"Yea, Master Vasco?" he said with an air of innocent surprise.
"Sergeant," said Vasco, "my potboy just now came clattering down the stair, crying that a devil in the form of a monstrous spider had issued from the wardrobe and sprung at him. He raced off into the night."
"Oh. that," said Thorolf, thinking fast. "My lady had disrobed and secluded herself in the wardrobe. When the maid departed, she issued forth, supposing your boy had likewise gone. When she saw the stripling, she snatched my cloak and wrapped it about her."
Vasco rubbed his chin. "Very well, Sergeant, if ye say so. I do hope there be no wizardry connected with this. If the word got out, 'twere bad for my trade."
"Worry not," said Thorolf. "Meanwhile, pray give orders that none shall enter the room until we signify."
"I understand, Sergeant. Strength to your yard!" With a knowing leer, Vasco departed.
Thorolf returned to the room and sank down upon the settee, thinking. At last he rose and bent over the tub. Speaking with exaggerated lip movements, he said: "I go to visit Doctor Bardi again." When she lay quietly, he pointed to himself and then to the door. He pulled a coverlet off the bed, spread it over the tub, and left.
III – The Sinister Sect
"Dear me!" said Doctor Bardi, in nightgown and nightcap. "This is most unfortunate. What is this creature ye say the Countess hath become?"
"A polyp. I saw them in the fish markets when I studied at Genuvia. The Tyrrhenians eat them under the name of polpo."
"Meseems not like gourmet fare. Hast ever partaken thereof?"
"Aye, once. It tastes not unlike other seafood, save that the one I ate must have been a tough old monster marine. It was like chewing rawhide bootlaces. I learned much at Genuvia, but not what to do when my sweetling becomes a creature of the deep. What wilt do about it?"
Bardi nodded thoughtfully. "Tell me, did the Countess partake of any intoxicating beverage betwixt the time I cast the spell and that when it took effect?"
"Sink me in Lake Zurshnitt. but did she drink! She outdrank me, with but half my bulk. By the time we returned to the room, she was as drunk as a Locanian lord. Forsooth, she even forgot her aristocratic interdictions against carnal commerce with commoners and set about seducing me! Shed have succeeded handily, too, had not this change come upon her. But what—"
Bardi struck his palm against his forehead. "Ah, the penalties of age! Thorolf, I meant to warn you twain that she must not touch any alcoholic liquor, even small beer, until after the change hath taken place."
"Well, why didst not?"
"I forgot! Ah, woe is me! Since this contretemps is in part my fault, I'll charge but half my regular fee—"
Thorolf roared: "You'll charge for turning my beautiful countess into an eight-legged sea monster? Go futter yourself! Not a penny shall you have; and you shall repair your error or face a suit for magical malpractice!"
Bardi recoiled. "Dear me! From what ye say, the lady hath suffered no lasting scathe. An I can restore her proper form, I shan't have harmed her. Belike I had better view her myself. Wait whilst I dress."
He vanished into the bedroom and soon reappeared in his symbol-spangled gown, saying: "Now, where did I put my cap?"
Bardi rummaged through his clutter and eventually located his headgear resting on the dried human head. It was an academic skullcap of stiff black material, atop which was fixed a square of the same material embellished with a dangling purple tassel.
At the inn, Thorolf whisked the coverlet off the tub. "There she is. Believe it or not, that is the veritable Yvette of Grintz. You made her short, dark, and dumpy with a vengeance, and at a most inconvenient time."
The wizard had been breathing hard from keeping up with Thorolf's soldierly stride. He gave a dry chuckle.
"Oh, ye were just about to ... Ah, to be ninety again! At least it's better than if she had turned werewolf."
Bardi fell silent while changing his eyeglasses, more closely to scrutinize Yvette, who waved a tentacle in greeting. At last he sighed.
"My good Sergeant, I fear ye've set me a task beyond my poor powers. The counterspell calls for some of the rare ingredients of the original, and I lack more of these. It might take a year or more to replace them."
"Mean you she must remain a polyp till then? *'
"Nay. There are others of the fraternity of greater puissance than I. Surely one of those can reverse the spell."
"Name one."
"The ablest for this, in my judgment, were the Great Psychomage, Doctor Orlandus."
"The Sophonomist? That were like begging aid from a tiger when fleeing a lion. I suspect Orlandus be more wind and boastery than true ability. It's rumored that his doctorate, even, be not genuine but self-conferred. I'd liefer consult Doctor Tetricus at the college; he is one of the few who backed me in the Dorelian trouble."
"But Tetricus is on sabbatical leave, is he not?"
"Oh," said Thorolf. "I had forgotten."
"So I am not the only one, ye see." The iatromage shrugged. "From all I can gather, Orlandus is not a man to be trusted overmuch; but of his genuine wizardry powers there is no doubt. All I know for sure is that Orlandus' followers report amazing cures. One ninny, who never finished four grades of schooling, so augmented his powers that from the sound of a footfall he could tell the sex, age, weight, and general aspect of the walker. Orlandus claims that he who takes his full course can acquire such godlike powers; he calls such a one a 'diaphane.' "
"I've heard of them. Hast ever met such a demigod?"
"Nay; but others tell me thereof, for whatever the tales may be worth." Bardi spread his hands. "I have told you all I can. Sergeant. This metamorphosis is particularly difficult to reverse, requiring a magician of the highest powers. Otherwise she might not recover her natural form for months or even years. I can but urge you to hie yourself and the Countess to Castle Hill and bespeak Orlandus' aid—with due caution, certes."
"How shall I get the Countess from this inn without causing a riot?"
The aged mage furrowed his brow. "Could those who fetched the tub hither take it down the stair—unaware of its contents?"
Thorolf grasped a corner of the tub and, with a grunt, heaved it upward. The corner rose a hand's breadth, while the water sloshed about. Yvette moved uneasily in the tub, while color changes flickered over her mottled hide.
"With the water and Yvette," said Thorolf, "it must weigh two hundred or more. Vasco's domestics could never manage it; nor could I alone. It's an awkward shape to carry. Hast no levitation spell to lighten our labors?"
"Alas!" sighed Bardi. "In my youth I could levitate a hundredweight as featly as ye raise a spoonful of pottage; but with age my psychokinetic powers have dwindled. How if we hired brawny workers and fastened poles to the tub for carrying? Or better yet, run it out the window on a boom or crane and lower it by rope?"
Thorolf shook his head. "Vasco would never let us make so free with his tub."
"Ye could buy him a better."
"But in the course of this cheaping and chaffering, Yvette's transformation would surely come to light and cause a turmoil. And once we got the tub to the ground, what then? Carry her in my arms, or ask her to wriggle along the cobblestones after me like a faithful dog? We should have a mob of Zurshnitters running and shrieking like the fiends of the Dualist Hell. Whilst I know not how long these sea creatures survive out of water, I dare not expose her to the atmosphere longer than can be helped."
"Well, then," creaked Bardi, "wherefore not buy another tub, hire a carter, place the tub in his cart, and fill it with water? Then ye can lower the Countess by a bedsheet from the window."