Myth-ion Improbable m-11

by Robert Asprin

  As I had hoped when I saw the little town, right in the middle was a place that looked a lot like Audry's. It was empty and we went in, taking what I was starting to think of as our normal table. I slouched in a chair in front of the window, glad to still be alive.

  There was only one thing bad about the carrot juice. When you came down off of it, you came down hard. Right now, if we were going to get to Donner by the middle of the night, I needed another fix or two of the golden liquor.

  This place didn't just look like Audry's; it could have been Audry's. And when the guy with the white apron and dirty rag came out of the back room, I wasn't surprised in the slightest.

  "What can I get for you, strangers?"

  "If you wouldn't mind," I said before either Tanda or Aahz could speak, "could I trouble you for three glasses of your best?"

  The guy beamed, wiped his hands with the towel, and said the words I was expecting.

  "Not a problem. Sure I couldn't interest you folks in some lunch as well? Just got a fresh wagon-load in. Everything's really crisp. You all need your strength, what with the round- up coming."

  "Thanks, partner," I said. "That sounds really good, but I think we'll just start with the juice right now, if you don't mind."

  "Not at all," he said.

  A few moments later he came back with three glasses of the carrot juice, smiled at us as he put them down, then headed off into the kitchen.

  "Okay, that does it," Tanda said, staring at where the guy had gone. "I'm officially completely creeped out."

  "What?" Aahz asked. "All the staring cows last night didn't do it for you?"

  "Okay, double creeped out," Tanda said.

  I downed about a half a glass of carrot juice and sat back, letting the wonderful flavor warm me. How I had ever lived without the stuff was beyond me.

  "I think you might want to go easy on that juice," Aahz said. He was looking as tired as I had felt a few minutes ago.

  "I think you might want to try some," I said, "if you're expecting to get to the treasure tonight."

  He shook his head.

  "I think one of us hooked on carrot juice is enough."

  "Your loss," I said.

  He just frowned and pulled out the map.

  This time the map hadn't changed. My magik had worked. We were still headed for Donner, which looked to be a good distance from here. I was going to need all the energy I could get. I downed another quarter of the glass.

  By the time we left the place, with me running through the same routine with the guy in the apron, promising we might be back for dinner, I had downed a glass and a half of the juice, and had the rest in the water containers. I was good to go through the night. As far as I was concerned, Tanda and Aahz could sleep while I flew. They weren't doing anything, so why not?

  Later that afternoon I think they both did actually fall asleep while flashing along knee-high off the road. It was lucky for all of us I had my carrot juice.

  As it happened, we were approaching another tiny little town along the road to Donner as the sun set. On the map this place wasn't even listed. It had maybe twenty buildings, all of them boarded up and shuttered. Still, Aahz figured there was no point in taking any chances, so we walked into the tiny town.

  We were just about through the town when, at once, every door in the town slammed open. It was a dark and quiet night, with the sun down and the moon not yet up. That much sud den noise and movement darned near scared me right out of my skin.

  "What's happening?" Tanda asked.

  I didn't have a clue. From what I could tell, every person in the town, all dressed in different clothing, some in night shirts, walked into the street like zombies, turned, and in a line headed out of town to the west.

  We quickly stepped up onto the sidewalk to get out of the way as the chain of people moved past down the center of the road. There was no life in any of their eyes or fighting against what was happening to them.

  "Be ready to take us back to Vortex #6," Aahz whispered to Tanda.

  "Oh, I've been ready for days," she said.

  The last person moved past us, leaving the town empty and every door standing wide open. I had no idea what we should do. I took the canister out of my pouch and downed the last of the second glass of carrot juice, just to be ready for whatever was coming.

  Aahz motioned that we should follow them, so, moving slowly about thirty steps behind the last person, we followed the line of people out into the countryside, along the very same road we had planned on traveling.

  The farther out we got, the more I expected to see the cows waiting for us, watching the zombie townspeople now. But there were no cows to be seen.

  But there were a lot of naked people, yawning and stretch ing scattered around the fields, as if they were just waking up from a long nap.

  The townspeople kept doing the zombie march as the na ked people in the fields moved toward them. The first naked guy to reach the line near us grabbed an old man in a nightshirt, tipped back the old guy's head, and bit into his neck.

  "Vampires," Tanda whispered.

  Behind us the full moon was easing up over the edge of the hill, shining light on the feast as more and more vampires picked a meal and bit in. So this was what the round-up was all about? I couldn't believe what I was seeing.

  The cows were vampires, and their feeding stock was the people. No wonder all the people in all the towns all ate vegetables and were afraid of the night. The people who lived in the towns were nothing more than cattle, being fattened for slaughter every month.

  It was the cows that were the masters.

  "You are not in the round-up line," a deep and pleasant voice said from behind us.

  All three of us spun around as one to face two naked people. One was a man, one a woman. Their bodies were perfectly formed, their muscles toned, their eyes large and brown, like the cow's eyes along the road every night.

  The woman was one of the most beautiful women I had ever seen without clothes on. No, make that the most beautiful. And with one glance into her eyes, I wanted to give myself to her. I didn't care if she bit me or not.

