MA04 Hit or Myth

by Robert Asprin

  “It isn’t that,” I interrupted hastily. “It’s ... well, it’s come to my attention that the high prices Possiltum is charging your kingdom for food is forcing you into this marriage. Not wishing to have you enter into such a bond under duress, I’ve decided to cut our prices in half, thereby negating the need for our wedding.”

  “Oh, Roddie, don’t be silly. That’s not the reason I’m marrying you!”

  Rather than being upset, the Queen seemed quite amused at my suggestion.

  “It isn’t?”

  “Of course not. Impasse is so rich that we could buy your yearly crop at double the prices if we wanted to and still not put a dent in our treasury.”

  My stomach began to sink.

  “Then you really want this marriage? You aren’t being forced into it for political reasons?”

  The Queen flashed all her teeth at me in a quick smile.

  “Of course there are political reasons. I mean, we are royalty, aren’t we? I’m sure you’re a pleasant enough fellow, but I can get all the pleasant fellows I want without marrying them. Royalty marries power blocks, not people.”

  There was a glimmer of hope in what she was saying, and I pounced on it with all fours.

  “Which brings us to the other reason we should call off the wedding,” I said grandly.

  The Queen’s smile disappeared.

  “What’s that?” she said sharply.

  For my reply, I let drop my disguise spell.

  “Because I’m not Royalty. I’m people.”

  “Oh, that,” the Queen shrugged. “No problem. I knew that all along.”

  “You did?” I gulped.

  “Sure. You were embarrassed ... twice. Once when I arrived at the palace, and again just now when I opened the door in my altogether. Royalty doesn’t embarrass. It’s in the blood. I knew all long you weren’t Rodrick. It’s my guess you’re the Great Skeeve, Court Magician. Right? The one who can shape change?”

  “Well, it’s a disguise spell, not shape changing, but except for that, you’re right.”

  Between Badaxe and Queen Hemlock, I was starting to wonder if anyone was really fooled by my disguise spells.

  The Queen uncoiled from her seat and began pacing back and forth as she spoke, oblivious to her nakedness which peeked out of her wrap at each turn.

  “The fact that you aren’t the king doesn’t change my situation, if anything it improves it. As long as you can keep your disguise up enough to fool the rabble, I’ll be marrying two power blocks instead of one.”

  “Two power blocks,” I echoed hollowly.

  “Yes. As the ‘king’ of Possiltum, you control the first block I was after: land and people. Impasse by itself isn’t large enough to wage an aggressive war, but uniting the respective powers of the two kingdoms, we’re unstoppable. With your armies backed by my capital, I can sweep as far as I want, which is pretty far, let me tell you. There’s nothing like growing up in a valley where the only view is the other side of the valley to whet one’s appetite for new and unusual places.”

  “Most people content themselves with touring,” I suggested. “You don’t have to conquer a country to see it.”

  “Cute,” Queen Hemlock sneered. “Naive, but cute. Let’s just say I’m not most people and let it ride, okay? Now then, for the second power base, there’s you and your magic. That’s a bonus I hadn’t expected, but I’m sure that, given a day or two, I can expand my plans to take advantage of it.”

  At one time, I thought I had been scared by Massha. In hindsight, Massha caused me only faint discomfort. Talking with Queen Hemlock, I learned what fear was all about! She wasn’t just a murderess, as Badaxe suspected. She was utter mayhem waiting to be loosed on the world. The only thing between her and the resources necessary to act out her dreams was me. Me, and maybe ...

  “What about King Rodrick?” I blurted out. “If he shows up, the original wedding plans go into effect.”

  “You mean he’s still alive?” she exclaimed, arching a thin eyebrow at me. “I’ve overestimated you, Skeeve. Alive he could be a problem. No matter. I’ll alert my escort to kill him on sight if he appears before the wedding. After we’re married, it would be a simple matter to declare him an imposter and have him officially executed.”

