“Honey, you're a genius. And this is all original art?”
“Ill 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 youll 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 what 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.”
“So,” I said, when I got my breath back, “what's the problem?”
“Come this way,” Massha said, leading me through the archway into the kitchen-dining area. “We can get some privacy in here. I love this house to pieces, but it's cozy — read ‘small’ in real estate terms.” She gestured to a large carved wooden chair with a cushion on the seat and a few small pillows to stuff in between sore lumbar muscles and the tall curved back. “That's Hugh's favorite chair. It's low slung so he can stick his legs out in front of him. He hates footstools.”
“Too easy to knock out from under you in a confrontation,” I agreed. Badaxe and I had been on opposite sides at one time, but never on the subject of strategy. “Glad to hear he's not going soft even though he went in for wedded bliss.”
“It's great,” Massha said, firmly. “When you find the right person, it's heaven. You should try it, Aahz.”
“Been there, done that, bought the T-shirt,” I said, settling into the chair with pleasure. It really was comfortable.
She drew me a mug of beer from a cask in a cradle on the counter. All the comforts of home. “So, what's so urgent? You've evaded the question twice. I know there's a favor involved, but we're old friends. The answer's yes on almost anything, exceptions being on things like getting married again.”
Massha let her antigravs bring her down to earth, and she perched on the front of a handsome upholstered chair made to her measure. I could have curled up in it side-ways.
“I just feel awkward knowing I have to call in a favor,” Massha said with a sigh. “Do you do much formal hunting?”
“No. If I'm hungry I know a thousand restaurants a D-hop away. If I'm really stuck out in the boonies I'll kill and eat whatever looks edible, no ceremony involved. The formal stuffs like the guy said, ‘the unspeakable in pursuit of the uneatable.’” I glanced at her. She was plucking at the edge of her orange harem pants with uneasy fingers. “Why don't you take riding lessons from Hugh?”
Massha dropped the filmy cloth and gave me an exasperated expression. “Aahz, honey, look at me. You've known me for years. Can you see me on a horse?”
“Well, no,” I admitted. Massha had no illusions about her figure, and I cared enough about her as a friend not to pretend I didn't understand. “But you don't expect me to do the riding, do you? I scare the hell out of horses.”
“Not these,” she assured me hastily. “They'll handle a Pervect. They're trained to hunt beside dragons.”
Some memory stirred. “Massha,” I asked warily. “How'd you get involved with the Wylde Hunt?”
“Princess Gloriannamarjolie is an old pal,” Massha said. “I was her babysitter for a while on Brakespear. She was a real brat when she was six or seven. No one had ever said ‘no’ to her before I did. There were some pretty fierce tantrums before she learned her limits. She liked it when I did magik for her, and I thought there was a great girl inside all that spoiled nonsense. We achieved a mutual respect, and we've been corresponding off and on for years. Now she's old enough to lead the hunt, and she asked for my help.”
“She's the quarry? It's a suicide mission!” Unlike the Klahds, who rode horses and followed a pack of dogs after fox-wolves over fields and through forests, a brutal enough sport, Brakespear had a pack of dragons that pursued a wily princess across the landscape. The hunt began at dawn. If the princess kept away from the hunters until sunset she was free. If the dragons caught up with her, well, there usually wasn't much left The mask or ears was awarded to the winning hunter. I was appalled that this was still going on.
Massha read the look on my face. “Those days are gone. It's only scent-hunting now. Glory's got to keep away from the hounds until sunset. The hunters are judged on style, fair play, riding, control of their dragons, and, if they're lucky, catching up with the princess. She's been training all her life for this. She's ready.”
“But for this well need a dragon for the pack. We haven't got one.”
“Yes, we have,” Massha said, with a little coy smile that should have sent me racing out the door as soon as I saw it. “I borrowed one.” She opened the back door of the cottage. A sinuous blue form twisted around in its own length at the noise, recognized me, and came streaking toward me. It knocked me over and started licking my face with a long pink tongue and breath that smelled like a volcano's dung heap.
