Harpy Thyme Read Free

When it might not be exactly the way a male goblin's region would be, not that she had ever seen such a region anyway? Of course the creature's voice was changing too, being now gruff and then dulcet. What a confusing (not to mention embarrassing) situation!
    “You-you must be part of my challenge,” she said after a moment. “I-I'm supposed to get past you, so I can go on to the next.”
    “And if you fail to find the key, I will get to crunch up your bonnie little bones,” the Yena agreed.
    Gloha had been afraid of that. But now, irrelevantly, she realized that there was something odd about the creature's mane. It was severely knotted. In fact it seemed to be twisted with balls of metal.
    She pondered, and decided that it was better to inquire than to ignore. “Your mane-” she started after a pale little pause. “Would you tell me why it has metal in it?”
    The Yena smiled, showing his distressingly big sharp teeth. “Ah, you are admiring my locks,” she said.
    “Urn, yes. They are-unusual.”
    “Indeed,” he agreed. “I'd give anything to be able to comb them out. But each one is locked in place.”
    Gloha picked up on a subtlety. There was something the Yena wanted. “Anything?” she asked hesitantly.
    He considered. “Well, anything, within my power, of course. I'm not exactly a wealthy monster.”
    “Even-even letting a minor little morsel get through without being eaten?”
    She peered closely at Gloha. “You're catching on, morsel,” he agreed. “But of course you would have to deliver.”
    Gloha realized that she had found only half the key to this riddle. She had to find a way to comb out the Yena's locks. But what could that be? They were solidly metal, and surely would not respond to her cute little comb.
    Yet somewhere in this chamber must be the answer. Because that was the way it was, with challenged. Everyone knew that. What everyone didn't know was how to get safely through a particular challenge. That tended to discourage querents from bothering the Good Magician- which was of course the point. Humfrey didn't like to be bothered by folk who weren't serious. His time seemed to be impossibly precious, so he prevented it from being wasted.
    She gazed around the chamber. What would comb out a metal lock? Surely not a donkey or a turkey. The flunky? She didn't see how; the metal would still be too hard to abolish. The same went for the monkey, and how that murky water could help was beyond her. Water made iron rust, which would be worse than ever, because it would make the locks impossible to work.
    Something began to percolate through her meticulous little mind. These things here-there was something similar about them. They were all keys! Donkey, monkeys-even the mur-key water. And a key should do for a lock, to unlock it. One of these keys must unlock Yena's locks.
    But which one? And how would it work? She couldn't bring the donkey to comb Yena's locks; it just wouldn't work. There was something she still hadn't figured out. She didn't want to make a mistake, because that would get her eaten, which she probably wouldn't enjoy.
    She went back to look at Yena. Now she saw that each lock of the monster's mane was different. Some were big padlocks, others were little keyhole locks, some were several types together-combination locks-and one was weird. “What lock is that?” she inquired, pointing.
    Yena craned her head about to look. “That is the Lock Ness,” he said. “It is a monster.”
    Indeed it was. It was a huge tangle of serpentine cables of metal knotted into a lock that seemed impossible ever to unlock.
    “I suppose that if you could unlock that one, the others would be easy,” Gloha said.
    “Surely so. But if anyone tried to unlock it and failed, making it even worse, I would be most annoyed. I'd probably have to pulverize that person.”
    Gloha had suspected as much. She returned to the alcove exhibits. One of these had to be the key to that awful lock-if she could only