“What’s all this?” Garth demanded. It wasn’t every day he came home to find his wife entertaining a strange wizard and the mayor’s youngest daughter.

“A godsend,” Zoli replied. “These good people have finally offered me something interesting to do. It’s a dark plot involving corruption in high places; more than usual, that is. If you stay, you help us; if you don’t want to get involved, clear out.”

Garth made no move to go. Instead he stood by the door, giving his wife’s guests the mother of all hard stares. Finally he pointed at Ethelberthina and blurted: “Shouldn’t you be in school?”

“Not according to my father,” she responded calmly. “He thinks it’s a waste of time, educating females.”

“What?” Garth’s face went red with indignation. “A waste, is it? Our Lily graduated from Overford Academy and went on to become Duke Janifer’s senior resident alchemist! She earns twice your father’s pay, bribes included. You tell your daddy that.”

“I believe he already knows,” said Master Porfirio. “Why do you think he hates educated women so much? He doesn’t want to face the embarrassment of any more Lilys.”

Garth hoisted a chair and slammed it down backwards at the table, straddling it like a horse. “Whatever this is about, count me in.”

“Good,” said Zoli. “We’ll be needing a babysitter.”

In the Swordsisters’ Union Hall at East Prandle, Pojandra Foeslayer glanced from her caller to the papers on her desk and said, “A favor? Favors for union sisters only. Your membership lapsed ages ago. Can’t say whether you still meet our qualifications.”

“Bugger ’em,” said Zoli, sitting on the desk. “I don’t want to re-up. Why feed dues into an organization that no longer meets my professional needs as a mercenary guard?”

“‘Mercenary guard?’” Pojandra echoed sarcastically. “School crossing guard. Everyone knows it!”

“That’s still guard duty, and I still get paid,” Zoli replied.

“So do we,” Pojandra snapped. “Go ’round to Customer Service, put in a work order, pay up like everyone else.”

“Impossible,” Zoli said. “I can’t afford to hire as many of you as I need.”

“If you can’t afford to pay for us—” Pojandra stopped short, her words cut off by the point of Zoli’s dagger as it tickled the underside of her chin.

“Tsk,” the former Swordsister remarked. “And you with a young woman’s reflexes. Tell you what, love: I promise not to tell your captain about how an old relic like me got the drop on you, and you tell her why it’s a good thing to loan me the services of ten Third Rank warriors.”

“T—ten?” Pojandra swallowed hard. “But—but minimum wage for Third Rankers is—It’d mean tapping the warchest. We can’t afford to—!”

Zoli brought her face very close to Pojandra’s and smiled. “As long as East Prandle’s downriver from Overford, you can’t afford not to.”

The water-dragon attacked the toll bridge at midmorning on Market Day, when traffic was heaviest. The beast reared out of the river with a mighty roar, sending the crowd into a blind panic. Draft animals snorted and stampeded, pulling their wagons after them willy-nilly, blocking both lanes of the bridge and preventing an orderly evacuation. Farmers and merchants abandoned their wares and scrambled over the blockading carts, but fat times made for fat men and few of them could haul their bulky bodies over a kitchen table, let alone an oxcart. They collapsed in despair against one another, yammering for rescue.

To its credit, the town patrol came running up to the bridge as soon as word reached them, but one look at the rampaging water-dragon petrified them in every limb. (Later, in the Crusty Boar, they spoke of this as “assessing the situation.” Their drinking buddies amended it to “close-order wetting yourselves.”)

“Is that our old water-dragon?” one of their number gasped. “It looks bigger than I recall.”

“Can’t be our old ’un,” said his comrade. “I heard as ours died.”

“Died, hey?” a third remarked. “Don’t look dead to me. You ever see the body?”

“No, but a friend of my wife’s brother-in-law’s cousin told us that—”

“Maybe it did die, and that’s why it’s bigger,” said the first man. “Dead things swell up bad, in the warm weather.”

“That accounts for the size, but what about all that thrashing about and roaring?” his companion countered.

“Rigor Morris.”

Their discussion was polite but impractical. For his part, Mayor Eyebright would have preferred less debate and more decapitation. His position in the crisis was most unenviable, for at the instant of the attack he was smack dab in the middle of the bridge, manning the toll station. Banning all wet-wheeled vehicles from Overford Market (thus forcing all commercial traffic to use the bridge) had been his idea. For this lucrative inspiration, he got the right to man the booth one Market Day per month, plus the town council’s promise to take his word about that day’s receipts. Mayor Eyebright would sooner miss his father’s funeral (and had) than his assigned stint at the toll booth.

This day, he found himself actively wishing to be anywhere else. The water-dragon loomed over the bridge, mouth gaping wide, fangs dripping. Mayor Eyebright knew that he was going to die, a fact which he resented deeply. Rancor swallowed terror and he came storming out of the toll booth, shaking his fist and shouting, “Unnatural monster! You’re supposed to be dead!”

“I am,” the water-dragon answered.

Mayor Eyebright dropped his upraised fist to his chest and staggered backward. “That’s my Ethelberthina’s voice!” he exclaimed.

“Yum,” the dragon agreed.

“How dare you devour my daughter?”

The water-dragon shook with laughter that sounded decidedly nonreptilian. “She was too delicious to pass up. As were the other children.”

“Other—?” The mayor’s jowls looked like slabs of calf’s-foot jelly.

“Every last one of ’em as they were on their way to school.”

“How’s that?” A fat merchant came waddling up to the mayor and poked him in the chest, dragon or no dragon. “All the toll revenue you Overforders gouge from us and you can’t spare your own kids the hire of a crossing guard?”

“We do have a crossing guard,” Mayor Eyebright sniped back. “Where is she? I’ll have her salary for this!”

 “You won’t have much, then,” the resurrected water-dragon chuckled.

Just then there came a thunderous cry of “Halt!” as a cloud of purple smoke erupted from one of the decorative pillars flanking the townward side of the bridge. The people’s eyes turned towards the sound.

Looking more than a little fetching for a woman of her age, Zoli of the Brazen Shield stood balanced atop the pillar, shining sword in hand. With this blade, the crossing guard now pointed at the school side of the Iron River and intoned, “Behold where he comes, the true source of our grief! And his old man.” A great roar of astonishment went up from the crowd as they saw two fully robed wizards being hauled bodily down to the riverbank by a hostile knot of armored swordswomen.

“This is unspeakable! An outrage!” Dean Thrumble bellowed as he and his son were chivvied along. “Just let me get my hands free and I’ll smite you all with a vast and awesome spell of destruction!”

“Try,” Pojandra Foeslayer snarled, giving him an extra shove that nearly sent him tumbling off the bank and into the river. “Won’t work while you’re wearing those enchanted manacles, though. Took ten of us to get ’em on you, but it’s worth the peace of mind.”

“Do you mean to kill us?” the dean demanded.

“Hardly,” said the leader of swordswomen, one Lt. Vida Chookslaughter. “We just want to educate you.”

The elder Thrumble drew himself up huffily. “Madam, I am the dean of Overford Academy. I don’t need an education.”

“No, but someone ought to teach you a lesson.”

“Good people of Overford!” Zoli called out. “I come before you with a heavy heart. This very day, while I was doing my sadly underpaid job, the water-dragon surged from the Iron River and attacked. I was as shocked as our mayor to see again a beast I’d thought dead. The monster took advantage of my amazement to strike me a mighty blow which threw me headfirst against a tree. When I recovered my senses, the dragon was gone. Alas, so were your children!”

Above the people’s cries of anguish, Mayor Eyebright sternly said, “Madam, the town council will be expecting you to refund us a suitable portion of your salary, in view of the insufficient performance of your—”

A small but attention-getting pebble flew from Pojandra’s sling and nipped the mayor’s hat off his head and into the river. “Shut up, Baldy,” she suggested.

“I loved those children as my own,” Zoli went on. “Thus I resolved to avenge them. To this end, I sought the services of the greatest wizard in these parts.”

“I never saw that woman before in my life!” Dean Thrumble spat.

“Not you.” Zoli’s contempt was epic. “I speak of Master Porfirio. From his wisdom I gleaned the reason for the dead water-dragon’s return, and from his hands I received this.” She yanked a small glass vial from her belt. “Behold the Elixir of Veracity! None whom it touches may speak aught save the truth!”

“And how is the truth supposed to kill a dragon?” the mayor wanted to know.

“Yes, do tell,” said the dragon. (Such patience and courtesy—that is, the beast’s neglecting to devour anyone during the extended parley—were downright odd. However, most of those present were too thoroughly distracted by other matters to remark on it.)

Zoli ignored both the mayor and the dragon. Without another word, she leaped lightly down from the pillar and sprinted the length of the bridge railing to the far bank, where the father-and-son wizards stood captive. Standing before them, she unstoppered the vial with her teeth and poured the contents over Master Thrumble’s head before he could react in any way save incoherent spluttering.

“Phew! What’s in that stuff?” his father asked.

“The doom of liars!” boomed a new voice. There was a second puff of purple smoke and Master Porfirio appeared upon the same pillar Zoli had just vacated. “A brew of my own devising, compounded of the dead dragon’s liquefied vitals.”

“But the dragon’s not dead!” the dean and the mayor objected as one.

“I was,” the beast in question said, “but I got better. It’s a fascinating story, good Overforders, most of which has to do with what’s been mucking up your river, but I’m not the one who can tell it. Am I, Mayor Eyebright?” it ended on a note of dreadful significance.

The onlookers began to mutter amongst themselves. The mayor, trapped in the midst of a disgruntled constituency, felt fear beyond any that the revenant water-dragon could evoke. Nervously he exclaimed, “Alarmist nonsense! Nothing’s wrong with the river.”

“No, dragons always come back from the dead,” someone said snidely.

“We’ll see,” said Master Porfirio with unnerving calm. He waved his hands and materialized in quick succession a vial identical to Zoli’s, a chicken carcass, and a length of thin rope. Anointing the dead bird with the gloop from the vial, he tied it by the feet, held it up before his face, and in a loud voice quizzed it thus: “Are you now or have you ever been a marmoset?”

“Here! How can a dead chicken lie?” the mayor demanded.

“Or tell the truth, for that matter?” someone else asked.

“What’s a marmoset?” a third party wanted to know.

“Shush,” the fat merchant directed them. “It is likely a wizardly matter. They’re always communing with the strangest things. Don’t let him hear you questioning his ways or the next dead chicken may be you.”

Master Porfirio laid an ear to the fowl’s side, then announced, “She says yes! And now . . .” He swung the body overhead at the rope’s end and let it drop into the river. When he reeled it out again and the mob saw the horrific changes that had overtaken the small corpse many turned pale, some gasped, a few screamed, and one unsteady soul vomited over the railing.

“Behold the power of the elixir and the fate of liars!” Master Porfirio proclaimed, flourishing the blackened, boil-encrusted remains of the experimental poultry.

Zoli turned to Master Thrumble. “I’m only going to ask you one question before I shove you in the drink and we see what the elixir thinks of you: What have you been doing to this river and who’s been making it easy for you to go on doing it?”

For only one question, it was a doozy, and young Thrumble’s reply was worthy of it. By the time he finished rattling through his deposition, most of the Market Day crush had come up out of Overford Town just to listen. Apparently he had never quite mastered the art of summoning demons to transport his alchemical errors to the safety of the Netherworld, as was standard safety practice among wizards. The one time he tried, the fiend broke free of a defective pentagram and only his father’s intervention saved him from annihilation. He never found the nerve to try again. Dumping his “leftovers” into the river seemed like the perfect solution: cheap, simple, and didn’t everybody do it? There were some complaints from local anglers over the mounting number of fish kills, but a word with Mayor Eyebright and the complaints vanished. By a strange coincidence, so did the anglers. Master Thrumble admitted to feeling a smidgen of concern when the water-dragon was reported missing-presumed-dead, but soothed his conscience with the thought that it wasn’t a bad thing if the stuff he’d dumped in the river had killed a monster.

“Didn’t kill it any too permanent, though, ha?” someone on the bridge yelled.

“My son crossed that river twice a day!” someone on the townside bank added. “If he’d fallen in, your sludge might’ve killed him!”

“It did kill him!” someone else cried. “And permanent! Did that when it brought the water-dragon back to life and it et him!”

Other parents amid the press now added their voices to the rising clamor. The swordswomen instinctively moved into protective formation around their captives at the sound of a mob baying for revenge, its mildest demand being that Master Thrumble be tossed into the river without delay.

Master Porfirio gazed down upon the rabble and innocently asked, “Why would we want to do that?”

“Because of what you did with the chicken,” someone hollered up at him. “To the chicken. Using the chicken.”

“Yeah!” someone else added. “With the magic elixir-thingie.”

“Oh. That. No, I don’t think so. You see, good people, sometimes when the truth comes to light, it’s more than magic: it’s a miracle. And so, if all that young Thrumble told us is true, we ought to be seeing a much more spectacular proof of it right . . . about . . . now!”

The water-dragon let out a spine-prickling howl. “O, I am slain! Again!” it wailed. “The truth has finished me! O woe, alas, alack, welladay—”

“Yes, yes, point taken. Now fall down already!” Master Porfirio directed.

The dying dragon eyed the river uneasily. “Into that?”

“Oh, for—!” Raising one hand, Master Porifiro engulfed the swaying monster in an impenetrable cloud of smoke which was, for a change, green instead of purple.

It was rather a lot of smoke, veiling the dragon, the bridge, large shares of both riverbanks, and most of the crowd. People stumbled through the murk, coughing, bumping into things, and calling out “Is that you?” in a generally useless manner. At last a brisk breeze swept in, banishing the thick haze.

One of the town patrol rubbed his eyes, blinked, and declared: “The water-dragon’s gone!”

“Course it is. Didn’t you hear that nice young wizard? The truth was spoke and it was the truth that got rid of it once and for all.”

“If that’s so, I’d like to lay my hands on that Master Thrumble and his pa for what they done to our river!”

“Hard luck. Look across the water. They’re gone as well, and them female sword-slingers with ’em. Prob’ly run off, and good for ’em.”

“Come to think of it, where’s that nice young wizard? And our Zoli? And our rotten excuse for a mayor?”

“Ex-mayor soon enough, you mark my words.”

“Can’t say I care if I ever see him or them Thrumbles again, but what happened to the others? Where did they—?”

Someone standing by the railing on the downriver side of the bridge gave a shout of amazement and joy that brought an end to all other conversations. The people thronged the railing, pushing and shoving in an effort to see what it was that now came drifting slowly out from beneath the shadow of the toll bridge. A volley of wild cheers went up as the raft emerged into full sunlight, Garth Justi’s-son at the tiller, all the schoolchildren of Overford aboard.

“Magic’s nice,” said one onlooker. “But give me a miracle any day. Less smoke.”

* * *

“Can I take this smelly thing off now?” Ethelberthina asked. She indicated the patch of water-dragon hide balanced on her head.

“You may,” Master Porfirio said, closing the door of Zoli’s cottage behind him. “Sorry about the smell, but you know it was necessary. No wizard can conjure a truly effective illusion without some token bit of the real thing to anchor the chimera.”

“Sorry for the delay, too,” said Zoli. “We had to settle certain matters with the town council.”

“And about time.” The girl doffed the piece of water-dragon hide and stepped out of the wizard’s chalked diagram. She was in such a hurry that she almost upset the scrying basin full of river water which had allowed her to observe the goings-on at the bridge and manipulate the dragon’s image accordingly.

“A job well done takes time,” Master Porfirio recited, ever the academic. “And you should certainly take pride in this one. You’re a clever girl, Ethelberthina. Your plan won me back my job, and a promotion to Dean pro tem. It won Zoli back the respect of the townsfolk and their offspring.”

“And a fat raise,” Zoli added.

“It also won us all a clean river, now that I’ve got the clout to organize a massed faculty cleansing spell, and it won you—hmm. What did it win you?”

“The right to continue her education,” Zoli supplied.

“Nnno. The council told us that her father will lose his job for this, remember? And her own money’s all tied up in trust. She can’t pay the fees.”

“After all she’s done for you, you’d charge her tuition?” Zoli’s hand automatically fell to her sword.

The wizard was rueful. “I’m dean, but I have no power over school finances. Our bursar’s a troll—literally. Trolls only understand the bottom line.”

“Oh, don’t worry about me,” Etherlberthina said cheerfully. “I’ll be earning my own money, soon enough.”

“Indeed? How?”

