Board Stiff (Xanth)

by Anthony, Piers

  They were in a pleasant suite of a grandiose stone house. There were five well-appointed bedrooms, each with its own bathroom complete with shower, toilet, basin, closets, and wall-sized mirrors, a living room with elegant pictures on the walls and couches that looked soft enough to bounce on, a kitchen with phenomenal stores of food and drink, and anything else anyone might have thought to imagine.

  “Whose royal suite are we intruding on?” Tiara asked.

  Then Ease spied a plaque by the door. WELCOME HONORED MEMBERS OF THE QUEST.

  A glance fairly banged their faces as it careened around them. “We were expected!” Pewter said.

  “But I thought the Events were random,” Astrid said.

  “Apparently not entirely,” Pewter said.

  “Where are we?” Ease asked.

  That was the question of the hour.

  “Let’s explore,” Tiara suggested. “Just to be sure we’re not locked in a tower.”

  They went to a window and looked out. Beyond was cloud-studded open air. The ground was far, far below. “We are in a tower,” Astrid said grimly.

  “But what a tower!” Ease said. He went out the door, and the others followed. There was a grand hall extending until it curved out of sight.

  “I will wait,” Pewter said, remaining at the door to their suite.

  They followed the hall past door after door, intersection after intersection, discovering bays and stairways without seeming end. Finally they came back to Pewter without turning around; they had completed a large circle. Pewter had known. It was just as well that he had stayed, because they could have missed their suite and gotten lost otherwise. As if they weren’t already lost.

  “Are we alone here?” Mitch asked.

  “Maybe we have this floor,” Tiara said. “We haven’t checked the others.”

  So they descended to the floor below. It was much like the other, only with a different wall color.

  “Shall we make another circuit?” Mitch asked.

  “Why don’t the two of you circle,” Astrid suggested. “While Ease and I mark the place.”

  That seemed to make sense, so they did it. Astrid sat on the lower steps while Ease looked around the immediate vicinity, peering into rooms. “Empty,” he reported as he returned. Then he froze in place.

  “Ease!” Astrid said, alarmed. “Are you all right?”

  Then Kandy caught on. PULL YOUR SKIRT DOWN she thought to the woman.

  “Oh.” Astrid’s skirt had ridden up over her knees so that Ease had seen under it. “I’m still not quite used to clothing. Or to male’s reactions to it.”

  THAT’S WHY I’M HERE. I’M YOUR FRIEND. Which made Kandy wonder: had she been transformed only to serve this purpose, guiding the basilisk in human conventions? No, there had to be more to it than that. She had to believe that.

  Astrid covered her thighs, then snapped her fingers.

  Ease resumed walking, unaware he had ever stopped. “Nothing there,” he reported.

  Astrid smiled, knowing that he meant the rooms. “So it seems that we have at least two floors to ourselves, and perhaps others. But this is curious. Why should there be so huge a tower, so well appointed, with no occupants? And how does it relate to our Quest? I am not making much sense of this.”

  Ease opened his mouth to answer, and paused, listening. There was a sound.

  “Oh—Mitch and Tiara completing the circuit,” Astrid said.

  But then they saw the figures coming around the curve. Not two, but three. Three women. Wearing little crowns.

  “The princesses!” Ease said. “What are they doing here?”

  The three saw the two. “Ease!” Melody exclaimed.

  “Astrid!” Harmony added.

  “Why are you here?” Rhythm concluded.

  “Oh, my!” Astrid said. “This must be Fornax Galaxy!”

  “Of course it is,” Melody said.

  “We’re here to watch the Demoness,” Harmony added.

  “For the Demon Xanth,” Rhythm concluded.

  “We’re on our next Event,” Ease said, covertly eying the three pretty girls. Kandy was getting used to it, similarly covertly tuning into his mind, and even was beginning to appreciate their points as he did. It was simply the way men were hard wired. “We turned up in a huge suite upstairs.”

  “We were exploring,” Astrid said. “Trying to make sense of it.”

  “The Demoness calls this her cottage by the sea,” Melody said.

  “Her incidental lodging,” Harmony agreed.

  “One of hundreds or thousands,” Rhythm concluded.

