Golem in the Gears (18 page)

"Yes, of course. I was brought up to be rational, so I never had a real monster under my bed. I really missed that. But—"

"Wait," Grundy said, realizing. "You're not a child now. How is it that Snortimer was able to hide under your bed?"

"It's not age that decides it," she explained. "It's atti- tude. Most children think it's grown-up not to believe in Bed Monsters, so when they grow up, they don't. But since I didn't have a Bed Monster, I never had the expe- rience of truly believing, and so never grew out of it. You have to experience something fully, before you can leave it behind. So I'm retarded in ways like that; I'm still ready to accept a Bed Monster, and my bed showed it."

"If you're retarded, I hope you never grow up!" Grundy exclaimed.

"I mean that I haven't had the experience of the real world," she explained. "I know about it, but I haven't experienced it. So I know a lot about Bed Monsters, but Snortimer is the first I have actually encountered. I'm so sorry he came all this way for nothing."

"For nothing?" Grundy asked blankly.

"He can't find romance. There is no female of his kind."

"What?" Grundy asked, appalled.

"Bed Monsters don't breed the way other creatures do. They don't reproduce. They form spontaneously from the dust under a child's bed, and they dissolve back into dust when the child stops being a child. Snortimer's the only one I know of who has traveled away from his bed."

"Well, actually we brought the bed along. But—"

"But his whole hope is vain," she concluded. "I sup- pose we'll have to tell him, if—"

"If he pulls through this crisis of light exposure," Grundy said morosely. "If I had known about this, I would never have—"

"Of course," she agreed quickly. "You are a nice per- son."

Grundy laughed ironically. "I'm neither nice nor a per- son. I'm a loud-mouthed golem."

"You certainly are a person!" she insisted. "And a brave one too! The way you fought Mother Sweet- ness—" But this brought her up short. "Oh, I wish I hadn't thought of that!"

"She really wasn't what you thought," Grundy said uncomfortably. "Naturally she didn't show her mean side to you."

"I realize that, now. I see that there were inconsisten- cies in the picture of Xanth she presented for me. If there were no things I didn't know about, why wouldn't she allow me to leave the Tower? Everything seemed to make sense, from the Tower; now that I'm away from it, I can see that reality isn't quite the same. Still, Mother Sweet- ness was the only person I knew, and it really hurts me to know that she—"

"I guess it's the same kind of shock for you that it will be for Snortimer, when he learns that—"

"You're very perceptive, Grundy."

"No I'm not. I just happen to know what it's like."

"What it's like?" she asked blankly.

"To have no female of your species."

"But golems can be made in any type!" she protested.

"But not living golems. When I was wood and rag, all I wanted was to become real. But when I became real, I discovered I was alone."

"I never thought of that! That's terrible, Grundy!"

"Anyway, that's not my Quest," he said uncomforta- bly. "I'm searching for Ivy's little dragon friend, Stanley Steamer. The Good Magician told me to ride the Bed Monster to the Ivory Tower, and now I've done that, but I still don't know where Stanley is."

"But I know that!" she cried, clapping her hands. "There's a young six-legged dragon with the Fauns and Nymphs."

"A steamer?" he asked, excited.

"Yes. He arrived there about three years ago, in a puff of smoke."

"He's all right?"

"So I understand."

"Then why didn't he go home to Ivy?"

"The Fauns and Nymphs won't let him go." Then her fair brow furrowed. "But that's strange, I realize now. The Fauns and Nymphs are supposed to be innocent folk who don't hurt any creature. How could they hold a dragon captive?"

"There must be a side to them that the Hag didn't tell you about," Grundy said grimly. "I know Stanley would have returned to Ivy, if he possibly could have."

She shook her head. "It must be so. The Fauns and Nymphs migrated south when the ogres migrated north;

now the ogres are up by the Ogre-fen-Ogre Pen, and the Fauns and Nymphs are down below Lake Ogre-Chobee.

It's really not a great distance from here, as the roc flies. I'm sure Stanley could have gone home, if permitted."

"Well, I'm going to rescue him and bring him home," Grundy said. "I have to, or Ivy will do something dis- astrous. She's a little Sorceress, you know."

"Yes, she's to be Queen of Xanth one day. I suppose when she grows up, she'll stop corresponding with me. Adults don't believe in pun-pals any more than they do in Bed Monsters." She dipped her gaze, sadly. "I wish I could have met her."

"But you can meet her!" Grundy said. "You're free of the Ivory Tower now!"

"Why, so I am!" she agreed, surprised. "But I'm not sure I could travel all that way alone. The fact that I know about the dragons and other creatures of Xanth doesn't mean I could handle them if I encountered them; in fact I'm sure I couldn't."

"You can travel with us," Grundy said. "We're going there, just as soon as we rescue Stanley."

"Why, so you are," she agreed, smiling gladly. "But I'm afraid I would only be in your way."

"I don't see why. Snortimer could carry both of us;

he's strong enough." Then he remembered the Bed Mon- ster's state. "Only—"

She sighed. "Only he's ill," she finished. "I had for- gotten. What will you do, Grundy, if he—?"

Grundy shrugged. "I'll just have to go on alone."-

"But then I could go with you!"

"On foot? I don't think you would like that."

She pondered. "Maybe you could talk to animals, and get a ride for us."

He nodded. "Yes, I could do that. But I'd rather go with Snortimer. He's been a good steed and a good friend, and—"

"Surely he will get better!" she said positively.

"Surely he will," Grundy agreed, but a big ugly doubt was hovering about him.

"Only—" she began.

"Yes?"

"What about the bed?"

Grundy sighed. "You're right. We have to take that along. But I should be able to get an animal to carry it."

