Free Frog Kiss by Kevin J. Anderson Page A

islands, and ducked his head in buzzing clouds of mosquitoes. All around, the other frogs continued their songs. “That one was mine!”
    “Not anymore!” He heard her voice from the side, in a different direction from where she had disappeared. He looked in time to see her running barefoot down a path only she could see. Barefoot!
    Keric ran after her. He found himself panting and sweating. He had grown up in and around these swamps. He considered himself an exceptional woodsman in even the deepest parts of the morass. He could outrun and out-hunt anyone he had ever known. But this girl kept going at a pace he could not hope to match. He stumbled, he missed solid footing, he splashed scummy water all over himself.
    “Wait!” he shouted. He heard only the crocodiles growling.
    “If you’d look over here, you’d have a better chance of seeing me!” She laughed again.
    He whirled to see her across a mucky pool, not twenty feet from him. Without thinking—since he was wet and filthy anyway—he left the path and charged across the way. “Give me my frog!”
    Keric tried to run with both feet, but each step became more difficult as the ooze sucked at his boots. He had to get the bullfrog with the three spots. He knew it was somebody from the royal family. The girl probably didn’t know what she had. Maybe she wanted to eat it!
    He sloshed onward, but before he had gone halfway across the pool, he felt the muck dragging him down. He sank to his waist, but found he could not take another step. He continued to submerge in the ooze. “Oh no!”
    From the spreading cypress tree over his head, he heard the girl’s voice. “You should be more careful out here in the swamps. Plenty of dangerous things out here. Crocodiles, water moccasin snakes, milt spiders bigger than your hand, poison plants.” Keric looked up to see her sitting on one of the branches, holding onto the frog sack with one hand and munching on a dripping fruit in the other. “But you really have to watch out for that quicksand. That’s especially bad.”
    “Would you help me out of this?” He looked at her. He had sunk up to his armpits and felt the cold muck seeping into his pores. The mud crept to the tops of his shoulders. Keric had to lift his head to keep his chin out of the ooze. “Um, please?”
    “I don’t know. You were chasing me.” She finished her fruit and tossed the pit down. It splashed beside him.
    “I’ll tell you what you’ve got in that sack of yours.”
    “It’s frogs.”
    “No, if you’ll just let me kiss one of them I’ll show you something magic!” He had to talk rapidly now. The quicksand had reached his lips.
    “Oh, you mean that ! Sure, I’ve got the whole royal family here.” She reached in and pulled out another frog, this one sleek and small. It also had the three identical splotches. “You don’t think you were the only one to get the idea for finding the frogs in the swamp, do you?”
    Actually, Keric had thought he was the only one to think of that. Once again, the obvious was staring him in the face.
    “But you were going about it all wrong,” the girl continued. “You kept trying to kiss them out here in the swamp. Now tell me, just what would you have done if the frail and arthritic Queen Mother had appeared? Or one of the dainty princesses who would squeal at the sight of a beetle? How would you get them back? Makes more sense to me just to carry the frogs in a sack, go back to town, and then change them all back. Reward would still be the same, maybe more for saving them the journey.”
    Keric had to lean his head back to keep his nose and mouth above the surface. “Will you please help me now, and give me advice later!”
    She shrugged. “You haven’t asked me the right question yet.”
    “What is the question?”
    “Ask me what my name is! I’m not going to risk my life to rescue a total stranger.”
    “What’s your name? Tell me quick!”
    “I am Raffin. Pleased to meet you.” She