or animation: just that her companions were still too sore from the bruising effects of the strangler figs to respond with more than desultory expansions of sorely afflicted rib cages and lungs.
It was Cezer who was first back into the forest, and therefore first to cry out with dismay.
'There was a big fallen log here.' He did not have to identify the exact spot where the bole he spoke of had lain. A long, wide depression marred the earth. 'Now it's gone!'
'We can see that.' Mamakitty was more puzzled than concerned. 'It's all right, Cezer. We'll find another.'
But they didn't. And though they braved a resurgence of flung thorns and whipping vines to probe ever farther back the way they had come, and even did some scouting off to the sides of their previous path, they found nothing suitable for the building of a dugout canoe, or even a raft. Every single fallen log had been removed, or concealed, by the forest. Unable to stop them, it had apparently chosen to deny them even the use of its dead.
'What now?' Taj would have sat down on a log had they been able to find one. In its absence they had to make do with sitting on the beach. 'Do we make use of living trees in the absence of dead ones?' He eyed Samm's axe suggestively.
'It appears we have no choice.' Mamakitty gazed hopefully at the giant. 'Do you think you can do it, Samm? It would take too long and therefore expose you to too many attacks from multiple sources for you to cut down a tree big enough to serve as a dugout. So we'll have to use smaller trees and try to fashion some kind of a raft.'
He shrugged broad, powerful shoulders. 'I'm willing to try. But if the forest has gone and defended its dead so dynamically, I'm sure it will exert even greater efforts to protect those trees still living. Still'—he rose to his feet, brushing sand from his lower legs—'I've cut down plenty of thorn trees and nut-throwers already. It shouldn't be impossible to manage a few more.' His soft smile was as unintentionally mesmerizing as his unblinking stare. 'I can deal with a few cuts and bruises.'
'Maybe you won't have to,' announced a familiar voice. From contemplating the ominous depths of the waiting woods, they all turned to see Cocoa standing in the water. Quite a ways out in the water, in fact. One arm held high, she waved cheerily back at her friends.
'Come on in,' she called to them. 'Not only is the water fine—it's not even up to my knees!'
FIFTEEN
Feeling a little light-headed, Oskar rushed to join her. The others followed at a more decorous pace: Cezer and Mamakitty because to them entry into even shallow water was a disagreeable business to be embarked upon only after sober consideration, Taj because the experience was wholly new to him, and Samm simply because when given the choice, he tended to do things more deliberately than his companions.
Not Oskar. Knees lifting high with each stride, legs pumping energetically, he made a joyous, splashing dash to catch up with Cocoa. If not precisely in his element, he was for once in their long journey more comfortable in new surroundings than any of his friends. She shut her eyes and turned away from him as his flailing legs threw water in all directions.
'Hey-ssst! I'd like to keep as much of me as dry as possible for as long as possible, if you don't mind.' Raising her left arm, she began licking away the droplets that clung there.
'Sorry. Guess I got a little carried away.' Slightly abashed, he bent at the waist and with cupped hands began to throw water in the opposite direction for the sheer joy of it. The blue-toned liquid felt a little heavier, a little denser, than the ocean water Master Evyndd kept stored in a large Jeroboam. 'I keep forgetting that certain attitudes carry over, and that your kind finds swimming and soaking unpleasant.'
'It's not so much that it's unpleasant.' She kept a wary eye on his active, splashing hands. 'It's just that it's cosmetically unflattering. Don't you remember spending hours and hours trying to dry and groom yourself after a compulsory bath?' When she drew only a blank look she sighed and turned toward the eastern horizon. 'No, come to think of it, I guess you don't.'
'What's to dry and groom?' He promptly sat down. Composed almost entirely of particles of what appeared to be very fine quartz, the bottom was eerily translucent. He let the warm water swirl around his legs and partially submerged lower body. At that point his previously uncooperative bladder relaxed. Even though the shore was lined with trees aplenty, there was no way he was going back into the Kingdom of Green. 'You lie out in the sun until you're dry. As for grooming, the wind takes care of that.'
'You ought to know that that's not how cats do it. We're a little more proper where our appearance is concerned.' Shading her eyes with one hand, she pointed across the water as Mamakitty trudged to a prudent halt nearby. 'I don't see any landmarks. No distant shore, no bump of an island, no trees: nothing.'
'Perhaps the whole Kingdom of Blue is like this,' the older woman speculated. 'Maybe we won't need a boat after all.'
Taj tiptoed up behind them. 'Surely it can't be all ocean. And if it is, there must be places that are much deeper than here.' He looked down at his booted feet, clearly visible through the warm, pellucid salt water. 'It defies everything I've ever heard about such bodies of water. Anything this shallow should quickly evaporate away.'
Mamakitty eyed him thoughtfully. 'How comes a canary to know so much about oceans?'
He looked away. 'I didn't spend all that time in the Master's study singing. With my cage hanging over his desk, I couldn't help but look down at some of the books he read.'
'You're thinking of the oceans of our world; the ones Master Evyndd spoke of often.' As Samm joined them, the others moved to stand discreetly in his cooling shadow. 'Couldn't it be that the water here, where everything is so saturated with blue, blue, blue, acts differently? Obviously it doesn't evaporate as fast, or under the same rules. Or perhaps there are forces at work we don't understand.'
'Coming from a snake, that qualifies as almost an insight.' Crouching but making sure his backside stayed dry, Cezer scooped up a palmful of liquid and brought it to his lips, They promptly curled back on contact. 'Tastes like thick salt water, looks like thick salt water, but that doesn't mean it has to behave like thick salt water.'
'There goes lunch!' Turning and leaping into the air, Cocoa came down with all four hands and feet on a tranquil patch of sparkling clarity. The rivulets that subsequently ran down her cheeks and chin were indicative of a good effort but lack of success. 'Missed, ssst!'
'What was it?' A curious Mamakitty waded over.
'Some funny-looking kind of flatfish. The only kind that would be comfortable in these long shallows. Not a flounder, or a small halibut. Something different.'
Cezer licked his lips, and would have licked his whiskers had they grown long enough. 'A nice change from trail food. This traverse might not be so uninteresting after all.' Bending low, he began scanning the nearby shallows and the crystalline sands beneath.
'Provided the water doesn't get up over our necks,' Taj reminded him as he joined in the hunt. Canaries liked fish, too, but only in the form of minuscule flakes. With the addition of teeth, the songster had been experiencing and enjoying a whole new universe of taste sensations ever since the first day of their transformation. This was just as well, there being a decided dearth of fruits and vegetables, not to mention seed, in evidence on the route that lay ahead of them.
With three cat-folk on the prowl, locating and catching the fishlike denizens of the shallows was a problem soon solved. Consumption, however, was another matter entirely. In their human guises the travelers had grown used to cooked food. Even if they had been able to locate any drifting wood, it would first have to be dried. Assuming they managed to do that, they then faced the dilemma of how to construct a fire in the midst of open ocean.
Returning cautiously to the beach, they managed to snatch some dead chips and branches from beneath the disapproving gazes of the denizens of the Kingdom of Green. The resultant humble blaze the travelers then managed to kindle on the sand caused the nearest trees to bend away in horror.
'This is all very well and good for now,' Taj pointed out, 'but what are we going to do when we start across the sea?'
Oskar shrugged indifferently. 'I don't mind raw fish. How about you, Cez'?'
The swordsman was amenable. 'Same here. We'll manage without human cooking until we walk out on the
