"And get rid of that pesky stork," Dawn said.

  "That too," Maeve agreed, finding her voice.

  "How could you do such a thing?" Olive demanded. "Maenads want only one thing from a man, and that's a pound of his flesh freshly ripped out of his body. They don't fall in love."

  "Maybe it's not love," Maeve said. "He gave me an amulet. He wants me to visit, for an hour, for a glorious session on his bed."

  "That's stork signaling!" Haughty said. "That's mischief."

  "I know," Maeve said. "But this time I think I want to do it. It's not as if the storks will know. Not if the signal doesn't go out."

  "Disgusting," the harpy said. But she did not seem fully serious.

  "We can be free here," Phanta said. "Free in a manner we can't—or shouldn't be—outside. In a way it makes us equal with men."

  "They have little if any responsibility," Eve said. "A little less for us would serve them right."

  Several others nodded thoughtfully. Jumper wondered what was going through their minds. How could diminished responsibility benefit anyone?

  "And we still have five symbols to return," Olive said. "Who is next?"

  There was half a silence. Jumper broke it. "Let's relax tonight, and decide tomorrow morning. We have had enough adventure for today."

  "Yes, it's been quite a game of drawbridge," Phanta said, laughing.

  Then Haughty vanished. "What happened?" Jumper asked, alarmed.

  "Oh, she's just popping out to verify the waking world," Olive explained. "She does that every few hours. Don't you remember?"

  Now he did remember. "We have been dreaming for some time. We probably need to take a break."

  Haughty reappeared. "Food, sleep, and p**p," she announced. "Are you ready?"

  "We can return to this same place?" Jumper asked.

  "You can't avoid it. That's the way the gourd is."

  "Then take us out," Jumper agreed.

  Haughty vanished again. After a scant two moments, so did the rest of them, one by one: Maeve, Wenda, Olive, Phanta, and Dawn. When Olive went, so did Jenny and the cats, because they had been conjured by Olive.

  "It's just you and me," Eve said. She turned and flashed her panties. Then she vanished.

  Jumper, caught off guard, was half freaked. That d**ned tease!

  Then he blinked. He was lying on the mat, and Tandy's hand was before his face, intercepting his connection to the gourd's peephole. "Welcome back, Jumper," she said, smiling. "You must have seen something interesting, just now; your face went slack."

  "Nothing important," he said, knowing that the truth would only make everyone laugh. Eve had had her little joke. But he knew he would have to maintain a better guard, because those panties certainly were potent.

  7

  HEART AND MIND

  In the morning, refreshed, they returned to the dream realm.

  When Jumper put one eye to the peephole he found himself in the Found Cabin, right where he had left it. All of them were there, appearing one by one.

  "I will summon my imaginary friend Jenny," Olive said. She concentrated, and in hardly more than a moment Jenny appeared, along with Sammy, Claire, and Kaboodle, swishing her nine tails.

  "Whose turn is it?" Jenny inquired.

  "Mine, I think," Wenda said. "I was the second one to pick up a symbol. The Heart of Love."

  "That's odd," Maeve said.

  "Odd?"

  "The way mine changed from Courage to Love. I picked up the Sword of Courage, but then Warren said he loves me. Who could ever love a maenad?"

  "A bloodthirsty warrior," Haughty said. "But you don't need to guess, girl. Invoke your amulet. Go see him for an hour. Then you'll know for sure."

  "But that might be only passion, not love."

  Haughty laughed. "Much the same thing, for a man. Go. They don't need you here for that time."

  Maeve looked around somewhat helplessly. "Is that true?" She seemed pitifully eager yet doubtful.

  "True enough," Olive said.

  "Well, if it's really all right…"

  The others nodded. Maeve lifted the little sword. "Take me to your master," she said. And vanished.

  "She's used to making love, not war," Phanta said.

  "I think that's actually one lucky warrior," Eve murmured.

  Jumper found he agreed. Maeve was one taut, pretty, shapely female, trying to learn how to be a woman instead of a vicious creature.

  She would surely give the warrior a lot of pleasure as she learned the nature of his interest.