“By bottling and selling as much Iron River water as I can before you clean it up,” she replied.

“Who would want to buy that swill?” Zoli asked.

Rather than answer, Ethelberthina inquired, “Would either of you have some dragon skin to hand? Besides this, I mean.” She waggled the patch of hide.

Zoli looked dubious, but rummaged through her storage chests. “I’m not supposed to have this,” she said handing the girl a limp remnant. “The king knows that armor made from these scales is flexible, light, and virtually impenetrable, so he reserves it for his soldiers. He also knows that it’s the only edge those clods have over the swordsisters, which is why royal law forbids a freelance female from owning even a scrap of it. But I had to keep this, law or no. It’s a souvenir of my first dragon slaying.”

“Well, you’ll always have your memories,” said Ethelberthina, and dropped it in the scrying basin. Zoli said a highly improper word and fished it out with the tip of her sword, only to have the girl smoothly swat the blade upward, sending the soaked bit of hide flying. The scales hit the floor and shattered like thin ice.

Zoli gaped. “The river water does that to dragon scales?”

“And dragonscale armor too,” Ethelberthina said. “Now can you guess who’ll buy it from us? Of course we’ll get better prices once the river’s cleaned up, and we’re the only ones with a supply of the old water put by.”

“ ‘We’?”

“Well, I’ll need help with packaging, advertising, distribution . . . You’d have to quit your job as a crossing guard, Zoli, but you’re our ideal sales rep to the Swordsisters’ Union. What do you think they’d pay for the Elixir of Equality?”

 “Nothing they couldn’t recoup once the king’s enemies start hiring them wholesale,” Master Porifiro muttered.

Zoli of the Brazen Shield laid one hand on the little girl’s shoulder. “Ethelberthina,” she said, “has anyone ever told you that you’re a very exceptional girl?”

“Yes,” she replied. “But for once it’s nice to hear it as a compliment.”

Even the ancient Greeks knew it: There really is no business like show business.

This is Kate’s first Chicks appearance, though by no means her first sale. She’s the author of six young adult mysteries, with a seventh on the way, and her work-in-progress, Polar City Nightmare, will be forthcoming from Orion Press in England.

 … But Comedy is Hard

Kate Daniel

It wasn’t my fault I stumbled. Blame the slob who threw his melon rind on the pavement instead of in the gutter where it belonged. These big city-state modern Greeks have no graces left, no culture. The great days of Athens are long past. Which in a way is where the whole affair started, not just with Citizen Melon-dropper.

But start with the stumble. It was embarrassing enough . . .

“Hippolyte! What’re you . . . be careful . . . Hades, will you watch where you swing that sword?”

I didn’t answer, being somewhat preoccupied with staying on my feet, a normally easy task made difficult by melon rinds underfoot. I’m no acrobat, but I felt like one as I twisted, righted myself, overbalanced once more, and finally steadied myself with my new sword. Called into service as a crutch, the tip of the blade plunged deep into the piece of melon, skewering it neatly.

My impromptu dance had drawn laughter around the agora, which rose to scattered cheers and applause at this point. I hammed it up for the gawkers, bowing and holding up the rind-topped sword as if it were laurel awarded a victor. After a moment I dropped the pose, lowered my sword, and pushed the garbage off the blade with my foot. Traffic in the agora resumed as I examined my pretty new toy for damage. Bronze is hard, but it can still be nicked.

Then a familiar voice spoke behind me. “Brava, my dear. I haven’t laughed so hard in ages, certainly not at my own poor efforts. Now that is comedy!” It was a musical voice, pitched to carry.

“No, it’s clumsiness.” Glycera, my fellow Amazon, came forward once my blade no longer posed a threat to nearby eyes, ears, and limbs. She’s a square-built older woman, tough as a boot, who wears her armor as easily as an Athenian housewife wears her chiton. “Hippolyte, I don’t know what your mother was thinking of, naming you for the Old Queen.”

“She probably thought she could get back at her own first sergeant by giving another one a headache in the ranks. Don’t you just love being a part of the great Amazon tradition?” I sheathed the sword, and turned to face the man who had spoken, doing my best to smile charmingly. Given how embarrassed I was by my awkward salute to Terpsichore, I don’t think it worked. “You’re Nicomachus, aren’t you? I loved your Silenus last year.”

“Did you?” The grin widened. “I’m glad somebody did. The judges weren’t too happy with it.”

“But . . .” Before I could say more, another man took Nicomachus by the elbow and steered him away. The borders on the newcomer’s robe were wide and purple, embroidered with gold; probably the sponsor, who wouldn’t enjoy waiting while an actor discussed the art of comedy with an Amazon warrior-girl. The actor in question directed a helpless smile back at me over his shoulder, confirming my guess.

So did the sergeant’s next words. “That’s Timaeus, the shipping king. You don’t keep that sort waiting.”

“But what did he mean about the judges? That was the funniest Silenus I’ve ever seen!”

“You know that’s not how the world works. That Silenus almost cost Nico the prize last year; way too old-fashioned an interpretation. Only reason the judges didn’t give the wreath to someone else was because he did such a terrific job on the part of the god and, well, he is Nico.”

“But it was funny!”

“So it was funny. That and half an obol will buy you a cup of wine. Goddess, Hippolyte, sometimes you act as if you’ve never been out of the Caucasus before.”

I hate to admit it, but Glycera was right. This was the fifth year I’d been sent to Athens with the tribute party. Some year Athens will get so involved with its own politics they’ll forget that old business between Theseus and my namesake, but don’t look for it to happen any time soon. My first year I had to miss all the plays in order to stand guard over the offering, especially the gold sheepskin. (No, not that golden fleece. That one’s just a myth. Ours is real wool, dyed gold because of some prophecy or other.) Standing guard is just for the symbolism. The money’s real enough, though, and a heavy tax it is on our people, too.

It’s always the junior members of the tribute delegation that pull guard duty, and by my second trip to Athens I had enough seniority to get to the opening comedy. The tragedies are the big show, even at a Dionysia, but I had no real interest in them. Especially not after the first time I saw Nicomachus. On stage, of course, all you can see is the mask, but the actors take their bows barefaced, and I memorized his. By the second show, I was in love. Well, theoretically in love; I didn’t have enough rank for a pregnancy, and I doubt if the Mothers would have approved a comic actor as a father in any case. But he was good.

Good, however, wasn’t enough, as Glycera had pointed out. (Goddess, what a name for a sergeant. It means Sweet One in the old tongue.) There are fashions in theater as in everything else these days. The current trend in comedy is political humor; select the right target and you can name your own price to the sponsors. But don’t expect me to laugh with the crowd. Call me old-fashioned if you want to, but I prefer traditional humor, with the protagonist whacking prune-faces over the head with a stuffed sausage phallus.

You might wonder what a country girl, even one who’s also a seasoned warrior, could possibly know about the theater. Sure, every apprentice sandal maker in Athens thinks he’s an expert, and the haeteras really are (they have time to study, during the day), but an Amazon from beyond the Hellespont? Most of my sisters, I’ll admit, regard theater as unimportant, something to kill time when winter keeps us close to our fires. But you see, I had an oracle once. Not from the Pythia, a private one. Thallia, Muse of Comedy, spoke to me. She told me to make people laugh.

See? You’re laughing already.

But we didn’t laugh when word came that the god’s favorite comic actor had gone missing.

“Missing? You mean he missed a rehearsal or something?”

“I mean he’s missing,” Glycera said. Grimly, she pushed through the marketplace crowd, with me following in her wake. “Gone. AWOL from his sponsor and his play and his house. And it looks like it wasn’t his idea to walk out.”

“But . . . but the dedication was held yesterday! He belongs to the god for as long as the festival runs.”

“Yeah. So?” Glycera stopped in front of an attractive house at the edge of the agora. A crowd had gathered in front, spilling into the garden and staring curiously in at the open door. Everyone was busy expressing their own opinions on what had happened at full volume. It sounded, in other words, like any normal gathering of Athenians.

I shook my head. In my opinion, a dedication should mean something, but times have changed. Judges accept bribes, hired claques make more noise than the audience, playwrights trim their poetry to the latest rabble-rousing breeze. With Nicomachus as protagonist, Anaxis was almost guaranteed the laurel. Personally I thought his poetry limped in every foot, a centipede of bad verse. But he was popular, and the sponsor was Athens’s latest political darling. It’s enough to give democracy a bad name.

The shipping magnate stood in the doorway, a sick expression on his face. Most likely he was picturing his expected crown on another’s brow. He caught sight of us and, to my surprise, motioned us forward.

“Thank you for coming. It was kind of your captain to offer your services.” He mopped at his brow, although the day was unseasonably cool. “Not that I expect it to do much good. He’s probably dead already. Poor darling Nico.”

I felt a pang. Peering over his shoulder, I saw why he’d said what he did; there was enough blood in the front room to supply an altar, or even a small battlefield. But no corpse. Most likely the killers had carried off the body. Or bodies; from experience I know even a small person holds a surprising amount of blood, but there were amphorae-worth of the stuff here.

Glycera entered the room and, after a slight hesitation, I followed. There was no reason to go in, since the entire room was visible from the doorway, and I didn’t want blood on my best sandals. But Glycera was the boss. “So why are we here?” I whispered.

“Captain thought it’d make a good impression on the locals. Called it an offering to Dionysus, for the Festival.” She poked with her sword tip at a chiton, dyed red by the puddle it rested in. The fabric dripped when she lifted it from the floor, and she let it fall again. “I thought you’d want to help, seeing as how you’ve been mooning over the guy for four years. We probably won’t be able to rescue him, but if we’re lucky we may be able to avenge his shade. You should appreciate that.”

A soft golden light dawned in one corner, wrapped around a graceful feminine form. It wasn’t the first time I’d seen this. My mouth gaped open like a fresh-caught fish, and I gasped more than said “Thallia!” The figure within the cloud of light giggled and nodded.

“Hmmm?” Glycera glanced over at me, apparently unable to see the apparition. “Oh, you mean Nico served the Muse of Comedy. Well, yeah, but a god trumps a muse. It’s Dionysus’s festival, after all.” She bent to examine a gore-caked dagger without touching it. “Strange, the furniture isn’t even broken. Just knocked over. You’d expect more damage, with this much blood.”

“But . . .”

Thallia giggled again, her finger raised to her lips. The words I had intended to say wedged in my throat, almost choking off breath. It seemed the muse wanted to keep this visitation a secret between the two of us.

“Timaeus is probably right.” Glycera dropped to one knee, examining a red streak where something had been dragged through the mess. “Problem is, I don’t see how we can find out what actually happened. My guess is Lycus is behind it. With Nico dead, he finally has a change at beating Anaxis.”

“But Lycus is nice!” Now that I wasn’t trying to draw attention to Thallia’s presence, I could speak. “Everyone raved last year about the victory party he gave for Nico, and Nico wasn’t even his protagonist.”

“Hippo, you’re so naive.”

I may be naive, but I couldn’t believe Lycus was behind Nico’s disappearance. For one thing, he really was a sweetheart. A lousy poet, but a nice guy. You’d think verse that cutting would come from a venomous tongue, but oddly enough you’d be wrong. He’s just got an overdose of humor in him; give him any subject and he’ll find the funny side. Give him a politician, and . . . well. He may not be much of a poet, but he knows how to hit the funny bone. Timaeus’s political career would sink faster than a leaky trireme if Nico wasn’t there to offset the effect of Lycus’s new play.

But even if Lycus were as nasty as his most cutting jokes, he couldn’t be behind Nico’s disappearance. If it were that obvious, why the private visitation from a deity, even a minor one? He was already the chief suspect; Glycera was as reliable as a lodestone in reading public opinion.

Thallia pointed to some footprints leading through the bloodiest part of the room. A small table was overturned beside them, but not one crimson drop marred its smooth surface. It felt staged, like a tragedy, if theater ever dealt with common people rather than gods and heroes. The footprints glowed with a ruddy light of their own. Thallia pointed to them again, demanding, then faded from sight.

The luminous footprints remained. No one but me noticed them, just as no one else had noticed Thallia. And it seemed like no one in the room, not even my own sergeant, could see me. I’d gone as invisible as the Muse herself. Glycera didn’t look up even when I spoke to her. I’m certain she couldn’t hear me.

The Muses aren’t Olympians, but they swing a lot more weight than a mortal. The Muse of Comedy wanted me to find her comedian, that was obvious, so I followed the footprints out the door. No one took any notice. To this day I wonder when Glycera realized I was gone. Sometimes I miss the old battle-ax.

The tracks led away from the door, away from the agora. I had only had the basic course in tracking, but even a six-year-old male-child could have followed these. Here the tracks halted, there they went to tiptoes, a bit further they widened into a lope. Whoever had left them had taken care not to be seen. I didn’t have to worry about that; I wasn’t on the run. Besides, Thallia’s magic still shrouded me. At least I thought it did.

At one point, I looked back. Behind me, the footprints had vanished. I retraced my own steps, searching, and they reappeared, ahead of me. Only ahead of me. I went back and forth a few times, confirming my deduction: the tracks lead forward but not back. Thallia, it seemed, really wanted me to follow the guy who’d left them. I had a hunch about who it was, but my hunch didn’t make any sense.

The spoor led to the edge of town and past it, away from Athens. At first the trail followed the road to Corinth, then it turned down a series of country lanes, each less traveled than the one before. When darkness overtook me, I made a rough bivouac for the night. The footprints glowed, in one direction only, all night long. At dawn I resumed my deity-inspired quest, down another country lane. By this point, I didn’t need the glow. There were no tracks on the rough path other than the ones I followed.

It ended at a small tumbled-down farmstead. The war god has plowed this section of the Attic plain time and again; there are dozens of such places to be found, abandoned to chance comers and wild animals. The traveler I sought was here, sitting under an olive tree, plunking idly on a lyre. The lyre was badly in need of new strings. In the end, finding him was rather anticlimactic.

* * *

“Nicomachus.” He looked up when I spoke.

“Yes? I . . . oh, I remember you! The Amazon girl from the agora, the one who appreciates comedy.” He grinned, the grin that had charmed me years before, the unmasked grin that invites the observer to share his delight in his own clever performance. I just stared back at him, hand on the hilt of my weapon. A few minutes of this made him nervous.

“Well? I assume Timaeus hired you. All right, you’ve found the runaway. What now, march me back at sword’s-point to Athens? I warn you, I’ll just run again. Timaeus is wasting his money; I won’t go on.”

By this point all I wanted was answers. “Why, Nico? You’re the greatest comic actor alive. You’ve taken the crown repeatedly at the Dionysia, at Corinth, even at Delphi. Sponsors beg you to be in their productions. So what’s to run away from?”

“Have you heard this year’s play?” I shook my head. “It stinks. Anaxis has always pandered to whoever pays his bar tab, but this goes way beyond that. It’s digusting. Pure hubris. I couldn’t be part of it.”

“So why not just go to a different playwright? Lycus would have been delighted to get you, I’m sure.”

Nico banged his hand against the strings of the lyre, a frustrated sound with no music in it. “I had a contract. I agreed to it before I read the new play, but you don’t break contracts with Timaeus. Besides, I doubt if Lycus’s play is any better. His sponsor this year is Castor of Piraeus.”

“But he’s not even a politician!”

“I know. He’s a boat builder, a shipper. Timaeus’s real rival, not for power but for the gold that buys power.” Nicomachus dropped his gaze to the lyre in his lap and he started to play a beginner’s exercise, not looking at me. “He tried to bribe me to wreck the play. I could do it. Change the timing here, slur a line there, wear a different mask, re-write the part the way I did with Silenus—”

At this he looked up. “That was mostly my own writing, you know. Anaxis wanted to kill me for changing his verse, but since he got the laurel he couldn’t very well say so.”

I bit my lip to keep from speaking and interrupting the flow, but I felt vindicated. I knew that Silenus was too good to have been Anaxis’s work.

“Be that as it may,” Nico went on, “my life won’t be worth a broken sandal strap if I play it straight, and I don’t want to play the part anyway. So I bought some pig’s blood and set my scene. I should have known it wouldn’t fool a real warrior.”

“You’d be surprised,” I said, thinking of Glycera. “So you ran. Dedicated to the god, and you ran.”

