Dragons Luck

by Robert Asprin

  Most of the table was laughing now, and though it was at Lowell’s expense, the tense mood had broken. Lowell even managed a weak smile as he grabbed up a napkin and wiped his mouth.

  “Not an allegory this time?” Griffen said.

  “Oh, it is. It is. But the minx changed my water to vinegar!” Lowell said.

  That set off another round of laughter. All and all, Griffen figured the first meeting could have gone a lot worse.

  Thankfully, everyone decided to tactfully ignore the few shape-shifters who did divvy up the cake.

  Thirty-seven

  Griffen found himself mildly amused that such a loose assemblage of people would adhere to an orderly schedule. He realized that it would be next to impossible to run a conclave such as this without one. A schedule was what seemed to separate the conclave from a drinking party and gripe fest. Griffen wasn’t entirely sure he wouldn’t have preferred the latter.

  The meetings scheduled were more open-discussion forums. No decisions were made. Instead it was more on the order of agreements, treaties, and arrangements. All largely on a personal level. This was no governing body, there was no enforcement arm of the conclave keeping a check to make sure agreements were honored.

  It was simply that anyone who broke their word would have a mass of witnesses against them, and their word would never be honored again. That and being denied entry to any future conclave kept people from violating their oaths, or more often than not kept them from giving oaths in the first place. Griffen was beginning to realize how important one’s word and honor could be in supernatural circles.

  Then there were the demos. A few of these would be away from the hotels. One in particular that had caught Griffen’s eye was a voodoo demonstration by Estella at her home. That was a couple of days into the conclave, though. Today was something that also intrigued him but apparently didn’t need any special location. The hotel would do just fine.

  The room chosen for most of the demos was about half the size of the one in which the opening ceremonies had taken place. For the most part, this was Griffen’s first look at the business of conventions, and he had to admit he was impressed. The room the hotel provided met all the requirements. A small elevated stage had been assembled in no time flat on one end. In front of it were rows of folding chairs, padded and more comfortable than Griffen would have expected. Next to the stage their was a door leading to a small adjoining room, which they were using as a combination green room and changing room.

  Changing . . . that brought to mind another feature Griffen liked about the room. Locks on the inside, and no windows.

  “I have to admit I am fascinated by this demo, but don’t really understand why it’s being put on,” Griffen said.

  He was sitting in the front row, though at the end of the row, not center stage. Jay, the spokesmen for the shifters sat next to him, and next to Jay were two of the other upper-level shape changers. They were half-turned to watch the door as people filed in. As usual, people tended to clump into groups, with at least a few seats left empty between each group. However, Griffen noted that each of the groups attending the conclave had at least some members at this demonstration.

  “In this crowd, there are always many reasons for anything. As you may have noted,” Jay said.

  Griffen couldn’t help but nod. It seemed to him that no one in the supernatural communities seemed to do anything for simple motivations.

  “But really, a demonstration on shape-shifting?” Griffen said.

  “On different types of shape-shifting. Thus we educate not only the non-shape-shifters present, but broaden the horizons of the more limited shifters. If it weren’t for meetings such as these, some of those present would be lucky to meet even a handful of other shifters in their entire lifetimes. Despite the concentration here, we are not all that common,” Jay said.

  “Not the most important.”

  This was said by the gravelly-voiced shifter Griffen had noted that Jay and the others seemed to defer to. Griffen hadn’t spoken much to him, just enough to catch that he was calling himself “Tail” despite the fact that he didn’t seem to have one. Griffen checked.

  In fact, he looked much like someone he would expect to find sleeping under a bench in Jackson Square. Yet Jay instantly lowered his eyes, and his tone went respectful.

  “What is?” Jay asked.

  “Competition.”

  Jay and the other shifter nodded and turned back to Griffen.

  “I’m not sure I agree that the competition aspect is the most important, but it certainly is prevalent,” he said.

  “What do you mean?” Griffen inquired.

  “Well, all those serving in this demonstration are volunteers. Which means at very least they have to be confident enough to show off in front of a crowd of strangers. Show off is what they do, and most of those expect to have the most impressive tricks. Truly remarkable demonstrations win the renown of the rest of the shifter communities.”

  Griffen couldn’t help smiling.

  “Are there prizes? Trophies? Best of show?”

  “Sometimes.” Jay smiled back.

  The other shifter nodded, and through his matted beard Griffen saw his lips twist into what had to be a smile.

  “Got me an apprentice years back from one of these. No one knew where he came from, but, boy, could he work it,” Tail said.

  “All the participants are in the other room right now waiting for their big moments. You can bet the tension level is fierce. That’s why I am allowing my colleague to take the honor of presenting. I’ve enough pressure with all the damnable meetings.”

  As if on cue, the door to the adjoining room opened and in walked the last of the shape-shifter leaders. He was a good head and a half shorter than Griffen, so that he looked small even on the elevated stage. His bald head glistened from perspiration, and he licked his lips nervously as he stepped up to a podium located in the corner of the stage.

  “Right, I’m sure you are all anxious to get started, but we decided to wait fifteen minutes past the scheduled time to let stragglers trickle in before we lock the doors.”

