“Sorry.” He let the binding up a notch. “If I hadn’t intervened when I did,, you might never come back to reality. Clothahump says you might’ve been stuck in that dreamworld forever.”
“Now would that ‘ave been so bloody awful?”
“Not for you, or for me, or for the rest of us, but it wouldn’t have brought us any nearer to our goal, and there are others depending on us.”
“That bleedin’ altruistic streak of yours again! I’ve warned you about that, mate.” He turned and stomped off in search of his longbow and sword, looking very unhappy.
Jon-Tom watched him go, considered what had happened to all of them. Each member of the group had seen their wildest fantasy come true. Unlike Mudge, however, none of the rest of them had any desire to succumb to that dreamworld for a lifetime. Eventually they would have given in to boredom, for when one has accomplished everything, even in a dream, there is nothing left to strive for. Clothahump explained it very clearly. Trapped in an illusion of complete fulfillment, unable to escape, the final result would have been not nirvana but death.
Now, if he could only think of a way to call it up for an hour or two at a time . . .
What might the perambulator be thinking? Did it think? Clothahump wasn’t sure if it possessed intelligence or not, or even if it did, if it assumed a recognizable form. Did it dream, and if so, what might something capable of traveling between universes and dimensions dream of? Certainly it was confused. Confused and nervous. The by-products of this space-time traverser’s anxiety were increasingly frequent perturbations. Interdimensional sweat.
There was no malice in them, save for those that the perambulator’s captor might be directing. The last one had left them all feeling better, though relieved at its end. Perhaps the perambulator suffered with each change just as they did.
As they climbed toward the pass he found that he no longer wanted to free the perambulator simply to stop the disturbing changes it was foisting on the world. He wanted to free it because it was the right thing to do for the perambulator itself, whether it was capable of emotion or feeling or not. As a child, he’d once been locked in a trunk by some friends. That caged feeling had never left him. He knew what it was like to be trapped, unable to run, hardly able to move. Nothing deserved a fate like that, not even something as inexplicable and otherworldly as a perambulator.
We’re not going to loosen a piece of frozen machinery, he told himself. We’re on our way to perform a rescue.
Clothahump called a halt just below the top of the pass.
They took shelter from the wind that blew steadily through the gap in the mountains.
“It would be useful to know what lies ahead and worth making the effort to find out. Would you be good enough to try, rune-caster?”
Colin sought out a protected spot beneath an overhanging granite ledge. “No promises now, friends. I’m willing to make the attempt, but don’t expect too much.”
“Anything you can tell us will be a great deal more than what we presently know about tomorrow, which is nothing,” Clothahump pointed out.
“Right. So long as you don’t expect too much.”
The sun gleamed off the silver thread as the koala removed the rune pouch from his knapsack. Everyone gathered close as he untied it and spread the leather out flat on the hard ground. They waited quietly while he went through his preparations, finally picking up the runes and letting them fall onto the leather square. No one spoke; everyone stared.
Jon-Tom tried to find some recognizable pattern, to make some sense of the double handful of bone and stone and fabric spread out before him. He found nothing but the beginnings of a slight headache from concentrating too hard. Much as it bothered him to confess to ignorance, he had to admit that Mudge’s description of the runes as so much garbage was as accurate as anything he could think of himself.
Clothahump was staring intently at the debris and nodding slowly to no one in particular. Whether the wizard actually understood any of what he was looking at or was just trying to keep up appearances, Jon-Tom couldn’t tell, and thought it undiplomatic to inquire.
When he finally spoke, Colin’s voice was unusually soft and thoughtful. “You were right, Old One. He knows we’re coming.”
“What can you see?” Clothahump asked anxiously. “Can you tell anything of it at all? Size, strength, mental powers, anything that would be useful in compiling a profile? Any indication at all of whom we are up against?”
“First that ‘he’ is accurate. There are too many signs of maleness for it to be otherwise. And there are many suggestions of magic. A wizard or sorcerer of some kind, surely. The forest fire that almost engulfed us may not have been a perturbation after all. There is power at work here, enough to constitute a threat on its own, without the aid of a perambulator.”
Clothahump spoke quietly but firmly. “Is his power greater than mine?” He waited silently for the rune-reader to reply. They all did. Even the skeptical Mudge looked on anxiously.
“I cannot say that it is stronger,” Colin finally declared. “Different certainly, in a manner I can’t describe or understand. I’m only a rune-caster, not a sorcerer myself.”
“What else do you see?” Dormas asked him.
“He will not let the perambulator go without a fight. We will be strongly opposed. At that time one among us must take the lead. Only that one has the ability and strengths to see us through the final confrontation. At that time also, Wizard, your knowledge and experience will be of paramount importance to our survival. All of us may have to sacrifice, but one of us will be the key. Only he can counter what our opponent will throw against us.” He looked up then to stare at Jon-Tom. So did the others.
Well, he’d half expected as much. He and Clothahump were the prime movers in this business. He was neither embarrassed nor intimidated by the stares of his companions. He’d been through similar situations often enough in the past to have gained a certain amount of confidence. And it was too much to expect that for once he’d be able to hang back and let bloodthirsty types like Mudge and Colin do the heavy work. He sighed.
“You’re not telling me anything I didn’t already suspect. Are you sure you can’t tell us anything more about what we’re going to have to deal with?”
Again Colin turned his attention to the runes. “I can see something but I can’t define it. The runes are rarely precise. It isn’t something I’d know how to handle myself. I can tell you that it will manifest itself in two ways. The first will take the form of a magic only you can counter.”
“More spellsinging.” Jon-Tom grunted. “Well, I had to fight it out with another spellsinger once before, and he and I ended up the best of friends. If I have to go up against another one . . .”
“The runes read in multiples.”
“All right, then, if I have to go up against several singers, maybe I can convert them the way I did the other one. They may end up as our allies instead of our enemies.”
“It’ll be a wonder if you can turn these to friendships. I read no accommodating signs in the pattern. You will have a tough time combating them. The runes don’t say if you’ll survive the confrontation; so powerful, so evil and destructive is their particular brand of magic.”
Jon-Tom sat up a little straighten “I’ll handle it. What form is the second manifestation going to take?”
“That much, at least, is clear.” The koala stared at him appraisingly. “The runes say that you will have to do battle with your own greatest desire.”
That set Jon-Tom back on his heels. He thought immediately of the dreamworld he’d been drifting through not long ago, of the thousands of fans cheering and screaming at him and the promise of a respected and venerated career in government.
“But I’ve already done that. It was part of the illusion I experienced earlier.”