  “There’s a sign, by our suite,” Astrid said. “Welcoming us. So someone knew we were coming. That must be Fornax.”

  “Where did you use the sequin?” Melody asked.

  “On the centaur planet?” Harmony added.

  “Where Fornax’s influence may remain strong?” Rhythm concluded.

  “That’s where,” Ease agreed.

  “But assuming she could hijack our Events,” Astrid said, “Why would she want to? We’re of no use to her.”

  “Maybe she’s still interested in Ease,” Melody said.

  “Because he’s handsome,” Harmony agreed.

  “And she’s lonely,” Rhythm concluded, smiling.

  “But she called me a lout,” Ease said. “Twice.”

  “She was angry,” Melody said.

  “Because her wicked plan had been foiled,” Harmony added.

  “And it was partly your fault,” Rhythm concluded.

  He was foolishly moved. “Do you really think so?”

  “We’re women,” Melody said.

  “We know how women think,” Harmony agreed.

  “Hell has no fury like that of a woman scorned,” Rhythm concluded.

  Kandy realized that they were teasing him, almost flirting. Were they lonely too? Or was there something else going on? They were princesses, and Sorceresses, with other interests. Yet at the moment they were on this somewhat lonely duty. Teasing a man might be harmless entertainment. For princesses or Demonesses.

  “But of course your Quest-mates might not approve,” Melody said.

  “So you probably shouldn’t discuss this with them,” Harmony added.

  “Keep it secret,” Rhythm concluded.

  “But Astrid already knows,” Ease protested.

  “I won’t tell,” Astrid said. She had evidently caught on to the game. She was not really human, and was still learning.

  “We have to move on now,” Melody said.

  “To snoop on the Demoness,” Harmony added.

  “To make sure she’s not violating her parole,” Rhythm concluded.

  “Glad to have met you,” Ease said.

  “It’s been nice,” Astrid agreed. She was learning the social conventions.

  The princesses moved on, soon disappearing around the bend. Then Mitch and Tiara appeared, having completed the circuit. “Empty,” he reported.

  “Not quite,” Astrid said. “We saw the three princesses. You just missed them.”

  “The princesses!” Tiara said. “But that means--”

  “That we are in Fornax Galaxy,” Astrid said.

  “That explains a lot,” Mitch said. “But also mystifies anew. Why would the sequin send us here?”

  “There must be something we need to do or learn here,” Astrid said. “Assuming the sequins are not entirely random.”

  They mounted the stairs and rejoined Pewter, who seemed to be playing with some sand from a potted plant. “We met the three princesses!” Ease announced.

  “You too? They stopped by here while you were gone. We discussed sand.”

  “Sand?” Mitch asked.

  “The presence of the princesses suggests that we are in the contra-terrene galaxy,” Pewter said. “Sand could be quite useful in a CT realm.”

  “Sand?” Mitch repeated.

  “Every grain of terrene sand would be like a bomb in a CT setting, because anything it touched would go
up in total conversion of matter to energy. This is because terrene and contra-terrene are diametric opposites, positive and negative, canceling each other out. This castle is obviously terrene, so as to be safe for we terrene visitors, but outside must be deadly.”

  “Sand like a bomb,” Mitch said, intrigued. “It might be smart to keep some of it on us.” He took a handful. So did the others.

  “It was actually the princesses’ notion,” Pewter said. “They are now carrying sand.”

  That was curious, Kandy thought; the princesses had not mentioned carrying sand or meeting Pewter, though they had evidently had a solid dialogue. But of course they could have stopped by to see him briefly.

  “Something’s piscatorial,” Tiara’s hair said.

  “Something’s what?” Ease asked.

  “Funny, shady, suspect, questionable, suspicious--”

  “Fishy?” Astrid asked.

  “Whatever,” the hair agreed crossly. “Why should the princesses visit with two of us downstairs, and one upstairs, and not the rest? Maybe they were fakes.”

  “I assure you the ones I encountered fifteen minutes ago were genuine,” Pewter said.

  “And the ones Ease and I met weren’t?” Astrid asked.

  “I can tell you why they avoided us,” the hair said. “Because they knew I could tell a fake when I saw it. It takes a demon to recognize one.”

