"There's no need to get ugly," he said. "I thought it'd make you happy to get done what you're aimin' to do. Who you lookin' for?"
"He's right, friend Aahz," Ersatz said. "Perhaps if you'd been more specific…"
"Shut up," I said. "I don't do everything perfect like you four." I turned back to the local. "I'm trying to find a guy who lives out in this direction. He lives out in the middle of nowhere. He studies all the time. He's got books."
In no hurry, the carter scratched at the fur on his shoulder with a meditative hand.
"Seems to me," he said, "you might want one of the folks who lives out on the wild heath. The happy floormaker is somewhere out there. Very artistic fellah. He searches the mud puddles and hollows of the marshes and fields for found materials and clay and just other little mineral treasures to make the blocks and artistic mosaics that he takes such joy in. He takes folks in who just want a quiet place to stay. That's his territory." The carter waved a hand out vaguely behind him.
"I see," I observed, "so that's the Merry Tiler Moor."
I looked at the man for applause. I shouldn't have bothered. I had never seen such a blank look in my life.
"Wai, you might phrase it that way, stranger. Follow the wild beast trails. Ain't no road to his place. Good luck."
"What did he say?" Calypsa demanded, following closely on my heels as I looked for another person to ask for directions. "And what did you say before that? Why did he look so puzzled?"
"All right," I said, rounding on her. "This is turning into a regular liability. I can disguise you as a local. I can guide you through a hundred dimensions and locate the treasures of the ages, but I don't have time to give you language lessons! If you don't understand something, stow it. I'll tell you if it's important. I've got enough problems to concentrate on."
The Walt quailed. "I am sorry, Aahz, but I only wish to know what is going on so I can help…"
"Well, you're not helping," I said. "Just shut up. I'll tell you when there's something you really need to know."
"Isn't that just a typical Pervect?" Asti said, through the leather of her case. "Temper, temper, temper, and never a thought for anyone else's feelings."
I rattled her case. "The 'shut up' goes for you, too, sister. You're always riding me, and I don't deserve all the abuse you are handing out. I'm doing what I can. Sorry if I would rather accomplish her mission than provide the Cook's tour to dimensions we're passing through."
"I know all tongues from the lands through which I have passed in my years," Ersatz said. "I would be pleased to help Calypsa with interpretation."
"But you might not be with her everywhere she goes," Kelsa said. In her depths was a picture of Calypsa passing through a door with the outline of a woman on it.
"Oh, I can fix her," Asti said. "Take me out of here, Pervect. I don't like messing up my case." As soon as she was clear of her carrier, her bowl filled up with a bright green liquid. "Drink this, child. All of it."
Calypsa looked nervous. "What will it do to me?"
"Do? It'll make you the superior of these two in languages. You will understand all tongues, of every creature that walks the dimensions."
"Dial that back," I said. "If she starts talking to fish and trees, someone's going to think she's insane."
"Why not?" Asti said. "You talk to goblets and swords. Go on, Calypsa."
The Walt lifted the goblet in quaking hands. With a nervous glance at Tananda and me, she dipped her beak in the liquid, and tilted her head back so it ran down her throat. She coughed violently.
"Ugh! It is disgusting!"
"I didn't say it wouldn't be," Asti said. "You are tasting the tongues of a thousand dimensions. Of course there's bound to be a little halitosis here and there."
Calypsa held the goblet away from her. "Tongues!" She looked as though she was going to be sick.
"Drink it anyhow, child. Pinch your nose…ah, you don't have one. Pretend it's medicine. It is, in a way. It will cure you of non-understanding."
"Drink it, dear," Kelsa said. "Then you will be able to understand what Aahz has been muttering about you beneath his breath."
"He is what?" The Walt looked at me accusingly. She seized the Cup in both hands and bent her beak to the foaming liquid.
"What muttering?" I asked, suspiciously.
"Dear me, did I say that out loud?" Kelsa asked, but the eyes behind her glasses twinkled.
"Drink, drink, drink, Arvernians…" Buirnie burst into song. "Come on, Calypsa! Don't think, just drink!"
"Chug, chug, chug, chug!" Ersatz chanted. Calypsa made a face, but went for a second mouthful.
It took a lot of encouragement, and more bobbing and tilting, but pretty soon the goblet was empty. It fell from Calypsa's nerveless hands. I just barely caught Asti before she hit the ground. Tananda caught Calypsa.
"Are you all right?" she asked.
"That was horrible," Calypsa said. She looked shaken. Her normally high-pitched voice wandered all over the octaves. "I feel funny."
Tananda and I grinned at each other.
"What are you smiling at?" she asked.
"You just said that in perfect Troll," I said.
"I don't speak Troll!"
"You do now," I said. "And Pervect. Now, come on, we've got ground to cover."
Tananda entertained herself for a while trying out Calypsa's new talent by talking to her in languages she had picked up over the years. I tuned them all out. I preferred to be alone with my thoughts. I was envious that the Hoard had given Calypsa a great gift like that, when I'd had to pick up my fluency the hard way. Still, I had to agree that we really didn't have the time for her to learn anything, and it was a pain translating everything we heard, then explaining the cultural references that went with them. This girl was so-oo-oo young. I knew I had never been that green. So to speak. No one I knew ever was…no, that's not true. I was pretty sure that Asti would give both me and Tananda the potion, too, if we asked, but I would rather have my scales peeled off with a paint scraper than ask. She already had the wrong impression about my sense of fairness regarding compensation, and I was not going to give her more ammunition. I already was tired of listening to the litany of my shortcomings, in her immortal opinion.
"Hot," Kelsa said, as we came to a crossroads.
"Which way?" I asked.
"Left, I think. It's a pity we are looking for the Book instead of traveling with him, because he has all the addresses in the world in his index. Absolutely anyone who's anyone! Of course, we don't know the name of the person with whom he is staying…it's such a muddle. The being's head is just full of names, I can't pick out his own!"
Tuning out the babble, I turned left. "Still hot?"
"Yes! Hot."
I strode along the narrow path behind Tananda. It was just a track that local ruminants must have made. My feet slipped on the ground. The mud was compacted to a rubbery surface with just enough dew on the surface to make it slick going. I kept my eyes just ahead of my feet to keep from tripping on exposed roots.
"…Hot…hot…hot…cold!"
"Cold? I thought you said it was hot!" Tananda said.
"Well, it will be cold, if you go through that bush just ahead," Kelsa said, blinking up at her, transformed into a very sexy Trollop with diamond-studded spectacles. "The bridge is out."
"Say, I know a song about a bridge!" Buirnie volunteered. "It's a tragic dirge. You'll love it. It's just the kind of thing to make our hike go faster."
I ignored him.
"This way," I said, as we crested yet another muddy hummock, early on the third day of our trek. "I hear hammering."
"Well done, Aahz!" Kelsa crowed. "Yes, I was just going to say…There it is. Off to the right, just past that stand of hawberry trees."
I led the way. As we got closer, the mud-colored building on the other side of the copse started to take shape. One fat oval story sat on top of a lower level that spread out in all directions, looking as if it had been built up over centuries. As an inhabitant decided he needed another room, he just broke a hole in the wall and built alongside it. Smoke was coming from several of the dozens of chimneys sticking up from the tiled roof. We halted about ten yards away.