"You were," Harold said. "It was why Ubald and his vam pire friends let you live."
"And the rope is what I think it is?" Glenda asked, not taking her eyes from Aahz.
Aahz held it up. "Just to be safe, you're going to wear it tonight as well. I promised my apprentice there for his peace of mind."
She stared at the rope for a moment, then nodded. "I sup pose I should thank you."
"Just help us all get out of here and we can call it even," Aahz said.
"I'll do what I can," she said, "but first, can I have a glass of water?"
Harold laughed. "You are cured. I'll get it for you."
I had no idea why Harold thought that Glenda getting a glass of water meant she was cured. Seemed like a somewhat silly sign to me. Or maybe vampires were only thirsty for blood?
Harold headed out the panel toward his kitchen area. When he was safely gone Glenda looked up at Aahz, the anger clear and at full force in her eyes.
"Why didn't you just stake me when you had the chance?"
I was stunned by the question. And her anger at Aahz for not killing her.
"I thought about it," Aahz said.
He pointed to a sharp stake on top of an antique dresser beside the couch she was sitting on. I hadn't noticed it before. Again I was stunned. Aahz went on.
"I figure you can be of help to all of us, something you haven't done much of up to now."
"You know I'm going to have to wear that rope for the rest of my life," she said, "on every full moon, every time I hop dimensions, every night?"
"I know," Aahz said, his voice cold and low and sounding just about as mean as I had ever heard him sound. "And if you don't help us, I'm going to free you into the countryside here, in this dimension, without the rope. You'll be a cow for most of the rest of your life."
I stared at him, seeing a side of my mentor I didn't often see. It seemed that, as always, he had known more than he was telling me, and that helping her had just been a ruse to keep her with us and under his control. He tucked the rope into his pouch and crossed his arms.
"And if you want the rope to stay alive tonight, you're going to work with us and not pull any of your tricks. Understand?"
Glenda glared at him, then slowly nodded. "I understand." Well, I didn't, but I didn't want anyone trying to explain it to me with all the anger flowing around at the moment.
Chapter Fifteen
"Go with the flow."
M. TWAIN
Sometimes in grand adventures, there are times when just noth ing happens. The rest of the third day of the full-moon cycle was one of those times.
Aahz, Tanda, Harold, and Glenda spent the entire day por ing over books and old scrolls, trying to find answers on how to get out. I mostly sat and listened, falling asleep every few minutes until my head bobbed enough to wake me up enough to listen until I fell asleep again.
And over and over that pattern went. My neck was sore by the time the day was over.
About thirty minutes before the sun set Aahz had Glenda lie down on a couch, and then he tied the gold-laced magikal rope around her. She fell asleep instantly. That rope was the best sleep aid I had ever seen. Aahz should take it back with us to Possiltum to make money. On bad nights, I bet the king would pay a ransom for it.
If it had been up to me, I'd have sent Glenda out into the hallway to be a cow, eating grass and being followed around by a guy in a white hat with a shovel. But it wasn't up to me, so Aahz put her to sleep.
About twenty minutes before the sun set Harold shut us into the library again and went to his grass to become a cow for the night.
I slept off and on all night. Aahz and Tanda did as well, reading while they were awake. By morning, when Harold opened the door and let in a few wonderful rays of sunlight from the living area, I was well-rested and bored to tears.
Aahz untied Glenda to wake her up, pouched the rope, and we all went out into the kitchen area to have Harold cook us horse steaks covered in tomatoes. He called it his celebration breakfast. He said he had it every month after the last full moon night.
I had to admit, it was surprisingly good. After breakfast the talk turned to escape, which, after the boring day and the fear of cow vampires all night, was the most interesting topic I could imagine.
Aahz took charge of the discussion and ticked off our options. "First chance we have is to lower the dimension-hopping screen. If we could do that for even an instant, we'd be out of here."
"I've never run into a screen like it," Tanda said, "even in all my years of being an assassin. It's more solid than a rock."
"More than likely coming from the energy in the moun tain," Aahz said.
I thought about the map on the ceiling, and how Aahz hadn't mentioned it to either Harold or Glenda. I had no idea what he was thinking, but I sure didn't want to mess up what he was doing by blurting something out. I'd done enough of that in the past.
"Our second option is to just find a way out of the castle."
"Right," I said, "and sneak all the way through Donner and past the posse."
"Posse?" Harold asked.
"Mounted riders who knew we were coming far outside of town."
"They picked me up as well," Glenda said.
"So they have some magik that tells them enemies are com ing," Aahz said. "We could be screened against that."
"If we knew what kind of magik it was," Tanda said.
"I'm stuck here anyway," Harold said. He pointed to what I had assumed was the front door to the suite. "It's like walking into a wall trying to go through there."
"And the same for how we came in?" Tanda asked.
"Oh, I can go all the way to the entrance into the ballroom through the skull room," Harold said. "Then I hit the screen."
"How about through the floor, or the window?" I asked.
"Haven't tried either," he said.
"I doubt it would work," Aahz said.
"Yeah," Tanda said, "captive spells, which I think this sounds like, are all-around prisons. It's like being in an invisible, unbreakable bubble."
"So to get Harold out with us," I said, "we have to break that spell as well."
"You're coming with us?" Glenda asked.
"I'm going to try," Harold said. He didn't add that there was gold for getting him out, and none of the rest of us filled her in either.
"So, old mentor," I said to Aahz, "how do we go about breaking the spells, since it seems to me that both our main ways of escape are blocked by them?"
He looked at me with a harsh look, then answered my question. "A couple of ways to break a spell. Either put a counter-spell on it, or cut off the source of power to the spell."
"Since this place is flowing with energy, the second doesn't sound likely. How does a counter-spell work?"
"I've tried every one I know," Harold said.
I glanced at Aahz. "My mentor hasn't even taught me any yet."
"When you gain enough self-control to use them," Aahz said, "I might think about it."
"I tried a number of them the first day I was here," Glenda said. "Didn't even dent the dimension-hopping shield."
"I tried all the ones I knew as well," Tanda said, frowning. Since we were all still here, I assumed she had had the same result as Glenda.