put his organization back together again to worry
about my whereabouts for a while. It probably wouldn't
be a bad idea to keep a close watch on the sky for a
few days, though"
"I follow you, mate. We won't be surprised from
above like that again."
"Damn right we won't." He turned thoughtful.
"I'm hoping that Gymaught... that's the eagle who
snatched me... Finds out what happens to the kind
of system he espouses, finds out that it's doomed to
self-destruction. I hope he learns that power cor-
rupts absolutely. That greed quickly overtakes loyalty
in the minds of supposedly obedient followers."
"Why 'e grab you anyways, mate, if not for
munching?"
"He needed a musician."
"Teh. All 'e 'ad to do was ask, and I'd *ave told him
as 'ow *e was wastin' 'is time." He grinned. "Sounds
like a fowl business all the way 'round, mate."
THE MOMENT OF THE MAGICIAN
131
If he hadn't just saved his life, Jon-Tom would
have pushed him overboard.
The further south they rowed, the more relaxed
I Jon-Tom became. Clearly Gyrnaught had his wings
t full with his newly enlightened flock, and even if he
» did Find the time to wonder where his musician had
jf gone to, he had no way of knowing which way
xJon-Tom had fled. As days slipped by, he was more
^and more convinced he'd seen the last of the eagle.
| His relief was tempered by their surroundings,
Iwhich grew thicker and more humid than ever.
'^Clothahump's "pleasant tropical country" was closing
|in on them with a vengeance. The trees of the
^W^nnipai towered above their frail raft, supported
d|»y labyrinthine root systems which sometimes choked
|E?ff their chosen route, forcing them to detour to east
|or west. Occasionally the roots themselves grew so
||tall it was possible to paddle beneath them. Shelf
fungi and toadstools clung determinedly to the bases
|»f the smaller trees.
? What little dry land they did encounter was so
thickly overgrown with brambles and thorn thickets
Ithat they had to hunt carefully to find campsites for
jtfie night. Mudge insisted they do this because the
jl-egular evening concert of eerie squeals and groans
Hnnade him leery of anchoring out on the water.
^. Man and otter would huddle close together in
front of their small fire for a long while before
drifting off into an uneasy, disturbed sleep. But
while both found the nocturnal noises unnerving,
nothing slouched out of the muck to devour them as
they slept.
Still, the dark, dank gloominess was all-pervading.
Not quite as Clothahump had described it.
Mist clung to them day and night, rising from the
, steaming surface of the water- When it rained, which
| was often, the heat abated somewhat, but it became
Alan Dean Foster
132
almost impossible to judge direction. This forced
them to seek shelter beneath the towering roots ot
the larger trees. After a couple of weeks, jon-Tom
was certain the morning growth that covered his face
was more mildew than beard.
Everything in the Wrounipai waff slick with moss
or rough with fungi. The intense humidity threat-
ened to rot the clothes otf their backs. .It also seemed
to penetrate to work on their minds, disorienting
them and making identification of the most ordinary
objects difficult.
They had beached the raft on a sand bar beneath
the natural roof formed by several interlocking aii
roots, sharing it with freshwater crustaceans and
other inhabitants of the brackish environment. Their
campfire crackled Fitfully, the flames struggling against
the cloying atmosphere. It was a pitch-black night
Trees blocked out the clouds, and the clouds shuttered
the moon. Their only light came from the fire.
But he could still hear, and something sounded
very peculiar indeed.
Jon-Tom roused himself, his eyes heavy from lack
of sleep. Nearby, Mudge lay rolled up in his thin
blanket, snoring on, oblivious of the strange rushing
noise which had awakened Jon-Tom.
The spellsinger listened for a long time before
donning his cape and walking to the edge of the
water. The sound was an unnatural one, steady and
moist, like a rushing in a vacuum. He put his hand
out into the rain, jerked it back as if he'd been stung,
then slowly extended it a second time. He stared at it
in wonder, shook his head to clear it. The phenome-
non persisted. So he wasn't crazy.
Water beaded up against his extended hand. It felt
like normal rain. It looked like normal rain. He drew
back his hand again and tasted of it. A pungent, salty
flavor that wasn't normal. He was relieved for that. It
THE MOMENT OF THE MAOICIAH 133
meant his senses were functioning properly, and he
was relieved that it was the precipitation that was
deranged and not himself.
He watched it until he was completely awake, then
walked back to wake Mudge.
"Huh... wuzzat, wot?" The otter blinked up at
him. Jon-Tom's face must have presented a less than
pleasing sight, lit only by the feeble glow of their
campfire. "Wot is it, mate? Cor, 'tis black as a
magistrate's thoughts out."
"It's still night. The sun's not up yet."
