gray limestone. Exactly like the wall to
our left. Needing the attention of a mason just as badly. But
something about it made all four of us nervous.
“It sure don’t look like something somebody threw up
over the weekend,” I said. Believe it or not, some Karentine
subjects are wicked enough to ignore established regulations and
will construct something illegal while the city functionaries are
off duty.
Nobody stepped up to the wall. Until Singe snorted the way only
a woman can do when she’s exasperated with men being men. She
shuffled right up till her pointy big nose was half an inch from
the limestone. “The track of the boy goes straight on,
Garrett. And this wall smells almost the same as the odor I found
where the two elves fell on one another.”
Playmate took a few steps backward, found a bit of broken brick
that hadn’t yet been scrounged by the street children. (They
sell brick chips and chunks back to the brickyards, where
they’re powdered and added to the clay of new bricks.) He
started to wind up, but paused and said, “Garrett, have you
bothered to look up?”
I hadn’t. Why would I?
None of the others had, either.
We all looked now.
That wall wasn’t part of anything. It might not even be
stone. It just went up a ways, then turned fuzzy and wiggly and
lizard’s belly white. Then it turned misty. Then it turned
into nothing.
“It’s an illusion.”
Playmate chucked his brickbat.
The missile proceeded to proceed despite the presence of a wall
that appeared completely solid, if improbably cold and damp when I
extended a cautious finger to test it. Saucerhead Tharpe
isn’t nearly as careful as Mama Garrett’s only
surviving son. He reached out to thump that wall. And his fist went
right on through.
We all stepped back. We exchanged troubled looks. I said,
“That’s an illusion of the highest order.”
Singe said, “I hear someone calling from the other
side.”
Playmate observed, “An illusion that persists, that can be
used as camouflage, requires the efforts of a master
wizard.”
I grunted. In this town that meant somebody off the Hill. It
meant one of six dozen or so people who are the real masters in
Karenta.
Singe said, “There is somebody over there. Yelling at you,
Garrett.”
I asked Playmate, “What do you think?” I admit to
being intimidated by Hill people. But I’ve never backed down
just because they stuck a finger in somewhere. I wouldn’t
back down now. Kip’s kidnapping had me irked and interested.
Of everyone I asked, “Anybody want to walk away?”
Nobody volunteered to leave, though Saucerhead gulped a pail of
air, Playmate seemed to go a little green and Singe started shaking
like she was naked in a blizzard and didn’t have a clue which
way to the warm. She made some kind of chalk sign on a real wall,
maybe to ward off evil.
“You’re the Marine,” Playmate said.
“Show us your stuff.”
Saucerhead pasted on a huge grin. He was ex-army, too. And he
had heard my opinions concerning the relative merits of the
services more often than had Playmate. He refused to see the light.
It’s a debate that seems doomed to persist forever because
army types are too dim to recognize the truth when it kicks them in
the teeth.
Saucerhead’s whole face threatened to open up. I thought
the top half of his head was going to tip over backward onto his
shoulders. He gasped out, “Yeah, Garrett. Let’s see
some of that old Marine Corps ‘Hey diddle diddle, straight up
the middle.’ ”
Ominously, Singe said, “There is no yelling
anymore.”
“I’m thinking about giving
you
some of that
good old, big boy.” I took a deep breath and squared off with
the illusory wall.
Saucerhead chuckled. He knows I’d never come straight at
him if I did think I had to get after him. Business led us to butt
heads briefly once upon a time, long ago. The results had been far
from satisfactory from my point of view.
I whooped like I was going in, back in my island
our left. Needing the attention of a mason just as badly. But
something about it made all four of us nervous.
“It sure don’t look like something somebody threw up
over the weekend,” I said. Believe it or not, some Karentine
subjects are wicked enough to ignore established regulations and
will construct something illegal while the city functionaries are
off duty.
Nobody stepped up to the wall. Until Singe snorted the way only
a woman can do when she’s exasperated with men being men. She
shuffled right up till her pointy big nose was half an inch from
the limestone. “The track of the boy goes straight on,
Garrett. And this wall smells almost the same as the odor I found
where the two elves fell on one another.”
Playmate took a few steps backward, found a bit of broken brick
that hadn’t yet been scrounged by the street children. (They
sell brick chips and chunks back to the brickyards, where
they’re powdered and added to the clay of new bricks.) He
started to wind up, but paused and said, “Garrett, have you
bothered to look up?”
I hadn’t. Why would I?
None of the others had, either.
We all looked now.
That wall wasn’t part of anything. It might not even be
stone. It just went up a ways, then turned fuzzy and wiggly and
lizard’s belly white. Then it turned misty. Then it turned
into nothing.
“It’s an illusion.”
Playmate chucked his brickbat.
The missile proceeded to proceed despite the presence of a wall
that appeared completely solid, if improbably cold and damp when I
extended a cautious finger to test it. Saucerhead Tharpe
isn’t nearly as careful as Mama Garrett’s only
surviving son. He reached out to thump that wall. And his fist went
right on through.
We all stepped back. We exchanged troubled looks. I said,
“That’s an illusion of the highest order.”
Singe said, “I hear someone calling from the other
side.”
Playmate observed, “An illusion that persists, that can be
used as camouflage, requires the efforts of a master
wizard.”
I grunted. In this town that meant somebody off the Hill. It
meant one of six dozen or so people who are the real masters in
Karenta.
Singe said, “There is somebody over there. Yelling at you,
Garrett.”
I asked Playmate, “What do you think?” I admit to
being intimidated by Hill people. But I’ve never backed down
just because they stuck a finger in somewhere. I wouldn’t
back down now. Kip’s kidnapping had me irked and interested.
Of everyone I asked, “Anybody want to walk away?”
Nobody volunteered to leave, though Saucerhead gulped a pail of
air, Playmate seemed to go a little green and Singe started shaking
like she was naked in a blizzard and didn’t have a clue which
way to the warm. She made some kind of chalk sign on a real wall,
maybe to ward off evil.
“You’re the Marine,” Playmate said.
“Show us your stuff.”
Saucerhead pasted on a huge grin. He was ex-army, too. And he
had heard my opinions concerning the relative merits of the
services more often than had Playmate. He refused to see the light.
It’s a debate that seems doomed to persist forever because
army types are too dim to recognize the truth when it kicks them in
the teeth.
Saucerhead’s whole face threatened to open up. I thought
the top half of his head was going to tip over backward onto his
shoulders. He gasped out, “Yeah, Garrett. Let’s see
some of that old Marine Corps ‘Hey diddle diddle, straight up
the middle.’ ”
Ominously, Singe said, “There is no yelling
anymore.”
“I’m thinking about giving
you
some of that
good old, big boy.” I took a deep breath and squared off with
the illusory wall.
Saucerhead chuckled. He knows I’d never come straight at
him if I did think I had to get after him. Business led us to butt
heads briefly once upon a time, long ago. The results had been far
from satisfactory from my point of view.
I whooped like I was going in, back in my island
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