“What did you do, make the poor fellow fly halfway across the Glittergeist?”
Jon-Tom coughed into his fist. “Something like that. But we didn’t make him do it. He volunteered.”
The goat consulted his notes. “And his blood pressure, verra strange.” He glanced up at the stallion through those half-inch thick lenses. “Are you on enna kind of medication?”
“Ah, no.” Teyva looked away. “That is, nothing of a long-term nature.”
“Long-term nature?” The physician looked at the stallion’s companions. “What does ’e mean, nothing of a long-term nature?”
Mudge started to reply but Weegee slapped a paw over his mouth. Jon-Tom took a step forward. “Our lives were at stake. Teyva here suffered from a fear of flying ever since colthood. We had to resort to the use of a stimulant to break him of that fear.”
“Weel you broke him of it, I’d say, judging from the way those wings look. Severe sprain, both of them.” He shook his head at the stallion. “No flying for you for a while, my friend.”
“Absolutely verboten.” Corliss was examining Teyva’s right eye, having added drops to dilate the pupil. “Nor would I take any more of that stimulant if I were you. Not if you want to fly anywhere soon except into a shallow grave.”
Jon-Tom felt uncomfortable. “Like I said, we had no choice. Everything happened pretty fast. I had no time to measure out a dose.”
This failed to placate the gibbon. “As a doctor I have little sympathy for anyone who employs strong drugs without a prescription.”
Mudge couldn’t stand it anymore, broke away from Weegee’s restraining paw. “Look ’ere, knuckles, we were about to be potted an’ we didn’t ’ave time for careful consideration o’ the possible consequences.”
Teyva gazed sorrowfully at Jon-Tom. “I am sorry I will not be able to do as I hoped and fly you all the way to Strelakat Mews, but I think I had best abide by the doctors’ decision.”
Jon-Tom walked up to pat him on the neck. “That’s all right. You’ve done more than enough by bringing us this far, Teyva. We can walk the rest of the way.”
Marley looked up from his papers. “Strelakat Mews? What business could you have in Strelakat Mews?”
Jon-Tom indicated the sack containing the fragments of his duar. “I’m a spellsinger by trade. My instrument is badly broken and my mentor, the wizard Clothahump, insists that the only craftsman in the world capable of repairing it properly is a fellow named Couvier Coulb who lives in the Mews.”
“That may be, that may be.” Corliss was writing on a pad of his own. “I wouldn’t know, not being a musician myself.”
“Where might we find someone to guide us to this dump?” Mudge asked.
“You can’t,” Marley told the otter. “It’s said the inhabitants of Strelakat Mews can do wondrous things, but nobody goes there.”
“Then how can they know that?”
Corliss shrugged expressively, pursing his thick lips. “Who knows how tourists come up with the things they do? Myself, I am not one for the jungle. I much prefer the coast.”
“Lovely,” growled the otter. “More creepers an’ cannibals.”
“No cannibals, I’d say.” Marley’s goatee twitched as he shook his head. “Not between here and the Mews, I shouldn’t think.”
“Other things, though,” said Corliss.
“What other things?” Jon-Tom inquired.
“Don’t know. Tourist talk. Traveler tales. Me, I stick to the coast.”
“All right then.” Jon-Tom’s exasperation was beginning to show. “If we can’t find anyone to guide us to this place, can you tell us if there’s at least someone who can point us in the right direction?”
The physicians exchanged a look. “Try Trancus the outfitter,” Marley suggested. “He’s the one who would know.”
“He’s also,” Corliss added sagely, “the only one I would trust.”
XIII
TRANCUS THE OUTFITTER was a wombat, overweight as were most of his kind. His features seemed to sit loosely in pockets and folds of firm flesh covered by dense black fur. At first he tried to discourage them but when they continued to insist, he agreed to provide them with directions.
“There’s a trail that runs straight to the Mews. Sometimes, not often, folks come from there to here to buy what they can’t make or grow. I hear it is the most wonderful sort of place, full of talented, kind people. They like to keep to themselves. Seem to find their way to Chejiji lots easier than people from here can find their way there. It doesn’t make me glad telling you this, but I will be glad to sell you supplies.” And he did.
When they had been appropriately reoutfitted for the hike ahead he closed his shop and waddled to the edge of the city to make sure they didn’t miss the trail head.
“You be careful in there.” He waved a stubby paw at the wall of jungle. “Get a few leagues away from good old Chejiji and you never know what you might run into. That’s what Mews means: jungle.”
“Then what does Strelakat mean?” Jon-Tom asked him.
“Beats hell out of me. We always wondered about that here in the city. If you find out you can tell me. If you come back.”
“Now ’ow did I know you were goin’ to say that?” Mudge sighed, started up the narrow, muddy track that wound its way among the trees.
“Good luck, friends.” They left the wombat waving to them as they filed into the unknown.
Some of the flora and fauna was known to Mudge and Cautious, much of it was new and strange, but nothing challenged their progress. They carried no waterbags, for as everyone knew, jungle water is pure and palatable. There was an abundance of wild fruit and while the atmosphere was humid it wasn’t unbearably so. By the second day they were all enjoying the level, easy walk. All except Mudge, who complained incessantly. This was normal for him, however, and everyone ignored him.
One new variety of lizard in particular interested Jon-Tom. Instead of the familiar webbed or feathered wings, this aerial charmer had thin wafers of skin mounted on small bones that rotated on a gimbel-like mount. Spinning at high speed, these provided sufficient lift to raise the brightly colored reptile straight up. Not only could it hover like Teyva, it could also fly sideways and backward. They seemed to delight in bouncing up and down in the air in front of the marchers’ faces like so many snakes on yo-yos.
One exceptionally iridescent six-inch specimen buzzed along in front of Jon-Tom for five minutes before flying off into a nearby calimar tree.