"Then why," asked a suddenly irritated Mudge,
"did you wake me?"
"It's raining, Mudge."
, The otter paused a moment, listening. *T can hear
it. So wot?"
"It's not raining right."
"Not right? 'Ave you gone daft?"
"Mudge, it's raining up."
"Gone over the edge," the otter muttered. "Poor
' bugger." He slipped free of his blanket and staggered
sleepily toward the water's edge. A paw reached out
.into the rain. Water beaded up against the back of
'his hand while the palm stayed dry.
^ "I'll be corn'oled, so it is."
! Jon-Tom's hand reached out parallel to the otter's.
"What does it mean?" It was fascinating to watch the
droplets strike the back of his hand, crawl around
the fingers, and shoot up into the dark sky.
"I guess it means, guv, that 'is wizardness wasn't
kiddm' when he told us this part o' the world was
tropical. My guess is that the land 'ereabouts gets so
wet from the 'umidity that it 'as to give back some o'
the water to the sky from time to rime. Not such an
improper arrangement, if you thinks about it. Keeps
everythin' in balance, wot? Up, down, up, down: a
body could get confused."
Alan Dean Foster
134
**1 can see what it's doing, but what does it mean?"
Mudge pulled his paw out of the upside-down
storm and licked the fur on his wrist to dry it as he
strolled back toward his makeshift bed.
&nbs
p; **It means that the world's a wet place, mate."
Jon-Tom watched the up-pour a while longer be-
fore rejoining his friend. He curled up underneath
his cape but lay wide-awake, staring out into the
storm. The steady rush of sky-bound water was
soothing.
"Actually, it's kind of neat. I mean, there's a won-
derful symmetry to it, a kind of meteorological poetry."
"Right, mate. Me thought exactly. Now go to sleep."
Jon-Tom turned to him. The otter's silhouette was
barely visible against the fading fire. "You live too
fast, Mudge. Sometimes I don't think you have the
slightest appreciation for any of the world's natural
wonders."
"Wot, me?" He blinked sleepily at Jon-Tom. " 'Ow
can you say that, mate? Why, this upside-down drizzle,
it revises me 'ole estimation o' 'ow the world's
constructed."
"Does it? Then maybe there's hope for you yet, if
it enables you to appreciate the strangeness and
beauty of nature, the astounding surprises that it has
in store for all of us. There is magnificence in a
slightly altered natural phenomenon like rain."
"Actually, mate, 1 see it a little differently. See, I
always thought the world was a toilet. 'Tis nice to
learn that it can function as a bidet also." Whereup-
on he rolled over once more and went back to sleep.
Jon-Tom resigned himself to the fact that his com-
panion was, aesthetically speaking, a primitive. He
contemplated the upside-down rain thoughtfully. It
was disorienting, but lovely and not at all dangerous.
If naught else it was a welcome change to their
monotonous surroundings.
THB MOMENT or THE MAGICMIV 135
It continued to pour upward for a good part of
the early morning. Standing on the raft, they remained
clean and dry as they paddled through a sheet of
rising precipitation. The raft was a little cube of
dryness sliding across the plant-choked waters of the
Wrbunipai.
Eventually the humidity fell below a hundred per-
cent and they left the region of constant rain behind.
The water had become a narrow, lazy stream, one of
many cutting through parallel ridges of upthrust
granite and schist. It was an improvement over the
country they had crossed, but not the balmy paradise
Clothahump had described. Dense undergrowth still
crowded for space among the stone and water. They
found themselves paddling down a green tunnel lit
by intermittent sunlight.
On one rocky outcropping Mudge located bushes
which produced delicious green-black berries shaped
like teardrops, and the two travelers spent a whole
afternoon gorging themselves. The stony island provid-
ed a clean, dry resting place as well, and they de-
cided to spend the night.
Jon-Tom awoke the following morning, stretched,
and was awake in an instant. They were surrounded.
Not by Gyrnaught's minions, nor by the faceless
demons of Markus the Ineluctable.
There were thirty otters staring back at him, and
every one of them looked exactly like Mudge. Jon-
Tom had experienced his share of oddities recently,
but nothing to match this.
"Good morning, Jon-Tom!" the thirty chorused in
unison.
He tried to rein in his panicky thoughts. Was he
seeing some kind of multiple mirror image fashioned
by someone well versed in the wizardiy arts? No- If
that were the case, they should all move as well as
talk simultaneously. But some were bending over in
Alan Dean Foster
136
laughter, others talking to their neighbors, still oth-
ers doffing their hats by way of greeting. Each moved
independently of the other.
There was a simpler explanation, of course. This
world had finally sent him over the edge.
