“Hold on here,” Vergetta said, piling the last coin in a neat stack. She peered at Tananda, her yellow eyes narrowed to horizontal slits. “There’s only four and three-quarters gold coins’ worth here.”
“That’s all we’ve got,” Tananda said. “It’s been a slow week.”
“I don’t believe you.”
“Well, that’s all there is. Take it or leave it.”
Charilor leaned across the table and took my little sister by the throat of her smock. “Just who do you think you’re talking to, babycakes?”
Tananda looked up at her without fear. “Blackmailers, that’s who. Scaly ones, at that.”
“Why, you pipsqueak!” Charilor heaved her up over her head and flung her at the mirror, cracking it across. Two silver coins’ replacement value! Tananda dropped to the floor.
“Oh, I say!” was surprised out of me. Charilor turned her attention on me, grabbing the fur of my upper arm in a perfectly manicured claw. With the amazing strength that was one of the Pervish people’s advantages, she heaved me over the table, and began to pummel my back and head. I twisted, wrenching my arm loose. She merely swung a leg up and planted it on my back, continuing to pound. Her blows hurt!
“Chumley!” Guido stood up to come to my aid. Vergetta, feeble as she seemed, was still a Pervect. As he rose, she swept her cane out and around in front of him, snagging an ankle. He tripped. She hauled him up into her lap like a toddler and held him helpless around the shoulders and body, while shouting encouragement at Charilor.
“*&^% you!” Guido snarled. “Lemme go!”
“Such language!” Vergetta snapped, shocked. She opened up her befanged mouth and roared. “Nobody uses that kind of language around me!” Guido’s hair blew over his ear from the blast.
In the meanwhile, at the cost of a hank of my fur I worked free and sprang up out of reach. Charilor charged after me. Tananda leaped to her feet and launched herself at the back of the Pervect.
“You leave my big brother alone!” she yelled. She landed on Charilor’s back as the Pervect reached for my throat. I knocked her arms apart and made to put my hands around her neck and face, closing off her airways. Against the combined might of an Assassin-trained Trollop and a Troll trained in the martial arts, the contest should have been over at that moment.
It was not. Charilor used the last minim of space remaining between her mighty jaws to draw in a pinch of the palm covering her mouth, and chomped down.
“Ow!” I bellowed. I am ashamed to say that I lost my grip. Blood dripped from my hand. My wits regained, I threw my shoulder at her body. Tananda applied her arms in a nerve-blocking hold that ought to have disabled Charilor.
It only seemed to make her angry. She went into a whirlwind frenzy, striking out with arms and legs. For a time I could see nothing but a green blur, then the maelstrom drew us in. The room revolved around and around us. I recall punching, kicking, even biting, but when the scene resolved itself, Tananda was draped over a chair, panting, and Charilor was literally wiping up the mess on the floor using yours very truly as a mop. Guido, sporting an eye in several colors that would have done credit to his palette, was lying face down yelping across Vergetta’s lap. She spanked the mob enforcer’s backside again and again, punctuating each blow with a syllable.
“You must ne-ver use that kind of lang-uage in front of a la-dy!”
If I had not been resolved already to discredit and drive these females from my purview, I was now. How dared she humiliate my friend! Charilor let go of my chest fur and let me stagger uneasily to my feet. I went to my little sister’s aid, raising her from the chair across which she was draped.
“I’m okay,” she croaked, though her face was as colorful as Guido’s. I imagine that if one were to part my fur I would be as battered as she. She clung to me for a while, then tottered away. “Look at this place!”
I surveyed the ruin of our erstwhile establishment, then looked back at her. “Place mess,” I said.
Vergetta looked up from the punishment she was dealing Guido. “Why, you’re right. Charilor, this will never do!” She sprang up, spryly for her appearance. “We must clean up this tent at once.”
“You bet,” the younger Pervect said. As readily as they had set about destroying it, they began to tidy it. With a wave of her hand the elder Pervect reunited the shards of our shattered mirror, heaving it back into place on the hook on the wall. Charilor picked up all the scattered bottles and jars, and sorted them into various shelves and boxes.