  The next instant the dust storm on Vortex #6 slammed into me, snapping me out of my desire to make a fool of myself with a beautiful woman for the second time in a week.

  Chapter Ten

  "I can quit anytime."

  S. HOLMES

  The hundred slogging steps through the dust storm to the cabin seemed to get longer and longer every time I had to do it. I had no idea why we just couldn't D-Hop right into the cabin and skip all this dust and wind. I was going to ask Tanda that, as soon as things settled down.

  As we got near the cabin, Tanda held up her hand for us to stop. I could barely see the dark shape of the building in the storm. There was no light in the window this time.

  She did something with both arms I assumed was some sort of scanning magik that assassins knew, then motioned that it was clear and we should move forward. Therefore, Glenda wasn't here waiting for us.

  I had the sudden image of one of the cow-vampires bend ing her over and sucking on her neck in the middle of some road somewhere. Considering what she had done to me, it was one of the nicer thoughts I had had about her in days.

  We got inside and the door closed against the storm.

  "Are we shielded?" Aahz asked Tanda.

  "Up and solid," she said. "Skeeve was right; there is power ful energy here. I can hold the shield for as long as we need it."

  "So Glenda can't pop in and surprise us?" I asked, moving to the stove to get it started before I took off my coat.

  "Not a chance," Tanda said. "She hops back here, she's going to get awful dirty standing out there in the dust."

  Aahz laughed. "Couldn't happen to a nicer demon."

  "Want something to eat?" Tanda asked, working around in the cabinets as I sat at the table.

  "Just more carrot juice," I said.

  I could feel my body starting to get really tired, as if some one h
ad pulled the energy plug and what I had left was draining onto the floor.

  I dug into my pouch for the canister that I had been carry ing. It was gone. I checked again and it was still not there. I couldn't remember doing anything with it, but I might have dropped it in the excitement of watching cows become vampires and bite on people.

  "You have the other canister of juice?" I asked Aahz. "Afraid not, apprentice," he said. "Left it back on Kowtow when we hopped out of there."

  My first reaction was not to believe him. Then it became clear that he had left the rest of my carrot juice, and my reaction was anger.

  "How could you do that?" I shouted. "Easy," he said.

  He showed me by reaching into his pouch, taking out an invisible canister, and dropping it to the floor. "But what am I going to do without it?" Again I shouted. I needed that carrot juice; right down to the very bottom of my soul I needed it.

  "You're going to sleep for a long time," Tanda said, smiling at me.

  Just her mention of sleep made me sleepy. I couldn't believe they had done this to me.

  "Taking a guy's carrot juice isn't nice."

  "I know," Tanda said. "But we're doing it for your own good. You haven't slept in at least three days. You need to stop moving and just lie down."

  The tiredness was washing up over me like a wave on the beach. It was everything I could do to even think about saying I didn't need sleep.

  How dare she tell me what I needed? How dare Aahz leave my juice behind? Hadn't I trusted him with that juice?

  "I don't need to rest," I said, my voice sounding funny to my ears.

  "How about you just lie down for a few minutes and then we'll talk about it," Tanda said, helping me to me feet and moving me over to the soft-looking bed against one wall.

  "Well, maybe just a minute," I said.

  What could a minute hurt? I'd get back some of my en ergy, and then convince Tanda to hop me back to get my juice.

  "Only one minute," I said.

  Or at least I think I said that. I might not have, because from the moment my head touched the pillow, I don't remember another thing.

  I woke up with a blinding headache and a taste in my mouth that was a cross between horse droppings and stale carrots. I rolled over and the pain hit me even harder, smashing into my head like someone was taking a hammer and pounding me right between the eyes.

  "Ohhh," I said, putting both hands to my head trying to stop the agony.

  "The sleeping apprentice awakes," Aahz, said, his voice far too loud for the size of the space between my ears.

  "And in pain, it seems," Tanda shouted.

  "Please whisper," I said, but my throat was so dry the words didn't really come out.

  I wanted to die. Why hadn't they just killed me as I slept? Or maybe they had tried, which was why I hurt so much.

  I also wanted to be sick, but that wasn't possible since there wasn't anything left in my stomach. But my stomach still felt like it wanted to twist inside out and come up through my throat. And the world spinning didn't help that feeling at all.

  And, most of all, I really wanted to forget all the night mares I'd had about cows turning into vampires, and the people of a dimension being nothing more than food stock. What an awful nightmare. That was the last time I had carrot juice if it caused those kind of visions.

  Tanda came over and knelt beside me. I could feel her hand on my forehead, then a soft energy flowing through me, washing the pain and nausea with it. Whatever she did, it was nice.

  After a moment she moved away and I opened my eyes. My head didn't hurt as much, and the world that felt as if it was smashing down on me from all sides had retreated.

  I also realized that what I had thought were carrot-juice-induced nightmares had actually happened. "That help?" Tanda asked.

  I nodded, wishing I hadn't almost at once. She had taken away the pain, but the rest of the problems-upset stomach and spinning world-were still with me.

