«What power do your people have?» Asedow asked. Whoosh!
«How many are they?» demanded Zolaika. Hard jerk, reverse spin.
«Why did you come here?» asked a plump man in bright yellow. Blur.
«What do you want on Ozran?» Nokias asked. Keff tried to force out an answer.
«Not—» Short jerk sideways.
«How did you obtain possession of the silver tower?» Potria asked.
«It's my sh—» Two half-arcs in violently different directions, until he ended up facing an image of Ferngal that swayed and bobbed.
«Will more of your folk be coming here?» Keff heard. His stomach was beginning to head for his esophagus.
«I . . .» he began, but his chair shifted again, this time to twin images of Ilnir, who gabbled something at him in a hoarse voice that was indistinguishable from the roar in his ears.
«Hey!» Keff protested weakly.
«The Siege Perilous, Galahad,» Carialle quipped. «Be strong, be resolute, be brave.»
«I'm starting to get motion sick,» Keff said. «Even flyer training wasn't like this! I feel like a nardling lazy Susan.» The chair twisted until it was facing away from Ilnir. A blurred figure of primrose yellow and teal at the corner of his eye sat up slightly.
Beside Keff's hand, a small glass appeared. It was filled with a sparkling liquid of very pale green. Keff's vision abruptly cleared. Was he being offered another shot of poison? The silver blob that was Chaumel shot a suspicious look at the tall girl, then nodded to Keff. The brawn started to take the ornate cup, when two more tasters abruptly keeled over and let their glasses crash to the ground. Two more servants appeared, always four-fingered fur-faces. Keff regarded the cup suspiciously.
«What about it, Cari? Is it safe to drink?»
«It's a motion sickness drug,» Carialle said, after a quick spectroanalysis. Hastily, before he was moved again, Keff gulped down the green liquid. It tasted pleasantly of mint and gently heated his stomach. In no time, Keff felt much better, able to endure this ordeal. He winked at the pretty girl the next time he was whirled past her. She returned him a tentative grin.
The Siege Perilous halted for a moment and Keff realized his soup plate had vanished. In its place was a crescent-shaped basket of fruit and a plate of salad. His fellow diners were also being favored with the next course. Some of them, with bored expressions, waved it away and were instantly served tall, narrow crockery bowls with salt-encrusted rims. Before he spun away again, he watched Zolaika pull something from it and yank apart a nasty-looking crustacean.
«Ugh,» Keff said. «No fish course for me.»
Thanks to the young woman's potion he felt well enough to eat. While trying to field questions from the magifolk, he picked up one small piece of fruit after another. Carialle tested them for suspicious additives.
«No,» Carialle said. «No, no, no, yes—oops, not any—more. No, no, yes!»
Before it could be tainted by long-distance assassins, Keff popped the chunk of fruit in his mouth without looking at it. It burst in a delightful gush of soft flesh and slightly tart juice. His next half-answer was garbled, impeded by berry pulp, but it didn't matter, since he was never allowed to finish a sentence anyway before the next mage greedily snatched him away from his current inquisitor. He swallowed and sought for another wholesome bite.
The basket disappeared out from under his hand and was replaced by the nauseating crock. His fingers splashed into the watery gray sauce. It sent up an overwhelming odor of rotting oil. Keff's stomach, tantalized by the morsel of fruit, almost whimpered. He held his breath until his invisible waiter got the hint and took the crock away. In its place was a succulent-smelling vol au vent covered with a cream gravy.
«No!» said Carialle as he reached for his fork.
«Oh, Cari.» His chair revolved, pinning him to the back, and the meat pastry evaporated in a cloud of steam. «Oh, damn.»
«Why have you come to Ozran?» Ilnir asked. «You have not answered me.»
«I haven't been allowed,» Keff said, bracing himself, expecting any moment to be turned to face another magiman. When the chair didn't move, he sat up straighter. «We come to explore. This planet looked interesting, so we landed.»
«We?» Ilnir asked. «Are there more of you in your silver tower?»
«Oops,» Carialle said.
«Me and my ship,» Keff explained hastily. «When you travel alone as I do, you start talking out loud.»
«And do you hear answers?» Asedow asked to the general laughter of his fellows. Keff smiled.
«Wouldn't that be something?» Keff answered sweetly. Asedow smirked.
«That man's been zinged and he doesn't even know it,» Carialle said.
«Look, I'm no danger to you,» Keff said earnestly. «I'd appreciate it if you would release my ship and let me go on my way.»
«Oh, not yet,» Chaumel said, with a slight smile Keff didn't like at all. «You have only just arrived. Please allow us to show you our hospitality.»
«You are too kind,» Keff said firmly «But I must continue on my way.»
The spin took him by surprise.
«Why are you in such a hurry to leave?» Zolaika asked, narrowing her eyes at him. The face with the monitor, hovering beside her, looked him up and down and said something in the secondary, more formal dialect. Keff batted the IT unit slung around his chest, which burped out a halting query.
«What tellest thou from us?»
«What will I say about you?» Keff repeated, and thought fast. «Well, that you are an advanced and erudite people with a strong culture that would be interesting to study.»
He was slammed sideways by the force of the reverse spin.
«You would send others here?» Ferngal asked.
«Not if you didn't want me to,» Keff said. «If you prefer to remain undisturbed, I assure you, you will be.» He suffered a fast spin toward Omri.
«We'll remain more undisturbed if you don't go back to make a report at all,» the peacock magiman said. A half-whirl this time, and he ended up before Potria.
«Oh, come, friends,» she said, with a winning smile. «Why assume ill where none exists? Stranger, you shall enjoy your time here with us, I promise you. To our new friendship.» She flicked her fingers. A cup of opal glass materialized in front of her and skimmed across the air to Keff's tray. Keff, surprised and gratified, picked it up and tilted it to her in salute.
«What's in it, Cari?» he subvocalized.
«Yum. Its a nice mugful of mind-wipe,» she said. «Stabilized sodium pentothal and a few other goodies guaranteed to make her the apple of your eye.» Keff gave the enchantress a smile full of charm and a polite nod, raised the goblet to her once again, and put it down untasted. «Sorry, ma'am. I don't drink.»
The bronze woman swept her hand angrily to one side, and the goblet vanished.
«Nice try, peachie,» Cari said, triumphantly.
Keff seized a miniature dumpling from the next plate that landed on his tray.
«Yes,» Carialle whispered. Keff popped it into his mouth and swallowed. His greed amused the magifolk of the south, whose chairs bobbed up and down in time to their laughter. He smiled kindly at them and decided to turn the tables.
«I am very interested in your society. How are you governed? Who is in charge of decision-making that affects you all?»
That simple question started a philosophical discussion that fast deteriorated into a shouted argument, resulting in the death or discomfort of six more fur-skinned foodtasters. Keff smiled and nodded and tried to follow it all while he swallowed a few bites.
Following Carialle's instructions, he waved away the next two dishes, took a morsel from the third, ignored the next three when Carialle found native trace elements that would upset his digestive tract, and ate several delightful mouthfuls from the last, crisp, hot pastries stuffed with fresh vegetables. Each dish was more succulent and appealing than the one before it.