "I"ll kick your bark in."
"Oh, sure." Three more tentacles whipped out and wrapped around the mare. Soon she was dangling in air too.
"I"ll send you Torus"s worst dream," Imbri threatened.
"I am Torus"s worst dream!"
Then Forrest got halfway smart. He reached into his pack and brought out the canned blanket of obscurity spell. "Invoke!" he cried.
The blanket wafted out and covered him and part of the tentacle that held him. The tree forgot about both. The tentacle went limp, letting Forrest drop to the ground.
"Ha ha-the faun got away!" Dawn cried gleefully.
"What faun?" the tree demanded.
"The one you caught," Eve said. "Now you can"t eat him."
"I"ll find him!" And the tree wrenched its roots from the ground and began writhing across the glade, searching for its missing prey. It shot tentacles out to circle the edge of the glade, so that no one could escape, even if unseen.
All four of them stared, astonished. "This truly is the worst tangle tree ever," Imbri said.
Now a tentacle reached into the tree"s central foliage and brought out a sword. "Where are you, faun?" the voice rasped. "Come taste this steel I liberated from a human fool who attacked me. He didn"t taste very good, but I love his sword."
That sword was whipping around so swiftly that Forrest had to stay well back to avoid it. Even if the tree couldn"t locate him directly, it knew there was a faun somewhere, and was bound to get him eventually. He could feel the merest tingle of the blanket covering him, and realized that he could move it about if he handled it carefully. That explained Cathryn Centaur"s throwing motions; she really did have hold of her blankets.
Then Dawn tried a new tack. "I know all about you, tangler," she called. "You lied. You"re not Torus"s worst dream. What about the Golem King?"
The whole tree shuddered. "I will eat you first, you impertinent creature," it said. "You look delicious." The tentacle started to swing toward the trunk.
"I am delicious," Dawn retorted. "But you don"t deserve me, because the Golem King is worse than you, and he should get me."
The tentacle hesitated. "You"re bluffing," the tree said. "You don"t know anything about the Golem King."
Forrest made his way toward her. If he could throw the blanket over her before she got eaten, the tree would lose track of her too.
"Yes I do!" Dawn said. The tree didn"t know that she was reading all this information from its own partly living wooden flesh. "The Golem King can make golems in a second. He can make golems like people, and like tangle trees, and like dragons, and he can make them life size or gnat size. He"s a golem himself-and so are you, you big fake!
"Aieeee!" the tree screamed.
"And if he ever got hold of a pretty living girl like me, he wouldn"t eat me, he"d marry me," Dawn concluded triumphantly. "Because he"s lonely down in the earth region where he lives, because n.o.body else will go there. He"s cunning and can change his form instantly, but he has no company, and that"s what he wants most of all. So when he finds out that you caught me and ate me, instead of turning me over to him, he"ll destroy you with one flick of his finger. Or maybe turn you into a golem privy potty."
"Or a golem sphinx dropping," Eve added, t.i.ttering.
It almost worked. The tree shuddered, and the three captives were lowered toward the ground. But then it recovered some of its wooden cunning. "But I"ll make sure he never finds out. I"ll gobble all of you down immediately and bury your bones where they"ll never be found."
The tentacle started moving again.
Forrest leaped the last few steps toward Dawn, and flung the blanket over her head. He couldn"t see it, and hoped it didn"t hang up on the tentacle-vine holding her.
Then she dropped slowly to the ground. It had worked! The tangler had forgotten about her.
"Oooo, thank you!" she exclaimed, kissing him firmly on the right eye.
"I was afraid you wouldn"t be in time."
"You were great," he said. "You made it pause long enough."
She kissed him again. "Say, I have an idea-"
"Not now!" he cried, realizing that her contact with him was affecting her in the usual way. "We have to save the others."
"Oh, yes," she agreed, remembering. "I"ll help."
They ran after Eve as the tangler hesitated, realizing that it had been about to do something but not remembering quite what. Forrest realized that the blanket of obscurity must work as much on the mind of any person or creature who might notice, as on the folk being covered. It was an excellent spell.