  She brought me a glass of water, helping me sit up to drink it.

  "Well, hangovers are sure fun, aren't they, apprentice?" Aahz asked.

  "No," I managed to croak out after I took a small drink, "they are not."

  "Good thing to remember next time you go bingeing."

  The thought of even seeing another carrot made my stom ach twist.

  "Was there alcohol in the carrot juice?"

  "No, but it had other stuff in it," Aahz said, "Stuff I'm guessing make the people of those towns good eating for the vampires."

  My stomach twisted.

  "And maybe help keep them under control," Tanda said, looking at me. "Think you can come to the table and try to eat a little something?"

  "I can try," I said, "but no promises."

  "Good enough. You need to eat."

  "How long was I sleeping?" I asked as I stood and shuffled my way to the table.

  I dropped into a chair and then tried to remain still while the world spun for a moment.

  "About twelve hours," Aahz said. "We were just getting ready to head back to Kowtow when you started to wake up."

  "Without me?" I asked, staring into the eyes of my mentor.

  He smiled at what must have been my shocked expression.

  "Just to explore and get a little closer to Donner while the vampires were back being cows. We would have left you shielded and been back in a few hours."

  "You still want to see if you can get to the treasure?" I asked, not believing that Aahz would even want to go back to the place again, let alone try to get a golden-milk-giving cow that turned into a vampire.

  "Sure," he said. "We're too close to turn back now."

  "And just what are you going to do when you find this golden cow?"

  "I asked him the same thing," Tanda said.

  "I'll figure that out when we find it," Aahz said.

  I nodded. "Glad I woke up then."

  "I doubt you're going to be up for coming along just yet," Tanda said, putting a little sandwich and another glass of water in front of me.

  "I'll be fine," I said. "Just a little carrot juice and I can fly a long ways."

  The silence in the cabin was intense.

  I looked at Aahz, then at Tanda and smiled. "Just kid-ding."

  For some reason, neither of them laughed.

  Along the way there were more and more cattle, bigger herds than we had seen at any other place. I was just glad that none of them were lined up along the road watching us.

  The countryside was becoming pretty hilly, and the road looked like it was headed right at a fairly large mountain range. I hoped Donner was on this side of the range and not the other. My question was answered almost at once as we topped a slight ridge and could see off ahead.

  I somehow managed to bring us to a stop and lower us to the ground. Considering what we were facing, I thought that was pretty good concentration.

  From the top of this hill we could see Donner. It had been built going up the side of a gentle hill. From here it looked as if the buildings down low were all like the ones in the towns we had already seen, but the farther up the hill you went, the larger the buildings, the more ornate.

  At the top was the palace. Only this wasn't like anything on this planet. It was made of stone and inlaid with gold that shimmered in the afternoon sun. It was like a second sun, only golden.

  "Oh, my," Tanda said softly.

  "No wonder there's a treasure map to this place," Aahz said. "I've never seen anything like that."

  "Neither have I," Tanda said.

  Well, if the two experienced dimension travelers in the group had never seen anything like the golden palace we were staring at, I sure hadn't either.

  After a moment I asked what I thought was the obvious next question.

  "So now what do we do?"

  "We go take a closer look," Aah2 said, laughing. "See what we can see."

  I glanced at my mentor. He was always happy when there was a chance we might end up with a lot of money. I didn't want to
ask him how he thought we were going to get any of the gold we could see from here, but clearly he had ideas, and the ideas were enough to make him smile.

  All his smile did was worry me.

  I flew us two more small hills closer to the city before Aahz said we had better walk the rest of the way. There was so much energy in this area that I didn't even feel tired from the effort of flying. It had come easy, which meant that all magik was easy in this place. That was both good and bad.

  Ahead of us on the road were some walkers, plus a wagon full of vegetables being pulled by two horses. Cows filled the fields, paying no attention to anything.

  Up closer, the town of Donner was even bigger than I had first thought, with a very wide, boulevard-like main road head ing straight through everything. The golden castle on the top of the hill was massive. It looked like it could swallow the entire royal palace and courtyard of Possiltum and not even burp. I wonder if this place had a royal magician. Maybe I could apply for the job, but I doubted I would pass the cow physical.

  We had just crested the last small hill and were starting down toward the edge of the city when a dozen men on horseback came galloping out of the city, kicking up a cloud of dust behind them. A few people ahead of us on the road stepped out of the way. And the wagonload of veggies had to move almost off the road and into a small ditch.

  The thundering horses came on, riding hard, the men's black hats pulled down tight on their heads. I didn't have a good feeling about this, but at the same time there was no reason to think they were after us.

  We moved to the side of the road as they neared, but in stead of riding past, then stopped, sort of forming a circle around us, pinning us against a pasture full of cows. I clearly should have trusted my bad feeling.

  "You are under arrest," a man sitting on a big black horse said. "Please come with us into the city."

  "It's a posse," Tanda said, the surprise in her voice clear. "Never thought I'd ever see one."

  "A what?" I asked.

  "Never mind," she said.

  "Under arrest for what?" Aahz demanded of the guy on the big horse.