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They say it was a trinket in the Temple of the Creator for a thousand thousand years before it came into Panamindorah. They say he commissioned a shelt to bear it in his service. They say I lost it, which is not quite true. Gabalon stole it from me, but only because I was careless.
—Archemais, A Wizard’s History of Panamindorah
From that day on, Corry spent every evening beside the lake. On the fifth day, he was trudging home near dark when he heard soft music. Moving furtively, he started back towards the opening in the palmetto hedge. Corry poked his head around a tree to have a look at the grove and something hit him between the eyes. Corry crumpled over. Through his pain, he was dimly aware that the projectile had glanced off him to land with a plop in the lake.
“No, no.”
Corry squinted up at the voice. Through doubled vision, he saw a deer—bone white, like a ghost in the gathering gloom. Atop her back sat the fauness. As Corry watched, she hopped down. The fauness walked around him, scanning the sand. She took no more notice of Corry than she might of a toad.
His vision was beginning to steady. He tried to stand up. “What are you doing?”
The fauness stiffened and turned slowly. “What did you say?” She did not speak English. Her words seemed to Corry like the face of an old friend, half-forgotten and somewhat aged.
“I said, ‘What are you doing?’ What did you just throw at me?”
She looked as though she’d been hit with something herself. “How do you speak my language?”
“I don’t know.”
She smiled. “You speak strangely—in the old way. Perhaps it is a property of the music.”
“What music?”
She shook her head. “What happened to the thing that hit you?”
“I think it fell in the lake.”
She straightened up. “Oh. Good.” She turned, took a running leap, and mounted her deer.
“Wait!” Corry tried to chase them, but every step made his head pound. For a moment he stood still on the gray sand. Then he turned back to the lake. By now he knew the surface like his own hands, and he could see a new hole in the blanket of water plants. It was several yards from shore. Corry hesitated a moment, thinking of alligators in the dark water. He’d never seen one, except in books, but he knew they were all over Florida.
Another moment, and it would be too dark to even contemplate a search. Corry stripped off his shoes and stepped into the water. He reached the spot while still only thigh deep, bent, and plunged his arm to the shoulder in the murk. His head throbbed. His fingers trailed along the slimy bottom. Don’t think of alligators, don’t think of alligators.
His fingers touched metal, a thin chain. Corry grabbed it and headed for the shore. He could tell without looking that the chain was a necklace, and it had something hanging on it. He slogged up the bank and sat down beside his shoes, shivering. Then he raised his prize. To his amazement, he could see no object, although the chain hung down in a sharp V. Corry grasped at the point of the V and felt a solid weight. He blinked hard in the deepening twilight. He could see...something, traced in water droplets. He closed both his hands around the object. Amazing! He was definitely holding something, and he even thought he recognized the shape.
* * * *
In his bathroom at the Tembril’s, Corry shut the door and turned on the sink. He placed his hand under the stream and watched as the water traced a shape out of the air above his palm. Corry reached into his other pocket, took out his cowry, and put it beside the sink. I was right!
The invisible object was shaped like a cowry. It had three holes either side of midline and a hole at one end. Corry remembered the music he had heard before seeing the fauness. It’s a little flute. On one side of the flute, he found a loop, all of a piece with the instrument, threaded by the chain. She was wearing it around her neck the first time I saw her.
* * * *
The Tembrils did not require housework on Sundays. Lately, Corry had been packing a lunch and leaving for most of the day. One Sunday as he grabbed his backpack and books, Mrs. Tembril surprised him by saying, “Corry I wish you wouldn’t spend all day outside, especially after dark. We’re playing card games this evening. I think you should join us.”
“Alright.”
Mrs. Tembril kept looking at him. “What do you do all day outside, Corry?”
He met her eyes. “I walk.”
“I saw you walking in the orange grove the other day. We told you to stay out of there.”
“I forgot.”
“Perhaps you need a day indoors to help you remember.”
Corry hated to beg, but he hated missing an opportunity even more. “Mrs. Tembril, I’m not doing anything wrong. I’m sorry I disobeyed you. Please let me go out.” He tried to hit the right note of contrition, but the lie stuck in his throat.
“Be back by three. If not, you’ll be grounded for a week. Do you understand, Corry?”
Corry nodded and was out the door before she could say more. He went to the lake, because that was the best way to get into the grove without being seen from the house. A stiff wind was whipping off the water, blowing his hair into a dark tangle as he entered the trees. Three o’clock. He’d wanted the whole day. He felt angry and sad and frustrated.
Corry tramped some distance into the trees, then crawled beneath an old, gnarled canopy of branches and made himself comfortable. The sugar sand drank sound as rapaciously as it drank water. The deep silence calmed him. He read for a while and ate his lunch, then played a bit on the flute. He thought he had the song almost right, but nothing interesting happened.
Corry opened his book again. The day was hot, and his meal began to make him sleepy. He never quite knew when he dropped the book on his knees and nodded off.
* * * *
Corry’s eyes snapped open. How long have I been asleep? The light had weakened, and long shadows stretched beneath the tree. Corry looked at his watch. Four thirty?
He nearly panicked. Mrs. Tembril will never let me out the door again. She might even send me back to the orphanage!
Formulating excuses furiously, Corry hefted his pack, clambered from under the tree, and started towards the house at a run. Sloshing through the sand, Corry counted the rows. One, two, three, four, five, six, seven... How far did I go? He stopped. This can't be right. I should have reached the house by now.
T-thump. T-thump. With only the briefest of warnings, three deer raced out of the trees, all brown, all bearing riders. Corry stumbled back as they jumped over him. The riders were fauns. The foremost wore a wide-brimmed hat with a long, green plume bobbing over the back.
Heart thumping, Corry stared after them. Then he heard another sound. Corry turned. Not five feet in front of him crouched an enormous gray spotted cat.
It was, of all things, a snow leopard. The cat didn’t seem to see Corry, who jumped out of its path just in time as it bounded after the deer. Corry hardly had a chance to feel relief before a number of black leopards charged out of the trees after the snow leopard.
Corry didn’t hesitate. He turned to follow them.
