"Good enough," Bink said. He wondered what sort of a fiend this lord would be, who had such a docile human servant.
"If you would be good enough to come this way."
"We're good enough," Chester said.
"But first we must do something about your hooves. The floor is teak parquet; we do not wish it scratched or dented."
"Why put it on the floor, then?" Chester demanded.
"We do not apply it to the floor of our stable," the man said. He produced several disks of felt pads "Apply these to your hooves; they will adhere, and muffle the impact."
"How about wearing one of these on your mouth?" Chester demanded.
"It's a small concession," Bink murmured. Chester's hooves were sound, since the healing elixir had eliminated all damage to the centaur's hind end, but they were hard enough to leave an imprint. "Humor the poor man. The fiends are probably very strict about such things, and punish their servants for violations."
With imperfect grace, Chester pressed his hooves one at a time onto the felt disks. The material clung to them, and it made the centaur's footfalls silent.
They moved through an elegant hall, descended carpeted steps, and entered a small chamber. There was barely room for Chester to stand. "If this is your main hall-" he began.
The man touched a button. The door slid closed. Then, abruptly, the room moved.
Bink flung out his hands, startled, and Chester kicked a hole in the rear wall.
"Easy, visitors," the man said with a small frown. "Haven't you ridden an elevator before? It is inanimate magic, a chamber that rises or sinks when occupied. Saves wear on stairs."
"Oh," Bink said, abashed. He preferred more conventional magic.
The magic lift stopped. The door slid open. They stepped out into another hall, and in due course came to the chambers of the lord of the manor.
He was, to Bink's surprise, a man, garbed richly in silver cloth and diamonds, but with the same foolish slippers his servant wore. "So you proffer service for a night's lodging," he said briskly.
"This is our custom," Bink said.
"And ours too!" the lord agreed heartily. "Have you any special talents?"
Bink couldn't tell his own, and didn't know Chester's. "Uh, not exactly. But we're strong, and can do work."
"Work? Oh my heavens no!" the lord exclaimed. "People do not work here!"
Oh? "How do you live, then?" Bink asked. "We organize, we direct-and we entertain," the lord said. "Have you any entertainment abilities?" Bink spread his hands. "I'm afraid not."
"Excellent! You will make an ideal audience."
"Audience?" Bink knew that Chester was as perplexed as he. The mirror had shown him watching a play-yet that could hardly be a service!
"We send our troupes out to entertain the masses, accepting payment in materials and services. It is a rewarding profession, esthetically and practically. But it is necessary to obtain advance audience ratings, so that we can gauge our reception precisely."
This innocuous employment hardly jibed with the local reputation! "To be an audience-to watch your shows-that's all you require? It hardly seems equitable! I'm afraid we would not be able to present an informed critical report-"
"No necessity! Our magic monitors will gauge your reactions, and point up our rough edges. You will have nothing to do but react, honestly."
"I suppose we could do that" Bink said dubiously. "If you really are satisfied."
"Something funny here," Chester said. "How come you have a reputation as fiends?"
"Uh, that's not diplomatic," Bink murmured, embarrassed.
"Fiends? Who called us fiends?" the lord demanded. "The ogre," Chester replied. "He said you blasted a whole forest with a curse."
The lord stroked his goatee. "The ogre survives?"
"Chester, shut up!" Bink hissed. But the centaur's unruly nature had taken control. "All he was doing was rescuing his lady ogre, and you couldn't stand to have him happy, so-"
"Ah, yes, that ogre. I suppose to an ogre's way of thinking, we would be fiends. To us, crunching human bones is fiendish. It is all in one's perspective."
Apparently the centaur had not antagonized the lord, though Bink judged that to be sheer luck. Unless the lord, like his troupe, was an actor-in which case there could be serious and subtle trouble. "This one is now a vegetarian," Bink said. "But I'm curious: do you really have such devastating curses, and why should you care what an ogre does? You really don't have cause to worry about ogres, here under the lake; they can't swim."
"We do really have such curses," the lord said. "They constitute group effort, the massing of all our magic. We have no individual talents, only individual contributions toward the whole."
Bink was amazed. Here was a whole society with duplicating talents! Magic did repeat itself!
"We do not employ our curses haphazardly, however. We went after the ogre as a professional matter. He was interfering with our monopoly."
Both Bink and Chester were blank. "Your what?"
"We handle all formal entertainments in southern Xanth. That bad actor blundered into one of our sets and kidnapped our leading lady. We do not tolerate such interference or competition."
"You used an ogress for a leading lady?" Bink asked.
"We used a transformed nymph-a consummate actress. All our players are consummate, as you shall see. In that role she resembled the most ogrelike ogress imaginable, absolutely horrible." He paused, considering. "In fact, with her artistic temperament, she was getting pretty ogrelike in life. Prima donna "
"Then the ogre's error was understandable."
"Perhaps. But not tolerable. He had no business on that set. We had to scrub the whole production. It ruined our season."
Bink wondered what reception the ogre would encounter, as he rescued his ideal female. An actress in ogress guise, actually from the castle of the fiends!
"What about the reverse-spell tree?" Chester asked.
"People were taking its fruit and being entertained by the reversal effects. We did not appreciate the competition. So we eliminated it."
Chester glanced at Bink, but did not speak. Perhaps these people really were somewhat fiendish. To abolish all rival forms of entertainment-
"And where did you say you were traveling to?" the lord inquired.
"To the source of magic," Bink said. "We understand it is underground, and that the best route leads through this castle."
"I do not appreciate humor at my expense," the lord said, frowning. "If you do not wish to inform me of your mission, that is certainly your privilege. But do not taunt me with an obvious fabrication."
Bink had the impression that obviousness was a worse affront than fabrication, to this person.
"Listen, fiend!" Chester said, bridling in most obvious fashion. "Centaurs do not lie!"
"Uh, let me handle this," Bink said quickly. "There is surely some misunderstanding. We are on quest for the source of magic-but perhaps we have been misinformed as to its access."
The lord mellowed. "That must be the case. Below this castle lies only the vortex. Nothing that goes that route ever returns. We are the Gateway; we straddle the vortex, protecting innocent creatures from being drawn unwittingly into that horrible fate. Who informed you that the object of your quest lay in such a direction?"