168 Robert Asprin
The vampire gnawed his lower lip as he thought.
"You're sure it will be all right?"
"I can't say for sure until I talk to my partner," I ad-
mitted, "but I'm pretty sure things will be amenable.
The main problem is to get the murder charges against
him dropped... which I think we've already accom-
plished. As for you, I think the only thing they could
have against you is false arrest, and there's no way Aahz
will press charges on that one."
"Why not?"
I gave him my best grin.
"Because if he did, we couldn't take you back to
Deva to deal with the swindling charge. Believe me, if
given a chance between revenge and saving money, you
can trust Aahz to be forgiving every time."
Vic thought about it for a few more moments, then
shrugged.
"Embarrassment I'm used to dealing with, and I
think I can beat the swindling rap. C'mon, Skeeve. Let's
get this thing over with."
Having finally reached a truce, however temporary,
we descended together to face the waiting crowd.
Chapter Twenty:
"There's no accounting for taste!"
—COLONEL SANDERS
"BUT Skeeve...."
BANG!
"...I told you before...."
BANG! BANG!
"... I could never abandon Matt...."
BANG!
"... he's my partner!"
BANG .'BANG!
"ButLu...."
BANG!
"... excuse me. HEY, PARTNER! COULD YOU
KNOCK OFF THE HAMMERING FOR A MINUTE?
I'M TRYING TO HAVE A CONVERSATION
HERE!"
"Not a chance," Aahz growled around his mouthful
of nails. "I'm shutting this door permanently before
anything else happens. But tell you what, I'll try to ham-
mer quietly."
169
170 Robert Asprin MYTH-ING PERSONS
171
If you deduce from all this that we were back at our
place on Deva, you're right. After some long, terse con-
versations with the citizens of Blut and fond farewells to
Vilhelm and Pepe, our whole crew, including our three
captives, had trooped back to the castle and through the
door without incident.
I had hoped to have a few moments alone with Lu-
anna, but, after several attempts, the best I had been
able to manage was this conversation in the reception
room under the watchful eyes of Aahz and Matt.
Matt, incidentally, turned out to be a thoroughly
unpleasant individual with a twisted needle-nose, acne,
a receding hairline, and the beginnings of a beer-belly.
For the life of me, I couldn't figure out what Luanna
saw in him.
"But that was when you thought he was in a jam," I
said, resuming the argument. "Aahz and I have already
promised to help defend him and Vic when they go
before the Merchants Association. There's no need to
stand by him yourself.''
"I don't understand you, Skeeve," Luanna declared,
shaking her head. "If I wouldn't leave Matt when he
was in trouble, why should I leave him when things look
like they're going to turn out okay? I know you don't
like him, but he's done all right by me so far ... and I
still owe him for getting me away from the farm."
"But we're making you a good offer," I tried again
desperately. "You can stay here and work for Aahz and
me, and if you're interested we could even teach you
some real magic so you don't have to...."
She stopped me by simply laying a hand on my arm.
"I know it's a good offer, Skeeve, and it's nice of you
to make it. But for the time being I'm content to stay
with Matt. Maybe sometime in the future, when I have
a little more to offer you in return, I'll take you up on it
... if the deal's still open."
"Well," I sighed, "if that's really what you
want...."
"Hey! Don't take it so hard, buddy," Matt laughed,
clapping his hand on my shoulder. "You win some, you
lose some. This time you lost. No hard feelings. Maybe
you'll have better luck with the next one. We're both
men of the world, and we know one broad's just like
any other."
"Matt, buddy" I said through clenched teeth, "get
that hand off my shoulder before it loses a body."
As I said, even on our short trip back from Limbo I
had been so underwhelmed by Matt that I no longer
even bothered trying to be polite or mask my dislike for
him. He could grate on my nerves faster than anyone I
had ever met. If he was a successful con artist, able to
inspire trust from total strangers, then I was the Queen
of May.
"Matt's just kidding," Luanna soothed, stepping
between us.
"Well I'm not," I snarled. "Just remember you're
welcome here any time you get fed up with this slug."
"Oh, I imagine we'll be together for quite some
time," Matt leered, patting Luanna lightly on her rump.
"With you big shots vouching for us we should be able
to beat this swindling rap... and even if we lose, so
what? All it means is I'll have to give them back their
crummy twenty gold pieces."
Aahz's hammering stopped abruptly ... or maybe it
was my heart.
I tried vainly to convince myself that I hadn't heard
him right.
"Twenty gold pieces?" I said slowly.
"Yeah. They caught on to us a lot quicker here at the
Bazaar than I thought they would. It wasn't much of a
172 Robert Asprin
haul even by my standards. I can't get over the fact that
you big shots went through so much trouble to drag us
back here over a measly twenty gold pieces. There must
be more to this principle thing than I realized."
"Ummm... could I have a word with you, part-
ner?" Aahz said, putting down his hammer.
"I was about to ask the same thing," I admitted,
stepping to the far side of the room.
Once we were alone, we stared at each other, neither
wanting to be the first to speak.
"You never did get around to asking Hay-ner how
much was at stake, did you?" Aahz sighed absently.
"That's the money side of negotiations and I thought
you covered it," I murmured. "Funny, we both stood
right there the whole time and heard every word that
was said, and neither of us caught that omission."
"Funny. Right. I'm dying." My partner grimaced.
"Not as much as you will if word of this gets out," I
warned. "I vote that we give them the money to pay it
off. I don't want to, but it's the only way I can think of
to keep this thing from becoming public knowledge."
"Done." Aahz nodded. "But let me handle it. If
Matt the Rat there gets wind of the fact that the whole
thing was a mistake on our part, he'd probably black-
mail us for our eyeteeth."
"Right, "I agreed.
With that, we, the two most sought-after, most
highly-paid magicians at the Bazaar, turned to deal with
our charges, reminded once more why humility lies at
the core of greatness.