"That may be the case," the stork agreed, "but we received a definite signal from one of them, and the delivery must be made. I am the supervisor, here to resolve an awkward situation. It is very unusual to lose a potential mother. Have you seen her?"

  "We have knot," Wenda said. "And we hope knot to. Maenads are dangerous."

  "Thank you. But keep an eye out for her." The stork re oriented, ran down the path, spread his wings, and finally managed to take off. In two and a half moments he disappeared into the sky.

  "Keep an eye out?" Jumper asked.

  "The bird wants us to keep one eye on the maenad, in case she shows up."

  "I have eight eyes, but I need them all. I don't want to put one on anyone."

  She smiled. "That is knot literal. Knot in this case. It just means to watch for her."

  "Oh." Jumper was relieved. "So we have to look for her?"

  "Knot really. We dew knot want to find her. But maybee she will bee like an inanimate object."

  "How is that?"

  "They always hide in the last place yew look for them."

  Jumper was confused again. This was one really strange realm! "So let's not look."

  "Of course," she agreed.

  Jumper was glad that was settled, and that he didn't have to risk any of his eyes looking for something they did not want to find.

  They resumed walking. "That's weird," Wenda said. "A stork looking for a maenad. There must be a glitch in their paperwork."

  So it seemed it wasn't quite done with. "I am not clear what this is about."

  "Oh. That's right. I guess yew wood knot know. Yew see, sometimes two humans—a boy and a girl, usually—get together and signal the stork, in that way telling it they want a baby. The signal goes out in the form of an ellipsis. That's three dots loaded with significance. The stork bureaucracy is very inefficient, and it takes them anywhere up to nine months to deliver the baby. They follow the path of the dots back, locate the mother, and give it to her."

  "You're right. That does seem complicated."

  "But maenads dew knot signal the stork. They use their sex appeal to lure men close so they can pounce on them and bite them to death. Even most village louts know better than to get close to one of those bloodthirsty creatures. So it's ridiculous for a stork to try to deliver to a maenad. It has to bee a mistake."

  "It must be," Jumper agreed. This realm was proving to be every bit as weird as it first seemed.

  "Oh, there's a campsite," Wenda exclaimed. "Let's stop there."

  "There is something there we want?"

  "Food. Rest."

  Jumper realized that he was getting tired, and certainly he was hungry. He hoped there would be fat bugs there.

  They entered the camp. It was very nice, with all manner of pie plants, and a pleasant shelter.

  And there was a beefsteak tomato plant. Jumper picked a beefsteak and brought it to his mandibles. It was delicious. One of the pie plants had a shoe-fly pie; he threw away the shoe and ate the fly. This camp was all right.

  Meanwhile Wenda found a small acorn tree and chewed on several acorns. Jumper remembered that she was made of wood, so must need wood food to sustain her substance. He wasn't sure how she assimilated it, because her mouth opened on emptiness inside, but concluded that was her business.

  They entered the shelter. There was a bloodcurdling scream. Jumper fell back, as curdled blood didn't work well for his system.

  "Someone's in there," Wenda said. "A girl. She must have thought yew were going to eat her."

  "Actually I prefer fat bugs."

  "I will talk to her." Wenda went on in.

  Jumper inspected the adjacent pond. Something leaped out of it and sailed through the air. Jumper snagged it with a loop of web and reeled it in: a flying fish. So he stripped away the ing fish and ate the fly. Yes, this would do.

  Wenda emerged. "This is complicated," she said. "Yew had better come in and listen. I have told her yew are knot for eating."

  She seemed to have it garbled, but he let it be. "Told who?"

  "It's Maeve Maenad," she whispered. "Hiding from the stork."

  He was astonished. "The one we didn't see! We should inform that stork."

  "No. That wood be telling."

  "I don't understand."

  "Yew woodn't. Take my word: storkly secrets are knot bruited about.

  We must help her."

  "But you said maenads are dangerous."

