But my gasping didn't last for long. Not two seconds later I
was right in the wizard's face. Clutching the lapels of his sorcerer's robe in my hands and shaking him the way a terrier shakes a rat. Well. Small terrier; big rat. The terrier actually does most of the moving around part.
"What's the big idea, Zulkeh?" I demanded. "What are you doing getting into a wrangle with the CEO of the Infernal Regions—the Archdevil himself!—over this damned Joe business? You were just supposed to ask him about Benny!"
Oh, I was hot—hot.
"Bad enough we get hauled down here in the first place! For any reason! But at least Gwendolyn's family so we got that excuse!" I took the time here to bestow a share of my furious glare on her. "Such as it is. Screwy, you ask me, chasing after an ex-boyfriend."
Gwendolyn glared back. Normally, that would have shut me up—she's such a scary woman—but not this time.
Hot—hot.
"That damned Joe business! I'm sick of it! Want no part of it! None, d'you hear? None!"
Alas, browbeating a wizard is easier said than done. Before I'd even finished, Zulkeh was spluttering his own outrage.
"Do I hear me aright? Is this midget jackanapes presuming to question me on the pursuit of my science?" Spittle, spittle. "Outrage! Impudence!"
Fortunately or otherwise, Greyboar interposed himself between us. It was so undignified. Greyboar's version of "interposing himself" involves scruffs of the neck and large hands and sundry hoisting operations. I leave the coarse details to the imagination.
I tried to keep hollering even suspended in midair—so did the wizard—but Greyboar gave us both a little shake and that pretty much brought silence. Hard to holler when your teeth are clattering together.
"Shuddup," he growled, after he set us down. "Both of you."
To add insult to injury, Greyboar's ensuing reproof was all aimed at me.
"And you're supposed to be the brains of the outfit!" he snorted. "What in the world did you think Zulkeh was doing on this little expedition, numbskull? You think the mage came along because he gives two fiddles about a revolutionary agitator's artist ex-boyfriend?"
"Preposterous!" spoke the mage. "Offensive—nay, insulting! Would any scholar allow himself to be diverted from his science for such a paltry and mundane purpose? Much less such a savant as myself?"
I goggled at him. Then, cursed myself.
What an idiot I was! Of course Zulkeh wouldn't have come along on this insane expedition for the normal reasons that grip your workaday lunatic. Ever since he decided that the weird dream of a now-dead king of Goimr portended some awful and unknown disaster for civilization, he's been a monomaniac about that damned quest of his. And since he was a maniac to begin with, you can just imagine what he was like once he got rolling.
That realization brought another. I swiveled and bestowed my glare on Magrit.
"And what about you?" I demanded. "What's your angle on this thing?" Here, a big sneer. "And don't bother telling me that you're doing this as a favor to Gwendolyn. You wouldn't cross the street to piss on a man dying of thirst unless he paid you in solid coin or—"
I stumbled to a halt. Magrit grinned. Wittgenstein spun around on her shoulder and mooned me. Disgusting, really, the way a salamander moons.
"What a dimwit," snickered the vile little creature. "Good thing he's built so low to the ground. Any taller, and the drop or two of blood which reaches his brain wouldn't be enough to keep him from passing out."
"You're swapping favors with her," I croaked. "You help Gwendolyn find her ex-squeeze and she owes you."
Magrit kept grinning. Wittgenstein snickered again. I could feel the emptiness of eternal destiny yawning wider and wider beneath my feet.
"And you count favors like a miser counts pennies. She owes you, you'll insist she pay you back. With a favor. And since Gwendolyn's in no position to do anything for you herself—she's on the run from every porker in Grotum—she'll have to put the screws on her brother—"
Light-headed now with growing horror, I stared at Greyboar. Even since we'd started on this insane trek, Greyboar had spent most of his time with his sister. In a tête-à-tête, I believe the sophisticated crowd calls it. I hadn't thought about it much, at the time. Sibling reconciliation, you know. Slobbering sentimental stuff; babble, babble, babble.
"Tell me it isn't true," I whispered.
Greyboar cleared his throat. "Ah. Well. Actually, Ignace . . ."
At that point, I believe I wailed. Not sure. My memory gets a little fuzzy. Sheer terror, I'm told, will do that to a man.
Then, it got worse. My wail was cut off by a hand placed over my mouth. Two hands, actually. Not Greyboar's dinner-plate mitts, but two little hands belonging to Jenny and Angela.
One from each. They're not hard to distinguish between. Angela's hands are small, well-shaped and beautiful. Jenny's hands are exactly the same, except her fingers are longer. I could tell them apart in my sleep. I have, actually, not to put too fine a point on it. And if that comes across as a lecher's remark, think again. It's got nothing to do with that. They comfort me differently, that's all. Can't explain how, exactly, but they do.
I love those hands. Just as I love the faces that were staring at me.
Um. Squinting at me, to be precise. As in: exasperation, discontent, contumely. That sort of thing.
With ever-growing shock, I realized that Jenny and Angela had also been spending a lot of time with Greyboar and Gwendolyn since the journey began. Tête-à-quatratête, so to speak.
"We think it's a great idea," snapped Jenny. "You would too if you ever paid any attention to what we told you about what's happening to the dwarves."
