“I want one,” Tag agreed. “Or three.”
“I’ll bet,” she said. “Maybe we should visit a casino, where anything is available for a price. How are you for gambling?”
“I am good at it. I always win, of course.”
“Of course,” she agreed thoughtfully. “But we’ll need money to start.”
“Here is money. A bag of gold.” The bag appeared in his hand.
Nate took it and reached inside. He drew out a small gold coin with ancient script on it. “Er—”
Lotus saw the problem. “Wait, if you always win, we can start with some of mine, and parley it into a better stake. So let’s go to the casino.”
Suddenly they were in a busy casino, standing beside a roulette table. Sexy girls were circulating, serving drinks. Tag was pleased; this was what he had come for.
Lotus shook her head. “First we need to build up our stake and buy some chips. This way.” She headed for a row of one-armed bandits. She put in a silver dollar she had, and pulled the handle.
The tokens whirled in the little windows and settled into place. The machine gave a hoot and poured out dozens of silver dollars. Nate and Tag gathered them up and followed Lotus to the cashier’s window, where she exchanged them for betting chips. Then they returned to the roulette table. And won. And won again.
Before long the casino bouncers appeared. “The boss will see you now,” one said menacingly.
“Why?” Tag asked, curious.
“You’re winning too much. Something’s fishy.”
“This is a problem?”
“Listen, joker,” the bouncer said, drawing back his fist.
“Don’t threaten him!” Nate warned. Too late, as usual.
Tag snapped his fingers. The first bouncer sailed through the air and crashed into a slot machine, which in turn crashed to the floor. The second bouncer turned into a white rat that scurried across the floor, starting a commotion.
“We’d better get out of here,” Nate said urgently. “And not by supernatural means. We’ll take a taxi.”
“A what?” Tag asked.
“A car. One of the things you need to learn about.”
“Good idea,” Lotus agreed. “We’ve made enough of a scene for the moment.”
They barged out and caught a waiting taxi. “Where to?” the cabbie inquired.
“To hell and back,” Tag said.
“That’ll cost you extra.”
Then there was a siren as the police closed in. “I think we ruffled some feathers,” Lotus said, not entirely dismayed. “This could get awkward.”
“Too bad we can’t just fly out of here,” Nate said, resigned to more than awkwardness. All this, because he had pulled off a stupid tag!
Then the taxi sailed up into the air and floated to another lane, where it landed. “Good trick!” the cabbie said as he accelerated. “In the morning I may wonder about this.”
“Cars aren’t supposed to fly,” Lotus told Tag.
“But Nate said—”
“I think we’d better just get home,” Nate said.
Then they were back in his apartment. Nate turned on the TV, fearing the worst. It was there. “There was a remarkable scene at the casino,” the announcer said. “It appears to have started with an unnatural winning streak. There are rumors about a man turning into a rat, and a flying car. Also nude women at another location. The authorities are investigating.”
“Aw, zip your lip,” Nate muttered.
And the mouth of the TV announcer became a closed zipper. He looked startled.
“Um, Tag, there are a number of things we have to caution you about,” Lotus said. “Such as figurative speech.”
“And we haven’t even touched upon the Internet,” Nate said.
“The what?”
“It’s a global communication system with its own protocols and dangers.”
“Dangers?”
“Like viruses. They can really mess you up.”
“Viruses?”
“They infect machines as well as people these days.”
“Machines get ill?”
“They do when their software gets infected.”
“Software?”
“This will take weeks,” Lotus said impatiently. “Where to begin?”
“This is giving me a headache,” Tag complained.
“Ifrits get headaches?” she asked.
“No. That’s what makes it hard to handle.”
“Well, we’ll handle it. I have a book to write. I need to know everything about you. Then we’ll put you on display for the public, doing real magic tricks. Proof of the supernatural at last. Take that, skeptics!”
Tag shook his head. “Damsel, you’re enticing, but this is not worth all the confusion. I’m going back into the mattress so I can sleep until a better day.”
“Don’t you dare! Not before I finish the interview.”
But the ifrit was already fizzing into vapor and sliding into the mattress. In moments the purple mist disappeared, leaving only the purple tag to seal it.
Lotus grabbed at it, but it was illusory: visible without being real.
“He made sure it couldn’t be removed this time,” Nate said, halfway relieved.
“Come out of there, you shirker!” Lotus screamed. “I need you to prove the supernatural is real! Otherwise they won’t believe me.”
A finger-shaped section of the mattress poked up in response.
“Oh is that so! Well, I’ll damn well drive you out again, Spook! You won’t get a minute’s sleep.” She jumped on the mattress and bounced repeatedly. “Take that! I have not yet begun to bounce!”
But the mattress was annoyingly unresponsive.
Meanwhile Nate noticed the bag of gold still sitting on the table where it had been forgotten. He took out a coin, then another, but the bag remained full. Finally he turned it over to dump it out. A stream of gold coins fell, piling until they overflowed the table, far more than the little bag could have held. “It’s an endless bag!” he breathed, amazed. “I’m rich!”
“No you aren’t,” Lotus said from the bed. “Spending those ancient coins would arouse immediate suspicion. We’ll have to fence them carefully. I have a connection.”
“We?” he asked blankly.
“We’re in this together, aren’t we?”
He gazed at her. She was slightly disheveled from her bouncing, but prettier than ever. There was hardly anything he could think of he would like more than being “we” with her. “We are.”
“But it would still be better with Tag on the scene so I can write my book and prove it. A real live ifrit! Vindication for the supernatural!”
Nate opened his mouth, about to suggest that, as Tag said earlier, the best way to wake up the ifrit was bouncing on the mattress. Preferably while clasped together, naked. Then he thought back on the events of the evening and decided it was definitely best to let sleeping magical creatures lie. And also that he liked Lotus too much to use a lame pickup line on her.
“Let him sleep,” said Nate. “There must be other ways to prove the existence of the supernatural. With your premonition talent and all this gold, we’ll find them for sure.”
“We?” Lotus asked.
“We’re in this together, aren’t we?” he repeated what she said earlier.
Lotus beamed at him.
Nate smiled back. He was ready for their adventures together. But first he’d need to find a nice, quiet storage unit that was large enough to fit a mattress.
***
Piers Anthony is one of the world’s most popular fantasy authors and a New York Times bestseller twenty-one times over. He’s the author of the Xanth series, the Apprentice Adept series, and many others.