  He paused while a few people waiting by the main doors closed and locked them. He pulled out a set of note cards and started to riffle through them.

  “Right, before we get started. Please keep all questions to the end or, better yet, save them for conversation later. Just make sure to keep an eye on any norms about if you are talking in the bar. Along those lines, no photography, no video. Violators will, of course, be disemboweled.”

  A low ripple of laughter spread through the room. Griffen joined in, though a little bitterly. He tried not to dwell on how flat his jokes had fallen the other night.

  “Okay, then, on with the show.”

  The presenter cleared his throat and glued his eyes on his cards as he began to recite in a slow monotone. Griffen could see why the shifters had chosen Jay to talk during the meetings.

  “There are, of course, as many different ways of shifting as there are types of shifters. Some are born with their gifts, some cursed, some find means through spells and science. It all comes down to variety, which is of course what shape-shifting is all about.”

  The door to the adjoining room opened again and two people walked onto the stage. One, a young man in a bathrobe. The other, a tough-looking man dressed in black jeans and a leather vest whom Griffen had seen standing with the loup garou.

  “Take, for example, the ‘werewolf’ of legend. Here we have two very different varieties of wolf-based shifter. Gustov here is of the more common variety: He finds changing his skin easier under the light of a full moon and nearly impossible when the moon is dark. The moon is nearly full this time of month, so even in day he can assume his other form.”

  Griffen watched frankly amazed as the young man somewhat nervously removed his bathrobe, carefully draping it so that at no time were his privates exposed to the audience. There were a few catcalls, but not many, and those that came were friendly.


  Then, with a sheepish smile, Gustov lifted the robe in front of him. He held it open, blocking off everything from the eyes down, then dropped it. By the time it hit the floor, a large gray wolf stood where he had been.

  The presenter only briefly glanced up from his cards.

  “Notice the seamlessness of the change. None of the pain and agony Hollywood has become prone to showing in their special-effects pictures. Gustov is lucky, as there are indeed those who cannot change without pain, just as there are those who experience transcendent ecstasy as their bodies reconfigure. Kevin here, being what is commonly dubbed the loup garou, can change forms just as quickly but, by slowing and controlling the change, can take more than wolf form.”

  Again, Griffen was astounded. His own encounters with such things had been brief and often so surprising that he didn’t notice the change till after it happened. He watched Kevin grow his nails and teeth to claws and fangs, then back again, then shift to wolf in an eyeblink. Then, with a small quiver, his form surged and there on the podium was a six-foot monster that combined all the best, or worst, attributes of man and wolf.

  Many in the audience gasped, though not any of the group leaders. Griffen, conscious of the fact that several eyes seemed to flick to him on occasion, had assumed a poker face. Difficult though it was to maintain.

  “Startling, isn’t it?” said the presenter. It was clear he had expected this reaction and put it on his note cards. “Not quite like anything Hollywood has come up with. Of course, part of that is because each garou tailors their form to what works best for them. This is Kevin’s wolf, and there will be none other exactly like it.”

  Jay muttered next to Griffen.

  “Unless it’s a good doppelganger or mimic.”

  “What was that?” Griffen said.

  “Oh, nothing. These are good basics, but it’s such a broad topic. Putting together an hour demonstration cuts off a lot of possibilities, you know,” Jay said.

  Meanwhile, both of those onstage had become human-shaped again, Gustov hastily scooping up his bathrobe. Kevin was still fully dressed.

  “How’d he do that without ripping his clothes?” someone called out. Griffen looked around and saw that it was one of the members of Estella’s church.

  “What did I say about questions?” the presenter said, irritated.

  There was a bit of a murmur from the crowd. The presenter looked a bit desperately at Jay and his fellow shifters, and received nods from them. He shrugged.

  “Right, just this once, but after this, no more interruption.”

  The crowd settled again.

  “To keep it simple, clothes are a specialty skill. Some actually change the clothes themselves, some . . . well, let’s just say the clothes go somewhere else till they are needed again. Now, this is important: Most shifters who don’t have to strip or rip through their clothes when they change don’t know how they do it. They don’t need to, they just do it, and since it is a rare thing, it isn’t really studied or understood. No one else in today’s demonstration can manage the trick, so if you have the plums, buy him a drink and ask. Just keep in mind the parable of the centipede that questioned its own feet, okay?”

  The two headed off the stage, and another figure came out of the door. She was easily one of the most beautiful women Griffen had ever seen. Tall and thin, curved enough that the one-size-fits-all bathrobe seemed strained top and bottom. Her long black hair fell straight to the small of her back.

  She paused at the edge of the stage, making sure she had the crowd’s attention, and let the robe fall away. She strode nude onto the center of the stage.

  The presenter stared openly for a few moments, till she caught his eye and quirked an eyebrow at him. He flushed and almost dropped his cards trying to find his place again.

  “Uhhh, um . . . yes. Variety is important. Some of the most subtle tricks are also the hardest. For example, changing one’s hair and skin color.”

  The woman closed her eyes and seemed to tense. At first it was gradual, her dark hair lightened, then reddened, then began to gleam. Her skin became tan, then brown, then black. Then she smiled and began to walk across the stage like a model walking a catwalk, and her skin began to swirl.