  "They are, normally. But Maeve has become a maiden in distress. That's different. I am similar, in my fashion. I must help her if I can."

  Jumper clicked his mandibles in perplexity. It remained a very strange realm. "So we help her."

  "Yes. We'll take her to the Good Magician, since we're going that way anyway, so she can ask him how to escape the stork. Meanwhile we'll have to hide her from the stork. That's why we need to hear her story. So we know exactly how to help her."

  What could he do? "We listen," he agreed.

  They entered the shelter. This time there was no scream. There was a succulent morsel of a bare girl, with wild hair and a feral smile.

  "Jumper, this is Maeve Maenad," Wenda said. "Maeve, this is Jumper Spider. We are meeting in peace."

  "Peaches and cream!" Maeve swore. "He's mouthwateringly fat."

  "And she's saliva-dribbling fleshy," Jumper replied. He realized that Wenda had not misspoken when she said he was not for eating: the wild woman really would have attacked him. Of course then he would have bitten her head off and sucked out its juice. It was a nice head, surely very tasty.

  "Yew both wood like to eat the other," Wenda said. "Yew must knot. We need to get along together."

  "Why?" Maeve asked. Jumper couldn't have put it better himself.

  "Because yew both need to see the Good Magician, and yew can get there better together."

  Maeve sighed, making her body jiggle in a truly appetizing way.

  Her flesh, unlike Wenda's, was edible. "If we must, we must."

  "Now tell us yewr story," Wenda said. "So we can figure out how to help yew."

  Maeve grimaced, then launched into it, while they listened.

  She was dropped into the central pool of bloodred wine with a resounding splash, with her name tag tied to her wild hair: Maeve, she who intoxicates. She immediately gulped some of the wine and got drunk and vicious: a true maenad. Gorged on wine, she soon grew into the flower of her wildness, racing with the other maenads to capture, tear apart, and consume any creature that strayed near Mount Parnassus. Especially anything male.

  But as she grew older, reaching her teens, she discovered a new aspect of her situation. Her body changed, becoming thicker through the hips, thinner through the waist, and developing mounds on her chest. At first she was disgusted, because it made her slower when running; her proportions had become ungainly, and the flesh on her chest flopped at high speeds. Then she happened to see a picture of a woman left by a man who had been routinely consumed, and it was just like that. It seemed that men really liked to see that awkward flesh on women. A bulb flashed over her head as she understood.

  Maenads weren't just wild women, they were sexy wild women.

  That was why human males came to their region. She wasn't sure what a man actually wanted to do with a maenad if he caught her, because they always chased down and tore apart any men they spied, biting off gobbets of hot flesh and swallowing them in a feeding frenzy. That was, after all, the purpose of a man, wasn't it? To be torn up and eaten. But it annoyed her when an occasional man was wary, and fled before the maenads could run him down. Perfectly good meat going to waste.

  So she experimented. Once when she spied a man near the fringe of the mountain, and he spied her, she didn't run after him with spittle flying. She stood and watched him. He came closer, eyeing her warily. He obviously knew her nature.

  But he did not come all the way up to her. He got nervous, and was about to turn to go. That was when she might have run him down and bitten his leg to lame him, so that she could then finish him off at leisure.

  He represented a huge meal she might have all to herself. But instead she lifted her arms, put her hands on her head, and half turned. This had the effect of outlining her chest, a body part he seemed to be looking at.

  He did look, and took a step toward her, licking his lips. But then he hesitated again, justifiably nervous about getting too close.

  So she inhaled. That made her chest expand, and her mounds stood out. The man's eyes glazed over and he panted. But then he shook himself, tore his eyes away, leaving tatters of eyelids behind, and started to turn away.

  So she turned away herself, pretending she wasn't chasing him.

  With luck he would be deceived, and then she could whirl and pounce.

  But there was another effect. He stared at her bottom, and this time his eyes completely glazed. He had freaked out.

