E.Godz

by Robert Asprin

  A light burned inside the bookshop; several, in fact. Actually, the place was lit up like Christmas at Macy's and the crowds within were almost as thick. As soon as Dov opened the door and stepped inside, he found himself up to his eyebrows in women. They came in as many shapes and colors as that candy gel used to make chewy fish, worms, teddy bears, sharks, spiders, and the whole Noah's ark of tooth-rotting fauna. Tall, short, fat, thin, meek, bold, laughing, grim, their skin, eyes, and hair of every color found in nature or made possible through chemistry, cosmetics, and contact lenses, they surged and swarmed around the bookshelves, wicker shopping baskets on their arms piled high with purchases.

  Dov felt his heart begin to beat faster with fear. It wasn't that he was afraid of being trampled or shoved. He certainly wasn't scared of women per se. What had him spooked was the way that every single one of the ladies present acted as if he weren't there. Their glances either bounced off him entirely or went right through him, seeing nothing where he stood. The phenomenon wasn't caused by active hostility on their part or even common rudeness. The room pulsed with magical power, more than Dov had ever felt centered in one spot before. They were the source of the power and its victims, for it was the power itself that possessed them and made them unable to recognize that Dov existed.

  It was very disconcerting. He didn't know what to do. He thought about calling out Fiorella's name, but stopped short of doing it. What if the power caged within this room had also rendered him inaudible? What if it were only a matter of time before he dissolved clear out of reality and ended up ... where?

  "Mr. Godz?" A shapely green-eyed blonde materialized at Dov's side and took him by the hand. "I'm Fiorella; so pleased to meet you."

  He tried to smile at her, but he was still fast in the thrall of unreasoning fear. She gave him a sympathetic look. "Oh dear," she said. "You poor darling, have we really got the power turned on that high? I'm so sorry. Come with me; it's better in the storeroom."

  Dov allowed himself to be led like a little child on a shopping expedition with Mommy. "You mustn't feel bad," she told him. "This happens a lot on nights when we offer extended hours for shopping."

  "Is it a ... woman's magic thing?" Dov asked, his voice hoarse and fragile.

  Fiorella showed her dimples. "Perhaps it is. Most of my female customers spend their worldly days being treated a little better than furniture. The people around them at home or at work or in the social whirl never seem to see them unless they absolutely must. Sometimes it's because they aren't pretty enough, or young enough, or wearing the right clothes, or holding down the right sort of job. They're the mothers with small children who get shoved aside by the people who think anything outside of an office isn't real work. They're the women who accomplish great things but who only turn visible when someone wants to ask them when they're going to get married and have kids. They're the ladies who wear size 18 dresses who can't get a salesclerk to notice that they want to buy the lipstick that the size 2 model is wearing. They were once the eleven-year-old girls who wanted to play Spin-the-Particle-Accelerator instead of Spin-the-Bottle. They make most men and some women nervous. And do you know what else? They don't like being invisible. That's why they come here, seeking magic, trying to learn how to be seen again. Meanwhile, as long as there are enough of them banded together in one place, they automatically invoke the power to treat others the way they've been treated themselves. They can't help it."

  While she spoke, Fiorella simultaneously conducted Dov through the thick of the females thronging her store, behind the main display counter, and out via a bead-hung doorway. The farther they went from the open-to-the-public part of Ye Cat and Cauldron, the better he felt, so he made no objection when she took him straight through the little parlor where she'd entertained Peez. A door at the far end of the Lilith Lair opened onto a narrow flight of stone steps that went down into the earth. A gust of warm air from below blew over his face and dried the beads of nervous sweat from his brow as he and Fiorella descended, a breeze that smelled of Oriental spices.

  The steps ended in a room that was empty except for a wide green velvet divan, a marble-topped table bearing a crystal decanter and two silver goblets, and a pair of wooden chairs so straight-backed and uncomfortable-looking that they would have pleased even the critical eye of a Puritan elder. The walls were covered with trompe l'oeil paper printed to resemble the shelves of a well-stocked library.

