Joe yawned. “I think we pretty well have what we can get at this point. I’d better get some sleep if I want to make any time tomorrow.”
“Yes, Joe, good-night,” Ruddygore said in a clear dismissal.
“I’m heading back for town,” Marge told them. “Joe can protect me tomorrow morning!”
Ruddygore caught her eye and gestured for her to linger. She understood, nodding, and they wrapped up everything. First Joe, then Poquah, left. Marge went over and closed the door behind them, then turned to the sorcerer. “So what’s the conspiracy?”
“No conspiracy—now. I’m afraid I’ve just had to undo one in a good cause. What would you say if I told you that Mia is not Tiana? That Tiana actually died at the hands of the Baron back on Earth?”
“I’d say you were feeding me baloney to try and keep Joe and me from being pissed off at the destruction of one of the neatest women this world ever produced.”
He sighed. “I can prove it to you rather simply. Tiana could read Husaquahrian. Not merely the formal language, but many of its dialects and several other languages as well. She also was schooled, as you may remember, in Switzerland. She spoke, read, and wrote German, French, and Italian with ease and English rather well, too. Mia is totally illiterate now in any tongue, has a reasonable speaking knowledge of English because that was supplied in the plot, but none of the other languages, and she can’t really read English, either.”
“Big deal. The Rules account for that.”
“No they don’t. Ask anyone. Not just my staff, anyone. Marge, there is no Rule prohibiting slaves from learning to read or write. Some, although not very many, can. And Mia was illiterate from the start—she couldn’t handle looking up the relevant passages on herself shortly after they returned here, long before even the Rules would have wiped it out, if such Rules existed. Mia doesn’t know how to read or write or any of those other languages or an awful lot that Tiana knew because Mia is not Tiana, she is really Mia, a former palace slave to Tiana.” Quickly, he sketched in the same scenario that he’d given to an unknowing Mia and Joe.
“Wait a minute! She sure as hell seemed like Tiana to me back on Earth, and she sure convinced Joe!”
“I know. I’m afraid I was partly responsible format. I spotted it right away, of course, and in the course of removing the Baron’s nasty little time bombs inside her, I realized that she could pull it off, allowing for the nature of Husaquahr and the Rules. I warned at the start that she’d be a dancer or courtesan, the former usually and the latter always slave jobs. I knew even then that the moment she returned to Husaquahr the Rules would take the path of least resistance and return her to her former status. Everything else they would blame on the Rules. Even she thought she was Tiana, and I helped that out a bit. Joe needed the time, he needed Tiana, for the wilderness period with Ir-ving. Now I have started the unraveling. Within a few days, a week at most, both she and Joe will realize the truth.”
“But—why!”
“Because at this point Tiana is the last person Joe needs. Not merely to avoid slipups, but suppose they do have a chance at the bodies? Could Joe really destroy the body of his wife, the woman he loved? Could she! There was no other choice. I’ve been letting it come off in stages, and I held off the full impact of the Rules with her as long as possible, but what was once a positive is now a negative. She is a very bright, talented, capable woman who is still an asset. But she is not the one anyone, even she, thought she was.”
“Wow! If you’re not pulling another of your scams, that’s heavy stuff!”
“Marge, I am not. I just wanted you to know ahead of time. It will make things easier later.”
“Yeah, well… Wow!”
“Remember, too, by the way, that she’s still a were. They both are. Joe saw to that. They had it on the road. I understand that Irving was, in his vernacular, pretty ‘freaked out.’ That’s an occasional problem, but, as you know, a valuable tool if used.
Keep it in mind. Joe will have enough to handle, so I’m counting on you as guide and adviser.”
She nodded, still stunned. “Yeah, I’ll do what I can, as always. Still, I said we couldn’t get away with it forever. Now you’re telling me that Ti’s paid the bill, and Joe’s got his own curse down the pike. Why does that make me feel like target number one in this business?”
Ruddygore shrugged. “These things pile up over time, but things like that are not inevitable. You have the same odds now you always did. You know about Joe, then?”
She nodded. “He told me. I guess he had to tell somebody.”
“Well, he might not have told you that, if and when it happens, he wouldn’t lose his mind and his memory any more than you did. It’s not as bad as that. It won’t be like the last time.”
“Yeah, but a big macho male stuck as a wood nymph isn’t gonna have a happy time. At least he’ll do damned near anything to stay alive as he is.”
“But that is also his Achilles’ heel. He might hold back, he might hesitate when he should strike. That’s another thing to watch out for.”
“Boy, you’re really loading the dice on this one, aren’t you?” she said glumly. “And, it seems to me, you’re loading it against your own side.”
CHAPTER 7
ON THE ROAD AGAIN
Places shall take on the atmosphere and attitude of their rulers. Evil pervades the very rocks and trees and air where it resides. And, if allowed to fester, killing the good, it will remain so long after the rulers have departed.
Saying farewell to Irving was gut-wrenching, but joe at least had the honest conviction that the boy had not been in better hands in his life.
They were barely out of sight of Terindell, though, taking the northern river route, when he realized how much he missed the rest of the old company and how, for the first time, really, on one of these missions, he was essentially alone. If it weren’t for Marge’s happy appearance, he thought, it might drive him nuts, but the Kauri wasn’t any company to speak of during the day. Instead, she just sprawled out on top of the bedrolls on the packhorse, sound asleep, mostly concealed under a thin wrap so that the sight of one of the fairies out cold didn’t attract too many curious stares or, worse, give the wrong impression.
The road went almost immediately inland, skirting places like the Circe’s lair and the Glen Dinig, domain of the great witch-queen Huspeth, heading first to the city of Machang on the River Rossignol, from whence roads went in all directions.
Joe missed most of all the company of the old Tiana, who had been more than wife, but also companion and equal, lover and confessor. The change in her had bothered him about as much as it had seemed to bother her, and now he couldn’t keep from wondering just how much of a change there was and how much he’d overlooked. Even in the months in the High Pothique wilderness, he’d been preoccupied with Irving and had tended to overtook things that now seemed to leap out at him. He’d blamed much of it on the Rules, of course, but now other things started bothering him. How had she learned to dance so well so quickly? Even he had needed to be trained by Gorodo; only the fairies got their skills by instinct. The fact that he was inclined to enjoy swordplay and combat skills hadn’t meant he hadn’t had to learn them and practice, practice, practice. Tiana had always been clumsy, even at formal dances; who had taught her those erotic moves and gyrations? For that matter, she’d lately shown some skill as a seamstress, barber, maid, and other such jobs that she’d never shown any knowledge of or interest in before.