  Which reminded him of Sharon, in her brief woman phase. Of course she had merely been trying to trick him. But in that moment she had been a most tempting morsel. Not that he had any business noticing.

  "I hope mine works out as well," Wenda said, picking up the heart.

  She glanced at Jumper. "Are yew coming with me?"

  Oh. He was still in spider form. "Yes. Let me change." He took a vial, sipped it, and became the naked man.

  Wenda was already there with clothing for him. Dawn and Eve mischievously flashed their undies, but too late to embarrass him. Even so, he blinked. They had reversed it, with Dawn showing her bright white panties, and Eve her dark bra. Both were as well filled as their prior examples, and did momentarily stun him. The others didn't notice that they were showing anything, but of course they were showing it only to Jumper. It was highly selective naughtiness.

  Wenda held up the heart. "Sammy, find who this belongs to," she said.

  Sammy went from midcatnap to midair without any intervening stage. He was on his way.

  "Wait for us!" Wenda cried belatedly, running after him. But of course he didn't wait.

  They charged through the dream sets again, in a blur. One was an ocean, but somehow they crossed the water without sinking in. They came to a shore, and then to a palace.

  Then they were in a royal bedroom. A maid was combing the hair of a handsome prince; their identities were clear because she wore a cloth headband, and he a sparkling golden crown. Sammy was snoozing at their feet.

  "Well, now," the woman said, spying Sammy. "I think we have found a cat."

  "No, yew did knot," Wenda said, arriving on the scene, followed by Jumper. How they had gotten there without passing through doors or walls Jumper wasn't sure. "Sammy Cat found yew."

  The maid's eyes widened. "Is this the Sammy Cat? Princess Jenny's friend?"

  "Yes," Wenda said. "And I am Wenda Woodwife, and this is Jumper Spider, who is guarding me. We have come to—"

  "Prince Charming!" the woman exclaimed. "We have remarkable visitors!"

  "Charmed, I'm sure, if you say so, Mercy," the prince said, evidently bored.

  "I brought the lost Heart of Love," Wenda said. "To which of yew does it belong? I wood knot want to make a mistake."

  The maid, Mercy, looked stricken.

  "It is yewrs?" Wenda asked alertly.

  "No," Mercy said, but she had paled dangerously.

  "Sammy led us here to the two of yew. If it's knot yours, it must bee the prince's."

  "Well, I have lost my love," Prince Charming said. "But I don't think any change of heart on my part will solve that problem. My wife just dumped me for a richer king. I am quite out of sorts. If it weren't for Mercy and my sister Sharon, I'd throw myself into the sea."

  Wenda exchanged a confused glance with Jumper. The prince had a point. How could the heart help him? Yet it seemed that Mercy knew something she didn't want to speak of. And what a coincidence that Charming's sister should be named Sharon, the same as the flion who had briefly vamped him.

  "Maybe your sister will have a thought on the matter," Jumper said, hardly daring to guess what to expect in such a woman.

  "Maybe," Charming agreed. He heaved his voice up by its boot-straps. "Sharon! I need your input."

  In barely half a moment she appeared: a lovely dark-haired creature of a woman with eyes that fairly glinted with illicit comprehension. It was her!

  "What is it, Charming?" Sharon asked, her voice compellingly dulcet.

  "This nymph found a lost Heart of Love, and thinks it's mine. But I don't need to love, I need to get my lost love back. So what's with the heart?"

  Sharon pursed her lush red lips. "Perhaps my art will fathom it," she agreed. Then she turned, leaned forward just enough to proffer half a glimpse inside her curvaceous decolletage, and smiled. The air around Jumper warmed perceptibly. "So nice to see you again, Jumper. And who is your friend?"

  "Wenda," Wenda said quickly.

  "Clearly not a maenad," Sharon said. "How did a forest creature like you come by the heart?"

  Sharon was making Jumper increasingly nervous. She knew too much, and obviously remembered him from their encounter in the other venue. He had had no idea she was really a princess!

