Myth-ion Improbable

by Robert Asprin

  Then, when I had them all, I held the image, imprinted it on my mind, and then imagined it being overlaid in blue lines on the map at my feet.

  It only took an instant. Then, with one last look at the beautiful colors of the energy and the surrounding countryside, I tugged on the string attached to my foot and I was back in my body, just like that.

  I opened my eyes and glanced at Aahz. My mentor was smiling like he had just won all the riches of the Bazaar at Deva.

  "Amazing," he said. "Sometimes you just flat amaze me."

  I was afraid to look down, so instead I stepped back.

  Aahz picked up the map and held it for me to see. There, in black lines, was the first map of the castle I had done from the ceiling.

  And over it were flowing lines of energy. The magik of the map was keeping the lines flowing in the image, just as I had seen it from above.

  I didn't know what to say. He was holding something I had created, and it was beautiful and working as it should.

  Better than it should. I had never expected the energy lines to keep moving, but they were.

  "Come on, apprentice. Let's go show the rest what you did. Amazing, simply amazing."

  He turned and headed for the door.

  For the first time in all our time together, I had sensed a little pride in Aahz's voice. I might have been imagining it, but this time I didn't think so.

  It was pride, and it made me feel good.

  Chapter Sixteen

  "Put your name on the map."

  A. Vespucci

  Everyone made great noises about the map I had created. And Tanda gave me a long and very nice hug. I didn't say much, since I was so proud of what I had done, I was afraid I'd ruin the moment by saying something stupid.

  Finally, Aahz laid the map out on the table and said, "Let's get to work. We need to find on here where the spell Count Bovine placed over this dimension is drawing its power."

  I studied the moving blue lines with everyone else, watching how they seemed to come up out of the floor plan of the castle and into the air.

  The map was magik, so it even showed the different levels of the castle, like looking into a fishbowl. It was both beautiful and disconcerting at the same time.

  "Look in the sub-level of the castle," Tanda said, pointing.

  I let my eyes adjust so that I could see the plan of the castle that far down. I instantly saw what she was pointing at. The wide, thick river of energy that was pouring up from the ground suddenly thinned, like a good part of it had been drained away into an unseen drain. That unseen drain, using that much energy, could only be a spell large enough to control an entire dimension.

  "I think you have it," Aahz said, nodding.

  "I agree," I said, remembering what the energy below that point felt like while I had been floating, and what it felt like above that point.

  "Where did you get this floor plan?" Harold asked, staring at it. "I've never seen anything like this before. That corridor isn't there, and I have no idea what that tunnel goes to."

  I glanced at Aahz, who only smiled.

  "You've seen this before," I said. "It's painted on the ceiling of the library in there."

  "No, it's not," Harold said, shaking his head. "This is a picture of the castle during Count Bovine's first days."

  "Go look for yourself," Tanda said. "It took me a while to see it as well. Skeeve spotted it first."

  Harold stared at us as if we had all gone nuts. I didn't blame him. If I had been living in a place for as many years as he had been trapped here, and a stranger had pointed something this important out, I wouldn't believe him either.

  He huffed and stormed off toward the library.

  "Okay," I said, "we know where Count Bovine tapped into the energy stream. How do we untap it?"

  "We have to get down there," Aahz said. "Then we have to divert it for just an instant to break the link. That's all it will take."

  I looked at the massive flow of energy rushing up out of the ground. I could tap into small energy streams, but I had no idea how a person would go about blocking something this large. And I wasn't sure I wanted to ask.

  Harold came back in, looking stunned and embarrassed.

  "If we manage to block this," Tanda said, "what do you think will happen?"

  Aahz looked at the map. "Probably every spell ever put up by any of Count Bovine's people will be broken."

  "My people will have their minds and free will back," Harold said.

  "Yeah," I said, "and every vampire will suddenly be around every day of every month."

