Isle Of View by Piers Anthony Page A

zombie. But she knew that even if her clothes had been fresh, and Nada's sodden, Nada would have been a sight for sore eyes, while Electra would have been a sight to make eyes sore.
    But hardly were they through, when the next challenge was upon them. A swarm of flying red objects charged them. Each was roughly heart-shaped but not properly symmetrical; there were ugly tubes protruding from the tops, and great swollen veins around their bodies. Each pulsed horrendously.
    “Oh!” Nada cried daintily as one of the grotesque things whammed into her shoulder. Even when under attack, she was ladylike.
    “Yuck!” Electra grunted in unladylike fashion as another sailed at her face.
    “What are they?” Nada asked, trying to avoid another that was threatening to splatter her nice dress with juice exactly the color of blood.
    “Monsters of the next challenge!” Electra replied, as the thing missed Nada and scored on her own dress. Bright gore dribbled down it and dripped to her feet.
    Nada became a big snake and reared up at the next red blob, her dress hanging awkwardly on her new body. In a moment she slithered out of it. She opened her mouth, showing formidable fangs, and hissed. The blob veered to the side—but another splatted her from behind. Her head whirled to snap at that one—whereupon the one in front splatted its gore on her.
    “There are too many of them!” Electra cried. “We can't fight them; we'll just get hopelessly gored. We have to figure out the key to this challenge!”
    The snake slithered down into the moat to wash off the splat. That left Electra as the main focus of attention. A huge blob smashed into her chest, trying to knock her down.
    She grabbed it, and lifted it up, ready to hurl it into the moat. But she knew it would just loop around and attack her again. The thing was slimy with leaking blood, and worse, it was warm and pulsing. Just as if a living heart had been ripped from—
    “Aaarrghhhr' she groaned with heartfelt horror. ”It is a heart!"
    The snake became Nada in her natural form: a naga, with the body of a serpent and the head of a woman. “A heart attack!” she exclaimed. “I've heard of them, but I never thought it would happen to me!”
    “No one ever does,” Electra agreed heartily. She ducked as a bold heart came at her head, and was caught in the rear by another.
    She still held the big heart that had hit her chest. It was oddly passive now, though she wasn't holding it hard. She realized that her electrical nature might be affecting it. That heartened her, because it might offer a solution to this challenge.
    Her magic talent was electricity. She was constantly building up a charge, and could discharge it all at once by delivering a hefty shock to some monster or gradually as when she made an electrolytic environment for the Heaven Cent. She had heard that hearts used electric pulses to time their beats or something. Maybe these wild hearts were just out of control, and so were attacking anything in the vicinity. If she could put her hands on them and use her electricity to get their pulses even, maybe that would tame them.
    She let the big heart go. It floated away, passive, beating steadily, seeming at peace with the world.
    She watched for the next, and when it zoomed in she grabbed it. The thing tried to slip out of her grasp, but she clutched it to her. It was hot, and it almost burned her, but she knew it was only heartburn. In a moment, as her hands retained contact, the heart became passive. Then she let it go, and it floated peacefully away. It was working!
    “What are you doing, 'Lectra?” Nada called from the moat.
    “I'm making a better pace for these hearts,” Electra replied. “They're wild because they're out of control.”
    “You're a good pacemaker,” Nada agreed, watching the orderly hearts floating away. “Don't break any!”
    “We don't want any broken hearts,” Electra agreed as she caught another. She doubted she could ever be a