  "I thought you said you were taking me to a storeroom," Dov said, looking around uncertainly.

  "This is it." Fiorella reached out and tapped the spine of the book closest to her. Its outline shimmered and an actual book popped out of the wall like toast from a toaster. The witch-queen passed it to Dov so that he could examine its solidity. The blank spot its removal had left in the wallpaper was already refilled by a fresh volume. "A little magic prevents a lot of storage problems, which can be the making or breaking of a small book business," she explained. "Plus it cuts down on the need for reserves against returns."

  "Fascinating." Dov riffled through the pages, then handed the book to her again. She put it back in its original site. The replacement volume very agreeably sank into the wall to accommodate its twin's return.

  "I was so glad to hear from you tonight," Fiorella said, waving him into one of the wooden chairs. "I've been looking forward to our meeting ever since your sister stopped by."

  "How was she?" Dov blurted. The question surprised him. It just wasn't the sort of thing he'd expect himself to say. An inquiry as to whether or not Peez had secured Fiorella's backing for the company takeover, maybe; a query about any deals Peez might have offered the witch-queen so that he might, in turn, better them, perhaps. But a simple question about her health and well-being? A sincere one, no less? Astounding.

  Because it was sincere; Dov couldn't deny that. He actually cared enough about Peez to ask after her! This was something new for him. How had it happened?

  And why shouldn't it happen? he thought fiercely, as though someone had challenged his right to feel concern for her. She's my sister, dammit! We're family! Why the hell shouldn't I want to know how she is?

  "Just fine," Fiorella replied, sitting opposite Dov and filling the goblets. "A trifle disappointed that I couldn't bring myself to give her my unqualified support, but otherwise well. You see, I like to hear both sides of most things before I make up my mind. That's why I'm so glad that you've finally come to see me. I'd like to choose between you and your sister for the directorship of E. Godz, Inc., after Edwina—"

  Dov burst into tears.

  He was still shaking with sobs as he felt Fiorella move nearer and put her arms around him. She stroked his hair and whispered soft words of comfort, helped him to his feet, led him to the green velvet divan and lay down beside him, cradling him to her. He cried and cried until all of his tears were gone. Then he closed his eyes tight, took a deep breath, blew it out forcefully, and thrust himself out of Fiorella's embrace.

  "I am such an idiot," he said, sitting on the edge of the divan with his head in his hands.

  "Probably," Fiorella said, being amenable. "But would you mind specifying what brought on that little bout of personal evaluation?"

  "Very funny. I've got a friend you should meet: He's jewelry, but the two of you would get along fine in spite of that. The two of you, working together, should be able to get my ego whittled down to sand-grain size without breaking a sweat."

  "Jewelry doesn't sweat. Do you mean you're a fool for crying, or for crying in front of me?" The witch-queen remained comfortably stretched out on the divan like a modern day Cleopatra. "Put your mind at ease, Mr. Godz: Men have been allowed to cry in public since the '90s, and not just over football games. Or are you afraid your outburst will make me think less of you as the potential head of E. Godz, Inc.? Au contraire, it's a blessing to find a CEO who's got human emotions. Why do you think we call it sympathetic magic?"

  Dov sat up a little straighter, feeling the old self-confidence trickling bac
k into his bones. "Really?" he asked.

  Fiorella nodded. "Considering all the stress you're under, I'd be repulsed if you didn't show a little emotion. Mr. Godz, what I do within the spiritual path I've chosen—what all of us who follow such paths do—is to seek connection. If I wanted a leader who was cold and detached from everything except the dictates of his own ego—" She sighed. "Never mind. I hate discussing politics."

  "It has been a rough time for me," Dov admitted. "I've spent most of it, ever since I heard about the report from Mother's doctor, trying not to think about what's coming. It all seems so ... strange to me."

  "You're not the only one," Fiorella said. "I must say, when I first heard about poor Edwina's condition, I was shocked."