“Not from the god! From Castor, yes, from Timaeus, even Anaxis, but never from the god.” He got up, lyre forgotten in one hand, and began to pace. “Look, I know you won’t believe me, no one else does, but I’ve seen the god. He appeared to me, Dionysus himself. Nico, he said, Nico, go make people laugh. It was an oracle. But it’s not fun any more, not when I’m just doing political jokes.”

I’d gotten a good grip on my sword hilt when he stood up, but now my hand fell away as my mouth fell open. “Make . . . people . . . laugh . . .”

“I can, you know. I can make people laugh at anything if I want to. But let it be worthy of laughter!” He waved his arms, a broad actor’s gesture meant to reach the back rows. “Give me decent material, a revival, one of the old satyr plays, something to work with! I’m sick of doing topical humor, I want comedy.”

I looked at Nico as if he were my own oracle come true, which in a way was exactly the case. “I believe you.”

“Yeah, we’re dying with laughter over here, funny man. Too bad Castor don’t have a sense of humor.”

Neither of us had heard them approaching. Now we turned to find four men facing us, swords drawn. The leader grinned as they advanced. I didn’t much care for the expression. Cutting humor is one thing, but not when it involves real cuts from real swords.

“The two of you planning to run off to Thrace or something together?” The man leered at me. “Can’t blame you; she’s kind of cute, even if she does wear armor. But Castor wants you dead, comic, and he don’t pay us till you are. Sorry to spoil your plans.” He didn’t look sorry. He looked like a man who enjoyed his work.

The quartet of swordsmen spread out slightly. I shoved Nico behind me, up against the olive tree, and drew my own weapon. “We hadn’t made any plans, but that sounds like a good one. We’ll send your shades a nice souvenir.”

“You think one little Amazon chick’ll be able to stop us? They don’t teach you girls much sense, do they?”

“No one taught you anything, that’s obvious.” Before the final syllable left my mouth, I was moving, feinting left, drawing the end swordsman out of position, then whirling right as I drew my long knife with my left hand, catching the leader’s sword with it while my own sword slid past the guard of the man next to him and on through his body. That one wore no armor. The rest would be more difficult. But common thugs are no match for a trained warrior; they’d made a serious tactical error in speaking at all.

The Amazon sword-and-knife technique seemed unknown to them. Nicomachus, safe behind me, yelled like a spectator at the Olympics. I feinted, ducked, whirled, jumped, keeping myself always between the swordsmen and the actor. A second swordsman fell back howling, upper arm opened almost to the bone. But it was still two against one, and a lucky stroke by the chief thug sliced through the right shoulder strap of my breastplate. I hadn’t fastened the side straps securely that morning, convinced I faced only an actor. Glycera would have blistered my hide for such carelessness, and she would have been right. Now the armor sagged sideways, hampering my sword-arm and leaving my right side vulnerable.

Behind the two thugs, a familiar golden light took shape along with a graceful feminine figure. I called out her name, “Thallia!” and I’m still not sure if I meant it as a prayer or invocation or curse. The two hired swords pressed forward, the second man hacking at my head. I parried the blow, turned, took a step, and my right foot came down on something slippery.

Desperately I tried to keep my balance, aware as I did so that the Muse was laughing, merry as a child. My sword almost lopped an ear off the second thug as it swung around wildly. It felt as if I’d done all this before. Behind me, Nico shouted, “Yes! By all the gods, yes, comedy! Dionysus!”

And he brought the lyre down on the second swordsman’s head. The strings parted with an unmusical thwang, leaving the instrument around the man’s neck like a halter. Nico ducked under my sword and grabbed one dropped by the first casualty. His opponent, intent on pulling his head free, failed to notice until Nico poked him in the backside. The man limped away at high speed, still wearing the lyre.

I only caught glimpses of the action, as I repeated the same involuntary dance I’d performed a few days before in the agora. Nico laughed like a fool, apparently under the impression it was intentional. I wanted to tell him there was nothing funny about it, as once again I twisted, righted myself, overbalanced, and caught myself with the sword. This time the point sank through the foot of the man facing me, just as his blade found the gap in my armor.

“And that finishes him!” Nico said, as he followed up with an inexpert cut at the man’s neck. The man reeled backwards. Nico’s paean broke off as I collapsed.

“Hippolyte! What . . . you can’t be hurt!” He dropped to his knees beside me. “Come on, that’s not funny. Please, get up. This is comedy. The protagonist can’t die in a comedy, the god would never allow it. You can’t die, you can’t.”

Behind Nico, I could still see the golden form of the muse, smiling at me. I managed to draw a breath past the fire in my lungs. “Oh, dying is easy. Comedy . . . now, comedy is hard . . .”

My eyes lost focus, but I could hear Nico calling my name. It almost sounded like a sob. “Hippolyte!”

I didn’t die, of course. I came to before Nico had lugged me half a league, his shoulder pressing the edge of my breastplate into my gut. I doubt if he could have carried me much further; he’d spent enough time at the gymnasium to know how to move, but he didn’t have much endurance. I’ve got him on a serious training program now.

He hadn’t bothered to take my armor off, which was a good thing as that stanched the wound. It should have killed me, but Nico was right; that wouldn’t be funny, and the Muse herself was our sponsor. I healed, quickly and without pain. I’ve had more trouble with wounds taken in practice.

Since we’d both had an oracle, we decided we should stay together. We turned our backs on Athens and, taking the joke for omen, headed for Thrace. Nico’s understudy was a great hit at the Dionysia, we found out later. Castor of Piraeus was so enraged he walked out, slipped (Thallia does love her melon rinds), and fell down the marble steps almost all the way to the stage. I hear the physicians think he may walk again someday. It doesn’t do to annoy a deity, even a minor one, and especially not one with a sense of humor

It turned out Nico didn’t remember my name after all; Hippolyte was just the only Amazon name he knew. Ah well, he knows me now. We make good partners. Of course in Athens women aren’t allowed to perform, but this isn’t Athens. Besides, we Amazons have never allowed Greek notions to keep us from doing what we want to do. Anyway, this really isn’t theater, just a refit of an old satyr play, done right here in the agora. You’ll enjoy it, I’m sure, and so will your customers. Like they say, a little song, a little dance, a little vino down your chiton. Comedy, and a headliner from Athens, and all for just two drachmas apiece. Your merchants’ association won’t find a better bargain. What do you say, eh? Do we have a deal?

You really wouldn’t want to annoy Thallia.

One time I wished aloud that someone would do something a bit different for the Chicks series. After all, it’s a big world with all sorts of cultures, and I do like variety. Kevin’s tale taught me that the second part of “Be careful what you wish for . . .” can sometimes be “ . . . you’ll be very happy when you get it.” His work has appeared in numerous anthologies, and according to his web page he does “cool goth stuff.” Cool web page, too.

Baubles, Bangles and Beads

Kevin Andrew Murphy

Mbutu spread her hands wide, making her rings wink like the eyes of caracals as she drew forth !num-fire from the stones. “Ai-yeeeigh, little ones! Listen! Listen! Gather round and listen! Hear now a tale from the days when the earth was young, the grass was high, and the men of the Nmboko tribe were still born with monkey tails. . . .”

Folk gathered from the night-market, drawn by the !num-light and the promise of a story. Mbutu waved her hands, weaving the talespell. “Hear now as I tell of Princess Mfara, the most radiant woman who ever lived, whose beauty was like that of the sun, with hair as black as night, eyes clear as diamonds, and teeth like sea-washed cowries . . .”

“That is a dirty lie!” A young man stepped forward from the crowd and stamped the butt of his spear on the hard-packed earth. “Take it back!”

Mbutu paused, unsure for a moment what the dirty lie was and exactly how she was supposed to rescind it. “Her teeth?”

 Mbutu grinned weakly, showing her own, which she knew unfortunately to be nowhere near as plentiful or as beautiful as Princess Mfara’s, at least if legends were given any credence. “Well, the radiant Mfara’s teeth weren’t exactly like cowries—we storytellers must exaggerate sometimes, you understand. After all, they didn’t start out brown with white spots, none of them were loose, and most important of all, her teeth never had snails living inside of them . . .”

The audience laughed, but Mbutu could tell by the young warrior’s expression that her jest hadn’t improved the situation. “No, storyteller,” he hissed, “the other lie.”

Mbutu grinned wider, showing the places where her teeth had fallen loose like wayward cowries. “The beauty of Princess Mfara? In that I told no lie, young warrior. She was the most beautiful woman who ever lived. But I know only of the past, not of the present, and perhaps you know of another woman, alive today, whose charms rivals those of the great beauty of ages gone by?”

“No!” shouted the warrior, though probably not in answer to the question. “Take back your other other lie!”

Mbutu thought back to what she’d been saying, but was fairly sure that the young man would have the same objections—or lack of them—to her mention of Princess Mfara’s night-black hair, diamondlike eyes, or radiant glow, which while probably nothing like the sun, hadn’t any living detractors to say it was otherwise.

Except for this man. Who had a spear. And the common wisdom of the marketplace, not to mention the morals of a thousand times a thousand tales, told Mbutu that you didn’t argue with the guy with the spear. The guy with the spear was always right.

Unfortunately, Mbutu hadn’t the faintest idea what he was right about. “Eh-heh-heh-heh . . .”

He then turned his back to her, then, much to her surprise, lifted the back flap of his loin cloth. “What do you see here, woman?”

Mbutu paused. “A butt? Um, a very nice butt?” The butt of a man holding a spear, who was obviously drunk?

 He whirled on her. “That is the butt of a man of the Nmboko tribe. And as the Sky God is my witness, neither I, nor my ancestors, have ever had monkey tails!” He stamped the butt of his spear on the ground, slapped his other butt, and stood there glaring at her in challenge, and she was not fool enough to contradict him, regardless of what the ancient stories said regarding the ancestors of the Nmboko tribe and their dalliances with Aktebo, the Queen of Monkeys.

That should have been the end of it. A warrior had stood his ground, denounced a mere night-market storyteller, and stamped one butt and smacked the other. And as everyone knew, you didn’t argue with the guy with the spear.

Unless you were an orisha or a mmoatia. Everyone who heard the stories knew that you didn’t argue with gods or faeries either.

At the man’s last word, the beautiful blue glass eye-bead he wore about his neck shattered, as if the glassblower had taken it from the kiln too quickly, not allowing it to cure. Yet something was left behind on the string, something black and sorcerous, and Mbutu watched as the dark knot of !num energy uncoiled itself, like a serpent birthing from an egg, pure !num, invisible to the eyes of all but poets and sorceresses, but as both, Mbutu certainly counted. The !num flowed and wavered for a second, then struck in a flash, grounding itself into the warrior’s chest like lightning into a tree. At which point the back flap of the his loincloth lifted without the aid of his hands and something long and brown and furry uncoiled itself like . . . well, like nothing half so much as a monkey’s tail, like the men of the Nmboko tribe had in ages past, and apparently now well into the present.

The warrior hadn’t noticed, or at least, not the tail. He was looking at his chest and the powder of blue glass across the burn of the !num-strike. “You witch!” he cried. “What have you done to my eye-charm?”

Mbutu paused, licking her lips, wondering how to explain that it wasn’t her, she wasn’t responsible, and pretty as the talisman had been, the warrior had greater concerns at the moment, when a small child, not knowing the wisdom about men and spears, or the dangers of strange magic, reached out and grabbed the end of the tail.

The warrior screeched like a monkey and jumped in the air, whirling about in a fighting stance, only to find a child. The little girl sat down on the ground, pointed at him and wailed, “Monkey!” while bursting into tears, not yet having learned that it was not wise to pull a monkey’s tail, no matter how fuzzy and alluring it might be. And when that tail was attached not to a monkey, but a warrior of the Nmboko tribe, such an action was doubly foolish, especially to those who knew the full account of the “The Monkey’s Tale” or “Ufaro and the Furry Temptation.”

Which Mbutu certainly did, as both storyteller and sorceress, and she took advantage of the monkey-man’s distraction to beat a hasty retreat, fumbling wildly through the tangle of talismans and baubles about her neck, trying to find the necklace of the owl spirit, which, if she worked the charm correctly, would turn her silent and invisible, and hopefully not invite the displeasure of Bwillo, Orisha of Owls, for being invoked without a propitiatory offering of fattened mice.

Unfortunately, this was not yet one of her tales, and Mbutu was far less skilled, or at least less well organized, than Gefghen the Storyteller, aka Gefghen the Sorcerer, who would not only have obese rodents and all other appropriate offerings for the orishas, but would also have a far better filing system for his talismans than simply wearing them on necklaces of different lengths. Or perhaps it was just the fact that he was a man, and had never had breasts, and so the stories of Gefghen and his Tales of Tales and Sorceries had completely failed to mention what happened to the necklaces of a no-longer-girlish sorceress who ran from a monkey-tailed warrior of the Nmboko tribe while wearing nothing more than a patterned skirt and a light scarf.

Mbutu dodged around the weaver’s booth, past the village well, and through the court of Ozomo, the palm-wine merchant, hearing a cacophony of screeches of   “Aieee! Pretty lady! Pretty lady!” which were either the wine merchant’s less-than-discriminating patrons or else the hundred trained parrots of Fat Etemboko, the bird catcher, who ran the shop next door.

Unfortunately, it was night, and the doors of the courtyard, the ones that led out into the desert, and possible escape, were locked and barred. And Mbutu turned and tried her very best to look small and unassuming and hope that the warrior would not notice her behind fifty drunkards, more than half of whom were the bandits that the gates were officially locked to guard against.

Mbutu looked around the bar, at the men and women leaning on the rail behind which Ozomo and his wife ladled watered palm-wine from open crocks, hoping to find a warrior of consummate skill and passable honesty, like Temzarro from the Twenty Tales, or Ulata of the Flashing Spear, who, if the tales were to believed, felled twenty warriors before breakfast without even breaking a sweat. Yet aside from the sudden horrible Miracle of the Monkey’s Tail, nothing that had happened that night was like anything from the age of legend, when Mfara and Gefghen and Ulata had walked, and Mbutu only looked from one unfamiliar face to the next . . . until she saw the shimmer of a hundred times a hundred brass rings and cuffs accentuating the tall and lithesome form of Talisha, the knife-dancer. Talisha, the scarred, who displayed her wounds and raised cicatrices with as much pride as her skill. Talisha who wore no clothing aside from her bangles and the strips of leopardskin she had cut from one of the children of Osebo, the Leopard, with nothing more than her wrist knives, and that when she was twelve and living in the same village as Mbutu.

Talisha was also known as Talisha the Mad, and while so far as Mbutu knew she had never killed twenty warriors before any meal of the day, or even in her lifetime, all Mbutu needed was for her to kill one, after dinner, and she didn’t care one way or the other if she broke a sweat. By the orishas, she wouldn’t even mind if Talisha failed to kill the man with the monkey tail, just so long as he quit chasing her with the spear.

Mbutu ran behind her. “Bangles!” she hissed, using the pride-name the warrior had chosen early in her career. “Hide me! Hide me and I will pay you well! For the sake of the friendship we shared as girls, hide me!”

Talisha looked back, more than a little drunk, and squinted. “Who—Oh, it is you, Baubles,” she said, using the taunt-name she and the other wild girls had given Mbutu when she first apprenticed to old Rashna, the village sorceress, and Mbutu had tried, unsuccessfully, to explain the importance of the many beads of her spirit necklaces. “What trouble have you gotten yourself into now?”

This was answered by a scream of “Witch!” and a responding chorus of “Pretty lady! Pretty lady!” cinching the fact that it had been Etemboko’s parrots, or perhaps indicating that Ozomo’s wife was not watering the wine as much as she usually did and some man had gotten exceedingly drunk, and could now no more recognize “lady” than he could “pretty.”

The Nmboko warrior stood in the middle of Ozomo’s court, one hand on his spear, the other pointing directly at Mbutu as he cried again, “Witch!” and the monkey tail curled in the air like an inquisitor’s crook which had somehow become entrenched in his buttocks.

Talisha stood, her bangles chiming up and down her arms as she stood to her full great height, and she took a drunken step forward as she removed the leather guards from the circular knives she wore on each wrist. “Who is it who is calling my good friend Baubles a witch?” Talisha purred, like a true daughter of the orisha Osebo, and Mbutu was glad because much as Talisha had never been her friend, or even shown any particular kindness to her at all (and in fact, much to the contrary, had often tormented Mbutu until she finally gave up the game as poor sport), Mbutu also had never seen Talisha back down from a fight, or let go of even the slightest excuse to pick one.

