Free The Neverending Story by Michael Ende Page B

swarm buzzed.
    He took one more step, which brought him near enough to distinguish the innumerable steel-blue insects which whirled around in seeming confusion. Yet the face as a whole remained motionless.
    “I am Atreyu,” he said. “I have come on a mission from the Childlike Empress.”
    “Most inopportune!” said the angry buzzing after a time. “What do you want of Ygramul? As you can see, she is very busy.”
    “I want this luckdragon,” said Atreyu. “Let me have him.”
    “What do you want him for, Atreyu Twolegs?”
    “I lost my horse in the Swamps of Sadness. I must go to the Southern Oracle, because only Uyulala can tell me who can give the Childlike Empress a new name. If she doesn’t get one, she will die and all Fantastica with her—you too, Ygramul.”
    “Ah!” the face drawled. “Is that the reason for all the places where there is nothing?”
    “Yes,” said Atreyu. “So you too know of them. But the Southern Oracle is too long a journey for a lifetime. That’s why I’m asking you for this luckdragon. If he carries me through the air, I may get there before it’s too late.”
    Out of the whirling swarm that made up the face came a sound suggesting the giggling of many voices.
    “You’re all wrong, Atreyu Twolegs. We know nothing of the Southern Oracle and nothing of Uyulala, but we do know that this dragon cannot carry you. And even if he were in the best of health, the trip would take so long that the Childlike Empress would die of her illness in the meantime. You must measure your Quest, Atreyu, in terms not of your own life but of hers.”
    The gaze of the eye with the vertical pupil was almost unbearable.
    “That’s true,” he said in a small voice.
    “Besides,” the motionless face went on, “the luckdragon has Ygramul’s poison in his body. He has less than an hour to live.”
    “Then there’s no hope,” Atreyu murmured. “Not for him, not for me, and not for you either, Ygramul.”
    “Oh well,” the voice buzzed. “Ygramul would at least have had one good meal. But who says it’s Ygramul’s last meal? She knows a way of getting you to the Southern Oracle in a twinkling. But the question is: Will you like it?”
    “What is that way?”
    “That is Ygramul’s secret. The creatures of darkness have their secrets too, Atreyu Twolegs. Ygramul has never revealed hers. And you too must swear you’ll never tell a soul. For it would be greatly to Ygramul’s disadvantage if it were known, yes, greatly to her disadvantage.”
    “I swear! Speak!”
    The great steel-blue face leaned forward just a little and buzzed almost inaudibly.
    “You must let Ygramul bite you.”
    Atreyu shrank back in horror.
    “Ygramul’s poison,” the voice went on, “kills within an hour. But to one who has it inside him it gives the power to wish himself in any part of Fantastica he chooses.
    Imagine if that were known! All Ygramul’s victims would escape her.”
    “An hour?” cried Atreyu. “What can I do in an hour?”
    “Well,” buzzed the swarm, “at least it’s more than all the hours remaining to you here.”
    Atreyu struggled with himself.
    “Will you set the luckdragon free if I ask it in the name of the Childlike Empress?” he finally asked.
    “No!” said the face. “You have no right to ask that of Ygramul even if you are wearing AURYN, the Gem. The Childlike Empress takes us all as we are. That’s why Ygramul respects her emblem.”
    Atreyu was still standing with bowed head. Ygramul had spoken the truth. He couldn’t save the white luckdragon. His own wishes didn’t count.
    He looked up and said: “Do what you suggested.”
    Instantly the steel-blue cloud descended on him and enveloped him on all sides.
    He felt a numbing pain in the left shoulder. His last thought was: “To the Southern Oracle!”
    Then the world went black before his eyes.
    When the wolf reached the spot a short time later, he saw the giant spider web—but there was no one in sight. There