“You next, Mudge.” Weegee pushed him toward the chair.
“Now wait a minim, luv. Let’s think this through. I ain’t sure I want to see myself as I really am. From wot friends tell me it leaves somethin’ to be desired.”
“Oh go on, Mudge. It’s only a mirror.”
“Yeh, sure.” He readied himself. “Just be ready to pick me up if I faint.”
Carefully he sat in the chair, resting his arms on the wooden ones, and turned to face his reflection. It showed a much older otter in the final stages of dessication. Most of the fur had turned silver and the figure was so thin the bones showed in the shoulders and face. Several whiskers on the left side of the muzzle were missing, spittle dribbled from the same side of the trembling mouth, and the right eye rolled wildly and independent of the left. The clothes were ragged and torn.
It was a reflection of a life taken to extremes, of one stuffed to bursting with too much liquor, too much rich food, drugs, wenching and a general overindulgence in all things. Despite intimations of incipient senility, there was no mistaking that lecherous expression. It was Mudge.
Jon-Tom eyed him worriedly as he slid slowly out of the chair. Weegee said nothing but embraced him tightly. He stroked the fur on the back of her neck.
“There now, luv, no need to get all upset.”
“It doesn’t bother you to see yourself like that?” Jon-Tom asked him.
“Why should it bother me?” He looked around at the trio of concerned faces. “That’s ’ow I’ve always seen myself. Besides, ’tis a reflection of ’ow I am now, not ’ow I’m goin’ to end up. Come on now, cheer up. You’re depressin’ me, wot with all these long faces. ’Tis your tum, Jon-Tom.”
“I don’t know.” The image of the decrepit otter still lingered on his retinas. What might the mirror tell him about himself?
“Go on,” said Cautious, displaying unaccustomed assertiveness. “We all done it, you got to do it too. You not afraid of what maybe you see, are you?”
“Yes I am.”
“Take the plunge, mate. Probably you’ll just see a straight reflection, like Cautious did.”
Now that all three of his companions had chanced the mirror he could hardly back out. So he settled himself in the chair, lifted his eyes and stared nervously into the glass.
His lower jaw dropped and he moved his head from side to side, but it didn’t change what he saw in the mirror.
“You okay, Jon-Tom?” Weegee was eyeing him with concern. He didn’t reply and she looked to Mudge. “What’s the matter? What’s gone wrong?”
“Maybe nothin’, luv. Maybe ’tis just somethin’ we ain’t smart enough to understand.” He held her tightly. “Not every answer in life’s an easy one.”
There was no image in the mirror, no image at all. Cautious leaned forward and saw himself, and you could see the otters standing a little further back, but Jon-Tom might as well have been invisible. The raccoon helped him up from the chair. Still stunned, he leaned against the dressing table, consciously avoiding any contact with the beveled glass that dominated the center.
“But what does it mean? Does it mean I’m not really here? That I don’t really exist?” He felt his chest, his legs. “I feel real. I feel like I’m here.”
Mudge tried to be helpful. “Maybe it means the real you hasn’t made itself known yet. Maybe there’s somethin’ that ’as to be added to make you complete. Hell, I’ve always thought you weren’t all there.”
“Mudge, this is no time to be funny. I’m scared.”
“Then that’s the best time to be funny. ’Ere, let’s think about somethin’ else for a while. I don’t think you ’ave to worry about fadin’ away.” He searched the chamber and his gaze fastened on the golden goblet. “Wot you want to bet this ’ere bit o’ crenulated crockery talks?” He picked it up, as he had once before, but though he held it tightly no glow issued from its hammered sides and no words from its depths.
“You lose,” Weegee told him.
“Can’t lose when you bet against yourself, luv.” He sniffed the clear contents. “Smells like rainwater. Must’ve dripped from the ceilin’. Pity it couldn’t be somethin’ a mite stronger.”
“As dry as my throat is all of a sudden I’m not going to be particular.” Jon-Tom took it from the otter and after a quick look to ensure himself nothing besides water had fallen into it from the ceiling he downed the contents gratefully.
He was about to put it back on the dressing table when the bowl filled with a pulsating blue smoke.
“Knoweth all that I am the One True Goblet. Knoweth all who standeth before me that I will provide sustenance for the thirsty of mind as well as throat.”
“Interesting.” Jon-Tom turned the empty goblet around in his fingers. “I wonder what it means, ‘sustenance for the mind’?” He looked into its depths anew and they heard the voice a second time.
“Beware the Moqua plants.”
The blue smoke dissipated. In its wake it left a fresh drink of water.
“Now ain’t that somethin’,” said Mudge. “‘Beware o’ the Moqua plants.’”
“What’s a Moqua?”
The otter formed a circle with thumb and forefinger. “Got little bells on it about like this that fill up with tiny bugs. Got nasty bites, they do.” There was contempt in his voice. “I didn’t need no talkin’ utensil to tell me that. But I do need a drink. Pass ’er over.”
Jon-Tom handed the otter the goblet and Mudge drained it in a single long swallow. “Water’s good even if the advice leaves somethin’ to be desired.”
It spoke again. “Avoid the lugubrious lescar.”
Mudge made a face. “That one’s got me stumped. Any o’ you lot know wot a lugubrious lescar is?” Weegee and Cautious shook their heads.
“Hurry up in there.” Teyva sounded genuinely impatient.
“Just another minute.” Jon-Tom glanced at his companions. “Nobody knows what a lugubrious lescar is?”
“Never ’eard o’ it,” confessed Mudge.
