He tried to find the enthusiasm to fight back as he
turned to scream at the landscape. “Who are you? Why
are you doing this to us? What is it you wan??”
He felt like a fool. Worse, he knew his companions
might think he was becoming unhinged. But they said
nothing. He would’ve welcomed some outcry of skepti-
cism. Instead, the sense of hopelessness settled ever deeper
around them.
Nothing moved within the Moors. Of one thing he was
fairly confident: this wasn’t wizardry at work. It was too
slow. He had to do something, but he didn’t know what.
All he could think of was how ironic it would be if, after
surviving Malderpot, they were to perish here from a
terminal case of the blahs.
So he was startled when a dull voice asked, “Don’t you
understand it all by now?”
“Who said that?” He whirled, trying to spot the speak-
er. Nothing moved.
“I did.”
The voice came from an eight-foot-tall mushroom off to
his left. The cap of this blotchy ochre growth dipped
slightly toward him.
“Not that I couldn’t have,” said another growth.
“Nor I,” agreed a third’.
“Mushrooms,” Jon-Tom said unsteadily, “don’t talk.”
“What?” said the first growth. “Sure, we’re not loqua-
cious, but that’s a natural function of our existence. There
THE DAY OF THE DISSONANCE
71
isn’t much to talk about, is there? I mean, it’s not just a
dull life, man, it’s boring. B-o-r-i-n-g.”
“That’s about the extent of it,” agreed the giant toad-
stool against which Roseroar rested. She moved away from
it hastily, showing more energy than she had in the
previous several days, and put a hand to the haft of each