“Gleep!” it carolled joyfully, in between slurps.
“Dammit, get off me!” I roared. Massha put a hand in Gleep's collar and hauled him back. I sat up, wiping the slime off with my sleeve. “You say you borrowed Gleep? Skeeve's not here?”
“No,” Massha admitted.
“Then who's gonna handle this fool lizard?” I asked. Gleep rolled his large blue eyes at me, wanting to get loose and greet me again.
“I've agreed to undertake the task,” said Nunzio, coming in the same door as the dragon, but at a easier pace. “We get along pretty well, don't we, boy?”
“Gleep!” Gleep agreed, trotting over to lave the Mob man with the Tongue of Doom.
“So why do you need me?” I asked Massha. Slurp. Gleep trotted back and soaked me again. I wiped the disgusting wetness off with the back of my hand. “… Me, the overgrown newt and Nunzio?” Gleep gave me a look of adoration mingled with reproach, or maybe I was reading too much into his expression. He was still a baby, for all that he was twice as big as any of us except Chumley.
“There's still a prize,” Massha said. “For the hunter who bags the princess, or, if she's better than they are, earns the highest points, the finest treasure the king has to offer. And I've got to tell you, Aahz, Brakespear has some terrifically hot stuff in the treasury. As crown princess, Glory had the keys to the playground. We used to go down there and try things on. It was enough to give a girl dreams.”
I liked the sound of the treasure, but I was too old a hand to believe in a free lunch for the guy who could stay on his horse the longest. “What's the catch?” I asked.
“Glory has been out looking over the course every day for the last three months. She's been seeing … well, shadows or shapes. She's certain someone's following her over the landscape, getting a look at where she's planning to go. She's afraid that whoever it is is out to interfere with the hunt Every once in a while they get protesters who picket the hunt, calling it brutal and outdated. Glory's dad has guards posted around, and they know the signs of an incipient demonstration. Whoever's been out there is more subtle than that. And the king has recently acquired a few terrific goodies for the treasury, a couple of them genuinely magikal. The prize is likely to be one of those. Glory wants her hunt to be fair and square. It's dangerous, you know, hot stuff. People can still get killed, even though it's for fun. If anyone's messing with it, I want it stopped.”
“All right,” I
said. “You've convinced me. Your Princess Glory sounds like she's reading all the signs right”
Massha leaped up and hugged me again. “So you'll do it?”
“Ill do it,” I gasped out. Joyfully, Gleep sprang over and licked me again. “Dammit, don't do that!”
The following week found me wearing ridiculous breeches and a jacket that only needed the too-tight sleeves to tie behind my back to make it fit for lunatics. I refused outright to put on the helmetlike hat a bunch of the participants were wearing, preferring to depend upon the toughness of my Pervect skull and save my reputation as a snappy dresser from total ruin. The boots were the only things I liked: shiny black leather with just enough heel to catch the stirrups but wouldn't make me trip while back down on terra firma.
It was the day before the hunt. My borrowed mount, a hiphippohippus named Fireball, came from Gloriannamarjolie's own stables, a buckskin mount like a cross between a horse and a rhinoceros. Its big barrel-like body had one deep, diagonal ridge running from midpoint down to a leg's length beneath the withers. It had delicate legs for its build, with bunched muscles in the shoulders and haunches that would make it a good jumper. The beast's spoon-shaped ears swiveled back and forth as I climbed aboard to try it out for size. The natural saddle ridge was suprisingly comfortable. A harness buckled about his barrel in front of the rider provided reins and stirrups. The grooms on both sides shortened the stirrups considerably until my feet fit into them. Not one adult Brakespearan I saw was my height. All of them were at least a head taller, usually more. When the princess had taken us on a welcome tour of the palace guard I felt like I was walking through a forest.
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