"We'll have to have Caitlin research it when we get back," suggested the elegant female in a skirt suit.
Hearing them talk about me made me nervous. They didn't know who I was, but the police could identify me if my disguise slipped. My hand trembled, sending drops of wine all over. The female sprang to her feet as I narrowly missed her ankle.
"Oh, for Crom's sake, female! I've never seen such an inept job in my life! Give me that mop! I could do a better job than you in my sleep!"
"Sit down, madam!" the judge roared. "Let our employee finish her work."
"I could have cleaned your entire courtroom in the time it's taken her to make matters worse," the elegant Pervect snarled back.
"You may end up doing menial labor," Domari warned her. "Each of these charges carries a penalty of a period not less than thirty days in jail, to be served consecutively."
"What?"
The combined outrage of eight Pervects was enough to knock me off my feet. Hastily I finished wiping up the last of the spill, scrambled up, and creaked out of the courtroom. Behind me, all of them were on their feet shouting at the judge. My guard escorted me to the door, then closed it behind me. I could still hear their voices echoing as I walked in increasingly long strides out of the building. A guard at the entrance gave me a strange look.
"My vacation starts tonight!" I piped, in a high-pitched voice. I didn't have to simulate the aged tremble; I was still shaking from being that close to my nemeses. The guard nodded and went back to staring off into space.
Unless I was very wrong, the Pervect Ten, or eight of them, anyhow, were going to be in a magik-proofed jail for years! Wuh's problem was almost solved. We should be able to handle the remaining two. I had trouble restrain- ing myself from dancing a little victory hop as I left the courthouse and tottered over the bridge to Bunny and the others.
Bunny and Tananda embraced me as I reached them. I hid behind a pillar to shed the cleaning lady's garments and straighten my own.
"You had better restore our appearance," Zol reminded me. The disguises had been knocked out by the anti-magik field inside the building, but were restored the moment we stepped outside its sphere of influence. That was a sophisticated spell.
It took less than a moment for me to reach down to the line of power I'd been staring at for over a day, erase the faces of long-nosed Scammies and restore their features. It felt so good to be doing magik again!
"Nice work, handsome," Tananda remarked approvingly, looking at herself in the mirror of Bunny's PDA. "You ought to get locked up more often."
"No, thanks," I replied. "I did learn something about concentration, but it does me no good unless I can actually practice my techniques."
"Down with the outworlders! Death to demons!"
I glanced up the street. A vast crowd of Scammies had collected in front of the courthouse. "What's going on?"
'They're protesting the loss of the goggles," Zol replied. "They should not be. Such time-wasting nonsense keeps one from the pursuit of truth and beauty. It is good that they have been taken away."
"It's not good! What will I do?" a female asked, clutching at us as she made her way forlornly toward the protest group. "I have to have my story! I loved it! I lived it."
"You must learn to do without it, my dear," Zol told her soothingly, patting her hand. "It isn't safe to fill your mind with falsehood."
"But I liked it! Can't I just have it for a while?"
"Oh, you must wean yourselves away from it. You should be as you were before, true to yourself!" "How?" a male demanded hoarsely. "How can we do that? How can we do without them?"
"Help us!" a female pleaded, clutching my arm. "I don't want to give it up!"
"You need to be strong!" the little gray man shouted, his thin voice almost swallowed by the woe of those around him. "Believe in yourselves! That is all you need to do! Rely upon one another!"
"He knows what he's talking about," I told the Scammies who lifted tear-stained faces to me. "That's Zol Icty, the self-help expert."
"Zol Icty!"
Desperate for any kind of comfort now that the Pervects' false vision had been taken away from them the crowd swelled in upon us. People shoved in close to me, shouting questions. They were so distraught they were crushing me. I used magik to open up a little space, but there were so many people I was hurting the ones nearest me. Bunny let out a yelp of distress. Hastily I grabbed her around the waist and swung her up onto the span of the bridge, then jumped up beside her.
"Advise us, wise strangers!" a Scammie pleaded, reaching for us.
The protest had attracted the attention of the people in the courthouse. Police officers came boiling out of the entrance. Officer Gelli spotted me and pointed.
"The wizard! After him!"
In my haste to get out of the crowd, I had accidentally placed myself in plain view. I pulled the D-hopper out of my boot and set it for Wuh.
"Tananda! Zol!" I cried. They glanced up. I pointed at the dozens of policemen racing towards us.
Down in the midst of the crowd I saw Tananda starting her bump-and-grind transportation charm. Zol, in the thick of everything, seemed perfectly calm. He tipped me a wink. Reassured, I pressed the stud.
The coolness of Wuh's pale-gray skies rushed in on me like a welcome splash of water. I gasped for air and let go of Bunny's hand. We were safe and sound in Montgomery's tavern. Tananda appeared next to us and brushed back her magnificent hair with both hands.
"That was just a little too cozy," Tananda articulated, shaking her shoulders, a movement that hypnotized me on the spot. "I prefer to be introduced before I get that close."
"You are back!" Wensley cheered, rising from the table in the corner. "You are saved from Durance Vile! I rejoice!"
Gleep, too, noticed our return. He sprang up and came hurtling toward me like a cannonball. After the delicious smells on Scamaroni, his stench hit me before he did. I went down on my back with him slurping my face. I gagged, but I was pleased, too. The Wuhses might have been spoiling him, but he missed me.
"That was a close call," I stated, climbing back on my feet. I wiped the slime off my face with my sleeve.
Gleep looked sad that I was disposing of his token of affection. I grabbed his head and scratched energetically around his ears. He slitted his eyes and let his body fall sideways to the floor in bliss.
"But where is Master Zol?" Wensley inquired.
SEVENTEEN
"The only thing dumber than sticking your head
in the lion's mouth is doing it twice."
"Uh-oh," I groaned. I looked around. The Kobold did not reappear. We waited. And waited. "Uh-oh."
"Perhaps he went home," Bunny suggested. "We didn't clarify where we should meet."
Another long pause, during which we just couldn't seem to talk about anything.
"He must have gotten arrested," Tananda said at last.
"Uh-oh," I reiterated. I got to my feet. "All right. We'll have to go back for him."
"You can't," Tananda reminded me.
"I can if I wear a disguise and stay away from their magik dispellers," I pointed out. "We have to go get him. No one knows he broke any of those mindbending goggles. They only saw me. He's part of our company. You wouldn't leave me in jail; I can't abandon him."
"Bravo," Tananda applauded, patting her hands together softly. Bunny regarded me with affection.
"But what about the Perverts?" Wensley babbled, ner- vously. "It would seem to me, though perhaps I am not seeing the big picture, that your attentions have focused themselves, probably with justification, upon a different situation. Not that Master Zol has not been a great help, but we still suffer from the effects of that government not of our own choosing."