“No, they don’t go there,” Tananda said, running after her. “Put that over there. No, the cosmetics go on that shelf! Please! Don’t mix the scale colorants with the nail varnishes! We won’t be able to find anything when you’re done!”
Charilor paid no attention, though Tananda pounded on her back with all her strength. I went to take her by the shoulders. They were shaking with fury. Her eyes blazed up at me.
“No wonder Vineezer didn’t want them in his shop anymore!”
“Take it easy, Little Sister,” I whispered. “Calm. Keep control. We’re nearly there.”
Stifling her anger, she watched as the two females transformed the ruin they had created into a perfectly neat and incomprehensible whole.
“There!” Vergetta said, dusting her hands together. “All better. Now, there’s just the little matter of the last quarter gold coin that you owe us for this week.”
This was it. I held myself tense as Tananda went humbly forward, her hands working together.
“I told you, we just don’t have it. You’ve got all the money we took in. We’re even talking about food money.”
“Now, now, chicken, it’s not so bad,” Vergetta said, picking up Tananda’s chin with a cocked finger. “You’ll eat tomorrow. What about bookings?”
Tananda showed her the appointment ledger. “We didn’t make any more for today. We didn’t know when you were coming, and frankly, you scare the other customers.”
“So?” Vergetta asked, raising a scaly eyebrow. “How do you plan to pay off the rest of your debt?”
“Service?” Tananda asked, hopefully. Only I saw the glint in her eye. “If you’ll let us give you the works . . . I mean, our best beauty treatment, everything, exfoliation, styling, manicure, makeup, I promise you’ll get your money’s worth. It’ll be more than a quarter gold coin’s value.”
The two Pervects conferred for a moment. “It’s not so standard, but why not?” the elder said. “Just this once, maybe.”
“Yeah,” Charilor agreed. “You do a pretty good job on the others. Okay.” She swung into the nearest, most recently repaired chair and settled back. The works. Careful, though. I’m ticklish.”
I moved in on her, fingers outstretched, to begin the scalp massage. I hoped neither of them could see the tremble in my hands.
It took longer than we expected, since none of us could find a thing in the rearranged shelves. Tananda kept up a pleasant line of meaningless chatter as she filed the tips off the Pervects’ claws and varnished each one a shimmering hue.
“The gold goes with your eyes,” she assured them. “All my Pervect customers like yellow, but this is a special shade I save for the best clients.”
Like every being who had sat, crouched, or hovered in those chairs during the last few weeks, Vergetta and Charilor preened and bridled when they beheld their gradual transformation in the glass.
“And now,” Tananda said, winding cotton batting in between their fingers so the top coat of the polish wouldn’t smear, “our cosmetician, Mr. Guido, will put the crowning touches on your beauty treatment.”
We both held our breath. Guido didn’t look at all tense. He knew the job he had to do.
“Okay, ladies,” he said, loading a brush with pigment. “Tell me if it tickles.”
In all his days as a reluctant beauty consultant he never had a finer hour. His strokes were ones of genius, drawing subtle tones of red, ochre, and more gold up to the tips of the Pervects’ large, point
ed ears, down to the sides of their cheeks and over their brows. Curlicues of jewel hues decorated their eyelids and around their cheekbones. An orange-red that did not shock against the green of their scales was applied to their lips. As they admired their reflections, Guido took up his fluorescent palette and added very subtle enhancements here and there, decorating the backs of their heads in a Baroque and complicated design. When at last he put down his brushes, Vergetta rose and picked him up in an enveloping hug.
“Honey, you’re a genius. And this is all original art?”
“I’ll never do another one like it,” the enforcer promised, a grin coming unbidden to his lips.
“Okay,” Charilor said to Tananda. “You’re right. This is worth more than a quarter coin. Good job.”
“I think so,” my little sister gushed, trying not to laugh in front of them. “Thank you. Now, enjoy your day. I think you’ll find it feels so different when you’ve been worked over . . . I mean, given the full treatment . . . I mean, been enhanced by A Tough, A Troll and A Trollop.”