  Good enough. She whirled and pounced, catching him before he could recover his sight and flee. She tore a bite from his neck, then landed on his back as he collapsed on the ground. Soon she was tearing delicious gobbets of flesh out and gulping them down. Before long there was little left of him except bones, and her belly was so full she had to go hide in a tree to digest it all. What a successful hunt!

  While she digested, she reviewed the process by which she had caught him. Her chest had almost done it, but in the end her bottom had finished it. Why these things should so fascinate a man she didn't know, but philosophy was not her forte. She just wanted to know what worked. Chests worked, bottoms worked. But could they be improved upon?

  When she was lean and mobile again, she went to spy on a human house hold beyond the maenad demesnes. It wasn't safe to hunt here; the humans were too likely to cut off her retreat and slaughter her. But she might learn something useful just by watching.

  She did. She saw a farm girl eyeing a passing village lout. Evidently the girl was interested in the lout. Maybe she was hungry. But the lout was too stupid to pay attention, and was walking on.

  "Hey, lout!" the girl called.

  "Huh?" he asked, turning to look at her.

  She turned away from him, pulled up her skirt, and flashed her panties.

  The lout was stunned. He just stood there, eyes glazed, until the girl dropped her skirt and went inside her house. He remained for some time, like a statue, until finally a woodbee sat on his nose, startling him back into activity. He departed, trailing crumbs of glaze as his eyeballs recovered.

  This was a revelation to Maeve. So it was clothing that did it! Panties freaked out men.

  She went to a small pantree and harvested a panty. She put it on, then admired herself in the reflection of a pond. It did do something for her bottom. It could be a secret weapon.

  She took it off and hid it away, because it wouldn't be secret if the other maenads caught on. Then when she was alone, and spied a man, she used it. He freaked out just like that, and she had no trouble catching and eating him.

  Thereafter she became the most successful huntress of her kind, though still a teen. The other maenads were jealous, but couldn't figure out how she did it. She made sure never to use the panty when any other maenad was near.

  There was only one mishap. That was when she flashed a man, and he came to her, and she bit at his throat and bounced off. So she bit at his arm, and missed again. Finally she bit at his leg, but still got nowhere.

  "Sweet violets!" she swore. "What is wrong?"

  The man shook his head sadly. "Nothing with you, maenad. It's me. My magic talent is to have an impenetrable shield that prevents any living creature and most inanimate things from touching me. It is the bane of my existence."

  "Then how do you eat and drink?" she demanded, hoping to find an avenue she could exploit to get at his flesh.

  "It lets in only food, water, and air—that sort of thing. So I survive.

  But it won't let me touch a woman, so I can't kiss her or do anything else with her."

  "So why did you come to me?"

  "I hoped that the savagery of a maenad would be too much for the shield, and we could touch maybe just enough. Alas, it's not so."

  "Just enough for what?"

  "You don't know? Ah, maenad, your prison may be as bad as mine. I suppose I will just have to go to petition the Good Magician for an Answer." And with that mysterious remark he turned and walked away. She hadn't even learned his name, not that she cared about that.

  Fortunately that was the only balk. She was able to satisfy her hunger with other men. But still she wondered: who or what was this Good Magician? Was he edible?

  By the time she emerged from her teens, she was not only truly full figured from her excellent diet, she was in contention to become the leader of the maenads, because of her hunting prowess. She was really proud of herself.

  Then came disaster. It started simply enough. If only she had known!

  It was a handsome man who came to drink at the maenads' wine spring. He came when the other maenads were out hunting, and only Maeve remained to guard the spring. This was no coincidence, she learned later—way too late. He had come then because he was interested in her.

  She stood before him in all her bare splendor. He gazed at every detail, but his eyes did not glaze. He seemed to be immune. So she donned her panty and turned her back. But while she was doing that, he was donning dark glasses, that fudged the image so it was too vague to freak him out.

  She tried moving her body in the ways that normally affected men.

  He watched, evidently appreciating it, but still not freaking out. This was most frustrating!