One similarity stood out on careful inspection. It
was enough to convince him he hadn't tumbled
down some metaphysical rabbit hole. While each
duplicate of the otter moved independently of the
others, displaying different expressions and making
different gestures, every one of them stayed in one
spot. None retreated and none approached.
Until one stumbled into him from behind and
nearly scared him to death. He grabbed this sole
mobile by the shoulders and shook it violently.
"Mudge, is it you?"
The otter's eyes were glazed. "I ain't sure no more,
mate. I used to think I were me. Now I ain't so sure.
I was out gatherin' breakfast berries when I came
back to see this lot." He gestured at the circle of
Mudges enclosing their campsite. "Maybe I ain't me.
Maybe one o' them is me."
"We're all you," said the otterish chorus, "every
one of us."
"Yes, but I'm a better you," insisted a pair of
Mudges off to the right.
"Not a chance," argued three across the circle.
"We're the best Mudges, we are."
"Oi, you couldn't fool your own real parents,"
declared a quartet of Mudges from the right flank.
"There has to be an explanation for this," Jon-
Tbm said quietly, "A sensible explanation"
"Sure there is, mate," said the Mudge standing
next to him. "I've been 'angin' around you too long,
and now I'm as loony as you are"
"Neither of you is loony," said *the two Mudges
directly in front of them.
THB MOMENT or TOE MAGICIAN 137
As Jon-Tom blinked, or thought he blinked, the
thing much worse; a pair of six-foot-two-inch-tall,
indigo-and-green-clad Jon-Toms. He stared at the
perfect duplicates of himself.
^"A trick, it's a trick of some kind. An optical
illusion." Sure it was, but who was doing it, and why?
They'd heard nothing during the night, and the
sensitive Mudge would surely have been alerted by
the encroachment of so many intruders. He turned
to the otter.
"You haven't heard anyone on the island besides
us?"
"Not a soul," the otter assured him. "But we sure
'as 'ell 'ave acquired some company."
"There has to be more than one of them at work
here," Jon-Tom muttered. "There's too much hap-
pening simultaneously for a single creature to be
responsible."
"You're right there." He turned on the voice, only
to see three more Jon-Toms chatting amongst them-
selves. One leaned against his ramwood staff, an-
other pointed, while the third studied his hands. But
they stayed rooted in three spots. In fact, it seemed
asif... yes, he was positive. The three new Jon-Toms
occupied the same locations as three now-vanished
Mudges. The otters had turned into Jon-Toms.
"I don't know who you are or what you are, but if
you're trying to frighten us, you've failed."
"Speak for yourself, mate," Mudge mumbled un-
der his bre
ath.
"Frighten you? Why should we want to frighten
you?" inquired a trio of Mudges off to their left.
Once more Jon-Tom's mind underwent an unsettling
shift in perception. The Mudges vanished, to be
replaced by three trees. Each consisted of a trunk
which topped out in a weaving, flexible point- Flow-
Alan Dean Foster
138
ers grew from the base of the trunk. In the center of
each was an indistinct, puttylike face. Jon-Tom could
see eyes and mouths but no nose or chin. An ear
protruded from each side, and a single thick, tapering
vine grew from the top of the tree. Or maybe the
trunk became the vine; Jon-Tom couldn't teil where
one ended and the other began. Maybe there was no
tree: Just the single tall vine.
"We don't want to frighten you- We're just practic-
ing our art. It's rare that we get an audience."
Jon-Tom turned and looked behind him. Three more
Mudges had disappeared. They had been replaced
by another pair of trees and a single giant butterfly.
It fluttered but didn't stray from its Fixed position-
"That's so true," the butterfly declaimed. "Our
audiences are few and far between."
"Your art?" Jon-Tom murmured.
"We're mimics, imitators, mimes," said one of the
vines. "It started as a defense against the plant-
eaters. Our trees are actually below the surface." So
these were vines he was looking at, Jon-Tom mused.
"We protect our buried trees by imitating things the
plant-eaters are scared of."
"It works very well," said a giant caterpillar. "It's
hard to try and eat something that looks like you.
Personally, being into photosynthesis, I never could
understand the motile digestion cycle,"
"Anyways," said a couple of Daliesque nightmares,
"it gets dull just sitting around waiting for something
to try and dig up your tree. So we stay in shape by
practicing different duplications. That gets boring,
too, unless we get a new audience with a fresh
perspective." The nightmares vanished, were replaced
by twenty pairs of applauding hands.
"Come now," said something like a small dinosaur,
"what would you like to see us mimic? We're the best,
on this side"
THE MOMBATT OF THE MAGICIAN 139
"Not quite the best," insisted a quartet of upside-
down birds across from the boaster. "You could
never do this."
"Fertilizer!" snapped the other vine, immediately
becoming an astonishingly colorful assortment of
dangling avians.