Then Rapunzel screamed.

Grundy jumped up. "What? Where?"

"That!" she cried, pointing at the floor.

Grundy looked. His heart sank. "A nickelpede!" he exclaimed.

"That's right—they infest these caves. They like the gold, though they can't eat it. Some creatures are like that. Where there's one, there's hundreds!"

"It's searching for meat," Grundy said.

"Can it reach us, up here on the bed?"

"In time. But it's not after us. It's after Snortimer."

She put her hand to her mouth. "Oh!" she cried with new horror.

"We've got to stop it," he decided. "If it doesn't return to its nest, the others won't know Snortimer's here." He moved to the edge of the bed.

"But how can we stop it?" she asked, peering down.

"I'll need a weapon," he said. He looked wildly about. "I wish I'd saved that hatpin!"

"I have a fairly large pin," she said. "Of course it's small, now, because—"

"Change size and get it for me," he said urgently.

She changed to human size, reached into her dress, and brought out a large pin. She handed this to Grundy, then changed back to his size.

The pin made a good sword. Grundy held the shaft between his teeth, and climbed down the leg of the bed.

The nickelpede was now approaching one of Snorti- mer's limp hands. It was a roughly circular creature stand- ing about knee-high to him, but it's two big claws reached up menacingly. They seemed to be gold-plated; this was one rich little monster.

Grundy stabbed at the thing with his pin. The point was sharp, but it scraped off the metallic hide and did no harm. The nickelpede clicked its claws and advanced, forcing Grundy to jump back. Those pincers could gouge disk-shaped chunks out of metal; they could surely do worse to his flesh!

He circled around, seeking some vulnerable spot. Sup- pose he skewered an eye? That would set the thing back! There was only one problem: he couldn't find any eyes. The thing had feelers or antennae, and when he stabbed at them, they simply swayed aside.

How about the feet? The thing had six or eight little pedal extremities, and they couldn't be too heavily armored, or they would impede its walking. If he took out several feet, that might ground it.

He watched for an opening, then stabbed at a foot. He missed—but the nickelpede didn't; one of its claws whipped around and caught his pin. CRUNCH! Grundy was left holding half a pin.

Dismayed, he backed away. The nickelpede pursued, aware of its advantage.

Grundy tripped over a ridge in the stone floor, and fell on his back. The nickelpede clacked its mandibles and scuttled toward him.

Something huge came down. The nickelpede disap- peared.

Startled, Grundy rubbed his eyes and looked again.

The huge thing was Rapunzel, human-sized. She had stepped on the nickelpede.

"Ooo, ick!" she exclaimed, stepping away.

The nickelpede was done for; she had squished it. But in a moment she was back to golem-size, standing on the bed, her face in her hands.

Grundy climbed back up. "You saved me!" he exclaimed.

"I just couldn't let you get chomped!" She sobbed. "Ooo, I never did anything like that before!"

"I'm glad you did! I messed up, the way I usually do, and if you hadn't—"

"You were so brave! When I saw you fall—"

"I'm not brave!" he protested. "I was terrified!"

"Well, you looked brave!"

He wasn't used to this sort of compliment and didn't know how to handle it, so he changed the subject. "There are bound to be other nickelpedes coming. We need some better way to hold them off. Do you know of anything better than stomping?"

"If we could find a nickelodeon," she said uncertainly.

"A what?"

"They eat nickelpedes. There are supposed to be some along the Gold Coast but I don't know exactly where."

"I'll go out and find one!" he said.

"But what if another nickelpede comes before you get back?" she wailed.

"Stomp it!" he snapped, and scrambled down the leg of the bed and across the floor of the cave.

She didn't answer. He didn't like being gruff with her, but knew that if he didn't solve the problem of the nickel- pedes soon, they would both suffer a lot more grief than hurt feelings. The other nickelpedes of the region would

soon smell the blood of the first and converge, and when they did, no amount of stomping would stop them.

Above the grotto, he approached the first plant he spied. "Hey, leaftop—have you seen any nickelodeons here- abouts?"

To his surprise, the plant responded: "Certainly. One prowls this region all the time."

"Point in its direction!" he cried.

Soon he was on his way, tracing down the nickelodeon. He could hardly believe his fortune. Before long he reached its lair. The thing turned out to be a somewhat dumpy box with a slot in the side. It didn't look like much, but he had to trust Rapunzel's information. He hoped it was alive, so that he could talk to it.

"Are you alive?" he "inquired cautiously in human tongue.

The box shook itself. "What a note!" it rumbled.

That enabled him to identify its language. "Are you hungry?" he asked the nickelodeon.

"I'm always hungry!" it responded. "But it's getting harder to catch my meals."

"If you come with me, I've got a place where nickel- pedes are coming in on their own. If you wait quietly—"

"On my way!" the odd creature agreed, rising on a number of little legs and traveling along.

When they reached the grotto, they found Rapunzel distraught. She had trodden on three more nickelpedes, but remained terrified of them and appalled at herself. "Oh, I wish I had never left the Ivory Tower!" she cried, blowing her nose into a dainty hanky.

Already she was missing her captivity! How bad would it be if the Sea Hag got her alone and started in with the "Mother Sweetness" business?

"You crawl under the bed next to the Bed Monster and

wait," Grundy told the nickelodeon. "Take only the ones that actually come under the bed, so as not to alert the others. Can you do that?"

"Trust me to know my business," the creature replied. It wedged under the bed.

Grundy clambered back to the top of the bed. "Come on up here," he called to Rapunzel. "Small-size."

In a moment she was with him, still sniffly. "It was horrible!" she said. "I don't know which I hate worse:

those nickelpedes, or having to squish them!"