"Thanks for the graphic description, blue and bouncy. We'd better be going."
"Of course! I am so sorry, luscious madame! Your clothes! My cousin awaits!" He assumed the position again, preparing to magik us out of there. "Come back again! I still owe you a favor! Come again!"
"Perhaps when the air's not so full of arrows," Chumley muttered into my ear, as mist gathered us up.
As soon as the cloud lowered us to the floor again I consulted the map, turning it over impatiently until I found the little you are here disk. We were near Doorway P, beside a huge facility through whose doorway belched clouds of smoke.
"The Volcano," I stated shortly, pointing at the tent beside us.
"Are you sure you don't want to go back to Klah and ask Skeeve if he's been here?" Massha said gently. "Learning magik can do funny things to people. You know he's been studying all alone for a long time ..."
"No way!" I snarled. "There's a lot of explanations for what that guy just told us."
"He wasn't lying," Chumley reminded me. "He did recognize the portrait."
"I know!" I said, shaking my head. "But I don't want to get Skeeve involved. Think about it," I reasoned, not wanting to let even a glimmer of what my two former employees were suggesting to worm its way into my brain, "magikal research does make people do funny things. The kid always tries to fly before he can walk. Look at the possibilities. Skeeve has lots of potential, and not as much control as he thinks he does. If he hatched himself a doppelganger by accident, we'd just have to come back here and dispatch it for him. He'd die or go nuts if he faced it himself. You know how doppelgangers work."
I looked at their faces and saw a hint of worry—not skepticism. They believed in Skeeve as much as I did. I was worried, too.
"Or if it's just the kid himself sleep-shopping, Bunny can't handle that alone, and Skeeve won't even be aware he's doing it. We'd need to do an intervention. That's what friends are for."
"Quite right!" Chumley exclaimed. "I say, Aahz, when you put it like that, I do see your point."
"Me, too, Green and Scaly," Massha agreed. "I don't want the boss to fall into a trap."
"Right," I said. "So let's not stand around here gabbing."
I plunged into The Volcano.
"Gah!" I coughed. "Reminds me of Pitsburg!"
Once you made it through twenty feet of smog, the air cleared, giving you a good view of the vast interior of the store. The floor was largely black, with aisles picked out in hot orange and red, like hot lava snaking through cooled magma like a gap in reality. When the color shifted suddenly I gave it closer scrutiny. Beneath a barrier of protective magik the floor was an active lava flow. I became uncomfortably aware that if the juice went out of the spell, everyone here was cooked, including me.
"Nice clothes!" Massha observed.
"Not bad," I admitted. I've got a natural flair for fashion, if I have to say so myself. The goods in The Volcano had cool, comfortable style. Most garments were cut on a relaxed bias from cloth of muted but interesting colors like brick red, mustard yellow, moss green, toast brown, and blue, blue, blue. Blue was definitely the default hue for The Volcano's merchandise. Racks and shelves were full of trousers shaded from glacier to midnight. I took one good gander around, then ignored them. Blue does nothing for my complexion.
I turned my attention to the facility itself. The walls, rough-hewn above as if really cut from the sides of a volcano, were skirted with long brown-and-green curtains from about eight feet down to the floor. Customers plunged in and out of them followed by Djinns with armloads of clothing. The line of curtains stretched back farther than the eye could see.
"Reminds me of our HQ," I pointed out. "Looks like M.Y.T.H., Inc. isn't the only firm to make use of extra-dimensional space."
On the map a wavy line showed at the rear of the store square that the key indicated meant "continued on next page."
I wondered how come I'd never found my way to The Mall before. It must have been known on Perv; plenty of my fellow Pervects were there trying on racks of clothes before the lines of magik mirrors. A male with frilled ears that I thought maybe I knew held up a green chambray shirt, and the enchantment made it look as though he had actually, donned it. He turned around, judging the fit and color. I thought it was a winner. My opinion was shared by the two slender blue Djinnies who were assisting him. He grinned widely, making the nearer clerk jump back a pace, and reached for the next shirt on the rack.
My attention was caught by a very attractive Pervect lady standing in the curve of a three-way mirror. She had a huge pile of merchandise draped over her arm. She glanced up and met my eye, and gave me a dimpling smile that made her four-inch teeth gleam in the store's orange lava light. I felt my heart beat faster. She gave me a conspiratorial wink as she shuffled through a pile of plastic cards in her hand. Suddenly, the fetching vision was gone. In her place stood a puny male Imp in a loud black-and-red shirt and lilac slacks. I shrugged and turned away. Not my business if she wanted to shapechange.
Out of the corner of my eye I noticed a flash of white. The little female in the white fur coat who had spoken to us outside The Mall was edging toward the door, her eyes darting nervously about.
Two Djinns flashed into being two steps from where I was standing. I jumped back.
"I tell you, she was here a moment ago," the younger one declared. "As bold as brass monkeys!"
"Find her," the older one growled. "I want her highly ornamented hide! Keep looking!"
I glanced again, but the white-clad female had made good her escape.
Another Djinn, probably yet another relative of Gustavo's, by his family resemblance, was demonstrating the wonders of a pair of blue pants to a goggle-eyed gang of Klahds, all standing around a dais in the middle of the store with their jaws dropping open.
"These blue djeanns are durable!" the Djinn boomed, tugging on the waistband. "Comfortable! Stylish! And," he added, pointing to the pair of gold fabric patches attached to the fanny of each pair, "these flaps of cloth at the sides and back provide you with modest storage space right inside the garment! Yes! These pants have their own magikal security system that only you control! Think of it! No more cutpurses making off with your belt pouch, because it's right here in one of these pockets!"
The Klahds gasped; a few more were moved to applause. One of the women burst into tears of joy.
"What's the fuss?" Chumley said. "Why are they so excited. In-garment storage system? What is so tremendously wonderful about that?"
"Ah." I waved a hand. "Klahds never discovered pockets. Skeeve never saw one until he started hanging out with me?"
"I say," Chumley exclaimed, intrigued. "I did not realize they were so ... limited."
"Well, Skeeve's not." Massha leaped in to defend her former tutor.
"Unschooled ain't stupid," I chimed in.
A sudden puff of smoke left us coughing. A large, prosperous-looking Djinn with a chest-covering beard appeared before us.
"Welcome to The Volcano!" he said. "I am Rimbaldi! How may I serve you?"
"Gustavo sent us," I replied.
"My beloved cousin!" Rimbaldi exclaimed. "Then you are doubly welcome! I know why you have come! This lovely lady needs my assistance!"
Suddenly we were at the nexus of a retail whirlwind that would have made the Deveel merchants of the Bazaar sit up and take notice. Two gum-snapping Djinnies flashed into being beside Massha and began to hold up garment after garment to her ample chest. The magik mirror showed how she'd look at every angle. Massha preened under the relentless stream of praise Rimbaldi kept flowing in her direction.
"Ooh," Massha crooned, turning to get the full effect of a pair of rose-colored djeanns that matched her harem jacket. The legs hugged her roundness to the ankles, where they flared out to cover Massha's feet, almost the opposite cut to the floaty bits of silk they replaced.