“Of course I’m anchored!” it said indignantly. “Think I don’t know my business? Tie me about you and I’ll rescue you from this foul hole.”
Dor did so, and soon he was on his way, treasure and all. “Aw, you lucked out,” the coin in his pocket said.
“What do you care?”
“Wealth destroys men. It is our rite of passage: destroy a man. We were about to destroy you, and you escaped through no merit of your own.”
“Well, I’m taking you with me, so you’ll have another chance.”
“There is that,” the coin agreed, brightening.
Soon Dor emerged from the hole. Chet and Smash were hauling on the rope, drawing him up, while Grundy called directions so that no snag occurred. “What were you doing down there?” Irene demanded. “I thought you’d never come up!”
“I had some trouble with the kraken,” Dor said, showing off a fragment of tentacle that remained hooked to his leg.
It was now late afternoon. “Any danger here?” Dor asked the ground.
“There’s a nest of wyverns on the south beach of this island,” the ground replied. “But they hunt only by day. It’s quite a nest, though.”
“So If we camp here at the north end we’ll be safe?”
“Should be,” the ground agreed grudgingly.
“If the wyverns hunt by day, maybe we should trek on past them tonight,” Irene said.
Smash smiled. “We make trek, me wring neck,” he said, his brute mitts suggesting what he would do to an unfortunate wyvern. The ogre seemed larger now, taller and more massive than he had been, and Dor realized that he probably was larger; ogres put on growth rapidly in their teen years.
But Dor was too tired to do it. “I’ve got to rest,” he said.
Irene was unexpectedly solicitous. “Of course you do. You stood rearguard, fighting off the kraken, while we escaped. I’ll bet you wouldn’t have made it out at all if Chet hadn’t found that vine-rope.”
Dor didn’t want to admit that the weight of the gold had prevented him from climbing as he should have done. “Guess I just got tired,” he said.
“The fool insisted on bringing us gold coins along,” the coin blabbed loudly from his pocket.
Irene frowned. “You brought the coins? We don’t need them, and they’re awful heavy.”
Dor sat down heavily on the beach, the coins jangling. “I know.”
“What about the diamonds?”
“Them, too,” he said, patting the other pocket, though he wasn’t sure which pocket he had put them in.
“I do like diamonds,” she said. “I regard them as friends.” She helped him get his jacket off, then his wet shirt. He had avoided the Kingly robes for this trip, but his garden-variety clothing seemed hardly better now. “Dor! Your arms are all scraped!”
“That’s the work of the kraken,” Grundy said matter-of-factly. “It hooked his limbs and dragged him under. I had to carve it with diamonds to make it let go.”
“You didn’t tell me it was that bad!” she exclaimed to Dor. “Krakens are dangerous up close!”
“You were busy making the escape,” Dor said. Now the abrasions on his arms and legs were stinging.
“Get the rest of this clothing off,” she said, working at it herself. “Grundy, go find some healing elixir; we forgot to bring any, but a number of plants manufacture it.”
Grundy went into the forest. “Any of you plants have healing juice?” he called.
Dor was now too tired to resist. Irene tugged at his trousers. Then she paused. “Oh, my-I forgot about that,” she said.
“What?” Dor asked, not sure how embarrassed he should be.
“I’m certainly glad you brought that along!” she said. “Hey, Chet -look at this!”
“The centaur came over and looked. “The salve!” he said. “Yes, that could be quite useful.”
Dor relaxed. For a moment he had thought-but of course she had been talking about the salve.
Soon Irene had him stripped. “Your skin’s abraded all over!” she scolded. “It’s a wonder you didn’t faint down there!”
“Guess I’ll do it now,” Dor said, and did.
Dor woke fairly well refreshed. Evidently Grundy had located a suitable balm, for the scraped skin was largely healed. His head was pillowed on something soft; after a moment he realized it was Irene’s lap. Irene was asleep with her back against an ash tree, and a fine coating of ashes now powdered her hair. She was lovely in that unconscious pose.
He seemed to be wearing new clothing, too. They must have located a flannel plant, or maybe Irene had grown one from seed. As he considered that, he heard a faint bleat in the distance and was sure; newly shorn flannel plants did protest for a while. He decided not to dwell on how she might have measured or fitted him for the clothing she had made. Obviously she was not entirely naive about such things. In fact, Irene was shaping up as a pretty competent girl. Dor sat up. Immediately Irene woke. “Well, someone had to keep you from thrashing about in the sand until you healed,” she said, embarrassed.
He had liked her better without the explanation. “Thank you. I’m better now.”
Chet and Smash had gathered red and blue berries from colorberry bushes and tapped a winekeg tree for liquid. They got pleasantly high on breakfast while they discussed the exigencies of the day. “I don’t think we had better try to walk by that wyverns’ nest,” Chet said. “But our most feasible alternative carries a penalty.”
“The curse,” Grundy said.
“Beware the air,” Smash agreed.
Dor scratched his head. “What are you talking about?”
“The salve,” Chet explained. “To walk on clouds.”
“I don’t want to perform some dastardly deed,” Irene said. “But I don’t want to get chewed up by wyverns either.”
Now a shape loomed on the ocean horizon. “What’s that?” Dor asked the sea.
“A big sea serpent,” the water answered. “She comes by here every morning to clean off the beaches.”
Now Dor noticed how clean this beach was. The sand gleamed as whitely as bone.
“I think our decision has just been made for us,” Chet said. “Let’s risk the curse and walk the vapors.”
“But the clouds are way out of reach,” Irene protested.
“Light a fire,” Grundy said. “We can walk up the smoke.”
“That ought to work,” Chet agreed.
Hurriedly they gathered dry wood from the interior of the island while Irene grew a flame-vine. Soon the vine was blazing, and they set the wood about it, forming a bonfire. Several fine bons puffed into the sky, looking like burning bones; then smoke billowed up, roiling its way slantwise to the west. It seemed thick enough; but was it high enough?
The sea monster was looming close, attracted by the fire. “Let’s move it!” Grundy cried. “Where’s the salve?”
Dor produced the salve, and the golem smeared it on his little feet.
Then he made a running leap for the smoke-and flipped over and rolled on the ground. “Lift me up to the top of it,” he cried, unhurt. “I need to get it firmly under me, I think.”
Smash lifted him up. Yes, the ogre was definitely taller than he had been at the start of their trip.
Now the golem found his footing. “Hey-it’s hot!” he cried, dancing. He ran up the column-but the smoke was moving, making his footing uncertain, and in a moment he stumbled, fell-and plummeted through the smoke toward the ground.
Smash caught him before he struck. The golem disappeared entirely inside the ogre’s brute hand. “Small fall,” Smash commented.
“How about putting it on his hands, too?” Irene asked.
Dor did so, dabbing it on the golem with the tip of his little finger.
They put Grundy up again. This time when the golem stumbled, he was able to catch himself by grabbing handfuls of smoke. “Come on up,” he cried. “The vapor’s fine!”
The sea monster was almost upon them. The others put salve on their hands and feet and scrambled onto