  "It was in the Found Cabin," Wenda said. "I am trying to return it to its owner. But—"

  Sharon nodded. "But there seems to be a confusion, yes. It does seem to be symbolic of my brother's loss, but such a magic artifact should represent the solution to a problem, rather than a complication of it."

  "Yes," Wenda agreed, disgruntled.

  Sharon's eye speared the maid. "And what do you know of this matter, Mercy?"

  Mercy burst into tears.

  Sharon's gaze hardened. "Do I have your permission to fathom your part in this?"

  Jumper did not know a great deal about human interactions, but strongly suspected that a maidservant could give a princess only one answer to such a request: yes.

  "Then here is my fathoming," Sharon said. She moved her hands in a magical pattern, and a scintillating cloud formed around Mercy. The scene changed around her.

  In fact it became a view of the depths of the ocean. There was Mercy, nude and lovely, swimming blithely along, propelled by her fish tail.

  Her what? Jumper blinked both his human eyes, but the sight didn't change. Mercy was a mermaid.

  "Fascinating," Sharon breathed.

  Mercy swam toward a commotion on the surface of the sea. There was a storm there, attacking a wooden ship. It blew so hard a man was swept into the water.

  He was Prince Charming.

  "This becomes intriguing," Sharon said.

  Charming tried to swim in the rough seas, but he was evidently better as a man on the water than under it, and soon he was on the verge of drowning. At this point Mercy reached him. She wrapped her arms about him and propelled him to the surface so he could breathe again.

  When he didn't, she squeezed him hard so that the water in him spewed out. Then she put her mouth to his and blew air into him, forcing him to breathe again.

  He choked and coughed, but remained unconscious. So she bore him to the nearest shore, a sandy beach, and heaved him onto it. She hauled herself out just far enough to give him one more kiss of life, then slipped back into the water.

  As Charming recovered consciousness, a princess happened to come along the beach, collecting shells. She spied Charming and ran to him. She tried to lift him up, but was not strong enough and fell onto him. As his eyes opened, she was the one he saw, there in his arms.

  "You saved me!" he exclaimed, knowing nothing of the true situation.

  Mercy saw this happen from the water. She was clearly happy that Charming had been rescued, but had another problem: she had hugged him and kissed him, and fallen in love with him. That was made clear by the little hearts that hovered around her head when she gazed in his direction. But there was nothing she could do. Her tears were lost in the sea as the vision faded.

  "You!" Charming said. "You saved me, not the princess!"

  "I couldn't let you drown," Mercy said.

  "But what are you doing here? You have legs now."

  "I got a spell," she said. "To convert my nether portion. I went on land, but it took me time to learn the language and make my way as a two-leg, and by that time you were married. So I applied for a position as a maidservant."

  "And for the past decade you have loyally served me," he said. "I never suspected."

  "I did not want to interfere in your life. I just wanted to be close to you."

  "Mercy Mermaid is a better woman than your wife was," Sharon murmured.

  "You are my lost love," he said. "So far and yet so near. Give me that heart!"

  "No!" Mercy cried.

  Too late. He had already taken the heart from Wenda and clasped it to his chest. It sank in and disappeared. "Now I love you," he said. "You are a better woman than the princess ever was. Now I will marry you and live happily ever after."

  "No," Mercy repeated tearfully.

  "What? One does not say no to a prince."

  Mercy was clearly uncomfortable. "I would not hurt you for the world, Charming. But I can't marry you."

  "I don't understand."

  She burst into tears again.

  "This too, I think I fathom," Sharon said. "For a decade Mercy has been your loyal servant. She has combed your hair, made your bed, helped you dress, done all the little personal things you required. While you loved another woman. She came to know you quite well. Now she faces the prospect of doing all these things for you for the rest of her life, plus serving your pleasure in bed. It is too much. She is a creature of the sea, and she has been long away from it. She wants to return to her natural environment."

  "Yes," Mercy said. "I thought I loved you, Charming, but that wore thin as I washed your stinky socks and scrubbed your messy chamber pot. I must go home."

  "But I love you!" Charming protested.

  "I would only leave you, as your wife did. The call of the sea is too strong."

  "But I absorbed the heart!"

  "I tried to prevent you."

