Dor addressed the floor. "Where is Irene?"
"Hasn't been here for days."
He moved into the hall, questioning as he went. Soon he located her-in her own apartment in the palace. "You go elsewhere," he told Grundy. "I have to handle this myself."
"Aw," the golem complained, "Your fights with Irene are so much fun." But he obediently departed. Dor inhaled deeply, the act reminding him fleetingly of Heavenly Helen Harpy, squared his shoulders, then knocked politely. Quickly she opened the door.
Irene was only eleven, but with his new perspective Dor saw that she was an extremely pretty child, about to blossom into a fair young woman. The lines of her face were good, and though she had not yet developed the feminine contours, the framework was present for an excellent enhancement. Give her two years, maybe three, and she might rival Millie the maid. With a different talent, of course,
"Well?" she said, with the sharpness of nervousness.
"May I come in?"
"You sure did yesterday. Want to play house again?"
"No." Dor entered and closed the door quietly behind him as she retreated. How to proceed? Obviously she had strong reactions and was wary of him without actually being frightened. She had potted plants all around the room, and one was a miniature tangler: she had no need to fear anyone! She hadn't told her father yet; he had, in the course of locating her, determined that she had not been near the library in the past day.
Irene was a palace brat whose talent fell well short of Magician caliber. No one would ever call her Sorceress. She had a sharp tongue and some obnoxious mannerisms. Yet, Dor reminded himself again, she was a person. He had always held her in a certain contempt because her talent was substantially beneath his own-but so was Millie's. Magic was important, certainly, and in some situations critical-but in other situations it hardly mattered. The Zombie Master had recognized that
Now Dor felt ashamed, not for what his body might have done yesterday, but for what he, Dor, had done a month ago, and a year ago. Stepping on the feelings of another person. It did not matter that he had not done it maliciously; as a full Magician, in line to inherit the crown of Xanth, he should have recognized the natural resentment and frustration of those who lacked his opportunities. Like Irene, daughter of two of the three top talents in the older generation, doomed to the status of a nonentity because she had only ordinary magic. And was female. How would he feel in such a circumstance? How had his father Bink felt, as a child of no apparent magic?
"Irene, I-I guess I've come to apologize." He remembered how freely King Roogna had apologized to the Zombie Master, though the problem had only deviously been the fault of the King. Royalty had no need to be above humility! "I had no right to do what I did, and I'm sorry. It won't happen again."
She looked at him quizzically. "You're talking about yesterday?"
"I'm talking about my whole life!" he flared. "I-I have strong magic, yes. But I was born with it; it's an accident of fate, no personal credit to me. You have magic yourself, good magic, better than average. I make dead things talk; you make live things grow. There are situations in which your talent is far more useful than mine. I looked down on you, and that was wrong. I can't blame you for reacting negatively; I would do the same. In fact you fought back with more spunk than I ever did. You're a person, Irene. A child, as I am, but still a human being who deserves respect. Yesterday-" He stalled, for he had no clear idea what the Coral had done. He should have gotten the specifics from Grundy. He spread his hands. "I'm sorry, and I apologize, and-"
She raised a finger in a little mannerism she had, silencing him. "You're taking back yesterday?"
Dor couldn't help thinking of his own yesterday, piping goblins and harpies after him with the magic flute, swinging on spider silk inside the Gap, detonating the forget spell that still polluted the Gap, hauling corpses from battlefield to laboratory to make zombies-unparalleled adventure, now forever past Yesterday was eight hundred years ago. "I can't take back yesterday. It's part of my life, now. But-"
"Listen, you think I'm some naive twit who doesn't know what's what?"
"No, Irene. I was the naive one. I-"
"You claim you didn't know what you were doing?"
Dor sighed. How true that statement was! "I really can't make excuses. I'll take my medicine. You have a right to be angry. If you want to tell your father-"
"Father, hell!" she snapped. "I'll take care of this myself! Ill give back exactly what you gave me!"
Dor was not reassured. "As you wish. It is your right."
"Close your eyes and stand still."
She was going to hit him. Dor knew it. But it seemed he had it coming. He had let the Brain Coral use his body; he was responsible. He closed his eyes and stood still, forcing his hands to hang loose at his sides, undefensively. Maybe this was the best way to settle it.
He heard her step close, almost felt the movement of her body. She was raising her arm. He hoped she wouldn't hit him low. Better on the chest or face, though it marked him.
It was on the mouth. But strangely soft. In fact-
In fact, she was kissing him!
Totally surprised, Dor found himself putting his arms around her, partly for balance, mostly because that was what one was supposed to do when kissed by a girl. He felt her body yield to him, her hair shifting with the motion. She smelled and tasted and felt pleasant.
Then she drew back a little within his embrace and looked at him. "What do you think of that?" she asked.
"If you intended that to be punishment, it didn't work," he said. "You're sort of nice to kiss."
"So are you," she said. "You surprised me yesterday. I thought you were going to hit me or yank off my panties or something, and I was all set to scream, and it was all awkward and bumpy, noses colliding and stuff. So I practiced last night on my big doll. Was it better this time?"
A kiss? That was what they had done yesterday? Dor's knees felt weak! Trust Grundy the golem to blow it up into something gossipy! "There's no comparison!"
"Should I take off my clothes now?"
Dor froze, chagrined. "Uh-"
She laughed. "I thought that would faze you! If I wouldn't do it yesterday, what makes you think I'd do it today?"
"Nothing," Dor said, relaxing with a shuddering breath. He had seen naked nymphs galore, in the tapestry, but this was real. "Nothing at all. Nothing absolutely at all."
"You want to know what yesterday was?" she demanded. "It was the first time you really got interested in me, for anything. The first time anybody got interested in me who didn't want a plant grown fast, instead of calling me a palace brat who should have been a sorceress but could only grow stupid green stuff. Do you have any idea what it's like having two Magician-caliber parents and being a big disappointment to them because not only are you a girl, you have lousy talent?"
"You have good talent!" Dor protested. "And there's nothing wrong with being a girl!"
"Oh sure, sure," she countered. "You never had no talent. You never were not male. You never had people being polite to your face because of who your father was and what your mother might do to them, while they cut you down behind your back and called you skunk cabbage and garden-variety talent and weed girl and-"