Half a dozen pigheads appeared, grunting urgently. This time the steeds leaped. The pigheads reached up, but their weapons were their tusks, not good for vertical goring. One got struck in the head by Hinblue's front hoof, and the others desisted.
A pack of wolfheads closed in, but the steeds dodged and galloped to the side and got around and through, then put on speed to leave the beasts behind. No more animalheads appeared, and Stile knew that his party had gotten away clean.
Unnoticed in the hurry, the vegetation had changed. They were now forging through a forest of huge old trees — oak, ash, elm, and beech, by the look. But it was not necessarily easy to tell them apart, for the trunks were gnarled and deeply corrugated, and the tops shaded the ground into gloom.
"I like not the look of this," the Lady Blue said.
Stile agreed. Their escape had led them away from the curtain, so that they now had to relocate. It would not be safe to return to their point of divergence from it; the animalheads were there. Stile still preferred to avoid the use of magic in the present situation; this was an annoyance, not a crisis.
All of which meant they would have to search for the curtain the tedious way — slowly, eyes squinting for the almost invisible shimmer. The curtain was easy to follow lengthwise, but difficult to intercept broadside unless one knew exactly where to look.
"Well, it's all part of the honeymoon," Stile said. The Lady smiled; she had known there would be this sort of interruption in the schedule.
They looked, riding slowly around the great old trees. The forest was so dense now that even indirect light hardly penetrated, yet there were an increasing number of small plants. They twined up around the bases of the tree trunks and spread across the forest floor. Some were a suspiciously verdant green; others were pallid white. Many were insidiously ugly.
Yet they were plants, not creatures. None of them sent questing tentacles for the intruders; none had poisonous thorns. They flourished in gloom; that seemed to be their only oddity.
There was no sign of the curtain. "It will take forever to find it this way," Stile said. "I want to be back on it by nightfall." He jumped down and walked. "We can make a better search on foot," he said.
Clip blew a warning note. Unicorns were naturally resistant to magic, and this protected the rider. The Blue Adept, Clip felt, needed protection, and should not be straying from his steed. As if Stile did not have ample magic of his own.
Stile walked on, peering this way and that, searching for the curtain. It had to be somewhere near here; they had not gone all that far and they had not diverged from its path greatly. In this gloom the shimmer should be clear enough.
Clip's ears turned. He blew a low warning note. Stile paused to listen.
The animalheads were catching up. Stile's party had to move on before-
Too late. A pigface appeared in front of Stile. A dog-face came up behind the Lady. There was rustling in the bushes all around. Perhaps aided by some sort of stealth-spell, the animalheads had surrounded them.
The Lady called Hinblue, who charged toward her. Stile stepped toward Clip, but already the pighead was on him. Stile did not use magic. He drew his sword, threatening but not attacking the creature. Thеге was something odd about this, and he did not want to do anything irrevocable until he fathomed it.
The pighead halted its aggression — but three sheepheads were closing from the sides. A spell would freeze them, but Stile still didn't want to do it. Rather than shed blood, he dodged around the pighead, hurdled a fallen branch — and an offshoot moved up and intercepted his leading ankle, causing him to take a heavy spill into a flowering bush beyond.
There was a kind of zapl as the leaves were disturbed, and Stile felt the presence of magic. Quickly he jumped up, feeling about his body, but he seemed to have suffered no injury.
The animalheads had taken advantage of his fall to surround him. Clip had stopped a short distance away, perceiving that the animalheads could reach Stile before the unicorn could. No sense precipitating an attack by spooking them.
Stile decided to make an honest attempt at communication before resorting reluctantly to magic to freeze them temporarily in place. It wasn't natural for normally peaceful creatures to attack and pursue strangers like this. Maybe he could establish a yes-no dialogue with one of the more intelligent ones. He really wasn't looking for trouble on his honeymoon!
He opened his mouth to speak — and nothing but air emerged. He couldn't talk!
Stile tried again. There was no pain, no constriction in his throat — but he could not vocalize at all. The plant — it had zapped him with a spell of silence!
The animalheads did not know about his power of magic, so did not know what he had lost. They thought him an ordinary man — which he was now. They converged.
Stile quickly brought the harmonica to his mouth. He might not be able to speak or sing, but the instrument's music would summon some protective magic. He blew — and silence came out.
He stamped his foot on the ground and made no noise. He banged his sword against a root — silently. He whistled — without even a hiss of air.
The spell had rendered him totally quiet. Since he could nullify it only by using his own magic, and that required sound, he was trapped.
These tests had been performed rapidly, and the conclusion drawn in a few seconds, for the animalheads were on him. Still he did not use his sword. He had threatened with it, but remained unwilling actually to shed blood. The mystery of these creatures' attack bothered him as much as the threat to himself.
A cathead pounced. Stile ducked, reached up, and guided it into a turning fall. He might be silent, but he wasn't helpless!
But now a tremendously tusked boarhead came at him from the left and an alligatorhead from the right. There was no question of their intent. He could dodge these two — but how long could he hold out against the converging mob?
Meanwhile, Clip had resumed motion. Now the unicorn arrived. His horn caught the alligatorhead and impaled it.
A powerful heave sent the creature flying back over the equine's shoulder. Then a forehoof knocked the boarhead away.
Clip stood beside Stile, giving him a chance to mount. Then they were away in a great leap. Soon they joined Hinblue and the Lady Blue and galloped clear of the animalheads once again.
The Lady Blue realized what was wrong. "Thou art victim of a silence-spell!" she cried. "We must take thee back to the Blue Demesnes for a counterspell!"
But the animalheads were already catching up again, cutting off the return — and of course it would be a long ride all the way back to the Blue Demesnes, even cutting directly across to it. Their only avenue of escape at the moment was north, deeper into the jungle.
The steeds plunged on, but the vegetation thickened. Now grasping plants occurred, reaching thorny branches toward them, opening green jawlike processes. This jungle was coming alive — at the time when Stile had lost his power. A single spell could quell every plant — but he could not utter that spell.
The Lady Blue exclaimed as vines twined about her body. Her steed had to halt, lest she be drawn off. Then the vines attacked Hinblue's legs, seeking to anchor the horse to the ground.
Stile nudged Clip. Hie unicorn charged back. His horn touched the vines, and they writhed out of the way, repelled by the countermagic. Meanwhile, Stile used his sword to chop at the nether vines, freeing the horse. The weapon normally carried by men in Phaze was the rapier, but Stile felt more comfortable with the broadsword, and now the cutting edge was useful indeed.
There was a renewed baying of animalheads, catching np yet again. Stile's party moved forward once more.