  “Exactly what are you saying?” Mitch asked.

  “I’m saying that you could have been talking with the Demoness Fornax masquerading as the princesses.”

  “This is possible,” Pewter said. “But what would be her motive? If this is her castle in her domain, she has no need to hide from anyone. Certainly not the princesses, who are here to watch her.”

  “Wrong, wire-brain. They are the very ones she would most want to hide things from, because they will report to Demon Xanth about any parole violations.”

  “But why emulate the princesses, then?” Mitch asked. “That’s bound to attract their attention.”

  “That is curious,” Astrid agreed. “We may be wading through murkier waters than we suspect.” As a basilisk she was familiar with murky waters.

  “Well, let’s relax and prepare for the morrow,” Mitch said. “The answers may come clear in due course.”

  The others were glad to agree. The mysteries here seemed to be too big to assimilate all at once.

  They went into their fancy suite. Ease, being mannishly hungry, checked out the kitchen supplies. The women joined him, lest he spoil perfectly good food in his clumsy ignorance. Soon they settled down to a nice meal of bread and jam and boot rear.

  Or was it? “There’s no kick,” Mitch complained.

  “You’re right,” Ease said. “This is denatured. It’s root beer.”

  “This food has been imported from Alpha Centauri,” Pewter said. “Which makes sense, as there would be nothing we could safely eat here in the CT realm.”

  “Because it would destroy us in total conversion to energy,” Mitch agreed, shuddering. “That’s more kick than I care for.”

  “Fortunately we won’t be here long,” Astrid said. “Just until we complete or discover whatever it is that brought us here.”

  “Assuming the sequins have some purpose,” Pewter said.

  They finished their meal, then found themselves ready to relax. Kandy was suspicious; had the food been drugged? But what would be the point in that? So their unwinding was probably natural.

  Mitch and Tiara took one room, not seeming to be bothered by the hidden presence of the demoness Metria; nice hair counted for a lot. Pewter settled down in another, hardly needing the company of the living folk. Astrid lay on a bed in another room for a nap. That left Ease, who was happy to take another bed in another room. Kandy tuned in on his idle thoughts, as she was increasingly able to do.

  But as he lay there pondering this and that, such as whether a lovely Demoness really could be interested in a lout, there was a sound at the window. It was like sand. Kandy thought of sand in a new way now, because of the CT connection.

  Ease got up and went to the window. There across the gulf of air was an attractive sunlit pavilion. And there within it, sunning herself, seemingly innocent of any awareness of her exposure, was the dream girl: Kandy’s form, nude.

  The nerve! The Demoness was doing it again. She was flashing Ease with the body. And Ease, the male fool, was eating it up. His eyes were close to glazing. Then the figure crossed her bare legs, proffering an all-too-perfect view, and Ease almost freaked out, prevented only because the angle was almost but not quite right to show a panty line. As if that close call was accidental. The Demoness knew exactly who was watching and what the effect on him was. She was playing him like a fish on a hook.

  Then the sunlight shifted subtly to illuminate a path that led from the base of the castle to the pavilion. It wound through lovely colored foliage and statuary, surely concealed from ground level but clear enough from above. A person could readily walk that path to get from here to there.

  Ease was already in motion, going out the door, down the stairs, and around to the exit to the path. The fool!

  Kandy knew she had to do something, but what? Ease’s mind had been preempted by the vision and was not subject to a HALT idea at the moment. Kandy realized that the Demoness must have pretended to be the three princesses to plant the notion of her own amenability in Ease’s foolishly eager mind, setting him up for the seduction. Now she was doing it, luring him to her. It remained a mystery why, since he was not the guardian; the three princesses were that. Fornax couldn’t want a mere dalliance; that was not the way a scheming woman’s mind worked. She wanted something else. Whatever it was was unlikely to be good news for the rest of them.

  Kandy tried to mentally signal Astrid, but she was asleep. Mitch and Tiara were locked in love, unreachable. Pewter was a machine, hard to reach unless attuned. The princesses seemed to be out of range. Meanwhile Ease was down to the ground floor and heading outside. He had made an easy job of getting on his foolish way, unfortunately.