The man of the Nmboko tribe stood as proud as he could with the monkey tail kinking his spine. “I am!” he shouted. “Look what she has done to me!”

Talisha looked him up and down, at last pronouncing, “You appear to be a perfectly healthy man of the Nmboko tribe, and I can see nothing wrong with either you or your tail. What did Baubles do? Give you that ugly loin cloth?”

The Nmboko warrior screamed and raised his spear, Talisha immediately falling into a fighting stance, and when the warrior lunged, she knocked the spearhead aside with her bracelets with a chime of brass. She then kicked forward with her right ankle-knife, which she had either somehow taken the guard off of or had never put it on in the first place. Regardless, a bright slash ran up the warrior’s thigh and down, a long swatch of flesh peeling away from the muscle to dangle from his left knee.

“A pretty mark, monkey-man,” Talisha cried. “Let me give you its mate!” She stepped forward with a whip-kick with her left ankle, but he dodged back, then feinted with his spear.

Talisha moved back, laughing. “You will have to try better than that, Nmboko monkey.” She shook her shoulders then, making her magnificently scarified breasts shimmy, taunting him. “Come, try to get a piece of this. There’s no sport in a little tongue-wagging sorceress like Baubles. Try yourself with a woman who knows how to dance!”

“Witch!” the Nmboko man screamed, utterly confused as to who or what he was dealing with, and lunged again with his spear.

With a shake of her arm and a spin of her bracelets, Talisha caught the head, half of the brass bangles looping about the shaft as it thrust forth, the others protecting her arm from the edge of the blade. She grabbed the wood and held it then, tugging against the Nmboko warrior, then executed another snap-kick, the ankle-blade this time contacting the middle of the spear and snapping it in two.

The warrior-man was caught unaware, and fell directly on his tail, literally, as Talisha disengaged the half-spear tangled in her bangles and tossed it up to catch in the timbers that roofed Ozomo’s winestand. “What, all you can offer me is that short stump?” Talisha cried, then leapt over the prone warrior and kicked him upside the head.

He did not move. Not even when Talisha grabbed his tail, pulled it straight, then slashed down with her wrist, severing the furry appendage, leaving the Nmboko man with nothing more than a fuzzy stump of a few inches, like a baboon’s, which, if rumor had it correct, many of the Nmboko men still had. Talisha took the tail and draped it around her neck like a dancer’s boa—assuming that on the day the Sky God created the boa, he’d not only forgotten the legs, but the scales as well, not to mention a head—then returned to Mbutu. “An interesting breed of enemy you have, Baubles.” She sat down at her customary place at the bar and took a swallow of palm wine. “When did you pick up witchcraft?”

“It was not me,” Mbutu protested quickly. “I was telling a story when suddenly—bang!—the !num flashed, and the next thing he was wearing a monkey ta—

”

Mbutu broke off as a drunken merchant, wearing a princely dashiki and more necklaces and gold rings than Mbutu had acquired in all her years as sorceress, staggered up and put a rude-to-the-point-of-suicidal hand on Talisha’s shoulder. “Talented work, pretty lady,” he said, feeling her many and beautiful scars. “I could use a pretty lady like you in my household.”

Mbutu saw the danger sign. Talisha might be beautiful, but she was beautiful the way a leopard was, and you didn’t put your hands on one like that either. But the merchant advertised his wealth like a cobra did its poison, for it was clear that only a fool would kill him, for only a king would be able to afford the death-price his family would demand.

Talisha might be mad, but she was no fool, and knew better than to strike him back. Physically at least. “Pretty lady?” she inquired, removing his hand from her shoulder. “It would appear to me that it is you, not I, who is the ‘pretty lady.’ Indeed, you have more necklaces and rings than Baubles and myself combined!”

“Pretty lady! Pretty lady!” shrieked the parrots, and the merchant took his much beringed hands back with an offended sniff, resting them proudly on his many necklaces and tokens of wealth–and Mbutu watched as a blue glass eye-bead, almost lost in the sea of treasures about his neck, suddenly shattered, and a flash of !num sunk into the merchant’s chest. Which began to swell. And swell.

The merchant’s chest grew, and his waist slimmed, and his hips grew wider and wider, suited for childbearing, while his eyes became as clear as diamonds, his hair long and black as midnight, and his teeth became remarkably like cowrie shells. Sea-washed. Without the snails.

The most beautiful woman in the world since Princess Mfara, or perhaps just her reincarnation, looked at her fingers, then touched her face, then touched her breasts, then screamed.

“Pretty lady! Pretty lady!” shrieked the parrots.

The spitting image of Princess Mfara, assuming that Princess Mfara were in the modern age and had taken to wearing men’s dashikis, looked at Mbutu and Talisha in horror. “What have you witches done to me?”

Talisha looked at Mbutu, but after Mbutu did not respond, the warrior replied, “We have done nothing to you, ‘pretty lady.’ Indeed, if anything, you have done this to yourself. By your impudence, you have attracted the attention of a mmoatia, or perhaps even an orisha, and they, not we, have done this to you.”

The merchant, or merchant princess, looked at them in horror as again the parrots shrieked, “Pretty lady!” “Oh woah!” wailed the merchant. “What is to become of me?”

Mbutu thought he had an excellent chance of marrying a prince, or even becoming one of the many wives of a less discerning king, but didn’t feel it politic to say so. “My friend Bangles and I,” she said with a small side-glance to Talisha, to see if the warrior objected to the familiarity, “we go far back. We have had many great adventures and faced many strange perils together.” “Great” and “strange” were of course highly relative terms, but when she was seven and Talisha had been eight, it had seemed a great and strange adventure for the village girls to steal the akua doll from Farmer Naniko’s gourd patch and put it in the bride hut of the chieftain’s son on his wedding night. “If you were to give us three bags of gold and an elephant tusk, I am certain we could find the witch or mmoatia who worked this magic, or perhaps the orisha you offended, and persuade them to restore you to your proper form.”

The mention of money, at least, shocked the merchant back to sobriety. “Three sacks of gold and an elephant tusk? Preposterous! Besides which, how do I know you have the ability to do what you say?”

Talisha waved the bloody end of the man-sized monkey’s tail in the merchant princess’s face. “There was just a man who was upset at suddenly having a monkey’s tail like his ancestors and we fixed that. I’m certain we can fix your problem as well.”

“Though it will, of course, take a bit more time,” Mbutu added, looking at the princess’s ample chest. “I doubt you would want such . . . an expedient . . . solution.”

The princess looked at her, then at her own breasts, then looked away, as if she could somehow pretend they did not exist. “I’m certain I could find cheaper help.”

“But not better,” Talisha purred back. “And never on such short notice. Though perhaps Baubles here has asked more than you are able to pay? I am familiar with the mercenary trade, and we could settle for what wealth you have on you now, with a sack of gold when we solve your problem. Plus reimbursement for incidental expenses.”

The merchant princess looked at her hard. “Half my jewelry now, half later. Nothing more.”

“Save expenses,” Mbutu added.

The princess paused. “Save expenses,”she agreed, then added, “but I expect receipts. And results.”

“And you shall have them,” Talisha promised.

“Now where,” Mbutu asked, “did you get that lovely blue bead charm . . . ?”

Mbutu and Talisha traveled through two more villages, hearing stories of a fat hippo, an ugly stork, and the village braggart whose endowments were now just as grossly exaggerated as he had always claimed. And always there was a blue bead in the tale, one of superlative beauty and finest craftsmanship, paid in trade for one service or another by an unknown and unremarkable young man, most likely a bandit.

“I say a witch is responsible,” Talisha insisted, her bangles jangling with the gait of her horse, even beneath the loose cotton robe she wore as protection against the sun, “a witch with a very sick sense of humor.”

Mbutu shook her head, wishing she was able to afford a better beast than a donkey. “Witches don’t have such power. One curse, perhaps. Maybe two. But that would be it. A witch who did such magic as we have seen would be dead, or at least invalid for months, and in any case, one would never be this capricious—it would cost him too much. Or her—witches can be female as well, you know. But I say it is a mmoatia. Perhaps a whole band. The Otherfolk are known to play such tricks and have a strange . . . logic . . . to the way their affairs are conducted. Mmoatia could definitely do what we have seen.”

“Perhaps Spider?” Talisha asked, saying the name of the orisha in hushed tones. “It would fit with the stories you tell.”

Mbutu shrugged. “Or Hare. But the orishas seldom involve themselves like this.” She speculated a bit more, trying to figure out what manner of magic it could possibly be, and then all speculations died in her mind as they crested the next dune and saw the scene before them: a massacre. A complete and total massacre. A caravan had been working its way across the desert, with horses and mules and camels, except now the sand was dark with blood and bodies lay strewn every which way, mangled and partially eaten, by the teeth of something—many things—huge and powerful.

Mbutu and Talisha paused for a long moment, drinking in the scene, then went down to investigate, a wake of vultures flying up, croaking in protest. Bolts of cloth lay strewn about, along with dried fruit and other trade goods. They both searched in vain for any sign of life until at last Mbutu grew soul-sick and drew forth one of her necklaces. “Oh Abo,” she whispered, invoking the python orisha who had blessed the serpentine beads, “if there are any alive here, any at all, show me . . .”

The beads gleamed in the sunlight, and Mbutu let the !num-fire flow through them, feeling the tug, as inexorable as the coils of the python, as sensitive as the taste of one’s tongue.

For a long while they lay still, then the string snaked west, pointing across the desert, like the head of Abo after his prey, and Mbutu motioned for Talisha to mount up again.

They traveled for hours, until at last they found a horse, lying dead in the sand, yet unmarked, run to the point of exhaustion and death. And beyond it, a set of footprints. They followed, the gray-green beads guiding the way over dunes until at last they found a man lying unconscious in the sand.

Talisha jumped down and lifted his head, giving him water, and holding him when he screamed. Yet then his eyes cleared, and realizing they were neither vultures nor desert ghouls, but instead his rescuers, the man calmed. “Shaka bless you,” he croaked, then accepted more of the water.

“Tell us what happened,” Talisha said simply.

“Oh, it was terrible,” the man said at last. “Our caravan was beset by bandits.”

Talisha raised one eyebrow. “What we saw was not the work of ordinary bandits.”

The man nodded. “But they seemed so at first.”

“Tell us what happened,” Mbutu said, “exactly.”

After informing them of a number of inconsequentials regarding the journey, the price of dates, and the relative profit to be had in the investment thereof, the man came to the important information: “And then, as we half expected, the suspiciously unencumbered group of travelers who had offered to let us share their fire, well, they took out their knives and their swords.”

“And then?” Mbutu prompted.

“Our guards took out their knives and their swords.”

“And then?” asked Talisha.

“Well, our caravan master, and the head of the bandits, looked at the approximate size of each other’s forces, and set down to haggling. Standard, everyday business. Until at last they reached an agreement, and our caravan master ritually cursed them all as being the sons of jackals and evil-minded camels. Nothing out of the ordinary.”

Mbutu paused, drinking this in. “And then?”

“And then . . .” the merchant said, shivering in horror, “that’s exactly what they turned into. All of them. . . .”

The date merchant was returned to his family in a nearby village, and Mbutu and Talisha were never so heartily sick of the palm-fruits as they were after the twelve feasts in their honor, involving every possible perversion of dates that twenty generations of villagers and date-merchants could devise. There were date pastries, date punch, date salad, date bread, and date-stuffed-everything and everything-stuffed-dates, with all options either marinaded in palm wine, fried in palm oil, or both. And there were yet more horrors as the jackal-camels—or jacamals, as they became known—attacked again and again.

Something, obviously, had to be done. If just to save them from the villagers.

“We must kill them,” said Talisha. “They are vicious beasts, but they can be killed.”

“Are we talking of the jacamals,” Mbutu asked, “or the chefs?”

Talisha paused, considering. “The jacamals,” she said at last. “We must kill them. Cut them with knives, trap them with traps, poison them with date punch.” She pushed the cup away from herself in revulsion.

“No,” said Mbutu, differing with the warrior for once, “we must talk to them. Explain the situation.”

The knife-dancer looked at her as if she were mad, then at last said, “Wait, are you talking about the chefs?”

“No, the jacamals.” Mbutu simply spread her hands, allowing her rings to flash. “I spoke to the stork and I spoke to the hippo. They are beasts now, yes, but very clever beasts, and the sons of jackals and evil-minded camels are very clever beasts indeed. Besides which, they have the hearts of bandits, and so can be counted on to be greedy. If we explain matters to them in the right fashion, we can count on them to follow their enlightened self interest . . . and ours, as the case may be.”

Talisha leaned closer and took another nut-stuffed date, which were as addictive as they were vile, from the tray. “Go on, storyteller. I’m listening . . .”

The plan was simple: a wedding feast fit for jackals and evil-minded camels. Chickens were stuffed with dates and roasted, then placed with more dates into a goat and roasted, then the roast goat was stuffed into a sheep (with more dates) and that was roasted too, and the roasted sheep was stuffed into a slaughtered ox, which was smeared with date paste and left out to bake in the sun, abandoned at the edge of the date grove along with Mbutu and Talisha, who sat in hammocks suspended from the tops of the palm trees like large bunches of dates.

The smell was truly incredible, especially when Talisha put date pips into her sling and killed three vultures who wished to crash the feast. Others were discouraged, after which one of the jacamals finally arrived, eyeing the traditional village wedding feast, which was complete in its presentation except for not having been stuffed into a camel and set ablaze with palmwine as the finale.

Mbutu rubbed her feather earplug, sacred to Darshima, orisha of parrots, and called out in something between the howl of a jackal and the evil braying of a camel: “Welcome, brother. This feast is in your honor.”

The jacamal sniffed the air. “What poison did you use, sorceress?”

“No poison,” Mbutu wailed back, correcting her accent in the strange jacamal speech, “merely chicken, goat, sheep, rotted beef, and lots of dates. Lots of them.”

The jacamal sniffed again. “And to what do I owe this courtesy?”

Mbutu paused, wondering how to render the flowery speech she’d composed into jacamal cries At last she tried: “Honored cousin, I know that the shape you wear now is not the one you were born with. Moreover, my partner and I have a proposition which we both might find equally profitable, ending with you being restored to your proper form, and all of us becoming exceedingly rich.”

The jacamal waggled its long and evil ears and twitched its equally long and evil nose, which was doubly horrible, for it combined a camel’s buck teeth with a jackal’s fangs. “What do you propose, cousin?”

Mbutu paused, realizing she was playing a long shot, but a reasonable one to try. “First of all, payment. I have it from my sources that you and your brothers recently came into some startling wealth, a great number of beads of finest craftsmanship, blue eyes, such as are commonly used to avoid the gaze of a witch.”

The jacamal spat. “Fat lot of good it did us. They obviously didn’t work.”

Mbutu smiled to herself. They most obviously did, for after a long while of sorcerous speculation, she had realized this: It was the eyes of a witch that held his power, and as such an eye could protect against them. However, if that eye had been stolen from a witch, then that eye would be the curse itself, not the protection from it, just waiting for the extra hint of malice to release the curse and aim the strike. For example, an everyday insult like “You fat hippo” or “You sons of jackal’s and evil-minded camels.” Yet there was no point in telling the jacamal that.

Mbutu waved one hand and demurred. “Ah, but the lay public does not know of the eye-charm’s defectiveness, do they? And the rest of those beads will still be quite valuable, if just for craftsmanship alone.”

The jacamal nodded. “They would. Certainly there’d be enough to pay for our restoration, if you have that power, sorceress.”

“Not quite,” said Mbutu, shifting position in her palm-tree hammock, “but I know where I can get it. But these beads—may I inquire as to their source? For while I have seen a few examples—and I know they must be quite rare and costly—if more were to turn up all at once, they would lose their value, and I would have a harder time paying for that which you need, as well as the trouble for myself and my partner.”

The jacamal snorted. “Not much chance of that. We got them from a mad foreigner, a pale-skinned man from the north, who came through the desert himself with nothing more than a horse and a pack with a king’s ransom in beads.”

Mbutu nodded sagely. “I see. And what became of this foreigner?” Obviously the man was the witch she’d surmised, and if it had been a death curse he’d laid upon the beads, it was not only fiendishly powerful, but would most likely prove impossible to lift.

The jacamal spat again. “Oh, nothing much. Foreigners are valuable in the slave market, so we just bagged him, gagged him, and sold him to a slave merchant in Embeko.” The jacamal gave her an evil look. “Now what was this plan you mentioned involving wealth and power in addition to our restoration?”

