“Damn those things,” I muttered.
“What have you got against monkeys?” asked a nearby tree.
“Nothing,” I said, scanning the foliage for a face. It felt rude, addressing something without a face. “I just don’t think they belong in a hotel lobby.”
“I suppose you’re the one who called the health department,” the tree said, heaving itself up to reveal a pair of dirty white running shoes among its roots.
“No, it wasn’t me,” I said.
But the tree ignored me.
“Spoilsport,” it muttered, and lurched slowly down the hall toward the conference rooms, waving its branches as it went.
Health department? I surveyed the lobby and spotted a middle-aged man whose brown business suit stood out in this costumed crowd. Unlike the civilian I’d talked to in the ballroom, he didn’t seem particularly disturbed by the costumes, but evidently the monkeys and parrots alarmed him.
“Either they go or we’ll close you down,” he said, waving his hand at the ceiling, where a group of monkeys played tag while the nearby parrots practiced hooting and chattering like the monkeys. “I’ll be back in three hours.”
With that, he turned and marched out.
His audience stared after him—a man in a hotel uniform and the short Amazon who’d escorted Michael and me earlier.
“I’ll round up a crew if you will,” the Amazon said.
“It’s your people who caused this,” the hotel staffer replied.
“And it’s your restaurant and hotel the health department will close if we can’t recapture them all in time.”
I nodded with satisfaction. A monkeyless, parrotless hotel sounded excellent to me. Maybe when the health department man returned, I’d introduce him to Salome.
I left the musicians singing “Amblyopia, Here I Come!” and headed for the dealers’ room, though I got lost several times on the way.
I wandered into a room where several earnest-looking young people under the direction of a bearded professorial type were discussing the use of Jungian archetypes in the first season Porfiria scripts—as if Nate had any idea what a Jungian archetype was. A list of upcoming panels posted outside the room featured a comparison between the Iliad and season two of the show, and a debate on whether or not Porfiria was a feminist. A room to avoid unless I needed to hide from someone.
Next door, in a room marked “Fan Lounge,” fifty or so people sat in the dark watching a Porfiria episode on a medium-sized TV. Not an episode I remembered, which probably meant it was from season one. The sign outside confirmed that they were showing all the episodes, in order, throughout the weekend, interspersed with the blooper tape.
A slightly better place to hide. I wouldn’t mind watching the blooper tape, a collection of outtakes from the show. The clips of cheesy scenery falling down or cheap props coming apart in the actors’ hands got old rather quickly, but I loved watching how Michael could ad lib something funny when he or another actor blew a line. Also, the number of outtakes made necessary by Walker tripping, falling, or hitting himself with swords and other props still held a morbid fascination. How had the man survived three seasons of near-fatal klutziness?
On my third try, I found the side entrance to the dealers’ room. Things were so slow I wondered if the customers had as much trouble finding their way here as I had.
I spotted a familiar face. Michael stared back at me from a hundred mugs, T-shirts, posters, 8×10 glossy photos, and dolls. Officially, action figures, but they looked like dolls to me. Some only six inches tall and made entirely of molded plastic; others twelve inches tall with real fabric robes. Not a bad likeness of Michael, either, but I found it disconcerting to see my boyfriend turned into a Ken doll.
But not as disconcerting as the remarkable number of Michael clones gracing the convention. So far I’d seen teenaged Michaels and senior citizen Michaels; authentically tall and lean Michaels, and even more short and pudgy Michaels. I rather liked the Asian and African-American Michaels, along with the Michael who tooled around in an electric wheelchair. But the cumulative effect of seeing ersatz Michaels everywhere got on my nerves.
I would be glad to escape this madhouse, I was thinking, as I reached the booth and found Steele studying the convention program. And frowning. Was something wrong?
Chapter 8
“Found any panels you want to attend?” I asked.
“Hell, no,” he growled. “I don’t watch the damned show; I’m just selling swords.”
But a smile undermined the gruff tone, and seeing it, I found myself wishing we were selling jewelry, or clothes—something that would let us use Steele’s ability to attract women to the booth.
“I wouldn’t watch it myself if Michael weren’t on it,” I said aloud.
“Your old man? Which one is he?” Steele asked, holding out the cover photo. “This one?”
“No,” I said, glancing at his finger. “That’s Walker Morris. He plays the Duke of Urushiol, Queen Porfiria’s archrival. That’s Michael, to his right, in the black robe.”
“Hmmm,” Steele said. “What’s he play?”
“The wizard Mephisto.”
“Mephisto?” he said. “I don’t remember anyone by that name. ’Course it’s been a year or two since I’ve seen it.”
“I thought you didn’t watch,” I said, laughing.
“I don’t,” he said. “Not regularly. But yeah, I’ve seen a few episodes. When it first came out. Weird, seeing something you vaguely remember reading as a kid turned into a TV show. But after a week or two, I could see what garbage it was. No offense meant,” he added, apparently remembering too late my tenuous connection with the show.
“No offense taken,” I said. “It’s not as if Michael has anything to do with the scripts.”
“Yeah, the scriptwriter’s the one who should be drawn and quartered.”
“Don’t blame Nate,” I said. “He’s on a pretty tight rein. Some of his original scripts aren’t bad. Unfortunately, by the time they shoot, the QB mangles the script into the usual swill.”
“The QB?”
“Tamerlaine Wynncliffe-Jones,” I said. “The actress who plays Queen Porfiria. Also known as, um, the Queen Bee.”
“Yeah, right,” he said. “Tamerlaine Wynncliffe-Jones? Bet that’s not her real name.”
“You never know,” I said. “Parents have done stranger things.”
“And I bet that’s not her original face,” he said, shaking his head. “Thirty years ago, maybe even twenty, she was a looker; you can still see that much. But now—it’s a bad joke. So what is this Mephisto character your guy plays?”
“He’s a mercenary wizard introduced in the second season,” I said. “Originally a one-episode guest shot, but he got such a good reaction from the fans that they brought him back for two more episodes that season, and he’s in about half of them this past season.”
That seemed to satisfy Steele’s curiosity.
I spent a reasonable amount of time at the booth before running out again for the combat demonstration. Steele was good at security. Even while talking to one customer, he kept the whole counter covered with his peripheral vision, and I could see he suspected the same shifty-looking people who raised my hackles.
Definitely a talented swordsmith. Perhaps more than any other form of iron work, weapons and armor call for a perfect balance of form and function. Steele’s swords had the spare and deadly elegance I was working so hard to perfect myself.