Vergetta pinched her cheek. “You’re so cute. See you next week, then, darling.”
And the two Pervects sauntered out into the sunlight. We watched them until they were out of earshot.
“How long do we have until the paint starts to react?” Tananda asked.
“About fifteen minutes,” Guido replied.
“We had better depart from here, then,” I said. “When does Murgatroyd’s team come to retrieve the equipment?”
Tananda squinted at the sun. “In about an hour. I paid the damage deposit.”
“We won’t get it back,” I said, cheerfully. “Coming, Guido?”
“Just one more thing,” the enforcer said. He carefully put his slab of paints down on the floor, then smashed his foot through it. Wiping his foot on the bare ground, he grinned up at us. “I’ve been wanting to do that for over a week.”
“You’ve earned it,” I assured him. “Don Bruce will be very pleased with you that everything is going to be back as he prefers it.”
“As long as he don’t hear about how I did it.” He felt an eye with gingerly fingers. “Including the part about lettin’ myself get beaten up so they’d fall for the ploy.”
“He won’t hear it from us,” I promised. “It would bode ill for our reputations, as well.”
“In about five minutes, those two are going to come boiling back here,” Tananda said, digging out our D-hopper from its concealed space under the rug. “We’d better hop out of this dimension for a while. I would also like to put some ice on this eye, and maybe a little concealer.”
“Don’t do a thing,” I told her, taking her arm and escorting her out into the sun. “You look beautiful just the way you are.”
“Twice now those three T’s have gotten away with paying short,” Charilor complained, as she and Vergetta marched down the street toward their next stop.
“Don’t worry so much,” Vergetta said, waving a hand. “This time did they tell us to go away? No, they found a way to pay in kind. That shows they’re intimidated. They’ll behave themselves.”
“Good,” Charilor said “I’d hate a good cleaning to go unappreciated.”
“Oh, how I hate it when they grouse,” Vergetta agreed, tapping the ground with her cane. “But we do look gorgeous. Admit it.”
“Ex . . .” a Deveel said, peering curiously as he overtook them.
Vergetta nodded her head regally.
“What does ‘ex’ mean?” Charilor asked.
“Who knows? Might be the latest slang for ‘pretty hot mama.’”
Two Imp maidens carrying embroidered straw marketing bags passed them, then giggled loudly. Charilor spun, glaring. The girls hurried away. A male voice behind them spoke slowly, as if uncertain what he was saying.
“Extor . . . ?”
Vergetta rounded upon a Gnome, whose eyes widened as she glared at him. He disappeared in a puff of smoke.
“Extoringist,” said a little voice near their feet. “Mama, what does ‘extoringist’ mean?”
“Hush!” a Deveel matron said, hustling her toddler away from the furious Pervects.
“Extortionist!”
“Extortionist!”
“Extortionist!” More voices took up the cry.
“Where?” Vergetta demanded. “Where? Who’s saying that?”
“It’s right there,” a Klahdish male said, grinning right in their faces. “Says so, right on the back of your heads. Yeah, both of you!”
“Why, you . . . !” Charilor started for him, manicured nails out and ready to tear his face.
“That’s right,” a mournful voice broke over the sound of the crowd. It was the herbalist Vineezer, standing in the door of his dusty shop, his eyes glowing with unrequited revenge. “Those horrible women have been taking money away from poor old honest merchants like me for weeks, now.”
Vergetta shouted at him. “You! Did you do this to us?”
He only grinned, as the crowd continued to chant. “Extortionist, extortionist, extortionist!”
“They’ve robbed me, too!” yelled Melicronda, as her three strapping sons flanked their mother at the door of the wine shop. “Taking bread out of our mouths!”
Gradually, ominously, the faces of the shoppers in the crowd turned from idle interest to open anger. Instead of being frightened as Charilor and Vergetta lunged at their erstwhile victims, they moved toward them, seizing whatever they could find to use as weapons.