“Oh, it is simple,” Mbutu said, “let me explain it to you . . .”

The villagers hailed Mbutu and Talisha as saviors when they led the jacamals into town, all meekly shackled with ropes and what chains could be found. Talisha, however, stopped the villagers from stoning them, threatening that violence might break Mbutu’s nonexistent spell, and moreover, would damage the beasts’ value when they were sold to the King’s circus in Embeko.

Mbutu collected the money from the grateful villagers, and didn’t feel bad about it at all—after all, they were ridding the village of a group of vicious beasts who were far worse than the bandits they’d originally been. And they were at last escaping the dates.

After which they journeyed to Embeko, where Mbutu told tales of her and Talisha having a fantastic battle with the jacamals, full of !num-fire and flashing knives, until finally, by power of blade and sorcery, they had brought the beasts to heel. It sounded much more impressive, overall, than hanging in a palm tree and haggling with enchanted bandits, but it didn’t matter—the jacamals danced and cavorted, pranced in circles, and finally ate a condemned prisoner for the amusement of the King. It really couldn’t have gone any better than it did.

Of course, what Mbutu knew that the jacamals didn’t, was that so far as she knew, there was no such treasure as the Lifestaff of Shango in the King’s treasury, and even if she wheedled herself into the King’s confidence as she promised, avoiding a dozen wizards, sorcerers, and backstabbing courtiers, it would be exceedingly difficult to appropriate a sorcerous object which did not exist, or use it to break a fiendishly foreign spell.

Not that the jacamals needed to know that particular fact, or the King for that matter. After all, he’d already paid Mbutu and Talisha lavishly for the jacamals, which were the talk of all Embeko, beating even the story of the miserly shopkeeper who, upon asking his wife if she thought he was made out of money, very suddenly vanished to leave an extremely wealthy widow.

Not that Mbutu and Talisha were doing badly themselves. Mbutu bought a dozen new necklaces, and Talisha new bangles and custom scars, and decked out in this manner, they entered the legendary slave market of Embeko. Mbutu was in paradise—lavishly perfumed and beautiful slaveboys brought her sweetmeats for her pleasure, all of which were wonderful, excluding the nut-stuffed dates, which after the third feast the week before, Mbutu had sworn off of for life.

“And how may the House of Orunmila bring pleasure to you ladies?” asked the slavemaster in his elegant feathered headdress as Mbutu flashed the additional golden rings she had got from the merchant princess.

“Slaves,” said Talisha. “We are in the market for a slave. Something male. Something to pique our interest.”

“And what might your tastes be?” the slavemaster inquired unctuously.

“Oh, I do not know. . . .” Mbutu fluttered her lashes and looked to Talisha. “What do you think, Bangles?”

The warrior woman laughed. “Oh, let’s see them all. We’ll tell you what strikes our fancy.”

“Of course,” said the slavemaster, bowing, “we at the House of Orunmila live only to serve . . .” And then the slaves were brought forth. Some were tall and lean. Some were short and fat. Many were very much to her tastes or Talisha’s. But there was still business to attend to.

At last, the slavemaster bowed again, his feathers bobbing like a secretary bird’s twin crests. “I see you are ladies of discriminating taste. Perhaps the next might intrigue you.”

At his words, the “next” came out—tall, lean, with skin as pale as a frog’s belly and hair as red as antelope fur. Talisha looked to Mbutu, and Mbutu inspected the man with the spirit sight. Strong, certainly, and healthy, but foreign as he was, not a witch or mmoatia, or even one blessed by the orishas. Mbutu shook her head subtly, and Talisha said, “Not quite, but intriguing. Do you have any more like that one?”

“I have not yet begun to list his skills and accomplishments,” the slavemaster protested.

Bangles waved him away with a chime of her namesake. “It doesn’t matter. He doesn’t please my sister. But I like the foreign look. Do you have any others with this pale skin?”

“Another,” the slavemaster allowed, and a moment later a fat older man was brought forth, with steel gray hair and a potbelly.

Mbutu shook her head again. “No, not that one either. Do you have any others?”

The slavemaster hung his head. “I’m sorry, that is the last of them.”

Mbutu sniffed. “Are you certain? I was so interested in finding a foreigner, but neither of those were quite suitable.”

Talisha smiled, showing her leopard teeth. “I am certain that you have goods you are not showing us.”

The slavemaster sighed. “All, I’m afraid, that I would feel honorable selling. For foreigners, the only other one I have has been unconscious for weeks, victim of . . . ah . . . let us call it a regrettable accident. We have been attempting to revive him, but I’m afraid we may soon have to call it a loss.”

“Bring him forth,” Mbutu ordered. “I would like to see everything.”

The moment they did, Mbutu knew they had the right man. Not only did he fit the jacamal’s description—pale of skin, but with hair black as Princess Mfara’s and almost as long, and a nose hooked like an eagle’s beak—but he also had the feel of a powerful witch. Yet one with his !num drained down to the lowest ebb.

“He looks sickly,” Talisha said. “Are you sure he’s not dead?”

The slavemaster waved his hand in the negative. “No, no. He is very much alive. But barely and he has been wasting away.”

Mbutu pulled off the least of her gold rings, one without any !num, merely value. “I believe I will take him. As a curiosity, if nothing else. Accept this trinket in payment . . .”

“Ah, sweet lady, but I paid so much more for him . . .”

And so the haggling began. In the end, they sealed the bargain, the man in exchange for two gold rings, a glass necklace, and an ivory earplug. Mbutu sent Talisha to the King’s palace to borrow Mumfaro, the youngest and best-tempered of the jacamals, who Mbutu felt vaguely sorry for. At which point they bore away the unconscious witchman and set off across the desert to where Mumfaro knew the treasure trove to be.

After all, splitting the wealth with one bandit as opposed to twenty bandits was much preferable.

The bandits’ lair was a ruined caravanserai at a dry oasis, and the treasure was stashed in the hollow of a broken wall—not terribly original, but effective. Talisha brought forth a leather saddlebag and revealed a huge cache of blue beads. Mbutu quickly put her hand over Talisha’s mouth before she could exclaim something foolish, like that she’d be the mother’s brother to a monkey. Mbutu only took the pouch and laid it across the chest of the sleeping man.

At which point he woke, like a prince from one of her tales. Slowly. Weakly. With lashes aflutter like dying butterflies, never quite opening, and Mbutu had more than ample time to propitiate the orisha of parrots so as to understand his speech. “Welcome back to the living,” Mbutu said. “Your treasure has been returned to you. All but a handful of beads. And they’ve caused quite some trouble, let me tell you. . . .”

He sat up and felt his head. “I’m glad. You southerners should learn to fear a gypsy’s curse.” He then looked at her, revealing eyes a startling blue, bright as his witch beads.

Mbutu blinked and made a subtle gesture against the evil eye. “What is a gypsy? Some type of witch or mmoatia?”

“I am a gypsy,” the man replied, glaring with all the azure balefulness of a peacock’s eye. “We are of the Rom. Travelers. I came because I heard your folk valued beads.”

“We do,” Mbutu replied, “and evidently your people do as well.”

“Not so much as you do. And not so much as our freedom,” the man said, looking away, and allowing Mbutu to relax her hand. “Slavery is the worst thing in the world to the Rom, and the second worst is stealing from us. To invite the curse of one is to invite the curse of the whole tribe.”

Mbutu bit her lip. An entire tribe of foreign witches—all fueling their malice into a single curse. Well that easily explained the power they’d been dealing with. Gypsies—hmph! Bad as witches and mmoatia combined. “You are free now,” she said, “and you have your beads back. At least most of them.”

“Good,” he said, then looked at both of them. “Not that I’m ungrateful, but may I ask why you two ladies have rescued me? It doesn’t look like you’re under a curse yourselves, and I can tell that you are a woman of power.”

Mbutu bowed her head. “My name is Mbutu,” she said, “but you may call me Baubles.” After all, if Talisha was going to keep using it, she might as well make her taunt-name into her pride-name, and there was no one better to start with than a gypsy witch.

“Talisha,” said the warrior woman, not understanding the language but obviously understanding it was time for introductions, “Bangles.” She chimed her bracelets as explanation.

“I am Davio, of the Rom.” He grinned then. “I suppose that would make me Beads.”

“Well, Beads,” Mbutu said, “Bangles and I have a business proposition for you. There are a number of curses you could end immediately if you felt like it, but there is one in particular—a merchant who is now a beautiful princess—that it might be more profitable to hold off on until we could do it in person. With all appropriate ceremonies. And extra charges. After all, he doesn’t know it was your curse to begin with.”

The gypsy man grinned. “I like the way you think, Baubles. It is good to know the dukerin is practiced this far to the south . . .”

And so it went, and many wondrous tales were told, of a widow whose chests of gold and ivory turned to blood and bone, of a King whose fabulous monsters turned into common bandits in chains, of storks and hippos that changed into thin girls and fat men, and village braggarts who remained exactly as they were, for there are some things even foreign witches find too funny to change.

And of Baubles, Bangles and Beads and how they bankrupted the most beautiful princess in the world, leaving her a happy man in the end.

All hail a true Warrior Woman, one who teaches fourth graders by day, writes by night, and has been a Nebula finalist into the bargain! I stand in awe. Her fourth novel, Black/on/Black, has just been published by Baen. And oh my, wait until you see what she’s done in this story!

Hallah Iron-Thighs and the Five Unseemly Sorrows

K.D. Wentworth

It was a miserable, sultry day down in the valleys of deepest Findlebrot. What passed for streets, all two of them, were choked with pink dust, pink apparently being the color of choice for most everything in that part of the world. Gerta, and I, Hallah Iron-Thighs, sworn sisters-in-arms, had just escorted a herd of attack goats across the mountains from Alowey. They had been ordered as Queen Maegard the Meek’s wedding present to her daughter, the illustrious Princess Merrydot. For once, the bandits infesting the passes had been fairly scarce. We hadn’t been forced to kill more than a dozen, hardly a decent workout for my sword, Esmeralda.

In the distance, the Findlebrotian palace rose before us. It had the unfortunate appearance of being sculpted from icing, then left out in the sun to melt. In keeping with the local color scheme, it was constructed of the most nauseating of pink stone. The turrets were covered with a rounded stucco that dripped with flourishes and curlicues, hardly a warrior’s dream for defense. The crenellations were nonexistent. A two-year-old with a battle-ax could have taken it.

Gerta scowled. “I hate this place.”

“You can’t hate it,” I said. My bay mare, Corpsemaker, waggled her ears in agreement. “We just got here. It takes at least half a day to properly loathe a country.”

“Well, I hate its smell anyway,” she said.

I couldn’t argue with that. Findlebrot did have a most peculiar odor, oversweet and noxious as though a perfume caravan had fallen off a mountain and smashed all the bottles in a heap.

“And look at that.” She gestured at the pink castle. “It makes me embarrassed just to be close to that eyesore.”

“I don’t care what it looks like as long as their gold is yellow,” I said testily. I flicked my whip at an errant attack goat that was taking aim at a local dog. It had been my decision to accept the Findlebrot run this go-round, though it was very unpopular among our sisters-in-arms. Everyone who came back from Findlebrot went on for days afterward about the locals and their ridiculous official list of “Unseemly Sorrows,” any and all of which could be committed without even trying. At the moment, though, our purses were emptier than my favorite serving lad’s promises and so we were here.

We escorted the goats and their trainer through the castle portcullis without encountering challenge. Once inside, the smell of perfume grew even stronger. My eyes began to water.

The castle guard, if one can dignify a bunch of sissies tricked up in red dancing outfits trimmed in gold braid with that designation, surrounded us belatedly. Gerta swore under her breath as she gazed down at their beardless pink faces. The head sissy, swathed in ribbons and medals, stepped forward and muttered something about “uncivilized heathens.” He fumbled for a hanky and held it to his nose.

My saddle creaked as I leaned toward him. The pasty-faced little turd didn’t even top my mare’s withers and he reeked strongly of roses. “What was that?” I asked. “I’m afraid my partner, Gerta, here, didn’t quite hear you, and her so touchy and all about being left out of the flow of conversation.”

Gerta smiled wolfishly and drew her dagger.

He flinched and stepped back. “I said, ‘Halt where you stand. Creatures dressed in such a brazen, Unseemly fashion cannot be allowed to offend our liege’s eyes!’ ”

Here we go, I thought and shook my head.

Gerta swung a bare leg over her saddle and leaped to the ground to tower over him. “Who are you calling Unseemly, bucko?”

He averted his gaze from her ample cleavage, located conveniently for his perusal before his nose, and turned an innovative shade of red, somewhere between Ripe Tomato and flat-out Fire. “Findlebrot is a highly moral country,” he said stiffly. “Our women are admired far and wide for being the most comely, the most demure, the most delicate and refined. We tolerate none of the Five Unseemly Sorrows anywhere within our borders, but certainly not here at court.”

“Yeah, yeah,” I said. It was much the same in half the new kingdoms we traveled to, these days. The whole world was turning into the most frightful bunch of stuffed shirts. “Just pay up and we’ll be on our way.”

He flushed further, tending now toward a deep, true Puce, an unusual achievement for one of his pallid coloring. Perspiration beaded up on his chubby neck. “We are experiencing a bit of a problem with the royal cash flow.”

I crossed my arms. “That’s what they all say.”

“This time, however, it is true,” he said. “Three times, our most gracious Princess Merrydot has been betrothed, and three times her intended has been kidnapped by a vicious dragon who lives up beyond the highest pass. King Merwick sent gold to ransom them all, but though the gold disappeared, none of the princes has ever been released. The royal treasury, is, shall we say, destitute.”

“Don’t give us that rot,” Gerta said. “There are no dragons.” She raised her chin proudly. “My valiant foremothers across the channel killed them all!”

“On the contrary,” he said, “the vile beast is often seen frolicking up in the mountains after dark—flames shooting everywhere. Word of it is keeping trade out, exports in. No one pays us visits of state anymore. The situation is becoming quite desperate.” He gave us an appraising look. “Despite your shocking propensity for vulgarity, you two do look as though you might be competent with those swords. I don’t suppose—”

“Forget it,” I said, waving a fist in negation. “Even if there were any left, we don’t do dragons. Send your own men up there.”

“That is out of the question,” he said haughtily. “Every member of our guard is of noble birth. If they went after the princes, they could very well be killed!”

“I’ll just bet.” I slid down Corpsemaker’s bay side. “Now, about our fee—”

“You will have to wait,” he said. “What little is left in the treasury is reserved for essentials such as wrapping paper and ribbon, not to mention satin and taffeta, silver wedding goblets, and those cunning little bundles of rice to throw at the reception. In fact, the royal wedding shower takes place in just a few hours. You cannot imagine how expensive wedding frippery is these days, and of course each time the wedding falls through, we have to resupply. Princess Merrydot, being of a sensitive nature, cannot endure the sight of implements intended for canceled nuptials.”

He flicked a bit of dust off his red sleeve. “It will be necessary for you to apply for your fee next year, after the princess is wed, unless—” he waggled his eyebrows invitingly “—you would care to waive it altogether as a sign of good will?”

I drew Esmeralda from her scabbard with a singing hiss. Gerta moved to my side, her sword also drawn.

He paled. “This is a civilized country. Hooliganism will get you nowhere.” He snapped his fingers and a hundred more sissies tricked out in gold braid flooded into the courtyard.

Gerta bounded forward, sword raised. “Death to you all!” she shouted, her blue eyes joyously savage. “Hallah, stand back! I wish to kill the first fifty myself!”

I shook my head. Glorious death in combat is still all the rage across the channel where Gerta was born, but my mother, Marulla Big-Fist, raised her ten daughters to be nobody’s fool. “Now wait just a blamed feint-and-parry minute,” I said.

My partner’s eyes blazed with anger. “Where is your pride? No one cheats Gerta Dershnitzel and gets away with it!”

“Hold!” A tiny figure, covered from head to toe in layers of pink lace, drifted toward us across the courtyard. Her skin possessed that classic upper-class pallor and she smelled fiercely of violets. “We would speak with these Unseemly creatures.”

“Your Majesty, no!” The head guard fell to his knees, clearly horrified at the prospect.

The princess, for that was who she had to be, stamped her dainty slipper-clad foot. “And why not, Major Duero?”

