Drop looked curiously at the preoccupied wizard. Although the old man had initially appeared bulky because he was swathed in so many layers of cloth, it was now clear that he wasn't actually much larger than the cat-boy's own body size. His head was completely bald and beardless; frost-white eyebrows shaded a pair of bright blue eyes flanking a beak of a nose.
"Aha!" The wizard triumphantly waved a dusty scrap of parchment, then brought it near the lamp to read the faded writing. "I thought so-it was Otwill's, for here's his rune. I don't know what possessed him to create this spell." The wizard frowned at the scrap as he read aloud, " 'Reveals the true character of the user: what his spirit might otherwise have been but for the accident of birth.' Meddlesome-I always said Otwill was a meddler, although generally well-intentioned. I remember now… he sent me these lozenges shortly after they had turned his servant into a toad. Most unfortunate. Still, the fellow really was rather toadlike, and Otwill did take good care of him afterward. Put him in a walled garden, I believe. Hmm."
The wizard read on, then paused and sighed. "I must be honest with you, Drop. This Keep-Shape Spell of Otwill's is not, I fear, reversible… at least, that is, he neglected to specify how to reverse it." For an instant, his face brightened, then fell back into an apologetic expression. "I was about to say that I could transmit a query to Otwill concerning this spell, but I just recalled that he has been missing for some time-went on a quest for phoenix feathers or some such rare thing. Bother. I shall simply have to puzzle it out by myself." He stopped and gazed thoughtfully at Drop. "Until I can return you to your proper cathood, you are most welcome to stay here and lend a hand." He waved vaguely at their muddled surroundings. "Would you care to learn a bit of magic? First, of course, you'd have to learn to read. I've never before taught a cat to read, but I feel sure you should be quite capable of learning. Oh, do speak up! I hate talking to myself all the time."
"P… paw?" asked Drop, extending his injured hand, which had swollen and was darkening with bruises.
"Forgive me," exclaimed the wizard. "That little beeswax mitten I made for you last night couldn't possibly contain the mass of a human hand." He bustled around the room, collecting materials. "My numbing spell should still be in full effect. Now I can attend properly to those broken bones. I shall need some dry plaster, water, strips of cloth, and perhaps some light wooden splints."
Working briskly, the wizard soon constructed a damp, but quickly stiffening bandage immobilizing Drop's swollen hand. As he tied the last knot and dabbed it down with a glob of plaster, he observed, "There-that should serve. Once those bones mend, your hand ought to be perfectly usable. A bit awkward, I expect, but then having hands will seem awkward to you for a time until you get used to them. Now that you're presentably dressed and bandaged, what should we do next?"
"Food?" suggested Drop, in a hopeful tone.
"Food!" The wizard's eyes widened. "My word-haven't we had any? Of course there's food. The cowherd left me some milk and cheese, and I have bread in the larder… and some dried herring. You should quite fancy that."
They had almost finished their breakfast when they were interrupted by a shy tapping at the door. By the time the wizard opened it, no one was in sight, but a basket of brown eggs had been left on the doorstep.
"It's because of the pig, you know," said the wizard, shaking his head. "I can't imagine why they still feel obliged."
"Pig?" prompted Drop. '
"I worked a magical cure for it, you see," explained the wizard. "The poor creature had a palsy… or was that the farmer's aunt? Perhaps it was colic. In any case, they're grateful for my help, the nearby folk, but most of them are mistrustful of magic." He sighed. "I've always had a talent for magic, ever since I was a child. It quite upset my parents. They expected me to become a wool merchant. I can't think of any other excuse for the name they gave me."
Puzzled, Drop said, "Flax?"
"Er, no." The wizard hesitated. "Woostrom," he confided, making a sour face. "What sort of name is that for a wizard? Still," he conceded, "they didn't know that I was to become a wizard. Fortunately, everyone soon began calling me 'Flax,' for the obvious reason."
"Reason?" Drop could perceive no reason to relate the wizard to a vegetable fiber which the speech spell informed him could be spun into linen.
"My hair, of course," retorted the wizard, then added with a rueful smile, "when I had some, that is. It was just the color of flax."
"Ah," said Drop, enlightened.
"Before I forget," the wizard continued, "do let me introduce you to the others who share my cottage. You will have noticed Ghost, our resident owl." Flax pointed toward the pale puff of feathers on the high shelf. At the sound of its name, Ghost briefly opened both pink eyes. "After I mended his broken wing, he chose to stay on. Very keen hearing, owls," the wizard observed, then added in a low tone, "I try not to disturb Ghost by speaking loudly, and most especially avoid shouting his name. For some reason, that agitates him unduly, and he tends to fly to one's head and… er, um… pull one's hair." Flax patted his own bald head reminiscently. "In my present condition, I do not welcome such aggressive attention. And there is, of course, Cyril, who had a most dreadful injury to his tail. I feared for some time that he could not recover, but he has assumed his place under the table, and nowadays I seldom even see a mouse.
Most satisfactory."
Drop stared under the table, seeing nothing but bare wooden legs and the wizard's own buskined feet.
"No, not this table," said Flax, following his glance.
"The side table."
What Drop had previously dismissed as ornamental rings of carved wood now slowly uncoiled into a sizable snake, albeit a snake with a much truncated tail.
Flax bent down to rub Cyril's head. "So few people recognize the real virtues of snakes. I'll wager there's not another snake in the kingdom who can rival Cyril for learning. Not scholarly learning, you understand," he hastened to add. "No, I can't claim that, but Cyril responds famously to patterns of taps on his head. I rather suspect that snakes may well be deaf; certainly Cyril doesn't appear to hear at all. You can imagine how long I bellowed at him with absolutely no result-except to agitate Ghost. Then I thought he might possibly feel vibrations, so I tried the tapping. Cyril now knows that two taps mean 'come,' three mean 'food,' and four mean 'danger.' Most accomplished of him."
Drop warily watched Cyril's blunt head approach his slippered foot, but apart from flicking out a forked tongue, Cyril politely refrained from touching Drop. In his cat form, Drop had usually avoided snakes. He had definitely never seen a snake as large in girth as Cyril, whose broadest dimension rivaled Drop's own wrist.
"Large," Drop observed, looking from his own forearm to the snake.
"Oh, yes, Cyril's size," the wizard replied. "I was given Cyril by a traveler who had acquired him in a distant, warmer land. Cyril dozes a good deal in cold weather, and, for that matter, he also frequently basks in the garden in the summer. While indoors, he generally curls around that table base. He doesn't care to be trodden upon, you know-much better to stay out of the way of people's feet. Now, let us carry these dishes to the kitchen, and I shall show you how to wash them."
"Why?" asked Drop, carefully balancing his plate between his uninjured fingers.
"Because we shall want to use them again," the wizard explained. "When you were a cat, you washed yourself, to stay tidy. We humans have to use soap and water instead of our tongues, but the object is the same. Come along."