Myth 13 - Myth Alliances Asprin, Robert (top 100 novels .TXT) 📖

booth that we had more or less come to regard as our own. “Master Mont?gomery, I don't really know where to start. We have some bad news for you. The revolution ...”

“... Went all wrong,” the innkeeper finished for me. “I know it. Ragstone, my potboy, told me all about it.”

I peered at him, wondering if I had heard him incor?rectly. “It went worse than 'all wrong,'” I stated. “It was a total failure. There were no survivors. Where was Ragstone watching from?”

“Oh, he was in the thick of things,” Montgomery de?clared.

“He was on the drawbridge?” I asked.

“He was up the stairs on the way to the Pervects' big room,” Montgomery replied, looking around at all of our puzzled faces. “He said they never had a chance. One minute he was about to break down a door with my best barrel-​rolling stave, and the next minute there's a big flash of light and he's back here.”

“Here?” I echoed.

“Aye, in his room. Which he shares with Coolea, my stable lad. Both of 'em as puzzled as a crossword. You've never seen such faces,” the innkeeper chuckled.

“They're alive?” I demanded. “But we thought the Per?vects had killed them all.”

“I bet the boys wondered if they was dead,” Mont?gomery grinned. “Finding themselves at home looking at the ceiling. We're all surprised, too. I thought like you did, that they might put down armed resistance with force, but maybe the Pervects are more merciful on us poor mis?guided souls than we would've been on them.”

Zol's eyes danced. “This is more material for my study,” he asserted eagerly, pulling out his notebook and tapping in several lines. “What a fascinating turn of events.”

“And your employees weren't harmed at all,” I pressed Montgomery.

“Well, except none of 'em can go out and about. I was right surprised to see you come in. I thought it didn't work. We've all tried to go out, but it's as if there's no door there.”

“That,” Tananda announced, once we had all gotten over the shock, “is one powerful group of magicians. Two couldn't have done such a mass working by themselves. Not even ten of them could have. What we saw them do the other day to combine their power has to be unique. I feel outgunned and outclassed.”

“And yet they temper their actions with mercy,” Zol muttered, writing furiously. “Intriguing.”

I thought for a moment. “It doesn't sound like mercy so much as a warning. They don't want to destroy their work?force. They'd have to train thousands of new Wuhses to do the work.”

“But what about our revolution?” Montgomery said.

Zol gave a rueful smile. “And with such a demonstra?tion of power, will you refuse to do your work tomorrow?”

“No!” the innkeeper exclaimed, his slitted pupils wide. “No, I'll get up early! I'll work late. Providing we can all get out of here in the morning, that is.”

“What about Wensley?” I asked.

"Oh, he don't live here, Master Skeeve. You ought to try his house. And on the way past, if you'd be so kind to drop

in at Carredelest's delicatessen? He lives above his shop. There's not a bite to eat on the premises, and I can't get out of here to pick up my order."

“Sure,” I agreed, absently. “Where does Wensley live?”

Myth 13 - Myth Alliances

TWENTY

“There's something funny going on here.”

Ñ g. carlin

“I'm sorry,” responded a petite female Wuhs with dark curls, through the window of a pleasant blue house several blocks from the inn. “My mate is not here.”

“That's strange,” I murmered, almost to myself. “Every?one else was returned to their homes.”

“He could be with his parents,” Kassery suggested apologetically. “They are not well. He is there as often as he is here. I applaud his eagerness to be a dutiful son.”

“Hmm.” I nodded slowly. “That might explain it. Could you tell us how to get to their home?”

“They don't live in Pareley,” Kassery offered. “I could send them a note ... if I could leave here, but at present I am finding it difficult... very difficult. Is it possible that I might be allowed an explanation of my temporary indisposition? Not that I am upset about it, of course,” she added hastily.

As quickly as I could I told her what had happened. “No, no, no,” the female shook her head disbelievingly. 'This is not my Wensley. It couldn't be."

Following Kassery's instructions, we traveled out a few days' journey into the countryside to a small village in Rennet, in the midst of a great forest just beyond the bor?ders of Pareley. Gouda and Edam, Wensley's mother and father, the local apothecary and schoolmaster, were as puz?zled as we were.

“He hasn't been here in some weeks,” Gouda explained, serving us tea in a scrupulously clean kitchen. She was a plump little woman, with soft, very deft hands. “He said he's involved in a project for the common good. I might make a guess, though you can tell me if I'm wrong, and I probably am, that you are involved in that project?”

“I think we are the project,” I explained. “It's just that we've lost track of him.” I glanced at the others, and they nodded. No sense in worrying them, when they could do nothing.

“I thought as much. It's clever of him to bring demons to enrich our local Wuhs culture, when all the others he knows are bringing back inanimate souvenirs. Why, they can't talk, can they?”

I knew plenty of knickknacks that could talk, and more, but I didn't believe then was the time to bring