  "Half of the population of vampires will be dead moments after they turn from cows," Aahz said. "And all the others will be without resources, clothes, shelter, and food, with the sun coming quickly."

  "Do you think my people will remember all the years of having to submit to the round-up?" Harold asked.

  "I have no doubt," Aahz said. "You still remember it before you were rescued from here, don't you?"

  Harold nodded. "My people will hunt down and kill most of the remaining vampires."

  "And you'll be free to leave," I said.

  "If we can break the vampire hold on my world, I won't want to leave," Harold said. "I'll stay here and help my people rebuild."

  I shook my head. It was all fine and good to plan what people would do if we succeeded, but I sure didn't see that happening any time soon.

  "So no one has answered the question yet of how we stop that flow."

  I didn't even want to try to bring up the point of getting down to that spot in the castle. We were way up at the top, and that breach in the main flow was way down in a sub-basement, where I doubted anyone had been in centuries.

  "Gold," Glenda said, her voice sounding tired and worn. "Gold would stop the flow, if you could focus enough of it."

  Aahz seemed to be off somewhere inside his head, thinking. Tanda was doing the same thing.

  Harold and I looked at each other. Clearly, as apprentice magicians, neither of us even had a clue what the other three were considering.

  "I think it might be done," Aahz said, nodding. He looked at Glenda. "Good idea."

  She said nothing in return. It seemed that as the closer we got to a possible answer, the more sullen and reserved she became. I was still so angry at her for what she did to me that I didn't care enough to even ask what was happening.

  "Okay, to the next problem," I said. "How do we get down there with enough gold to stop the energy stream?"

  "We won't need much gold," Tanda said. "Just enough, with a good connection spell, to hook other nearby gold into the blockage. Maybe something gold-plated and flat."

  "A golden shovel?" I asked.

  Tanda nodded. "That would do it, I'm sure."

  Harold moved over toward the front door of the suite, near where the grass was planted. He tapped a spot on the wall and a closet door opened. He reached inside and pulled

  out a golden shovel, just like the ones the palace guys had. It seemed that, in the palace, no cow droppings could be picked up with anything but a golden shovel.

  "Okay, we're set for the gold part," Aahz said. "Tanda, when we're ready to try this, can you do the connection spell to hook enough gold into the shovel?"

  She nodded. "I've done a number of them over the years to build shields and walls."

  "So back to my problem," I said. "How do we get down there without being run over by the mounted posse?"

  Aahz pointed to a spot on the map. At first I couldn't see what he was pointing at, then I saw it. The very same tunnel I had been afraid I was going to end up down in.

  "Follow where it leads," Aahz said. "Starting with the secret opening back in the library."

  I did as he suggested, focusing on the map as it changed, showing me the different levels of the secret passageway as it dropped through the mountain behind the castle, curved under everything, and came out in the very room where the big energy flow had been taken off for the spell.

  "Looks like
there was a reason that tunnel was built," Aahz said, smiling at me.

  "Count Bovine used it to get to his main power source when he lived here full-time," Harold said.

  "What do you know?"

  "So we're going underground," I said, reaching over and taking the heavy shovel from Harold. "I just hope I don't have to dig my way out."

  "You and me both," Aahz said, staring at the map.

  My mentor had a way of making everything seem so positive that it was a wonder I could even move most mornings.

  It took a little longer than I had expected to find the hidden passageway into the tunnel in the old library. We had to move pile of furniture, old books, and more rolled-up scrolls than I could count. The scrolls were the hardest, since Harold wouldn't let us just kick them aside. Finally, we got to the spot where the passage should be and faced a stone wall.

  "I didn't think there was anything back here," he said. "After all these years, I know this room."

  I didn't want to mention to him that he really didn't, since he hadn't even noticed the map painted on the ceiling.

  "Oh, it's here all right," Aahz said.

  All five of us were standing there in the dusty place. I had the shovel, Tanda had the map.

  "Glenda?" Aahz said.

