The Enchantress of World's End

“What? You’re what?”

“I’m not at all sure which way is ‘back,’” she confessed in a very small, frightened voice.

Xarda and the Illusionist stared at each other blankly. Then they turned and looked south. Endless leagues of grass, the dim glitter of the Glass Sea, and the dull, lumpy ridges of anonymous mountains was all they could see.

“Well, the Land of Red Magic could be that way …” began Xarda, tentatively.

“Sure. Or that way, or even that way,” grumbled the old magician wearily. “I knew I shouldn’t have gone to sleep and left this mindless, scatter-brained creature to her own devices!”

“No use crying over spilt water over the dam,” said Xarda, getting her cliches somewhat mixed. “What’s to be done about it, that’s the question.”

Prince Erigon, from the back seat, cleared his throat politely.

“I say, maybe we could ask for directions?” “From whom?” asked the Illusionist, gloomily. “Well, there’s a city over there, east of us …” “There is? Where?” The Illusionist craned around to look. Sure enough, some two or three miles away, built right in the very midst of the interminable grassy plains, stood the towers and ramparts of a curiously futuristic metropolis, all made of bright metal that sparkled prettily in the morning sun.

“I say, that’s odd. The maps show no city anywhere around here. The Purple Plain forms a natural barrier between the many countries of Greater Zuavia and the upper borders of Northern YamaYamaLand; there’s nothing on the Plains themselves, except for wandering herds of Indigons and an occasional Youk. At least, there’s not supposed to be …”

“Maybe that was so, the last time you were in these parts, magister,” said Xarda practically. “But there’s certainly something there now.”

“So there is,” the old magician mused. “Well, I haven’t been up north for ten thou-… for quite a few years, I mean. I suppose somebody could have built a city here, during the interim. Heaven knows a lot of people have been rendered homeless by the Ximchak Barbarians, further north … still, it does seem odd!”

“Well. Let’s go over and take a look at it. From the air, I mean,” said Xarda, getting bored from inaction. “We don’t have to land if the people look unfriendly or dangerous. What do you say?”

The Illusionist scratched his chin with the tip of one forefinger, eddying the lavender vapors that perennially masked his features from view. “I don’t know,” he said thoughtfully. “Everytime we land in a strange city, seems like we get into trouble. Look at Chx. Horx, too, for that matter; of course that was before we met you, my dear, but still …”

“If you hadn’t landed in Horx, and if Ganelon hadn’t gotten into trouble trying to help me, I’d be a slave of the Holy Horxites right now,” she said, with a touch of reproof. “So forgive me if I can’t quite regard your experiences in Horx as an unqualified disaster—”

“Of course, my dear, I didn’t mean—”

“Are we going to float here all day, while you silly humans just talk?” squawked the Bazonga bird restively. Now that they were no longer angry at her foolish flying in the wrong direction, it had not taken the ebullient vehicle long to recover her usual good spirits.

“Oh, all right, let’s go,” sighed the magician. “Might as well have a look at the place. Can’t do any harm, I suppose.”

“Tally-ho, yoicks, yoicks!” sang the Bird, happily speeding up. She curved about, Istrobian’s flying kayak wobbling behind her like an aerial caboose, and flew east towards the strange metal city that Prince Erigon had noticed.

The nearer they got to it, the more curious it looked to them. The City was all metal—streets, towers, buildings, and everything else. And it was a lot smaller and more compact than it had looked from further off: instead of dwindling into scattered suburbs and farms at the edges, like most cities, it just stopped at a certain distance from its center. This termination was very clearly marked; in fact the city was a perfect disk, evenly trimmed around the outer perimeter. The streets that radiated out from its center like spokes from the hub of a wheel, stopped completely at the edges of the disk, ending in purple grass. There were no roads leading to it. It looked as if some playful or mischievous deity had just picked it up from somewhere and plunked it down here in the middle of nowhere, for a joke.

They flew over it, dipping and swerving to avoid the spires, while the three adventurers peered over the sides of their craft curiously. There seemed to be hardly any people out on the streets, although it was well into mid-morning by this time; you almost would have thought the city uninhabited, if that hadn’t been obviously unlikely. Somebody had to keep the city in good repair, and all that metal polished!