  Then she got a notion. METRIA! she called mentally. She was getting better at aiming at specific minds, but could she reach the demoness?

  Do you mind? Metria answered. This couple is in a most interesting embrace, and her hair is curling around his head and locking it in for a prolonged kiss while it seductively tickles his neck.

  And just who was facilitating that? Tiara’s hair was anti-gravity, not prehensile. The demoness must really be enjoying her lascivious participation. But at least Kandy had reached her.

  THIS IS IMPORTANT! EASE IS LEAVING THE CASTLE.

  What do I care? Then the demoness did a mental double-take. Who are you, anyway? There are no telepaths in this Quest.

  Oops. They had not told the demoness about Kandy. It seemed that now was the time. I AM KANDY, A WOMAN CHANGED INTO A BOARD. THE ONE THAT EASE CARRIES, ONLY HE DOESN’T KNOW IT’S ANYTHING MORE THAN A BOARD. IT’S A LONG STORY. BUT TRUST ME: I HAVE HIS WELFARE IN MIND. DEMONESS FORNAX IS LURING HIM TO A SEPARATE PAVILION, WHERE I DON’T KNOW WHAT WILL HAPPEN.

  Oh bleep! That is important. She’ll seduce him and corrupt him, and then he won’t be much fun anymore for the rest of us. What do you want me to do?

  Trust the demoness to have a selfish motive. WAKE THE OTHERS. LOCATE THE PRINCESSES. THIS COULD BE A VIOLATION OF FORNAX’S PAROLE, OR WHATEVER.

  Whatever, the demoness agreed. At any rate, interesting. You say you are a board? That’s interesting too.

  And of course interest was what motivated Metria. She wanted to be where the most action was, of whatever nature, especially if it was violent or naughty. It might have been hard to pull her away from the lovemaking couple if a confrontation with a Demoness were not more exciting. If seduction was occurring, Metria wanted to be on hand to see every detail.

  But Tiara’s evocative hair is important too. I’ll have to split.

  Kandy took that to mean Metria had decided to let the loving c
ouple be for a while. GET BUSY she thought impatiently.

  Soon Astrid was awake and communicating. I’m looking out the window, she reported. I see that path, and the sunning she-devil. We’ll hurry down there, but I fear not in time.

  That was Kandy’s concern too. DO YOUR BEST.

  A female figure popped into view behind Ease. The man did not see her, but Kandy did. It wasn’t Metria, though there were points of similarity, notably on her chest. Was it Fornax? But she was busy sunning herself, visible from the path. Could she be in two places at the same time? Well, she was a Demoness, and if she had emulated the three princesses, she could do this. But why would she bother? Her ploy was already working.

  Well, maybe it was best to be direct. WHO ARE YOU?

  “I am D Mentia, Metria’s alter-ego,” the figure said, not loudly enough to attract Ease’s attention, but quite clear for Kandy. “We had to fission to be in two places at once. What’s this about a board woman?”

  D Mentia. A pun. And that split had been literal fissioning so Metria could continue with the couple. This was wasting precious time. WHAT DO YOU CARE?

  “I care because though I have no speech impediment like my alter, I am a bit crazy, and this is the kind of craziness that intrigues me. If you want my help, cater to me to this extent.”

  No speech impediment? That seemed to be true. This was a slightly different creature. Kandy sighed inwardly. She had better oblige. So she sent the story of her wishing well wish and conversion in a single concentrated mental blast.

  “Interesting indeed,” Mentia agreed. “Let’s see what I can do.” She vanished.

  Ease paused. There before him was a crazily luscious figure of a woman with a dress whose decolletage plunged toward unknown depths. “Who?” he began.

  “No, I’m not your dream girl,” Mentia said. “I’m better. I’m your dream woman. I have some crazy notions. Let me walk you back to your room where we can have some privacy.” She leaned forward, inhaling.

  Kandy had to admire Mentia’s technique. She had perfected the art of flashing just enough to do the job.

  Ease was obviously tempted. If there was one thing better than a distant dream girl, it was a dream woman who was close at hand.

  But then the Demoness Fornax caught on. “Begone, bleep!” she called. Actually bleep was not exactly the word she used, though it was close.