  She stepped up to him.

  Quicker than I had seen my mentor move in a long, long time, Aahz had the rope out of his pouch, over her head, and tied.

  She dropped to the ground, sound asleep, before she could even get a complaint out of her mouth. I was stunned.

  "Harold," Aahz said, "pick up her feet and let's move her to a couch."

  Harold looked as stunned as I felt. Tanda seemed to again know exactly what was happening. Aahz moved Glenda to the couch, made sure the rope was tied, then looked at Harold. "No matter what you do, what you think, what happens around you, do not untie her until we get back. Understand?"

  Harold nodded. "But I don't see why."

  "The map," Aahz said.

  Tanda held it up and pointed to a spot on it.

  "Right here," she said. "See this tiny thin line coming up out of the basement and into this suite?"

  I looked real close. For a moment I thought she was making it up, then I saw the blue line. It went right to a spot in the suite where the chair was, where Glenda had been sitting when I did the map.

  "Glenda's hooked up somehow," Aahz said. "I didn't see that until we had already made our plans."

  "You mean they might know we're coming?"

  "Possible," Aahz said.

  "Oh, that's nice," I said. I wondered how many of that posse I could hit with the golden shovel before they took it away from me.

  "Are you ready?" Aahz asked.

  "You want me to lead?" I asked, still not seeing where we were going to go.

  "I've got it for the moment," Aahz said. He picked up the torch we had brought with us from the first tunnel, held it out and said to me, "A light might help."

  I eased some energy out of the stream, just enough to start the torch on fire. Not long ago I had had trouble with that spell as well. And a year ago I might have set the entire library on fire trying to light that torch.

  "Follow me," Aahz said, and stepped at the stone wall.

  And right through it.

  "This place could give a guy a headache," I said, moving at the stone wall behind him. I had the shovel slightly in front of me in case the stone decided to be stone for me.

  I went right through, just as Aahz had done.

  Tanda came through behind me.

  The tunnel was narrow and carved out of solid rock. Steps led down into the bowels of the earth. More steps than I could see in the torchlight. The place was cold and very dusty. It was clear that no one had been in here in a very, very long time, as our footsteps kicked up a cloud of dust that swirled in the flickering light of the torch.

  "Are we shielded?" Aahz asked Tanda.

  "Same as in the library," Tanda said. "Count Bovine didn't want this tunnel found, that's for sure."

  "That helps us," I said.

  Aahz nodded, made sure we were both ready, then, holding the torch up so that we could see the steps as well as he could in the dust, he started down.

  And we went down for a very, very long time, kicking up thick clouds of dust with every step. I could not imagine how anyone could have carved the tunnel. I could barely walk the steps, and we were going down. Climbing this must be next to impossible for anyone not in top shape.

  Finally, after what seemed like a nightmarish eternity, we reached an area of the tunnel that flattened out.

  "Map," Aahz said.

  Tanda moved up and the two of us crowded with Aahz so that we could see the map in the torchlight and swirling dust. It showed that we had reached the bottom of the tunnel. I glanced around at the rock walls and ceiling. We were under thousands and thousands of body-lengths of rock. I couldn't imagine how much weight was pressing down on the ceiling of the tunnel above us right at that moment.

  The thought sent a shiver through me, and a touch of panic. "Can we keep going?" I asked.

  Tanda took the map and Aahz smiled at me, his green scales covered in dust, his eyes yellow holes in the dirt. I must have looked as bad as he did, maybe worse. "A little claustrophobia?" he asked.

  "I don't know about that," I said, not having a clue what the big word meant. Sometimes Aahz just didn't remember what a backward part of a backward world I came from.

  "Feeling the pressure of all this weight over us?" Tanda asked.

  "Yeah," I said, "more than I want to think about right now, thank you very much."

  Aahz laughed. "We don't have that much farther to go." "Then let's go," I said, fighting against the panic at the walls closing in.