“J-just look at them!” he sputtered. “They are coarse, vulgar, rude, tall, completely immodest, nay, even—” he lowered his voice “—bold! Altogether Unseemly in every way! You must not sully your royal ears by discoursing with such!”

“Really?” She tapped a manicured finger against her lovely chin. “Perhaps even bold enough to rescue our fiancé?”

“Which one?” Gerta asked loudly, then snorted.

“The lack of a royal bridegroom is a great national tragedy,” Major Duero said. “I will thank you not to make light of it.”

“Why, all of them, of course,” Princess Merrydot said.

Gerta slapped her knee and doubled over with the effort not to laugh. “Won’t that make it a bit hard to honor your obligations, there being three of them?”

“Besides that,” I said, giving Gerta a hard look, “what makes you think any of them are still alive? I mean, dragons—not that I’m admitting there is such a thing—are not known for the quality of their mercy.”

“Well . . .” The princess stared at her demurely folded hands. “We know poor Prince Tristin is alive, as well as Prince Adelbert, because—” Her face went pink as the finest Findlebrotian dust. “We recognize their voices every night when the flames appear and the screaming starts.”

“You did a bit of screaming together before they disappeared then?” I asked conversationally. “Auditioning the little rascals, perhaps?”

She stiffened. “They shouted—a little. We only listened.” She picked an imaginary bit of lint off her lace overdress. “Obviously, We cannot discuss such a sensitive matter of state here. Meet Us down the road at the Inn of the Five Unseemly Sorrows in a hour.”

I frowned. “I smell a ploy to get us out of the castle without collecting our lawful fee.”

She shook her head. “We swear upon our sacred honor, this is nothing of the sort.” She glanced around. “The Inn—in one hour.” Then she walked back across the courtyard, head up, chin set, hardly more than an inch of exposed skin showing.

Major Duero gave us a withering glare. “Now you’ve gone and upset her, and just before her bridal shower! We’ll have to play hours of those odious bridal shower games to cheer her up.”

Gerta and I mounted and left without offering our condolences.

The Inn of the Five Unseemly Sorrows had a warped wooden door that stood open. I grasped the hilt of my sword, Esmeralda, and stuck my nose inside. The room was stuffy and reeked of cabbage and about-to-turn pork. A skinny serving girl looked up from the oak table she was scrubbing without enthusiasm, gave me a horrified look and darted behind a ragged curtain.

Gerta pushed past me and pounded her fist on the table. “Ale!”

The curtain quivered, but no ale appeared.

Gerta, never the shrinking violet, jerked the curtain aside and dragged the poor girl out by the wrist. “We’ve been on the trail for weeks and we want ale!”

“But I-I can’t!” The serving girl hung her head.

I disengaged the poor girl’s arm before Gerta broke it. “Why not? We can pay.”

She sniffled. “Didn’t you read the sign?”

“Read?” Gerta grinned savagely. “Who can read?”

I swiveled my head. “What sign?”

The girl pointed with a trembling finger. “Outside—it says ‘No Skirts—No Service.’ ”

Gerta’s mouth dropped open. She reared back and drew her sword with a great rasp of steel against steel.

“Are you crazy? Don’t say the S-word!” I snatched the girl out of range. “It makes Gerta really cranky!”

She backed against the wall. “But it’s the First of the Five Unseemly Sorrows—An Immodest Woman.” She glanced fearfully toward the back room. “My master would stripe me good and proper if I ever served anyone dressed like—”

I covered her mouth before she incited Gerta to full-out murder. “Just bring us some ale, and we’ll say no more about this little misunderstanding.” I produced a silver piece and waved it beneath her nose. Her gray eyes blinked twice before she snatched it out of my hand.

An hour later, several taciturn patrons had come in and then ducked back out again, apparently unwilling to share the inn with the Unseemly likes of us. The ale tasted like the vats had been used to soak rutabagas, but I was just reaching that wonderful muzzy state a bit southeast of mellow. Gerta was considerably further down the same road. My boots were propped up on the plank table and I was scratching that insistent midback itch beneath my hauberk with the hilt of my dagger, when the princess entered the inn.

“Oh—my,” she said unsteadily when she saw us.

Gerta balanced her chair back on two legs and pared her nails with her dagger. “If you have something to say, spit it out.”

“It’s just that—” She swallowed hard, then straightened her spine. “You are showing your legs so freely, both of you. I’ve never seen such a blatant display of the Second of the Five Unseemly Sorrows—a Vulgar Woman.”

Gerta’s chair slammed down on the floor just as her dagger bit into the table.

The princess flinched.

“I’m beginning to think all this so-called Unseemly stuff everyone keeps talking about only involves women.” Gerta leaned across the table, palms down, and glared. “Tell me that I’m wrong.”

“That would be untrue,” she said primly. “We recognize Five Unseemly Sorrows in all.” Princess Merrydot ticked them off on her fingers. “An Immodest Woman, a Vulgar Woman, a Bold Woman, a Rude Woman, and a Tall Woman.”

“How—interesting.”

I’ve seen grown men faint at the sight of that particularly feral gleam in Gerta’s eye, but to her credit, the princess pulled out the bench opposite Gerta and sat down. “I am in desperate need of having at least one of my fiancés rescued, and none of my father’s guard are willing to go after them. My bridal shower is this afternoon, the wedding is tomorrow, and there simply isn’t a bridegroom in sight. Then I saw you two and . . .”

I motioned to Gerta to hold her tongue. “And?”

“And you’re so big,” she blurted, then rushed on at the sight of our grim expressions. “Or should I say tall, taller than any of the men in our guard. You see, one must be related to our family to serve in the royal guard and Pap is quite—” She hesitated, looked around, then whispered, “Untall.”

“Lot of that going around,” Gerta muttered darkly and returned her attention to the dregs of the dreadful ale.

I held my tankard out for the little barmaid to refill. “So what—exactly—makes you think a dragon is involved?”

“The bones,” she said. “They’re all gnawed and strewn along the trail up to its lair, not to mention the fearful amount of screaming most nights, and sometimes up on the horizon, one can see fire licking straight up into the sky.”

“Sounds like a bunch of snot-nosed kids playing a prank to me,” Gerta said drowsily and pillowed her head on her arms. “You got one of those Unseemly things for that?”

She raised her chin. “I believe Prince Tristin, he of the lovely green eyes, and Prince Adelbert, who has the most exquisite cheekbones, are both still alive. I fear poor Prince Rumkin, my third fiance, is dead, because I never hear his voice. That might be for the best, however, as he was rather unremarkable. At any rate, if you can rescue any or all of them, I—” She hesitated, clearly conflicted, then forced herself to finish. “I will see that you are invited to the wedding!”

“Gee,” I said, “just what I’ve been longing for. I’ll break out my best knife sheathe and polish up my mail.”

Gerta looked up blearily from the table. “You’ll have to come up with serious gold if you want us to stir from this inn, sweetcheeks.”

Two bright spots of red danced in Merrydot’s ivory cheeks, making her look almost human. “That’s Her Royal Princess, the Most Illustrious Merrydot, Keeper of the Sacred Cutlery and the Back Staircase, to you!”

“Whatever,” I said. “Okay, here’s the deal. Gerta and I will ride up and have a quick look-see, but you have to guarantee double our original fee, whether we find any bits of fiancé lying about or not.”

Merrydot bit her lip. “Very well, but you must hurry! The wedding is tomorrow. After that, I have but two days left before my sixteenth birthday when I become an official old maid and therefore unworthy to marry and continue the family line.”

“Whoa,” I said. “We can’t have that.”

Gerta just snored.

After the princess left, I hauled Gerta outside to dunk her head in the horse tank. She rubbed her eyes blearily, then stared at me, dripping scummy green water. “Wha—?”

“Wake up,” I said. “We’re off to see the dragon.”

“There are no dragons,” she said. “My foremothers—”

“Yeah, yeah,” I said. “I know the litany. Mount up.”

As dusk fell, we took the only road up into the south pass and found it curiously abandoned. This time of year, there should have been trade caravans arriving one after the other, not to mention messengers, perhaps even a young blade out to court a likely lady. A warning prickle ran up my spine.

Gerta rode with her head sunk on her chest. “I don’t feel so good,” she said thickly. “I think someone punched a hole in my head, when I wasn’t looking, and let all the thoughts out.”

“I think maybe you’re right,” I said. “Stay away from rutabaga ale after this. It doesn’t agree with you.”

“Yeah.” She thumped her heels against her gray gelding’s ribs and rode on in silence.

An hour later, we were climbing one switchback after another and were about midway up the side of the mountain when I glimpsed a bright gleam playing along the rocky peak. “What’s that?”

Gerta shook her head, then groaned at the excessive movement.

The gleam waxed and waned, waxed again. I stood up in my stirrups. “It looks like flames.”

“I don’t want to know,” Gerta said. She pressed her hands to her aching temples. “Let’s bed down here and then tell the princess tomorrow that we couldn’t find anything. We can collect our fee and she’ll never know the difference.”

“That would be Unseemly,” I said in my best royal imitation. “Besides, if there really is a dragon up there, don’t you want to kill it? I mean, it is a tradition in your family.”

“A glorious one,” she agreed dully. “I think I’m going to be sick.”

“Thanks for sharing,” I said.

Half an hour later, we heard sounds echoing down from the rocks. They started low, just a few groans and whimpers, then rose in pitch, ending with a final maniacal scream.

Gerta reined in her gray gelding. “Dragons don’t torture their prey,” she said. “At least, not in any of the tales my family used to tell. Sometimes they eat you, but that only takes one bite, maybe two. They’re not dainty.”

“And the meal wouldn’t go on night after night,” I said. My curiosity was roused. “Three princes would last no more than three days. After that, the dragon would have to hunt.”

We found a scrubby pine and tied our horses, then climbed the rest of the way on foot. Esmeralda was comfortingly heavy on my back, but Gerta carried her sword already drawn. The noises continued, but in a different pitch, lower. Tristin or Adelbert, I wondered, or even the unlamented Rumkin?

The sounds were coming from a large cave lit from within. “—you can chain me up like this!” a male voice was saying enthusiastically. Metal links rattled. “And then like this and this! Very fetching, don’t you think?”

“Go home,” said a weary voice that sounded like a cross between a vulture and a camel. “I have told you over and over—I am a vegetarian. I have no desire to eat any of you wretchedly scrawny humans, no matter how crazy you are or how much you deserve it.”

“I shall be the Harem Boy, staked out for sacrifice by a Cruel Eunuch. You can be the dragon,” the first voice continued eagerly. “You can drop down from the sky and have your way—”

“I am a dragon,” the vulture/camel voice broke in petulantly.

“All the better!” the human cried. “Chain me to the wall here. Just a few links—please! You know you want to!”

Gerta and I gave each other a startled look. Was this one of the missing princes, or an insane goatherd escaped from being locked down in his family’s root cellar? I slipped a dagger between my teeth and motioned for Gerta to follow me up the slope.

Inside the cave, shadows danced upon the wall, distorted and huge. A large bonfire was burning just a few feet away. A dusky pink dragon, about the size of a mastiff, sat turning a spit full of squash and eggplant.

Gerta shuddered. “By the gods, I hate zucchini!”

“Shut up!” I whispered, craning my head for a better look.

“If you don’t want to play Harem Boy, then how about—”

“Oh, give it a rest!” another voice, also male, broke in. “If he doesn’t want to play, I’ll chain you up again myself.”

“You are both vile, despicable knaves!” a third voice put in, full of ringing overtones. “Though I will not live to bask in poor sweet Merrydot’s presence again, I thank all the powers that ever were she will not be exposed to your depravity.”

“Put a sock in it, Rum-Punch!” the other two said in unison. Someone giggled. There was the sound of a brief scuffle.

Stranger and stranger. I slid my back along the rough wall, Gerta at my heels. Fifty feet beyond the dragon, three figures moved in the shadows and light gleamed off a quantity of metal. A pile of treasure caskets lay nearby.

“Besides, you’ve already had your turn, Bertie,” the voice continued. “I want to play Cabin Boy, the victim of desperate Pirates. You can be the Pirate King and lash me to the mast!”

The dragon sighed, then tested a winter squash with an extended claw.

I straightened up, stepped into the light, and cleared my throat. All four figures froze, the three humans, and the dragon as well. “Princes Tristin, Adelbert, and Rumkin, I presume?”

“Thank goodness you’ve come!” the diminutive dragon said. “I thought these three were going to eat me out of house and home.”

A handsome young man darted forward, hair brown as mahogany, eyes green as the first leaves of spring. “Mind your tongue, dragon. No one asked your opinion!”

The dragon removed a steaming eggplant from the spit. “You will take them away, won’t you?” it said to me plaintively.

I hefted Esmeralda. “You will permit it?”

The dragon rolled its golden eyes. “I will positively dance for joy. Name your price, old thing. I’d pay all I have to be rid of them!”

“You weren’t torturing them?”

“They were torturing me!” it said.

“But, then, what are all these chains for?” I asked.

“They’re left over from the cave’s last tenant, my maternal aunt,” the dragon said. “In her day, they were the latest in dragon chic, but now that clanky stuff is so passe. I’m trying for nice clean lines, you know, a much more modern look.”

“No!” the young man cried, rushing forward to throw himself on his knees. “Don’t make us go back! You don’t know what it’s like down there! This is Unseemly and that and that! Nothing I do is right and they keep making me memorize lists of rules. Nobody in all of Findlebrot knows how to have fun! Would you believe—” He lowered his voice. “They don’t even play Hide-the-Thimble there? The princess looked positively shocked when I suggested we retire to her bedroom to get acquainted. Everyone is so proper and serious and—”

I turned to Gerta. “He does have a point.”

Firelight glinted off her blonde braids as she nodded.

“And you?” I gestured to the second figure with Esmeralda. “Back there in the shadows. Come out where I can see you.”

A second young man shuffled forward, shorter than the first, as fair as the other was brown, and owner of the exquisite cheekbones which Merrydot had mentioned. He was swathed in chains and very little else.

“Nice outfit,” Gerta said.

He blushed. “My father made me come to Findlebrot,” he said petulantly. “I didn’t want to. Everyone down there is a sodding bore!”

“Mmmnph!” someone said from the deepest shadows. “Mmmmnphhhh!”

“What’s that?” I said.

“Oh, that’s just Rum-Punch,” the first prince said. “He can’t talk very well at the moment. He has a sock in his mouth.”

I scowled. “Well, take it out!”

Upon his release, a red-faced Prince Rumkin hastened forward. He was shorter than the other two, rounder of face, with soft myopic gray eyes. “Arrest these two wretches!” he cried. “They are traitors to my beloved Merrydot! When they saw I would not be coaxed into running away, as they both had, they knocked me on the head and kidnapped me. They wished to stop Findlebrot’s alliance to my father’s kingdom, even though either one of them could have wed Merrydot themselves and prevented it.”

“Bummer,” I said.

“You don’t know what I’ve suffered.” He glared at them. “Having to watch their sordid little games night after night, while poor Merrydot was doomed to pass her sixteenth birthday unwed and die an old maid.”

“There, there,” Gerta said awkwardly, because there seemed nothing else useful to say.

“Gosh,” I said, “what to do, what to do?” I stared off into space helpfully. “The lovely Merrydot must have her prince, and soon, but she only needs one.” Adelbert and Tristin hung their heads. The dragon munched thoughtfully on a roasted zucchini.

“Wait!” cried Gerta. “I am getting an idea!” She closed her eyes and pinched the bridge of her nose. “Give me a minute!”

I sagged back against the wall of the cave and studied the hilt of my sword. Could use a good polishing, I thought. I rubbed the embossed elephant’s trunk with the hem of my tunic.

“We’ll only take back one of the princes for the wedding!” Gerta looked at us all triumphantly. “The other two will return to their own kingdoms—but how will we ever pick which one?”

“Gee,” I said, “that is a problem.”

“I will go home,” Prince Adelbert said abjectly, “if you’re sure it’s really necessary.”

“And I.” Prince Tristin hung his head. “But I’d rather just stay up here and go on having fun, if it’s all the same.”

“No can do, sonny boy,” I said. “This noisy male bonding stuff is creeping out the rest of the kingdom. All the jumping around the fire, howling at the moon, and chaining each other up has got to go. Otherwise, the royal guard is going to find its nerve one of these days and come up here to check things out.”

“How true,” the pint-sized dragon said. “And I long to have my nice peaceful cave back to myself again. How will I ever summon the energy to grow to a properly terrifying size with all this racket?”