  Then he spoke. "Hello, lovely nymph! I am Harbinger, a binge-drinking messenger with some harpy ancestry. Who are you?"

  She was so surprised that she answered. "I am Maeve Maenad. Why aren't you freaking out?"

  "Because I came prepared, knowing that otherwise you would tear out chunks of my living flesh. You are far too lovely to be wasted that way. Know, O delightful damsel, that wine dulls my vision so that I can't freak out."

  "Then why do you need those glasses?"

  He smiled. "I don't. They are merely a prop." He removed the glasses and gazed at her, unfreaking.

  Her amazement continued. "What do you want of me?"

  "I want what any man wants of a beautiful woman."

  This was stupid, but he was so handsome that she really wanted to know. "What is that?"

  "Love."

  "I don't know that word."

  "Then I will be glad to teach you its meaning. Come with me, Maeve, and we will make beautiful music together."

  "I don't know anything about music."

  He laughed, as if she had said something silly. "You don't need to. Come." He started walking away from the pool.

  And such was her bemusement, she walked with him. After all, she could pounce on him and tear him apart any time, as long as he remained close. After she satisfied her curiosity.

  He led her o'er hill and dale to an unfamiliar glade with its own pleasant pool. "Let us swim together," he said, removing his human clothing.

  "Swim?" That was his idea of love? Swimming was something a maenad did to catch a person trying to escape across water.

  "It is a pleasant diversion. We can get close together in the water."

  She stared at his bared body. What a handsome specimen he was, with firm lean meat on his arms and chest! Her mouth was watering already. And of course he would be easier than ever to catch in the water.

  She removed her panty, because water wasn't good for it, and waded into the water with him. He reached out and took her hand, and she let him.

  And something odd happened. Suddenly she was overflowing with an emotion she had never remotely experienced before. She stepped into Harbinger and kissed him. A real kiss; she didn't even try to bite. That was quite unlike her. Unlike any maenad.

  He wrapped his arms around her, and she delighted in that touch.

  He was right: it was fun being close together in the water. But also very strange. She found herself with urges she had never experienced before.

  And he was indulging them. They had a gloriously weird experience together, amazingly pleasant.

  Then it was done, what ever it was. He separated from her. "Thanks, Maeve. It's been fun. Now I'll be on my way."

  On his way? "But I have just gotten interested in you," she protested.

  "Get over it." He dried, donned his clothing, and walked away.

  She stood chest deep in the pond, staring after him. What had happened? She hadn't even tried to bite him, let alone tear out any of his flesh. She had just hugged him and done something oddly new, and now he was gone.

  Finally she waded out of the pool, picked up her panty, and walked back home to the wine pool.

  The other maenads had returned. "Where were you?" one demanded. "The spring was unguarded."

  "A—a man took me away," Maeve said haltingly. "To a pool."

  "And you didn't tear him apart?"

  "No."

  "What did you do, then? Club him to death and hide the body so we couldn't share the meat?"

  "I—I kissed him. And swam with him. And hugged him. Sort of."

  They stared at her in shock. Then an older maenad asked an irrelevant question. "Exactly where was this pool?"

  Maeve pointed. "That way."

  The maenad nodded. "That's a love spring."

  "A what?"

  "Water that makes any male and any female fall in love with each other, at least for a while, and signal the stork."

  Maeve was appalled. So that was what they had done! "Why, that miserable deceiver! I didn't know."

  The older maenad sighed. "It's not the sort of thing our kind normally knows about. He tricked you into it, then had his way with you.

  You should never have trusted him."

  "I didn't trust him! I was going to eat him."

  "Well, let's hope the stork didn't get the signal."

  They resumed their normal existence. But unfortunately the stork had gotten the message, and just about nine months after the incident came looking for her. Her worst fear had materialized.

  Maeve fled. The other maenads, understanding her horror, tried to cover for her, pretending that she was still among them. But the stork wasn't fooled. It knew exactly which maenad it wanted. When it didn't find her by the love spring, it widened its search.