TOO MUCH MAGIC

TOO MUCH MAGIC

Prologue to The Frog and the Grog

Christopher Stasheff

For a very powerful wizard, Cadavan was surprisingly modest. He was short, stout, middle-aged, and considered himself anything but handsome (which was why he wore a beard). No mansion for him, no palace or tall mysterious tower; no, Cadavan lived in a simple thatched cottage deep in the woods—not that the depth had spared him the pleas of the unfortunate. After all, everyone knew that the Wizard in the Wood was too kind-hearted to chance a wolf or bear falling upon those who came to him for aid.

So Cadavan could not sleep. Oh, there was nothing wrong with his nerves, mind you—it wasn't that he tried to fall asleep but couldn't. No, he would lie down and fall into slumber in minutes—but after an hour, two at the most, someone would be pounding on his door and crying for his aid in a voice nearing panic.

He could have told the visitor to go away, of course. He was a wizard, after all, and no one would have dared disobey him—but Cadavan could never have brought himself to turn away an unfortunate. No, he would haul himself up and out of bed, totter reeling with weariness to the door, draw the bar, and let the petitioner in. Like as not, the peasant in such panic would need only a love philtre or a cure for a wart, but who could tell? It might be distraught parents whose child was wasting away from some nameless disease. No, Cadavan could never bring himself to leave the door barred or to chant a spell that would have damped out the noise, then fallen back to sleep.

At last it became too much for him. He had spent the afternoon enchanting a field where crops had refused to grow and had left it with the crop sprouting and himself wearied. The farmer's thanks clattered in his aching head, the farmer's wife pressed a huge pack of foodstuffs on him in thanks, and he nodded and smiled in return. All he wanted, though, was his bed, and he was staggering by the time he recited the chant that opened his own door, stumbled through his sitting room and workroom, and collapsed into his bed and closed his eyes with a sigh of relief.

A fist hammered on the door; a voice shouted, "Wizard! I need your aid!"

Cadavan lay very still for a moment. Then he opened one eye and saw the moonlight streaming into the room. That meant some hours had passed, but not nearly enough. Still, a soul in need was a soul in need, and this one had the touch of panic in its voice that bespoke fear, Cadavan forced himself up and went to open the door.

It was a farmer whose cow had gone dry.

Cadavan would have bitten his tongue, but he needed it to recite the spell. He couldn't help saying, "This could have waited till tomorrow," even as he laid his hands on the beast.

"My children have little to eat but her milk," the farmer explained.

Cadavan sighed and recited the incantation. Babbling thanks, the farmer tried to press a cheese on him to show his gratitude. "Give it to your children," Cadavan told him, and shut the door in his face.

He wasn't usually so rude, but he couldn't keep the anger in any more. He howled, he raged, he caught at anything he knew wouldn't break and hurled it across the sitting room. Unfortunately, he mixed some spells in with his shrieks of rage, and limbs broke off trees in the forest outside; clouds raced to cover the moon, then reveal it again; a wind blew through the forest and nearly blew the homebound farmer and his cow off their feet. Lightning lanced out of a clear night sky into a forest stream and par-boiled a dozen trout. The fisherman who found them the next day was delighted, but it didn't do much good for the trout.

Finally, exhausted from his rage, Cadavan knelt panting, holding onto a table for support. "Nevermore!" he gasped. "There is never enough of me to meet all their needs!" This, he realized, would have to stop. He could not keep giving and giving, could not keep curing every peasant with a bad case of hiccups or a hen that would not lay.

Cadavan was going to have to take a vacation.

So he filled a small keg with magical fluid, a potion that would adapt itself to every spell and never run dry, then stepped out his door, secured it with a mighty enchantment, and walked away, leaving all his alembics and crucibles, his staff and his wand and his thuribles, all the tools and the paraphernalia of wizardry behind him and strode off into the forest to escape his life, with none of his belongings save the foot-wide keg under his arm.

When Cadavan came to a little clearing that he knew of, bordered by a musical brook, he held the keg up with the spigot over his mouth, twisted it to give him one draught of the potion it contained, then set down the keg with the admonishment, "Never be far from me!" and a few magic words to ensure that wherever he went, he world find the keg there before him. Then he raised his hands and began to intone the spell. Cadavan liked his ale, of course, but that wasn't the main reason he wanted that keg. It was very adaptable.

He had never been much to look at, not even as wizards go—no tall, gaunt, severe creature he, no long white beard or robes embroidered with mystical signs (he did have a set of those, but they hung on a rack most of the time; he only used them for very powerful incantations. They were protective clothing). No, Cadavan wasn't any taller than most, and he was a little tubby around the waist, if truth be told. His beard was short and grizzled and his robes were sackcloth—he could have changed them into velvet easily enough, but there was always more important work to do. Besides, Cadavan was fond of saying that magic shouldn't be used for minor things, and he always considered his own comfort to be minor.

