Jinx On The Divide Read Online Free PDF

you?"
    "Complete and utter disaster was right, as it happens," said Felix, lowering the lamp. "Rhino's disappeared."
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    ***
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    Fuzzy's first sight of Yergud was a surprise. It was a hodgepodge of a town -- strips and wedges of closely packed wooden buildings painted in pastel colors and laced with a network of frosted roads beneath a brilliantly blue winter sky. It was very cold. There were patches of open snow-covered ground, across which drifted shape-shifting clouds of steam from geothermal springs. She swooped lower, looking for somewhere to land. There was a quarry on the outskirts of the settlement. A triple-head was moving big blocks of stone from one place to another, and diggelucks were breaking them up with sledgehammers. A couple of japegrins shaded their eyes and looked up at her. A third one picked up a stone and threw it at her.
    Fuzzy was shocked to the hollows of her bones. Nothing like that had ever happened to her before. Throwing stones at an intelligent being in flight was unthinkable. Perhaps Thornbeak hadn't been exaggerating about brazzles being
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    unwelcome after all. She gained height again as quickly as she could and headed away from the town, looking for the perching rocks. The Andrian rocks, back home, were considered by all to be very fine -- they were located in a sheltered hollow and placed in a large isometric grid, fifty flaps apart, for a nice secluded roost.
    The Yergud perching rocks turned out to be very down-market. They hadn't been mathematically positioned by a trained rock designer; they were simply a natural feature of the landscape. They hadn't been cleaned for a while, either, and they were far too close together. Every single perch was vacant.
    Fuzzy circled down and selected a roost. A ragamucky came bustling out of a ramshackle little hut and demanded a week's rent in advance. Fuzzy handed over a silver coin, wondering if she'd brought sufficient funds with her.
    "And you can't perch there," snapped the ragamucky. "That rock's out of order. Go to number thirteen."
    "Why? They're all empty."
    "Because you're a brazzle," said the ragamucky. "Carrionwings get the pick of the perching rocks." She stomped off and disappeared back into her shack.
    Carrionwings? Fuzzy could hardly believe her ears. Carrionwings disposed of magical garbage. They were probably smelly, and they spent a lot of time shrieking. Brazzles commanded far more respect. "Gizzards to you, you crazy old ragbag," she muttered. Then she flew over to the nearest
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    patch of snow and made patterns in it with her feet. After that, she found an icy slope she could slide down, and then she found a really deep snowdrift she could plummet into. Snow was squawking good fun, the smoothest thing ever.
    "What's a magic lamp like on the inside?" Felix asked Betony, as they stood in the middle of the main road out of town, which was completely deserted (you are now leaving vattan, purveyor of fish to the monarchy ). The cuddyak hoofprints and the runner ruts from the japegrin's sleigh were already filling up with snow.
    "I've no idea," said Betony. "Try lifting the lid."
    "It won't budge. Do you think Rhino really has disappeared?"
    "The brandee wouldn't make it up. What's the point? He's lost his hostage -- I bet he's sorry he shouted out the news for everyone to hear. He's got no bargaining power left. The question is, did Rhino vanish inside the lamp or outside it? The only thing we can do is summon the brandee again and ask him what happened."
    Felix groaned. He was so cold now that he couldn't even think straight. "You've turned blue," said Betony. "I think we ought to find that inn, thaw out next to the fire, and get something hot to eat."
    "No money," said Felix, his teeth chattering again.
    "I've got some, silly," said Betony. "Come on, let's try the Pink Harpoon."
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    The inn was easy to find. A couple of lanterns illuminated a garish painting of a cross-eyed fish with a harpoon through it. The sign swung from