  "Of course you were. You and she have been more than business associates, right? When a friend tells you her doctor's only given her a short time to live—"

  "Oh, it wasn't that so much as— Well, yes, it was that, but what struck me as even more shocking was that Edwina not only went to a common M.D., but that she actually believed what he told her. In all the years that I've known your mother, I can count the times she's seen mainstream medicos on the fingers of one hand. Frankly, I think she's only gone to see them that many times for tax purposes."

  "Tax purposes?" Dov's right eyebrow lifted.

  "Tax purposes, insurance purposes, something like that. You know, like when you want to take out a new policy and it calls for a physical? Most insurance companies won't accept forms that are signed by herbalists, no matters how reputable. Edwina just doesn't trust ordinary doctors; says their diagnoses are a crapshoot and they're too closed-minded to accept alternative methods of healing. I'd have thought that if one of them told her she was about to die, she'd laugh in his face and—" Abruptly, the witch-queen stopped talking. She stared at Dov closely. "Mr. Godz?" she inquired apprehensively. "Mr. Godz, is something wrong?"

  "No," said Dov, his voice pitched to that soft, scary level that meant he'd had a very telling revelation. "Nothing's wrong at all. In fact, everything you've just told me is so very, very right that I was a fool not to notice it before now."

  He stood up and bowed his head slightly to the witch-queen. "It's been a pleasure, but I have to go. Now. Will you excuse me? I'll see myself out."

  Fiorella swung her legs off the divan and reached out a staying hand, "Wait!" she cried. "At least let me escort you back through the store. All that power—"

  "Unnecessary," Dov replied as he stalked out. "Now I'll be able to stand it. Power and I are old friends. You might even say we're family."

  Chapter Seventeen

  Midnight in Salem, Massachusetts.

  The witching hour found Dov Godz slumped in his rental car in front of Ye Cat and Cauldron engaged in high wizardry of the most puissant order, namely using his palmtop to hack into the records of the M.D. who had supposedly pronounced his mother's death sentence. First he used his own tech skills, enhanced by every drop of magic at his command, to force a passage into Edwina's personal financial records, found evidence of payment rendered for a recent physical examination (for insurance purposes, as he had surmised), and obtained the examining physician's name from that.

  Accessing the doctor's records was relatively simple.

  Locating a copy of the report that the M.D. had e-mailed to the insurance company was child's play.

  Discovering that, in the doctor's professional opinion, Edwina Godz would live to see ninety, was a kick in the head.

  Deciding that maybe Edwina would not live to see ninety more seconds of life if he had anything to say about it, was merely the vindictive desire of a moment, cast aside almost as soon as brought to mind. Funny how relief at knowing that his mother wasn't at death's doorstep after all was so quickly replaced by the urge to send her there, special delivery.

  Maybe he couldn't kill her, but he sure as hell was going to make her pay for what she'd done to him.

  "And Peez, too," he muttered at the glowing screen of his palmtop. "Damn it, Edwina, what the hell were you thinking, putting us through this? Especially Peez. She's always been more concerned about you than I ever was. She gets hurt too much, too easily, and you knew it! Or you should have known it, if you'd paid half a lick of attention to either of us. Why did you do it, Edwina? Nothing good on TV?" He snapped the palmtop shut, started up the car, and drove back to his bed-and-breakfast, thinking dark thoughts all the way.

  The front door was locked and deadbolted when he got there. House rules clearly posted in his room indicated that all guests should either plan on being back by midnight or being elsewhere until six the next morning. Dov never was one for conforming to other people's plans. He stroked one fingertip over both locks and they yielded to him soundlessly.

  As he climbed the stairs and opened the door to his bedroom he was still immersed in thoughts of vague payback plots to invoke against his mother. He was so distracted that at first he took the scene awaiting him—right in the middle of his bed, no less—for an illusion.

  Ammi the amulet, Dov's faithful companion throughout his recent travels, was propped up on a lace-covered throw pillow, its silver eyes fixed on the wavering apparition of a teddy bear that floated in the air just above the headboard. Bear and amulet were in the middle of a very animated conversation:

  "So then I says to her, I says, 'Peezie-pie, I jes' wuuvs New Owleenz all to eensy- beansy pieces, yes I does, but oo isn't doing um's job by camping out in this swamp like a brain-dead bullfrog!'" The ghostly bear looked angry and disgusted. "I says, 'You better get cracking, get back in the saddle, back on the road, or else your brother's going to beat you to the punch and steal the company out from under your nose!' And you know what she says to that?"