  Terrific. Thanks to my big mouth, Massha would be walking into a trap if she tried to return the King to the castle. If Queen Hemlock’s men saw him, then ...

  “Wait a minute!” I exclaimed. “If I’m walking around disguised as the King, what’s to keep your men from offing me by mistake?”

  “Hmm. Good thing you thought about that. Okay! Here’s what we’ll do.”

  She dove into her wardrobe and emerged with a length of purple ribbon.

  “Wear this in full view whenever you’re outside your chambers,” she instructed, thrusting it into my hands. “It’ll let my men know that you’re the man I want to marry instead of their target.”

  I stood with the ribbon in my hand.

  “Aren’t you making a rather large assumption, Your Majesty?”

  “What’s that?” she frowned.

  “That I may not want to marry you?”

  “Of course you do,” she smiled. “You’ve already got the throne of Possiltum. If you marry me, you not only have access to my treasury, it also rids you of your other problem.”

  “My other problem?”

  “The Mob, silly. Remember? I rode in with their representative. With my money, you can buy them off. They’ll forget anything if the price is high enough. Now, isn’t being my husband better than running from their vengeance and mine for the rest of your life?”

  I had my answer to that, but in a flash of wisdom kept it to myself. Instead, I said my goodbyes and left.

  “From your expression, I take it that your interview with the Queen was less than a roaring success,” Badaxe said dryly.

  “Spare me the ‘I told you so’s,” General,” I snarled. “We’ve got work to do.”

  Shooting a quick glance up and down the corridor, I cut my purple ribbon in half on the edge of his axe.

  “Keep a lookout for Massha and the King,” I instructed. “If you see them, be sure Rodrick wears this. It’ll make his trip through the palace a lot easier.”

  “But where are you going?”

  I gave him a tight smile.

  “To see the Mob representatives. Queen Hemlock has graciously told me how to deal with them!”

  THE MOB REPRESENTATIVES had been housed in one of the less frequented corners of the palace. In theory, this kept them far from the hub of activity while Badaxe and I figured out what to do with them. In fact, it meant that now that I was ready to face them, I had an awfully long walk to reach my destination.

  By the time I reached the proper door, I was so winded I wasn’t sure I’d have enough breath to announce my presence. Still, on my walk I had worked up a bit of a mad against the Mob. I mean, who did they think they were, popping up and disrupting my life this way? Besides, I was too unnerved by Queen Hemlock to try anything against her, which left the Mob as the only target for my frustration.

  With that in mind, I drew a deep breath and knocked on the door.

  I needn’t have worried about announcing myself. Between the second and third knocks, the door opened a crack. My third knock hit the door before I could stop it, but the door remained unmoved by the impact.

  “Hey, Shai-ster! It’s the King!”

  “Well, let him in, you idiot!”

  The door opened wide, revealing one of Shai-ster’s massive bodyguards, then a little wider to allow me entry space past him. “Come in, come in, Your Majesty,” the Mob’s spokesman said, hurrying forward to greet me. “Have a drink ... Dummy! Get the King something to drink!”

  This last was addressed to the second hulking muscle man who heaved himself off the bed he
had been sprawled upon. With self-conscious dignity he picked up the end of the bed one-handed, set it down again, then picked up the mattress and extracted a small, flat bottle from under it.

  I wondered briefly if this was what Big Julie meant when he referred to the Mob tradition of “going to the mattresses.” Somehow the phrase had always brought another image to mind ... something involving women.

  Accepting the flask from his bodyguard, Shai-ster opened the top and offered it to me, smiling all the while.

  “Am I correct in assuming that Your Majesty’s visit indicates news of the whereabouts of his court magician? Perhaps even an estimated time as to when he is expected back?”

  I accepted the flask, covertly checking the locations of the bodyguards before I answered. One was leaning against the door, while the other stood by the bed.

  “Actually, I can do better than that. The Great Skeeve ...”I closed my eyes and dropped my disguise spell.

  “Is here.”

  The bodyguards started visibly at my transformation, but Shai-ster remained unmoved except for a narrowing of the eyes and a tightening of his smile.