“We’d better get out of here,” Vergetta said, turning and fleeing up the street with the mob in pursuit.
“What about the plan?” Charilor wailed, as a thrown stone zinged past her ear. “We still need more money!”
Vergetta ducked a few stones as she felt in her purse for their D-hopper. “To the pits with the plan! The plan won’t go anywhere if we’re not alive to help! It’s those damned beauticians! They marked us! Labeled us! Now everyone knows who we are!”
“Grr!” Charilor growled. “I knew that ‘free makeover’ was too good to be true!”
Vergetta spun the wheels on the little device and grabbed for Charilor’s hand. She pushed the button as they dashed around a corner in between two shops. Her voice echoed on the air as they vanished. “As soon as the coast’s clear again, I’m going to go back into that tent and tear all three of them into pieces they can stuff in their own little cosmetic bottles!”
But no one was left to confront. Within an hour, five or six heavy, multi-legged creatures, supervised by a Deveel with a clipboard, arrived and cleared out everything, including a broken cosmetic palette on the floor. Shortly, there was nothing remaining of A Tough, A Troll and A Trollop but the sign hanging by one hook over the door.
An Imp matron passing by peered forlornly into the empty tent.
“Mr. Guido?” she called.
MYTH-TER RIGHT
By Robert Asprin and Jody Lynn Nye
I sauntered into the Palace of Possiltum like I owned the place, pretty much my normal way of entering a building. Massha’s summons had sounded urgent, but I wasn’t going to look as though I was in a hurry, in case the problem she was having was with someone here. I had been taking some time alone for myself, but I didn’t like it when my friends were in trouble.
“Hey, Kaufuman,” I called to one of the uniformed guards at the portcullis. “How’s it hanging?”
For a moment the pink-faced guy goggled. There was only one short, green-scaled guy with handsomely pointed ears, mysterious yellow eyes, and dagger-pointed four-inch fangs in the kingdom, to my knowledge. Kaufuman recognized me immediately.
“Lord Aahz, sir!” Immediately he straightened up and held his halberd higher. I threw him a salute as I went by, sighing over the inadequacy of sharp pointy sticks as deterrents to invasion. I had never been able to convince Hugh Badaxe to go more high-tech in the castle armament. He claimed that they could get it if they wanted it, but in the meantime it just meant more accidents. Couldn’t argue there. For wha
t Queen Hemlock paid her soldiers, she was lucky to get men who could hold the weapons the right way up, let alone ones who were as dedicated to her defense as the guys who served her and Rodrick.
I ran into the current Minister of Agriculture on the stairs leading to Skeeve’s—I mean, the quarters of the Court Magician. Even after a few months I was still not used to the status quo. “Hey, Beadle, Massha upstairs?”
“Oh, hello, Lord Aahz,” the square-built Klahd said, peering up from his scrolls of paperwork. The guy really needed a good secretary. “No, I believe the Lady Magician is in the Residence. The cottage. Out in the gardens.” He waved a vague hand.
“I know the way.”
Since she’d married General Hugh Badaxe and taken over Skeeve’s job as Court Magician, Massha had really blossomed. She’d gained confidence, starting to rely upon her own magikal skills as much as the wealth of gizmos that hung jingling about her more than generous figure.
When I got to the cottage, a wedding present from Don Bruce, Massha was hanging in the air like an orange balloon in the cathedral-ceilinged living room, supervising a couple of guys on a ladder who were replacing the chandelier.
“Careful, you cuties! There are sixty crystal drops on this one, and I want sixty to get the floor all at the same time. Get it?”
“Yes, Lady Massha,” they chorused as if they’d heard it before. But one of them accidentally knocked a hanging prism loose, and it fell.
“There, what did I tell you?” she exclaimed, tilting into a nosedive to save the crystal, but I got to it before she did.
“Did you lose something?” I asked, holding it up to her.
“Aahz, sweetie!” she cried, throwing her arms around me. Between her strength and her levitation bracelet, she lifted me right off the ground. “You came! Thank you.”
Myth-Told Tales Page 11