But when he began to work magic, he became very imposing.

He frowned, standing straight, seeming taller than he really was, the roll around his waist disappearing, eyes flashing and hands rising to draw mist from the grass to hide him. Then, within that mist, the shrinking began, the widening, the howl of pain mixed with victory, until the mist blew away and a two-foot-wide frog hopped out of the heap of loose clothing to look about it with interest and appreciation, croaking delight before it hopped away toward the stream.

The peasants found that discarded robe the next day and knew it for Cadavan's. Since the three who'd found it had been on their way to ask Cadavan to multiply their cattle, they wailed laments as they took the robes back to the village as proof, and told all their neighbors that their wizard was gone.

They would have felt no better to learn their wizard had croaked—and hopped away.

In their way, Cadavan's villagers were right to say he had left them. In fact, they were nearly far too right for anyone's ease. Cadavan wasn't more than halfway to the brook before he smelled the musky scent of danger, and froze—the animal's instinct to avoid notice.

Three boys burst from the trees into the clearing, shouting and laughing. Two of them caught up sticks and began to play at sword-fighting, but the third saw Cadavan. He gave a shout of delight and pointed.

Now, Cadavan knew the ways of boys with frogs—he had once been a boy himself, after all, and though he had never willingly caused an animal pain, he knew many who thought it a game. He called out the spell that would change him back into a man.

All he heard, of course, was "Krrrrr-oak!"

The boys heard the deep-basso croak and came running with cries of delight.

Despair flashed through him as Cadavan turned to run, hopping as far and as fast as he could. A frog's mouth is not made for shaping sounds, and its tongue is made for catching flies, not rolling speech. When he had abandoned human form, he had given up the ability to speak—and how could a wizard work spells when he could not chant? He raced for the river, but the boys cheered and came on faster. A stick thumped his back; a stone grazed his head. Desperate now, Cadavan called out every spell he knew, but all that came out was "Juggerum" or "ribbet" or "rekkety-rex korex!"

It was the last that was his saving. A woman burst from the bushes and called, "Boys! Stop tormenting that poor frog and come do your chores!"

The boys slowed, but one of them turned away with a mulish look. "See how big the frog is, though, Mumma!"

"I'll have no frog about the house, big or small!" she decreed. "Poor thing, see how frightened it is! How would you like it if someone chased you with a stick?"

They glanced at her hands uneasily, as though remembering not a stick but a switch, and plodded back to her with glum faces.

Cadavan, of course, kept hopping—he knew an ally when he saw one. He plunged into the water, then edged up under a lily pad, eyes above the surface, and, with relief, watched the boys trudge away. When they were gone, he remembered that there were some very big fish in that river and climbed out onto the bank again. There he sat and wondered how the mother had come to his rescue in so timely a manner. Surely it could not have been a spell—the last sound he had croaked had been "Rekkety-rex korex," like an ancient Greek frog...

Korex.

Corrects.

So the woman had answered the call of magic and had come to correct her sons, to tell them that what they were doing was wrong and order them to stop! Never mind that she would have had to set out from her home ten or fifteen minutes before he called; he knew that magic can work backward through time to arrange an appropriate moment. So some croaks resembled words closely enough to work magic!

Could any of them change a frog back into a man?

Cadavan sat there on the bank of the stream and experimented. He tried to say, "Become a man," but it came out "bekkamun"; he ventured, "I shall be as I used to be," but all he heard was "Bustubna;" he said, "Go back to what you were," but it sounded more like "bakkayu." He even fell back on "juggarum," but all that happened was that that the little keg appeared beside him, and since he had last used it to help change him into a frog, it wasn't apt to be much use now. He gave up, dejected; a frog he had made himself and a frog he would stay.

Then Cadavan brightened at a thought—another wizard could reverse the spell! If, of course, Cadavan-frog could make him understand that he really was an enchanted man—and if that wizard were willing to help a colleague. Some were very jealous of their power and would gladly rid themselves of any competition, no matter how distant; some would laugh at him for the sheer pleasure of insult.

Cadavan did know one magic-worker who was friendly, though, kindly. They had shared a glass of wine on more than one occasion, swapping spells and describing what happened when the magic went wrong. It would be embarrassing to go to Monahere, but Cadavan felt sure his colleague would help. Of course, there would be the problem of communicating that he was a self-enchanted wizard—but how many two-foot frogs did one see, after all? Especially ones who sought out wizards. Surely Monahere would realize what had happened, though perhaps not who sat there croaking, and would be willing to help.

Heart considerably lighter, Cadavan turned to hop northward along the stream bank. He would have to keep an eye swiveled to watch for foxes and wildcats and other creatures that might think a frog looked tasty, and he would have to search the water carefully before he leaped in, wary of pikes and storks—but with luck and a bit of care, he should be able to find Monahere. Northward he hopped, thrumming deep in his throat.