Free Isle Of View by Piers Anthony Page A

just sand, and the wind was constantly whipping it up into sandstorms. If anyone sat on the ground long, he would be buried in sand. A captor shouldn't take Che here for that.
    Then Dolph had another bad thought. Suppose someone were mad at Chex or Cheiron and wanted to make them suffer? He could steal their foal away and dump him here, and they would certainly suffer! He wouldn't care that the foal could not survive in all the wind and sand; that would be the point.
    Did he really want to find Che, if that was the case? A dead foal buried under sand?
    No, that was too horrible! Nobody would want to do that to the winged centaurs. The regular centaurs didn't like them, because centaurs had very strict notions about species purity, but all centaurs were creatures of honor who would not stoop to any such malice. The other winged monsters certainly wouldn't, because all of them were sworn to protect their own; Dolph had crashed Chex's wedding ceremony and knew how the Simurgh had impressed this on them, and on Dolph too. Of course the land monsters weren't bound, but most of them lacked the wit to foal-knap him; they would simply eat him and be done with it. So the chances were that this was a more organized effort and that the foal wouldn't be left in a place like this.
    Little dust devils sported among the moving sand dunes, being watched by their parent tornadoes. They had fun sucking up the sand and throwing it around. This was one big sandlot, for them. But there was no sign of Che or any other living thing. Dolph was glad.
    Then a dust devil swung in toward him. He veered to the side to avoid it, but it veered too. He moved the other way, and it matched him. It was following him!
    Well, it couldn't hurt him. “Whaaat doo yooo waaant?” he called in ghost accent, realizing that this was something more than a freak of nature.
    The whirling cone was replaced by another ghost. “So you are an intruder!” it said, with no ghostly distortion. “Who are you?”
    “I'm Prince Dolph of the human folk,” he replied. “Who are you?”
    The ghost swirled and became devastatingly female. “Well, now, a living man! This is most intriguing.”
    “You didn't answer my question,” he said.
    “I am the Demoness Metria,” she said. "I have had some limited dealings with your benevolent.”
    “My what?” he asked blankly.
    “Your compassionate, gentle, humane,” she said crossly.
    “Oh, you mean my kind,” he said, catching on.
    “Whatever. What are you doing here, Prince?”
    “I'm looking for Che Centaur, who was foal-napped by a party unknown.” Then it occurred to him that the demons could be responsible. Maybe he had said too much!
    “Oh, that,” she said, disinterested. “He's not here.”
    “He isn't?”
    “No, the goblins took him. I suppose they want him for food, and to feed the little goblins too.”
    “Feed the little goblin stew?” Dolph asked, horrified.
    “Why else would goblins want horsemeat?”
    “Horsemeat!” he exclaimed. “He's a winged centaur, a unique species!”
    “Well, you don't think they want him for his proclivity, do you?”
    “His what?”
    “His bent, disposition, inclination, penchant, propensity,” she said, annoyed.
    Dolph concentrated, and after a bit it came to him. “His mind?”
    “Whatever. What would a goblin care about that?”
    “Nothing,” he said.
    “Precisely. So you might as well be on your way.”
    “Wait a minute, demoness! How can I believe you? Maybe you stole Che, and you're trying to distract me!”
    She focused her ghostly eyes on him. “Listen, vacuum-head, if I wanted to distract you, I wouldn't bother with words. I have easier ways.”
    “Yeah? Like what?”
    “How old are you, Prince?”
    “Fifteen, going on sixteen. What does that have to do with it?”
    “And I'm a hundred and fifteen, going on a decade or two more. I lose count. But my age doesn't matter; it's yours that is critical. Do you know how to summon the stork?”
    “No! No