  It occurred to Jumper that there was a certain poetic justice here.

  Mercy had loved the prince, unrequited; now he loved her, unrequited.

  "But where will I go, what will I do?"

  "You will surely find another woman to love." Mercy fled the scene, and in three and a half moments they heard the splash as she dived into the ocean. She was definitely gone.

  "But perhaps I can help answer your question," Sharon said. "Have you considered the one who returned your lost love to you? Perhaps this was not coincidental."

  "The one who… ?" he repeated, perplexed. Then his eye fell on Wenda.

  "Now wait an instant," Wenda said, alarmed.

  "I'm on one bleep of a rebound at the moment," Charming said. "I need a pretty, innocent, loyal woman to console me."

  "But I wood knot bee that to yew!" Wenda protested.

  "I love the way you express yourself. You're a forest nymph. You'll never jump into the sea."

  Sharon caught Jumper's eye and held it relentlessly. "Let's give them some privacy to work this out," she said. "Come to my chambers with me."

  "But I can't do that! I have a mission."

  "To which you will return in due course. What are you going to do, bite off my head? Right this way, you intriguing man."

  "I'm not a man," he said as she led him away. "I'm a spider."

  "Oh, another shape changer? I like you better than ever."

  "Not exactly. I just—"

  She gave him a gentle push, and he found himself lying on her soft bed. She was right there with him. "We're not in combat mode now, Jumper. Let's see what we can do with each other."

  "No! This isn't—"

  She cut him off with a kiss.

  Still, he did not trust this. "Who are you, really? What are you?"

  "If I answer you, will you let me have my way with you?"

  He was thoroughly nonplussed. "What way is that?"

  "It goes something like this. First we kiss." She kissed him again, and his smooched face radiated guilty plea sure into his body. "Then we remove our clothing." Her hands were already busy. In a mere fragment of a moment they were both deliciously bare. She was trying to freak him out with bra and panties, except that she wore none. "Then we—"

  "No!"

  She drew herself close to him. "I don't think I heard you, Jumper."

  "I said no!" He struggled weakly to escape.

  "You say no, but it sounds like yes."

  "No!"

  "Do you mean it doesn't sound like yes?"

  "Yes!"

  "Ah, you agree to the deal at last."

  He opened his mouth, but she stifled it with another kiss. Her body reminded him forcefully of Angie. But he dredged up another fading effort. "No."

  "Exactly what are you afraid of, Jumper?"

  That set him back. She wasn't asking him to leave his mission or commit to anything. In that respect, she was just like Angie, and excruciatingly tempting. "Just answer my question."

  "Gladly. I am Sharon, sister of Charming, who in real life is not a prince but a lesser Demon, Charon, who associates with the Dwarf Demon Pluto."

  "Pluto!"

  "Yes, the one you are opposing. I represent the enemy, in that respect. It is my mission to divert you from your mission."

  This was amazing candor. "Are you a Demon too?" That would explain how she could shape change and do fathoming magic; Demons weren't limited to single talents the way mortals were.

  "A very minor one, Jumper, hardly worthy of the capital. Barely above the uncapped demons common in Xanth."

  "But any Demon is way beyond the comprehension of mortals."

  "Not necessarily. I am close enough to mortality to share some of its passions. Such as this one." She kissed him again, and stroked him with her hands. "Now I have honestly answered your question, Jumper, and I expect you to do your part."

  "But I'm not going to give up my mission!"

  "I have not asked you to."

  "But?"

  "I told you that my mission is to stop yours. But that is not our deal of the moment. I have established truth between us, so that we can enjoy our fling. I'll try to stop your mission another time."

  "You're not—?"

  "Not," she agreed.

  That seemed sufficient. After that a ferocious ellipsis encompassed them. Sharon was every bit the woman Angie was. Of course, somewhere in the back of his awareness, behind a thick cloaking mental curtain, was the awareness that neither was a real woman. One was imaginary, the other a Demoness. That did not hinder his passion of the moment, but it did make him doubt that there was any real future here, even for a real man, which he wasn't. Even had it not all been part of a dream.