  Multicolor whirls no natural skin tone could hold started to move across her skin. Blues and greens and purples blended and flowed and moved over her. Her hair was filled with metallic and jewel tones that seemed to flash into existence, then fade back.

  Then the pigments of her skin become shapes. As if a film projector was using her as a screen, what started as unnatural colors became flapping songbirds in a rainbow of colors. All alive and realistic, like the world’s greatest tattoo. An animated tattoo.

  The audience burst into applause.

  “Of course, some tricks aren’t subtle at all,” the presenter said.

  The woman threw her head back and, in midstride, she burst apart. Griffen was half-out of his chair, thinking something had gone horribly wrong. His jaw dropped as he realized the woman had become the birds, a hundred of them flapping about. A cyclone of color that seemed to dip, as if bowing, then flew off the stage and back out the door.

  The audience was stunned silent by the showmanship of it all.

  The presenter shook his head, clearly having been overwhelmed, too. And he had been expecting it.

  “Keep in mind,” he said, “that even in the multiple forms her mass had not changed. This, among other things, keeps her from ranking among the highest shape-shifters.”

  Griffen eased back down in his chair but leaned over to whisper to Jay.

  “That may be so, but I don’t understand why someone with that kind of confidence hasn’t pulled up a chair with you four.”

  “Maybe she wants to be invited,” Jay said thoughtfully.

  Tail, the wild-haired shifter next to him, laughed in his gravelly voice.

  “Invite her to sit? Ha! I’m inviting her to dinner.”

  Apparently, despite the showstopping number, she was not the last on the docket for this demonstration. The presentation went on.

  “Last but not least, one should keep in mind how broad the term ‘shape-shifter’ really is. There are many who are classified in other groups who have the means to change their form.”

  For a panicky moment Griffen thought he, as a dragon, was going to be called on to perform. Thankfully, the door opened one more time and out stepped the changeling girl Tammy. She cast a brief, but heated, glance over her shoulder. Griffen was good at reading faces, and knew jealousy when he saw it. Tammy was feeling like a follow-up act.

  She seemed to have decided to forgo the bathrobe.

  She stalked onto the stage, clearly trying for a model strut, but she didn’t have the attitude. Her fey-enhanced youth made her look almost like a child, or at least girl barely out of puberty. Especially compared to the woman who had just vacated the stage. Still, she had a raw appeal that made Griffen feel a little guilty. Very much the gamine.

  “Tammy here is one of our new changeling attendees. As this has been their first time attending, she has volunteered to show off some of her shifting abilities.”

  Tammy stood with her feet together and threw her arms up into the air, arching her back and throwing her head back. With an audible creak, she seemed slowly to lengthen, her limbs especially growing spindly and long. Her skin went a dark nutty brown, and began to roughen. Green shoots started to extend from her fingers.

  Tammy stood as a small cherry tree, barely seven feet high. Her roots spread over the stage, a light smattering of soft petals drifting from her branches.

  There was a brief bit of applause. This was not as startling as the demonstration before, but it was something different. The cherry blossoms reddened, as if she were blushing.

  Griffen heard a low growling from Tail. He looked over curious, to see the man reach into one of his pockets and pull out a small stone. Before Griffen could react, the stone had been hurled toward the stage. Right at one of the
leafy branches.

  The stone passed through the branch and struck the wall behind.

  What had been a tree before was instantly Tammy again.

  Though her limbs were a little longer, her skin a little woody in color, she was still very much human shape. There was an angry burst of conversation from the other shape-shifters in the audience.

  “Fifteen percent shifting, eighty-five percent fairy glamour. When the other participants agreed to only use shifting, even if they had other abilities,” Tail said.

  There was a hiss from one of the shifters, a boo from another. Tammy, now fully her old self and quite naked and exposed in front of the audience, burst into tears. She ran off the stage and out of the room as the presenter tried to calm everyone down.

  Griffen couldn’t help but feel sorry for her. He joined the presenter on stage, using his position as moderator to send everyone away. Competition aside, this was supposed to have been a friendly demonstration. And after the garou’s specialty trick with his clothes, picking on the changeling for her glamour seemed . . . petty.

  Thirty-eight

  Taking advantage of an open period in his schedule, Griffen tried to hook up with Slim to double-check the arrangements for the next day’s activities. Though the street entertainer had no official standing in the running of the conclave, he had proved to be a great help at seeing to the myriad of details that went into running an event, as well as serving as a liaison with the local groups.

  The problem was, he wasn’t always that easy to find.

  He was one of those that tended to keep his cell phone turned off except when he was making a call, which made that avenue of communication iffy at best. What was worse, he didn’t have any particular movement or behavior patterns, making his whereabouts unpredictable. While he would occasionally hang out with the other animal-control people at the conclave, for the most part he was a loner, seeming to prefer his own company.

  One place there was always a chance of finding someone from the conclave was the hotel lobby bar. While the attendees were mostly into exploring the wilds of the Quarter and the locals tended to duck out to drink at their habitual watering holes, the lobby bar was convenient for a quick drink or conversation.