"Drink your milk, Dor," said Millie the ghost, who was his governess while his parents
Bink and Chameleon were away. King Trent trusted them, and anyone the King trusted was
bound to be away for long periods of time. But, Millie wasn't a ghost anymore, she was returned
to life at the time of Dor's birth, 20 years ago.
After a few minutes of eating, Irene, the princess, walked in. She had come for what
seemed an unexpected visit. But Dor surely was expecting her.
"Hi Dor!" she said with unusual excitement.
"Hey, a beautiful day out isn't it? It's nice for a swim," Dor replied. It was their annual
"swim in the moat day" started when he was sixteen, and she fifteen. "You are absolutely right,
dear."
"There she goes with that 'dear' stuff again," said Grundy the golem, who used to be
made out of string and clay. But had done something to become real, "I can't believe you let her
reel you in like that, Dor. Agreeing to marry her while you were in a dungeon. It's so stone-
aged."
He was right, they had missed a "swim in the moat day" once, because they were off in
Mundania where there is no magic, and magic talents didn't work. They were there trying to save
King Trent and Queen Iris from the terrible Mundanians that imprisoned him.
"I had almost forgotten that grim day when she..."
"Dor! Grim day?" Irene exclaimed.
"I was teasing you, you know that. I'll never regret that day, I never have," Dor said.
"Blah, blah, blah. Just go jump in a moat! I have better things to do than to sit here
listening to you two reminisce about Mundania," that was Grundy's attitude towards life.
They happily went to the castle. "You first, Dor," Irene insisted. He jumped in and soaked
Irene with water, he laughed at her. "That's not funny!" She jumped in and started swimming
towards him.
"Do you remember the first time this happened to us?" Irene wondered. She asked this
every year, and every year she got the same answer. "Yeah, of course I do. You were making fun
of my spelling, actually the spelling that your spelling bee gave me. And started going off how the
great Mundane Bear would come out æbare naked'," Dor said, "Then you kept teasing me about
it and I said 'Bare, bare, bare!' and I ripped your suit down. I could never forget."
Irene replied, "Yeah, but then my vine pulled you in, and I ripped your pants off to get
back at you." She laughed, "Then Cherie Centaur rode up on us."
"When your father called me to speak with him I thought I was in serious trouble..."
Just then, Irene's hair lost its green tinge. And Dor looked to the inanimate for answers as
usual.
"Wall, what happened?" Dor asked, no reply. "Wall! What happened!?" He had lost his
magic ability, or so he thought.
" I thought I could find you here, Dor. The magic in our world seems to be fluxing. Xanth
is merging with Mundania!" said Arnolde, the magic catalyst. He was actually a centaur, but his
gift was a continuous line of magic in all directions, his ability never faded.
"Dor, you have to do something, I don't want to lose my talent...Or my green tinge,"
Irene exclaimed.
Dor could only reply, "I don't know what to do, dear. You know your tinge is very
important to me." He was teasing her, but Irene didn't feel that way.
"Stop with the romance story already!" Grundy said as he rode up on Chet centaur, who
can shrink objects that he touches.
"Pipe down, ragbrain. Go unravel your string!" Irene responded.
"Stop it, stinkfinger. I'm a real man now!"
"It's a green thumb!" said Irene.
She and Dor got out of the moat, she ran to her bag and grabbed a seed, she grabbed the
seed of a hypno-gourd plant.
"Don't make me use this!" shouted Irene.
Grundy remarked, "Just try it."
"Grow." She commanded the seed to grow, as was her ability. It seemed like the seed
tried to sprout. "What? It didn't work!?"
"Precisely," said Arnolde, "I think we must venture into Mundania once more, and I think
we should go without consultation. Ne need to worry anyone."
"I agree, though the King may worry about Irene's disappearance, which would lead him
into worrying about myself also," said Dor. He was absolutely right, the King had been known to
worry about things he couldn't explain, and the disappearance of the princess would, in deed, be
unexplainable.
"I think we can do it by ourselves. Even though the King will be looking for us," said
Chet, "We must find out what's making the two worlds merge, and then we must stop it," Chet
continued on, "I have recently ventured back to Centaur Isle, and they provided us with new
Centaurian Jackets.
"Very good, indeed. These will aid us in combat, and bartering, if need be," said Arnolde,
"These could fetch a great deal of information."
Irene stood next to Dor, blushing. And then Dor remembered. When they were in
Mundania for the first time, they were locked up in a dungeon. When the guard asked Irene to
show them her magical talent, she said that she could not. He took her out of the cell, and tore off
her jacket, and then her blouse. Dor laughed, because he also remembered what he said to her,
"Your new outfit is great, but you might want to put this on."
"What's so funny, Dor?" asked Irene.
"I just remembered what had happened to my old centaur jacket," he replied, and he gave
Irene a look that made her whole face turn red. She too, had remembered. They both laughed
about the dungeon.
Sigh. "Why can't we just stop with the true love jig for just a few minutes? We really need
to focus on the problem at hand," said Grundy, annoyed at them, again,
Irene smiled and said, "Just wait until you meet your prefect match Grundy. Then we'll
see who really needs to stop with the mushy scenes."
"Yeah, like that'll ever happen, no one ever falls in love with a golem..."
"It may happen just yet, Grundy. There may be a few female golems that have returned to
life..." said Dor. It was true, the Good Magician has given many answers, and therefore had many
years of work. He charged one year for each answer he gave, he even charged his wife, the
Gorgon, for asking him to marry her. But he told Dor that it was to get her used to him, and to
see if she would still want to be married at the end of her one year.
"Well, maybe so, but I don't want to get my hopes up, or down. So lets just get on with
this mission, the sooner we leave, the sooner we can come back," said Grundy.