“As for you, Prince Rumkin,” I said, “I’m afraid you will have to keep the details of this unfortunate experience secret.”

He threw his pudgy chest out. “And why, pray, would I do that?”

“Because, your highness, if you keep quiet,” I said, “Gerta and I will tell everyone you had just worked free of your bonds, slain the dragon, and rescued the other two princes seconds before we arrived. We’ll return the gold to the king and you’ll be a hero.”

“And if I don’t?”

“Then we will tell everyone that you were tied up like a sausage by choice, playing nasty macho party games with your two lunatic soul mates here, while poor Merrydot languished in the valley below, doomed to go to her grave a virgin.”

He paled. “But that would be a damnable lie!”

“So it would,” I said affably, “and, for the record, Gerta and I are quite good at lying. We’ve had lots of practice.”

He ran spread fingers through his sandy hair. “But it all sounds so—dishonorable, so downright unseemly.”

Gerta nodded sagely. “He’s just the man to help rule Findlebrot,” she said in a stage whisper.

“So, Prince Rumkin,” I said, “what will it be?”

Prince Tristin dropped to his knees. “Rum-Punch, play the hero, please! My father would kill me if he ever found out what I’d been up to. He frowns on the whole concept of harem boys. He’d marry me to someone even worse than Merrydot in a second!”

“Me too,” said Adelbert. “I promise we’ll back you up every step of the way, have songs sung in your honor, make feasts in your name.” His lower lip quivered.

“And there’s always the chance that Merrydot will chose one of these scoundrels over you,” I said, “all things being equal.”

Rumkin scuffed his boot in the pink dust. “Oh, all right,” he said in a low voice.

“Say, old things, on your way out,” the dragon said, “could you dump those ridiculous chains down the nearest ravine? I can’t look at them another second. They’re so incredibly tacky.”

Prince Rumkin and Princess Merrydot were married scant hours before she turned sixteen and exceeded her expiration date. Princes Tristin and Adelbert hung out at the castle long enough to back up Rumkin’s story, then set off for home, shoulders slumped. Fortunately, no one in Findlebrot ever realized they were pining for one more round of the Whipping Boy and the King instead of marital bliss with the luscious Merrydot.

The weird screaming up on the mountain, the ominous fires, and clanking of chains ended. No more gnawed bones were strewn along the high trails and there were no more royal abductions, although I later heard reports of an excessive amount of broiled squash rinds littering the heights.

True to her word, the princess paid Gerta and me handsomely, though the bulk of our fee came to us in the form of surplus wedding gifts. I suppose we’ll eventually find a use for the silver candle-snuffers and jewel-encrusted toilet paper cutters. It’s the thought that counts, as they say.

The most elegant reward for our exploits, though, Merrydot kept secret until her wedding reception, where she announced to one and all that henceforth only Four Unseemly Sorrows would be recognized throughout the kingdom.

That’s why, in Findlebrot, it is no longer a sin to be Tall.

Sarah informs me that she “has just finished her fourth SF novel, The Quiet Invasion, and will go on to write her fifth, if nobody stops her. When not writing, she sings, dances, does tai chi and plays the hammered dulcimer, but not all at once.” To which I wish to add, in view of the following story: Arrrrrrh!

Miss Underwood and
the Mermaid

Sarah Zettel

As told by Captain Latimer of Her Majesty’s privateer Nancy’s Pride for the general edification of all Their Majesties’ subjects by land or sea.

First, let me say, she was not the kind of woman one normally saw in the Debauched Sloth. No mother who produced that straight spine and those squared shoulders should have permitted her daughter to know that dim, smoky, dockside tavern where unmarried men with open shirts and braided hair mingled freely with women of the Queen’s navy, and the Queen’s privateers.

For all that, the young lady in exquisite, but wholly modest, green silk walked a straight and determined line. She seemed wholly undeterred by the silence that fell like leaden weight around her. Without pause she approached the table where I sat with, it must be confessed, Jimmy Harte, an amiable, ample and generous lad employed by the Sloth’s mistress—and occasionally by her customers. the stranger looked right at Jimmy and I swear before Goddess, her eyes flashed with a cold blue light. Jimmy stumbled to his feet, splashing beer and mumbling excuses, and retreated.

Neither event warmed me to this person.

She turned those eyes to me, and I saw they were huge, ice blue and judgmental in her fair-skinned, rich woman’s face. After the barest instant, I found I had to drop my own gaze to my beer.  This also did not encourage my favor toward her.

The young lady cleared her throat. “You are, I believe, Captain Latimer, of the Queen’s privateer, Nancy’s Pride?”

I raised my gaze and straightened my own shoulders. “I am, and you, Miss, are interrupting my personal business.”

I saw it then, the light shining beneath the blue. Without a doubt there was power here. A witch, then? With those manners and that Dress? Whoever heard of a prudish witch?

“Then I must apologize for my actions, which without my knowledge or intent have been rude and an affront; but I must say, I believe that when you hear me out, you will both forgive and understand the reasons for those actions, as I am on an errand of both delicacy and urgency.”

“And you, Miss, were obviously traumatized by a grammar book in your youth.”

The quip failed to put her out. Uninvited, she sat, and her spine did not bend an inch with the act. As there was no immediate prospect of a brawl, or a shooting, the noise around us gradually returned to its normal levels.

The young lady raised her voice. “I wish to hire your ship, your crew and yourself.”

I looked again at her clothing in all its silken splendor, and the diamond and sapphire necklace around her throat. “My ship has a letter of marque and reprisal,” I said, a touch reluctantly. “My commission is to capture, burn, sink, or destroy all of Their Majesties’ enemies by sea. I can take no other work until the war is over.”

That took her back for all of one heartbeat. “What would you say of a personage who accosts one of Their Majesties’ ships? Abducts one of Their Majesties’ officers? Would you say this personage could indeed be considered an enemy to the peace and security of Their Majesties’ kingdom, territories, and possessions?”

I did not like the turn this was taking. “I would be hard pressed not to.”

I would not have believed it possible, but she actually sat up straighter. “Then, Captain Latimer, it is my duty to tell you of the work of one of Their Majesties’ greatest enemies by sea, a cunning, ruthless and destructive enemy, one who terrorizes at will, and who is also magnificently rich.”

All at once, you could have heard a pin drop in the tavern. All my sailors looked at me, as wolves might look upon hearing the words “wounded deer nearby.” My own monetary hunger rolled hard through my privateer’s blood. Glowing eyes and prudish Miss or no, this woman had word of a prize.

I wiped at my mouth before I could start drooling, something this woman would surely consider uncouth, and tried to reassert my powers of reason. “What enemy would this be, Miss . . . ?”

“Cecilia Underwood,” she answered primly. “As to the enemy, you have perhaps heard of the King’s ship Magnificent?”

I choked on my own breath. The Magnificent had set out early in the year five to cruise the northern waters and protect Their Majesties’ shipping. As a King’s ship, the frigate was crewed by men and captained by one Jack Tremor, a young fellow but a prime seaman by all accounts.

Six months later, the Magnificent returned to the Kingdom, a broken hulk. The ship foundered off Whitefish Point, and only one sad wretch was pulled from the water. No matter what the doctors and wizards attempted, all he could say was, “Go and tell her he will marry the mermaid. Go and tell her he will marry the mermaid.”

“Captain Jack Tremor is my fiancé,” said Miss Underwood. “Your enemy is the mermaid.”

Very slowly, I set my tankard down. “Your enemy is the mermaid, perhaps, Miss Underwood, as it was your fiance who was stolen. My enemies are all mortals, and dry-skinned ones at that.”

Miss Underwood did not bat an eye. “She is rich.”

Damn the woman! My blood sang as I thought on all the treasure that went to the bottom of the sea: ingots, plate, fine jewels, not to mention the wealth in pearls that grew down there of their own accord. All for the taking. The Queen’s ships were bound to assist the King’s, as the King’s were the Queen’s. The Magnificent had been foully attacked, an officer dragged away, to all that wealth, chests of it, casks overflowing with it. . . .

I wiped my chin. Reason made a last, desperate bid for victory. “How could we find the mermaid, Miss Underwood? She is said to be a secretive creature.”

Again, the light shone behind her eyes. “I will find her, and her treasure, for you.”

Reason collapsed, beaten. I lifted my gaze to my sailors, standing still as statues around the tavern. “What say you, good women?”

The storm of cheers, defiance and approval threatened to raise the Sloth’s roof. In the midst of it all, Miss Underwood sat and quietly smiled.

* * *

A fortnight later, Nancy’s Pride was ready to sail. Miss Underwood arrived at dawn on the appointed day. It took four of my crew to lift her sea chest and stow it for her. My first lieutenant, who hated passengers, was for once not put out that her cabin was commandeered. Miss Underwood could have had my cabin, if she’d desired it, as long as she took us to the mermaid, and the mermaid’s riches.

So, with the breeze freshening from the southwest and an ebbing tide, I gave the order to weigh anchor and make sail. Wind caught the canvas, filling it proudly. Ropes and timbers creaked and Nancy’s Pride slid forward from the bay toward the open sea. I turned to Miss Underwood, whom I allowed beside me on the windward side of the quarter deck, as a courtesy. I saw, with a start, that she smiled the same smile she had in the tavern when we had accepted her mission. Discomfort stirred in me, overriding my greed for a moment. I wondered, was this really the proper reaction for a woman whose love had been kidnapped by a mermaid? Then, I wondered why I had not thought of this before.

Miss Underwood turned to look at me, her eyes shining with gentle amusement. I feared that all I thought was plain in my face, then I feared her speaking those magic words “she is rich,” and chasing my fears away.

 “Would you care for a cup of coffee, Miss Underwood?” I blurted out. “It was an early start for you this morning.”

She inclined her head politely. “Thank you, Captain, but no.”

“Tea then, if you prefer? Or wine against the chill?”

Her smile both broadened and gentled. “Again I thank you, but I believe I shall retire.”

An important point reached my conscious thought. “You have not yet told me what our destination is.”

Miss Underwood looked forward and her eyes narrowed. “The course you are on will be satisfactory at present, Captain.” Without in the least minding the pitch and roll of the ship, she walked down the quarterdeck ladder and disappeared through the hatch.

I blinked. In fact, I would swear I’d never even saw her sway the smallest bit, despite the strange, weaving course she walked across the deck. The strange course, as if avoiding something only she could see . . .

A captain must never collapse to her knees on the quarter deck, pounding the boards with her fist and cursing herself for then times worse than a fool. It is bad for her authority.

I settled for bellowing. “First!”

“Captain?” Miss Sherman bounded up the ladder and saluted smartly.

“Pass the word for the ship’s carpenter.” I did not say why. I did not wish it generally known I wanted to find out how much cold iron we had on board.

The next ten days passed without incident. Any incident. Even aboard a tight, happy privateer there are cases of drunkenness, falls, minor disagreements that flare up into brawls. But not this time. Nothing happened to keep any hand from her work, and they worked cheerfully. Never a cross word or a mild curse. For the first time in twenty years of sailing, I heard sailors say “please” and “thank you” to those of their own rank. I’d finger the nail I’d taken to keeping in my pocket and consider issuing them generally, but I confess, I liked it. As unnatural as it was, it made for a remarkably pleasant change.

Miss Underwood herself kept to her cabin, only coming up once or twice a day to take a turn on deck and stare straight ahead of us. Each time, I would ask her what course to set and each time I would receive the same answer. “This one is most satisfactory, Captain.” Then I would ask whether the normal precautions against mermaids should be instituted and she would say, “Not at present, Captain,” and I would have to be content with that.

In the middle of the morning watch on the eleventh day, I sat in my cabin drinking my first pot of coffee and going over the charts. Miss Sherman knocked on my door.

“Beggin’ your pardon, Captain,” she said brightly. “But Miss Verity reports there is a sea serpent.”

I did not spit out my coffee. I swallowed. “A sea serpent?”

“Yes, and a most prodigious big one, she says.”

I squinted at my First. Miss Sherman’s eyes were lively and full of her native intelligence. She simply did not see any reason to be alarmed. It was then I concluded things had perhaps gone too far.

“Very well, Miss Sherman. Beat to quarters and clear the decks for action fore and aft. Have the great guns and all the muskets loaded directly. I shall follow you up.”

“Very good, Ma’am.”

She vanished, and I got to my feet. With great effort, I blanked my face of all expression. I would not, I could not, appear before my crew wearing my fear. Only when I was certain I had succeeded did I leave my cabin.

On deck, I found my orders being carried out, merrily, as if for a target competition. The unoccupied crew leaned on the rails and grinned at the creature casting its shadow over our deck. Its dripping head reared higher than our mainmast, its fins spread out broader than our spritsails. It bellowed and sound and stench rolled over us. In the next instant, it bent its great, pale neck and swooped down on us.

“Raise weapons!”

Those of my crew who had armed themselves lifted their muskets. The creature must have been acquainted with guns, because it pulled back abruptly and had the nerve to look affronted.

I opened my mouth to give the command to fire, when the air stirred behind me.

“I would not recommend it, Captain,” said Miss Underwood calmly. “Its hide is too tough for such projectiles. You will only succeed in angering it.”

As if in answer, the creature shook the sky with a fresh bellow and dove straight down. Something smashed against the hull, knocking us all ahoo and causing every hand to clap hold of ropes and rails. The crew’s unnatural calm vanished. It takes more than a spell of bemusement to remove the fear of hull breach from a sailor.

Miss Underwood, of course, did not move an inch.

“Can you suggest a remedy, Miss Underwood?” I gasped, pulling myself upright.

Her blue eyes were thoughtful, but without light. “Have you anything you believe exceedingly hard I might throw, Captain?”

One third of my mind considered the phrasing of the question and the nature of the person in front of me. This was neither the third that was gibbering in terror, nor the third reminding it that captains did not gibber on deck. “Miss Sherman!” I barked. “Tell Miss Barton to jump down to the galley and have Cook roust out some of the month-old biscuit. Handsomely now!”

I turned my attention to ordering the hands to take up the canvas, to mind the wheel. The serpent erupted from the water. Its great, fanlike fins battered at the waves, rocking Nancy’s Pride and almost swamping us. The thing opened its mouth in a grin I took to be idiot glee and reared back, ready to strike.

Miss Barton arrived and saluted. She handed me a rock-hard ship’s biscuit which I handed to Miss Underwood, who thanked me. Like any sailor, I would happily show the chips in my teeth from such objects, and I firmly believed nothing could be harder.

Miss Underwood’s eyes glowed intensely blue. she drew her arm back and hurled the biscuit at the sea serpent’s head. It smacked the creature right between its eyes.

The serpent bellowed in gargantuan pain. Cheers arose from the crew. The monster slipped slowly beneath the waves.

“All sail!” I shouted. “All sail, now!”

Still laughing and cheering, the crew obeyed. Nancy’s Pride leaned against the wind and sped forward.

I turned to my passenger. “Miss Underwood, a word with you, if you please.”

Once in the great cabin, I turned to face her. I had to keep myself from clutching the nail in my pocket.

“Miss Underwood, were you aware we would meet this . . . creature?”

“I suspected something of the kind might happen, yes,” she said coolly. “I thought perhaps Scylla and Charybdis, but I was mistaken.”

“Can we expect any similar troubles?”

“I do not believe so. I think she will wait for a direct assault before she attacks again.”

“I see,” I nodded. “Miss Underwood, I fear I must be direct. Exactly who are you?”

For a moment those blue eyes glowed and I feared for my safety.

But the glow subsided. “So difficult to bespell someone in their own place of power,” she shook her head. “I had hoped the lure of riches would be enough to lull you. I see that in this I was also mistaken.” She met my gaze. “Obviously, I cannot give you my true name. Let us just say that I am a person of some importance in the Seelie court, and that the mermaid has stolen something of value to me, and destroyed one of your King’s ships while doing so. I could not travel to reclaim him in my own form and under my own power, as the mermaid would sense that leagues away and strike me down at her leisure. Hence, my need for this disguise, and your services.”

“And who is Jack Tremor?”

Her eyes did glow then, cold and dangerous. “Mine.”

“I see.” I felt curiously little fear now. Perhaps it was her acknowledgement that she did not have me in the palm of her fairy hand. “One thing I wish to make perfectly clear, Miss Underwood. If I determine you are unnecessarily endangering my ship and my crew, or forcing my people to act contrary to my direct orders, I will have you thrown in irons.”