  “I see. That simplifies things a bit. Boys, give the Great Skeeve here a chair. We have some business to discuss.”

  His tone was not pleasant, nor were the bodyguards smiling as they started for me.

  Remember how Rupert jumped me so easily? Well, he took me by surprise, and had three hundred years plus of magical practice to boot. Somehow, I was not particularly surprised by the bodyguards’ action ... in fact, I had been expecting it and had been gathering my powers for just this moment.

  With a theatric wave of my hand and a much more important focusing of my mental energies, I picked the two men up and spun them in midair. Heck, I wasn’t averse to stealing a new idea for how to use levitation ... even from Rupert. I did like a little originality in my work, though, so instead of bouncing them on their heads, I slammed them against the ceiling and held them pinned there.

  “No, thanks,” I said as casually as I could, “I’d rather stand.”

  Shai-ster looked at his helpless protectors, and then shot a hard stare at me.

  “Perhaps this won’t be as simple as I thought,” he admitted. “Say, you’ve got a unicorn, don’t you?”

  “That’s right,” I confirmed, surprised by the sudden change in topic.

  “I don’t suppose you’d be particularly scared if you woke up in the morning and found him in your bed ... not all of him, just his head?”

  “Scared? No, not particularly. In fact, I’m pretty sure I’d be mad enough to quit playing games and get down to serious revenge.”

  The Mob spokesman sighed heavily.

  “Well, that’s that. If we can’t make a deal, we’ll just have to do this the hard way. You can let the boys down now. We’ll be heading back in the morning,”

  This time, it was my turn to smile.

  “Not so fast. Who said I didn’t want to make a deal?”

  For the first time since I met him, Shai-ster’s poise was shaken.

  “But ... I thought ... if you can ...”

  “Don’t assume, Shai-ster, It’s a bad habit for businessmen to get into. I just don’t like to get pushed around, that’s all. Now then, as you said earlier, I believe we have some business to discuss.”

  The spokesman shot a nervous glance at the ceiling. “Um ... could you let the boys down first? It’s a bit distracting.”

  “Sure.”

  I closed my eyes and released the spell. Mind you, unlike the disguise spell, I don’t have to close my eyes to remove a levitation spell. I just didn’t want to see the results.

  The room shook as two loud crashes echoed each other. I distinctly heard the bed assume a foolproof disguise as kindling. I carefully opened an eye.

  One bodyguard was unconscious. The other rolled about, groaning weakly.

  “They’re down,” I said, needlessly.

  Shai-ster ignored me.

  “Big bad bodyguards! Wait’ll the Big Boys hear how good dumb muscle is against magic!”

  He paused to kick the groaner in the side.

  “Groan quieter! Mister Skeeve and I have some talking to do.”

  Having already completed one adventure after antagonizing the military arm of a large organization, I was not overly eager to add another entire group of plug-uglies to my growing list of enemies.

  “Nothing personal,” I called to the bodyguard who was still conscious. “Here! Have a drink.”

  I levitated the flask over to him, and he caught it with a weak moan I chose to interpret as ‘thanks.’

  “You said something about a deal?” Shai-ster said, turning to me again.

  “Right. Now, if my appraisal of the situation is correct, the Mob wants three things: Big Julie’s army back, me dead or working for them, and a crack at the new money coming into Possiltum after the wedding.”

  The Mob spokesman cocked his head to one side.

  “That a bit more blunt than I would have put it, but you appear to have captured the essential spirit of my clients’ wishes. My compliments on your concise summation.”

  “Here’s another concise summation to go with it. Hands off Big Julie and his crew; he’s under my protection. By the same token, Possiltum is my territory. Stay away from it or it will cost you more than you’ll get. As to my services, I have no wish to become a Mob employee. I would consider an occasional assignment as an outside contractor for a specific fee, but full-time employment is out.”

  The Mob spokesman was back in his element, face stony and impassive.