They held two ends of the blanket, and tossed it over Eve. In a moment she dropped to the ground, joining them in their coverage. "Get Imbri," she said urgently.
Indeed, it was time, for Imbri had been carried almost to the gaping wooden maw in the trunk of the tree. The mirrors had been moved aside so that its complete horror was evident.
The several tentacles holding Imbri swung her back and forth, getting ready to heave her into the maw. Forrest and the girls ran close and heaved the blanket with all their force.
It sailed over the mare and into the maw. Oh, no!
The maw creaked closed. There was a crunching sound. The blanket had been consumed.
Now they were exposed. The tree became aware of all of them.
"There you are!" it creaked. "Now."
"Has it been an hour?" Imbri asked.
"I don"t think so." For it took an hour for the canned blanket spell to recharge. They had to find their own way out, if they were going to.
"It seems to be in doubt," Imbri remarked. "Let me see if I can peek into its vegetable brain."
They waited, while the tentacles flailed. "Why isn"t it attacking us?" Dawn asked, shuddering.
"Maybe the blanket tastes funny," Eve said.
Then Imbri had it. "It"s forgotten its mouth!" her dreamlet exclaimed.
"It can"t eat us because it has lost track of how!"
"The blanket saved us after all," Forrest said, relieved.
They walked slowly out, and the tree ignored them, obsessed with its own problem. It knew it wanted to do something, but couldn"t figure out what it was. Its wooden mind wasn"t very sharp, and it couldn"t focus well on more than one thing at a time. So they were escaping. But it was no sure thing.
They made it to the edge of the glade. The tree was still distracted.
They breathed a collective sigh of relief.
"And let"s stay clear of the Golem King, too," Dawn murmured.
Forrest looked around. The glade was surrounded by thickly meshed th.o.r.n.y brambles, except for several paths. Above loomed the vast shape of the other side of Torus, curving around and downward north and south like a ma.s.sive rainbow. It made him feel dizzy, as if he were about to fall upward toward it, so he pulled his eyes back to the ground. The girls, following his gaze, looked similarly giddy.
"Just out of curiosity," Dawn began.
"Why didn"t you use the petrified wood cross to scare the tree off?" Eve finished.
Ouch! He had a ready answer: "I never thought of it."
"Neither did the rest of us," Imbri pointed out.
They followed a path out. It was intended to bring prey into the tangler"s glade, but it was a two way track. It led, in due course, to a village.
"Do we want to meet any people?" Forrest asked the others.
"Has it been an hour yet?" Dawn asked.
"Almost, I think."
"Then maybe we can use it if we get into more trouble. Let"s talk with the people. I can learn a lot if I can touch one of them."
That seemed good, because though Ida should be reasonably nearby, they had no idea in which direction. The villagers might know.
They walked on in. There was a banner flying in the center. It said HOLLOWDAY.
"A holiday?" Imbri asked. "They don"t seem to be celebrating."
Eve approached a wan villager. "Excuse me sir," she said prettily.
"What are you celebrating?"
He glowered at her. "Nothing!"
"But you have the big banner up."
"It"s Hollow Day. It"s empty. We have nothing to do on it. We hate it."
"Then maybe you should find something good to do," Eve suggested. "That would brighten the day."
"Like what?" the man demanded grumpily.
"Like helping a group of strangers to find Ida, the lady with a moon."
He considered. "Very well. Take that path." He pointed out one they wouldn"t otherwise have noticed.
"Thank you so kindly," Dawn said, flashing him a smile and a bit more as she bowed slightly.
"So very very kindly," Eve added, doing much the same.
"It doesn"t matter," the man said. "We exchanged." He faced away from them. "Hey villagers! We have something to celebrate!"
There was a cheer.
Forrest and the others moved on along the path. "Do you think this is really the way?" Forrest asked. "I don"t want to be unduly suspicious, but-"