At that, I had the sweet satisfaction of seeing her blanch. “I understand you perfectly, Captain. Now, will you excuse me please? We are approaching the mermaid’s demesne and I wish to be ready.”

I bowed politely. “By all means, Miss Underwood.”

Miss Underwood left me there. When she was gone I passed the word for the blacksmith, deciding I might do well to order up some additional precautions for this voyage.

Back on deck, the normal order of things has reasserted itself, including the crew’s fairy-wrought unflappability. Miss Verity steered a straight northeast course, both sea and sky were as clear as one could wish and from the feel of things, Nancy’s Pride made a good seven knots. Still, I could no longer be easy. I paced the quarter deck, aware that my First watched me with amused patience.

“Miss Sherman, let us beat to quarters and crew the forward guns. I should not like the next serpent to catch us unawares.”

“Aye, aye, Captain.” She grinned at the prospect of good sport and turned to bellow out my orders to the appropriate crewmembers, who repeated them up and down the deck. The drum rolled to beat to quarters.

Even under the sound of running feet and the insistent drumbeat, I heard it. A rumble from deep below the ship, like thunder originating from the ocean rather than the sky. Miss Sherman’s cheerfulness faltered and something like real concern showed on her face.

I opened my mouth, trying to think of something captain-worthy to say, when a great jet of water fountained from the waves to leeward. The sea split open. From the depths rose a great, grey whale, a living wall between us and the horizon, smelling powerfully of very old fish. It regarded us with one baleful eye.

On the whale’s back perched the mermaid. The blue and green scales of her tail shimmered in the sunlight. Sea weeds and sea flowers twinned in her green hair. Her, ah, feminine endowments were bare to the world. Beside her sat a man in a naval uniform much bedraggled from overexposure to salt water. Where the mermaid sat as calm as a cat or a queen, he seemed uncertain as to what to do, blinking and bobbing his head in all directions like a man being introduced to too many people at once.

Fine-looking cove, though.

I summoned all my lung capacity. “Ahoy the whale!”

The mermaid answered, her voice ringing clear as a bell over the sounds of wind, wave and whale. “What do you mean, Mortal, addressing us in that fashion?”

Well. “Madame, that is a King’s officer next to you. As a servant of the Queen, I must demand his return.”

The whale snorted. A gout of fishy-smelling water fell across the deck, and consequently across me.

“I think perhaps we have just been insulted,” I said to Miss Sherman.

“I think so, ma’am. Shall we give her a gun?”

“No, I think . . .” My sentence trailed off. Miss Underwood had appeared on deck.

The prudish miss was gone. This was a warrior. A breastplate of bronze and silver encased her proud torso. A golden, plumed helmet covered her head. Her legs were bare, except for the greaves covering her, quite probably perfect, knees and shins. She carried a silver-tipped spear. I could not miss the fact that the fretwork encircling the helmet’s brim looked remarkably like a crown.

A person of some importance, indeed.

“The man is mine!” Her eyes flashed and her voice rang and I wondered that I had ever had the nerve to raise my voice, to her, to this.

She also seemed no longer occupied with my crew. Smiling insensibility was fast being replaced by incredulity descending into wonderment and into fear. “Miss Sherman, ready all guns. Miss Chapwick!” I lifted my voice to the rigging. “Haul in the main top gallants. Handsomely now!” All hands sprang to their work, fear replaced by reflex. Quite suddenly no one seemed to mind the whale and the mermaid, or the warrior fairy.

The mermaid, however, was not so easily put off. “Jack Tremor is my lawful prize! You shall not steal him from me!”

“I will reclaim my own!” Miss Underwood hurled her spear with all the force she had used to hurl that biscuit.

The mermaid roared, as did her whale. The animal arched into the air like a sea bird. The spear shot under it. The whale hit the water with an enormous splash, sending salt water sheeting across our decks.

Miss Underwood also took to the air. I was not surprised to see a pair of gossamer blue wings spread from her shoulders. She beat the air, flying swift and sure toward the mermaid and her resurfacing whale. I also saw that the spear was back in her hand.

The mermaid called out something harsh and incomprehensible. The waters roiled. A monstrous, slime-covered tentacle rose from the water and lashed out at Miss Underwood. Miss Underwood circled us and emitted a piercing shriek. All at once the air was alive with raptors; eagles, falcons, hawks. They poured down from the clouds, savaging the tentacle.

I was just wondering whether I should order a broadside, and if so, which target to make, when a new voice caught my attention.

“The ship ahoy!”

My gaze dropped to the water. Captain Tremor had obviously lost hold of the whale in the fracas and now bobbed in the waves on the leeward side of Nancy’s Pride.

“Miss Verity, a rope for the captain, if you please.”

The rope was dutifully lowered, and Captain Tremor was hauled, dripping, onto our deck. Out across the water, the tentacle had somehow become entangled, and Miss Underwood, a bolt of glowing gold and blue against the sky, let out a peal of savage laughter.

I turned my attention to the drenched man in front of me. “Captain Tremor, permit me to welcome you aboard the Nancy’s Pride. I am Captain Latimer.”

“Delighted to make your acquaintance, Captain.” Despite the dampness of his condition, Tremor gave me a smart salute and a most appealing smile.

I sent immediately for blankets, and brandy, and directed Miss Fletcher, my personal servant, to take Captain Tremor down to my cabin where there were some dry things that might do for him until his uniform could be cleaned. Miss Fletcher took Captain Tremor neatly in hand and I turned my attention back to the battle royale.

The mermaid seemed to have summoned a wealth of seabirds to assist her now, and the raptors screamed and clawed at gulls and albatrosses. Blood fell in a red rain onto the rolling sea. The whale had a bad gash in its side and Miss Underwood had blood on her bright spear.

“A little more sea room, Miss Verity, I think.”

“I should think so,” she muttered under her breath, and I knew the fairy veil had been truly stripped from my crew.

The mermaid raised her arms. A wave lifted out of the water and swung like a club at Miss Underwood who managed to back-paddle (back-wing?) just out of its reach.

“Captain Latimer?”

Captain Tremor stood at the foot of the quarterdeck ladder. He now wore the blue jacket, trousers and white shirt I keep in case . . . similar situations might arise.

“Do come up, Captain.” As he did, I called for coffee. While we settled ourselves, a large, damp chunk of unearthly flesh dropped onto the deck.

“A mop and bucket, Miss Verity.”

“Aye, aye, Captain.”

“May I ask, Captain Tremor,” I began, sipping hot coffee and wishing I smelt a little less of second-hand fish. “How you came to be embroiled in the affairs of these . . . persons?”

He smiled again, dropping his gaze to his coffee. “I am afraid, Captain Latimer, I am a victim of an old story. You see, my father became lost in the Great Forest and . . .”

I saw at once. “And was given shelter in a mysterious castle for the night. In return for the hospitality, he promised to give his host the first thing that greeted him upon reaching home?”

“Just so.” Captain Tremor drank some coffee with evident relish. “What greeted him was myself of course, and I was informed of the bargain upon reaching my thirteenth birthday.”

I nodded in sympathy. A hoarse cry of rage tumbled across the deck. Heavy waves slapped the hull. A shadow, which seemed to come from a leaping whale, fell momentarily across us.

“Well, my feelings had not been consulted in the matter,” Captain Tremor went on, “and I took it rather hard. I’ve never been one of those clever fellows one reads about in the histories of such matters. I confess I ran away to sea, hoping to escape my fate. I seemed to have done so, until my twenty-third birthday and my first command. You are aware, perhaps, of the care one must take in waters frequented by the mermaid?”

I nodded. The wind carried screams and shrieks to us. I surmised Miss Underwood and the mermaid were hurling imprecations at each other in their native tongues. “I mostly cruised the far southern waters where such things are not as common, but I had heard. One must not use proper names on deck, that sort of thing.”

“Indeed, yes.” His handsome face grew grave. “If one calls out a real name, such as ‘James’ the mermaid might rise from the water and say ‘give us James,’ and so you must, or your ship is lost. Consequently, one must call one’s crew such things as ‘lamp’ or ‘bucket,’ ‘old shoes,’ and so on. Unfortunately, one of my men forgot this most sensible rule, and called me by my proper rank. The mermaid,” he gestured toward leeward with his cup, “rose from the water and cried, give us Captain!’”

“I attempted to explain to her there was a prior claim on my personage, but it was to no avail. I had to accompany her or the ship would be wrecked and my men lost.” I looked at him with renewed respect. A captain who held his men’s life above his own was not merely a pretty face. There was honor and a spine underneath. I felt absurdly pleased.

“Unfortunately, due to my crew’s mistaken attempts to reclaim me . . .” He shook his head.

“Incoming!” cried Miss Verity, and we instinctively ducked our heads as a fairy spear shot across the deck, falling into the waves to windward.

When we straightened, I noted that the sky had darkened perceptibly, and I knew in my bones the glass was sinking fast. Miss Sherman bellowed the orders to take in the sails.

I drained my cup, briskly. “Well, sir, I must ask you, what are your particular wishes in this matter? The ladies,” I decided to use the word in its loosest possible sense, “are likely to finish soon, and the winner will most certainly try to lay claim to you.”

Captain Tremor sighed. “Yes, I’m afraid you are correct. I will tell you quite honestly, Captain Latimer, I have no wish to go with either of them.” My heart warmed within me at this, but I hope I only managed to nod gravely. “But I do not see how it can be helped.”

All blue sky was not hidden behind dark clouds. I regarded them with a pursed mouth as, in the distance, the mermaid laughed out loud.

“It would seem at the moment the mermaid has the advantage.” I frowned. “I believe she and Miss Underwood, the one who flies there, are closely related.”

“Indeed. They are both of the fair family.”

“Mmm.” I considered certain events, as well as the uncommonly beautiful man before me. “I believe we may safely say both are Their Majesties’ enemies. The lower there kidnapped you and took a considerable number of lives. The higher—” The mermaid let out a piercing scream just then, cutting off my words. “The higher attempted to enslave you, which is clearly against the law.” I tapped my chin. “I would be for making sail immediately and leaving them to each other, but my crew was brought out here with the promise of a crack at the mermaid’s treasure. We are a privateer, you understand Captain, and while I have no wish at this time to assist Miss Underwood—” Lightning flashed overhead. “I must pay my crew.”

“If it would be of any assistance,” said Captain Tremor, “I know where the treasure is. There is a sea cave beneath an island not far from here. She took great delight in showing all its contents to me.”

Now, I let myself smile. “It would be of great assistance, Captain. If you’ll just give directions to Miss Sherman at the wheel, we can get under way at once.”

He regarded me for a moment with a mix of emotion playing across his features. “With all due respect, Captain, do you not fear pursuit, from either the mermaid or your Miss Underwood? The mermaid easily subdued a ship of the line . . .”

He was, unfortunately, correct. I regarded the combatants out across the choppy, darkening sea. Miss Underwood glowed in the remains of the sunlight like a living bolt of lightning, surrounded by her birds of prey. The mermaid reared up on her battered leviathan, raising her hands to call up the waves and bring down the storm.

Whatever I did, it would have to be done quickly. If I gave my crew too much time to consider whom we were attacking, they would believe we could not win. Even when engaging mortal foes, belief in your abilities is critical.

Belief. Perhaps if the crew could be induced to believe differently about these ladies. Perhaps if they could be shown they were not all-powerful, but rather, were something quite different . . .

“Miss Sherman,” I called. “Pass the word for the blacksmith, and tell her to bring the precautions we arranged.” I faced Captain Tremor. “Captain, I must ask you to indulge me. I am going to attempt to disarm Miss Underwood, but to do so I will need to get her attention.”

He bowed gracefully. “I place myself entirely in your hands, Captain Latimer.”

As beguiling as that image was, I had no time to reply properly, for at that moment Miss Johnson, our blacksmith, along with the cook and her assistant, appeared. Between them they wrestled one of the galley’s great, cast iron soup kettles up the ladder. It had been modified so that its lid was attached by means of a sturdy hinge. A lock for firm closure had also been provided.

Captain Tremor looked at me quizzically.

“When one has a fairy on board, one never knows what one is going to be obliged to store,” I said. “Miss Johnson, place the kettle behind me and be ready to slam the lid.” Then, I turned from him to the combatants.

“Miss Underwood!” I bellowed. The fae queen’s attention turned abruptly toward me, the glow in her eyes hitting me like a solid blow. I staggered, but did not fall. “You cannot win! For if the mermaid does not prevent you from stealing away Jack Tremor, I most certainly shall!” At my side, Captain Tremor drew himself up straight, proud and unafraid.

“Upstart mortal!” cried Miss Underwood. “You have no power here!”

She hurled the spear toward me. I stayed stock still as long as my nerve held. Then, I slid sideways.

The spear fell into the iron kettle with a great, ringing clang. Miss Johnson slammed the lid over the top and shot home the bolt on the lock. Trapped, the spear banged madly about, seeking escape and causing the heavy kettle to shudder. Miss Johnson and Cook understandably backed away.

“No!” screamed the fairy. She dove toward the quarterdeck. Biting my lip, I reached for my pistol, but a new noise split the air, as I hoped it would—the rude, raucous laughter of the mermaid.

Miss Underwood screamed incoherently and turned in midair, descending on her damper cousin like all the wrath of Heaven. The fairy wrapped both her hands in those seaweeded, golden tresses and pulled hard. The mermaid screamed and slapped uselessly at the fairy’s hands.

“Miss Sherman,” I said. “Encourage the whale to leave.”

“Aye, aye, ma’am!”

Miss Sherman gave the order and the great guns fired, filling the air with smoke and stench. The balls skipped across the water, bruising flukes, trimming tail and shuddering the great flanks. This iron attack convinced the poor, beleaguered beast that it had finally had enough. It arched its mighty back and vanished beneath the waves. Miss Underwood shot into the air a moment before the whale vanished, hauling the mermaid with her by the hair. The mermaid screamed again and clung to her rival’s arms. They rolled over and over in the air, struggling with one another, slapping, biting, and letting out the most piercing of shrieks.

“Cat fight!” shouted one of my crew.

“Get ’er girl!” came the cry from one of the foremast hands.

“That’s the way! Slap that pasty face!”

“I’ve a shilling says the one with wings can take her!”

“I’ll take that bet, Chips!”

Someone chuckled, someone guffawed, someone howled, watching these two great queens of the fair folk rolling about like jealous serving boys fighting over some seawoman’s affections. The crew’s laughter rang across the waters, sliced through the wind and waves. It poured forth until even Jack Tremor joined in. I added my own mirth to the din with the greatest satisfaction.

The pair of them froze in midair, the mermaid’s tail wrapped around the fairy’s waist. The fairy’s hand in the mermaid’s hair and her free arm drawn back to deliver a ringing slap.

The merriment of my crew redoubled at this splendid tableau. Several of the women in the rigging had to clasp the ratlines and masts to keep themselves from falling as they shook with their laughter.

The air around the fabulous pair shimmered and I blinked. Instead of a winged warrior and a mer-queen, my streaming eyes made out a bone thin girl of about ten years suspended by a pair of limp, flower-petal wings hanging onto a thing that looked more like a boiled haddock woman than a seductive ruler of the sea.

They looked at us, they looked at each other, they looked down at themselves.

And, oh, Goddess, how they did scream.

The winged girl dropped the haddock woman and flew for the horizon. The haddock dove beneath the waves, and did not reappear. I laughed again at the sudden thought that the whale might be waiting for her in order to discuss its terms of employment.

“That was wonderful, Captain Latimer.” Captain Tremor’s eyes shone with mirth and delight. “Nothing short of wonderful. However did you think of it?”

I laid a hand on his firm, square, young shoulder. “Belief, Captain Tremor,” I said, “I have learned, is all-important in matters of magic. We believed they looked ridiculous, and for that important moment, so did they.” The clouds were clearing and the breeze freshening all around us. “Of course, I was praying the entire time that their vanity was as real as their beauty was false.”

“You are a marvel, Captain Latimer,” he said, with his admiration plain on his open face. “I hope you will tell ’em in more detail of your voyage. Perhaps when we have a moment to ourselves.”

I let my self be warmed by the young man’s earnestness. “First, Captain Tremor, you must guide us to that sea cave, or my crew will be more put out than either one of us would care to deal with.” I smiled over my deck and my seawomen. “After than, I do believe you and I shall have all the time we need.”