  “That doesn’t sound like much of a deal.”

  “It doesn’t?”

  I reviewed the terms quickly in my mind.

  “Oh! Excuse me. There is one other important part of my offer I neglected to mention. I don’t expect your employers to give up their objectives without any return at all. What I have in mind is a swap: an army and maybe a kingdom for an opportunity to exploit an entire world.”

  Shai-ster raised his eyebrows.

  “You’re going to give us the world? Just like that? Lord Magician, I suspect you’re not bargaining with a full deck.”

  “I didn’t say I would give you the world, I said I would give you access to a world. Brand new territory full of businesses and people to exploit; one of the richest in the universe.”

  The spokesman frowned.

  “Another world? And I’m supposed to take your word as to how rich it is and that you can give us access?”

  “It would be nice, but even in my most naive moments I wouldn’t expect you to accept a blind bid like that. No, I’m ready to give you a brief tour of the proposed world so that you can judge for yourself.”

  “Wait a minute,” Shai-ster said, holding up his hands. “This is so far beyond my negotiating parameters that even if I liked what I saw, I couldn’t approve the deal. I need to bring one of the Big Boys in on this decision.”

  This was better than I had hoped. By the time he could bring one of the Mob’s hierarchy to Possiltum, I could deal with some of my other problems.

  “Fine. Go and fetch him. I’ll hold the deal until your return.”

  The spokesman gave one of his tight-lipped smiles.

  “No need to wait,” he said. “My immediate superior is on call specifically for emergencies such as this.”

  Before I could frame a reply, he opened the front of his belt buckle and began rubbing it, all the while mumbling under his breath.

  There was a quick flash of light, and an old, hairy-jowled man appeared in the room. Looking round, he spied the two bodyguards sprawled on the floor and gripped the sides of his face with his open hands in an exaggerated expression of horror.

  “Mercy!” he wheezed in a voice so hoarse I could barely understand him. “Shai-ster, you bad boy. I
f there was trouble, you should have called me sooner. Oh, those poor, poor boys.”

  The Mob spokesman’s face was once again blank and impassive as he addressed me.

  “Skeeve, Lord Magician of Possiltum, let me introduce Don Bruce, the Mob’s fairy godfather.”

  “OH! This is simply marvelous! Who would have ever thought ... another dimension, you say?”

  “That’s right,” I said off-handedly. “It’s called Deva.”

  Of course, I was quite in agreement with Don Bruce. The Bazaar on Deva was really something, and every time I visited it, I was impressed anew. It was an incredible tangle of tents and displays stretching as far as the eye could see in every direction, crammed full of enough magical devices and beings to defy anyone’s imagination and sanity. It was the main crossroads of trade for the dimensions. Anything worth trading money or credits for was here.

  This time, however, I was the senior member of the expedition. As much as I wanted to rubberneck and explore, it was more important to pretend to be bored and worldly ... or other-worldly as the case might be.

  Don Bruce led the parade, as wide-eyed as a farm-kid in his first big city, with Shai-ster, myself, and the two bodyguards trailing along behind. The bodyguards seemed more interested in crowding close to me than in protecting their superiors, but then again, they had just had some bad experiences with magic.

  “The people here all look kinda strange,” one of them muttered to me. “You know, like foreigners.”

  “They are foreigners ... or rather you are,” I said. “You’re on their turf, and a long way from home. These are Deveels.”

  “Devils?” the man responded, looking a little wild-eyed. “You’re tellin’ me we’re surrounded by devils?”

  While it was reassuring to me to see the Mob’s bully-boys terrified by something I had grown used to, it also occurred to me that if they were too scared, it might ruin the deal I was trying to set up.

  “Look ... say, what is your name, anyway?”

  “Guido,” the man confided, “and this here’s my cousin Nunzio.”

  “Well look, Guido. Don’t be thrown by these jokers. Look at them. They’re storekeepers like storekeepers anywhere. Just because they look funny doesn’t mean they don’t scare like anybody else.”