  Aahz gave me a long look, then turned and headed along the flat part of the tunnel. I kept the golden shovel clutched in front of me. At least if the tunnel came down, I'd be buried with something worth digging up. After a hundred paces the tunnel started back up. Stair after stair after stair. Up and up and up.

  I forgot to be afraid of the tunnel coming down on me because I was so tired from the climbing.

  "Wait," Aahz said, stopping to pant for a moment. "The air's bad in here."

  I realized when he said that that I was also having trouble getting enough air. Now not only was the roof about to fall and crush me, I was going to die from lack of air.

  "Almost there," Tanda said from behind me. I could hear the rustling of the map. Aahz nodded and pushed upward, taking one step at a time.

  I used the shovel as a sort of crutch. Step. Clunk. Step. Clunk.

  The sound echoed down the tunnel behind us. If this plan didn't work, I couldn't imagine having to go back to the suite using this tunnel. I'd try it if I had to, but I sure didn't want to.

  Step. Clunk. Step. Clunk.

  We kept climbing. Forever. How could this be? Had we gotten turned around and were headed back to the suite?

  My lungs burned like the time I had stayed underwater too long in the pond when I was a kid. My eyes stung with the dust, and I could feel the grit in my mouth.

  "We're here," Aahz said, his voice barely a whisper. I glanced back. Tanda was a few steps behind me, her face covered in dust, mud caked around her mouth and nose. She looked as if she was about to pass out.

  Ahead of me Aahz slid back a wooden panel and stepped through.

  Cool, fresh air hit me like a hammer as I stepped up to follow him. In all my life I couldn't remember anything feeling that good before.

  We were in a good-sized room, at least fifty paces across, that was completely empty of every stick of furniture. It was simply four walls of stone, a stone floor, and a stone ceiling. From the looks of it, the door we had come through was the only door in the place. And there were no windows. Where the wonderful fresh air was coming from I had no idea.

  "Oh, my," Tanda said, coming up out of the tunnel and taking big gulping breaths of air. I gulped right along with her.


  Aahz came over and took the map from Tanda, studying it as we caught our breath. After a moment he moved around the room, staying to the outside.

  I knew why he stayed to the outside. In the center of the room was a massive energy flow coming up through the floor and going out through the ceiling. It wouldn't hurt him to walk through it, but Aahz was taking no chances.

  About halfway around the room he stopped, studied the map again, and then came back toward us a few steps.

  "Right here," he said, pointing into the empty air. "Right here is where the energy flow is diverted."

  He pointed in the direction of the empty wall beside him, indicating how the energy flow moved off the main one.

  I took a deep breath and let my mind open slightly to see the flow.

  "Wow!" I said, staggering backwards from the sight.

  Beside me Tanda did the same.

  "It's huge!" she said.

  Not more than a few paces in front of me was a torrent of pure blue energy, flowing like a fast-moving river up out of the ground and through the ceiling. It was a good forty or more paces across. I could see Aahz through it, but just barely. About halfway up, in the center of the room about head high, the flow seemed to decrease in size significantly, from forty paces across to less than thirty. I could see where the other energy was going sideways and then vanishing in the direction that Aahz had pointed. That energy was powering the spell that held this dimension in the strange state it was in. How Count Bovine had managed to divert so much energy into one spell was also beyond my apprentice's level of understanding. I glanced down at the little gold shovel I held in my hand, then back at the raging torrent of blue energy in front of me. The silliness of even thinking of trying to change that torrent with my little shovel made me laugh.

  Aahz, staying to the outside, came back around to where we were standing.

  "This isn't possible," I said, holding up the shovel.

  "It fills this room, Aahz," Tanda said, the awe in her voice clear. "I've never seen an energy stream anything like it."

  "We can do it," Aahz said. Again I looked at my little gold shovel, then at the torrent of blue energy and just shook my head. Sometimes my mentor was smart, sometimes angry, but right now he was just plain crazy.