Angela sneered. "Ignace? Pay attention to anything in the world except what's going to make him a few quid? Ha!"
They were exceedingly disgruntled, now. I could tell. I tried to mumble something but the hands on my mouth just tightened down.
"Oughta cut him off for good, we should," growled Jenny. "Him and his tight fist for a heart. Put him on a real budget."
Angela snickered. "Great austerities. Be good for the midget. His heart wouldn't be the only thing shrunk down to a walnut."
To add insult to injury, Zulkeh added his advice.
"Splendid idea! A stratagem worthy of the ancients! Should you need guidance, damsels of dubious virtue, I shall be delighted to provided you with a copy of the classic treatise. Lysistrata Sfondrati-Piccolomini's seminal—if you will pardon the expression—Do It Yourself, Big Shot; You're a Man, Aren't You?"
By now, I suspect I was whimpering. Jenny's frown got crosser still.
Angela's was even worse. "We are going to rescue the dwarves at Operation Nibelung. One of these days, when the time's right. Magrit's still figuring out the plan. Greyboar's already agreed, and so have we. So's the Cat, for that matter."
My eyes rolled wildly in the direction of the Cat. The woman was standing not too far away, giving me her own cold-eyed stare.
"Et tu?" I managed to mumble through the fingers.
The Cat shrugged. "Sure. Why not? And Gwendolyn says Schrödinger may be there."
"Bastard's one of the 'top scientists,' according to one rumor," Gwendolyn snarled.
It was hopeless. Everybody was against me. An outcast in my own land, you might say.
So I did the only rational thing, of course. I capitulated.
"Okay," I mumbled. "I'll help. When the time comes."
Jenny and Angela's squints were now so suspicious that their eyes were mere slits. But they moved their hands off my mouth.
"S'true!" I protested. "Give you my word."
Squints. Squints.
Support came from an unexpected quarter. Gwendolyn, to my surprise.
"That's good enough, girls," she rumbled. (Oh, yeah. Gwendolyn talks in a rumble just like her brother. Different tone, of course. Contralto profundo, you might call it. Her voice is just like she is: beautiful in a way that's hard to describe. Think of a very feminine avalanche.)
"Good enough," she repeated. Gwendolyn moved up alongside Jenny and Angela. "He's a little scoundrel, true—greedy as a sponge and with about as much concern for moral standards. But he's no liar. Never has been."
I stared up at Gwendolyn. Her hawk face loomed over me. A lot like Greyboar's, that face. She's got the same dark complexion, same black eyes, same kinky mass of hair—except hers is a glorious mane instead of a bramble—same raptor beak of a nose. How she manages to look gorgeous instead of just scary is a mystery to me, but she does. And look scary at the same time.
Suddenly, Gwendolyn's face burst into a smile. Her smile, which is not quite like anything else in the world. Not a whole lot of warmth in it, mind you. Gwendolyn's not what you'd call the sweet-and-sentimental type. But it's such a real thing.
I found myself getting choked up. It had been so many years since I'd seen that smile. It was my first memory of Gwendolyn. My first memory of either one of them, actually, because it was Gwendolyn who had introduced me to Greyboar.
Happened way back when I was a kid, growing up in one of the slums near the Flankn. Six years old, maybe seven. I'd gotten cornered in an alley by half a dozen bigger kids. Bunch of sullen snots, if you know what I mean. Was it my fault they couldn't take a joke?
Really a humorless lot, no doubt about it. Had chains and clubs and everything. But just when things were looking dicey they started flying every whichaway. The ones who didn't land on their asses took off running like rabbits. And the next thing I knew this really big girl was smiling down at me.
"Hiya, shrimp," she'd said. "I thought it was a pretty good wisecrack, myself. But you might want to work on your timing."
"Hiya, shrimp," Gwendolyn said.
"Long time," I croaked back.
The next thing I knew—just like it'd happened all those years ago—I was clutching her. Bawling my eyes out, if you can believe it.
"S'okay, Ignace." She squatted down. Her powerful arms gathered me up and held me tight. So tight, so real, just like I remembered. "S'okay. I never really stopped loving you either. Even if you were a crook, I knew you weren't dishonest. A rotter, yes. Rotten, no."
"Faint praise," I mumbled sourly, my face still pressed into her neck.
Gwendolyn's big shoulders heaved. One of those chuckling kind of shrugs, I would have thought, except that I could feel her own tears leaking into my hair.
"What else do you ever get in this world?" she whispered.
That brought the high moment of the day. Because Wittgenstein made a wisecrack, and, like me, his timing was off.
"Idn't dat sweet?" he sniggered, from his perch on Magrit's shoulder. "Weeping willow meets blubbering bantam."
The Cat was there, somehow, clutching Wittgenstein in her hand. Didn't even see her move.
"Wonder if salamanders can grow new heads?" she mused, hefting the lajatang.
The Cat's not given to idle speculation. She proceeded immediately with the experiment.
"You fruitcake!" howled Wittgenstein. Hissed, I should say. It's hard to actually howl, when your head's no longer connected to your lungs.
Everybody else was really howling, now. With laughter, except for Magrit.
"You fruitcake!" She charged up, shouldering the Cat aside, and stooped over to pick up Wittgenstein's head. "You got any idea how hard it's going to be to fix him back up?"
The Cat shook her head. "No. Can I watch?"