  "No," Ammi replied. "But if you've got an ounce of mercy in your stuffing, you'll tell me without resorting to that dumbass baby-talk!"

  "Hey, it keeps her happy, let's her believe you can hold onto your childhood forever." The bear grinned. "Like Edwina says, play 'em right and children are easy to lead anywhere you want them to go."

  "Easy for her, maybe." Ammi snorted.

  "Preach on," said the bear, in total agreement with the amulet. "I don't know what's been happening, but the more Peez travels, the harder it gets for me to guide her the way I want her to go. I sure could use Edwina's help on this, but whenever I try to get some feedback she says I should stick to giving her my latest surveillance report."

  "Tell me about it. I've been giving her the lowdown on what her precious sonny boy's been up to, right on schedule, but when I ask her for maybe a little help with getting him to cooperate with some of my plans, she clams up."

  "Plans?"

  "Two words: chest hair. I've been trying to get him to shave it off for ages."

  "That's barbaric!" the bear exclaimed, crossing his paws protectively over his own furry chest. "No wonder Edwina wouldn't—"

  "Wouldn't what?" Dov asked, his voice dangerously free of all emotion as he stepped into the bedroom.

  "Oops. Busted," said the phantom bear. "Tough luck, Ammi. At least my half of the operation's still safe. Ta-ta!" The apparition vanished just as Dov's fist closed over the little amulet.

  "All right," Dov told Ammi. "Start talking."

  "I don't have any idea what you mean," Ammi replied, trying to act innocent and failing spectacularly.

  "Sure you don't. And I won't have any idea how you managed to get flushed down the toilet. Maybe the thought of spending the rest of your unnatural born days with sewage doesn't scare you. Maybe you figure that Edwina will rescue her faithful little spy. Maybe you've got some kind of homing device inside you and maybe you don't, but it all comes down to this: Are you feeling lucky, punk?"

  "Aaaaiieee!" Ammi shrilled so loudly that it was even odds whether or not he'd wake up everyone in the B&B. "Not that! Anything but that! I'll tell you everything I know, only please, I beg you, I implore you, I cast myself upon your mercy and plead with you: Stop with the bad Clint Eastwood imitations! There's
only so much that mortal silver can stand!"

  Dov scowled. He thought he did a very good Clint Eastwood. "Fine," he said, biting off the word short. "Deal. Talk."

  "There's not a whole lot for me to say that you don't already know," Ammi began. "Edwina contacted Teddy Tumtum and me on the q.t., asking us to keep closer tabs on you and Peez than—"

  "Closer tabs on us?" Dov cut in. "How long have you been spying on us?"

  "How long has Peez had that blabbermouth bear?"

  "Almost forever. But what about me, then? You've been part of my office equipment from the first, but that leaves some pretty big stretches of my life unaccounted for. I expected more thorough work from Edwina when it comes to domestic espionage."

  "Then don't sweat it 'cause she didn't let you down. Your sister clings to that bear, so he was the logical place to lodge a listening post. You, on the other hand, haven't got any one thing that's special to you, so Edwina simply scattered dozens of information- gathering devices throughout your life. It would've been too complicated to do that once you hit the road, though, so she tapped me to take charge."

  "And you talked your way into my confidence. Very neat, Ammi; very smooth. I ought to flush you for that, at the very least."

  "Aw, come on, Dov, you know you don't mean it," the little amulet wheedled. "I admit that it was just a job to me at first, but the longer I traveled with you, the more I got to know you and like you. I know that I'm only a trinket and I'm not supposed to have feelings for anything or anyone, but when it comes to you, I do."

  "Nice try. If I made a habit of believing in the impossible, you might have a fighting chance of fooling me some more."