"For the right person, the impossible is

easy!"

—DUMBO

To everyone's surprise, particularly my own, I didn't

find the revelation about the true nature of Aahz's con-

finement at all discouraging. If anything, I was doubly

pleased. Not only did I have an immediate idea for how

to beat the problem, I had arrived at it before my

knowledgeable partner... well before, as a matter of

fact, as he had been pondering his dilemma for days

whereas I had only just received the information. Of

course, he was probably not in a position to see the easy

solution that I could.

"What are you grinning at?" he demanded. "If

there's anything funny about this, it eludes me com-

pletely."

Unlike my own amiable self, Aahz tends to show his

worry by getting mad. Come to think of it, he tends to

express almost any emotion by getting mad. Well, at

least he's consistent.

"Tell me," I said, eyeing the dragon's head, "you say

this thing's alive. How alive is it?"

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Robert Asprin

MYTH-ING PERSONS

107

"What do you mean, 'how alive is it'?" Aahz

scowled. "It's alive enough to swallow me if it gets it

into it's head. That's alive enough for me.

"I mean, can it hear and see?"

"Who cares?" my partner said, in a dazzling display

of charm and curiosity that makes him so lovable. "I

hadn't planned on asking it out for a date."

I stared thoughtfully at the beast.

"I was just wondering if it could hear me ... say, if I

said that I thought it was the ugliest building decoration

I've seen here in town?"

The dragon's head rewarded me by narrowing its eyes

into an evil glare.

"I think it can hear you, Boss," Guido said, shifting

his grip nervously. "It doesn't look like it liked that last

comment."

"Oh, swell!" Aahz grumbled. "Tell you what, part-

ner. Why don't you come in here and sit on this thing's

tongue instead of me before you start getting it all riled

Up?"

"I was just checking." I smiled. "To tell the truth, I

think it's the most incredible thing I've seen since I

started traveling the dimensions. I just said that other to

test its reactions."

The dragon stopped glaring, but it still looked a little

bit suspicous and wary.

"Well, find some other reaction to test, okay?" my

partner snapped. "For some obscure reason, I'm a little

nervous these days, and every time this thing moves its

tongue I age a few centuries."

I ignored his grumbling and shook one of my legs.

"Hey, Guido! Are you still paying attention down

there?"

His grip tightened fiercely.

"Of course I'm paying attention, you little ... I

mean, yeah, Boss. There's not much else to do while

we're hangin'. here, know what I mean? And quit jerk-

ing your leg around... please?"

I found his verbal slip rather interesting, but now

wasn't the time to investigate further.

"Well, listen up," I said. "Here's what I want you to

do. I want you to let go with one hand and pass the rope

up to me. ..."

"No way, Boss! Have you seen how far down it is?

I'm not lettin' go no matter what you. ..."

"... because if you don't," I continued as if he

hadn't interrupted, "I'm going to start squirming

around until either you lose your grip with both hands

or Massha loses her grip on me. Whichever way it goes,

you'll fall. Get my drift? Now for once could you just

follow orders without a lot of back-talk? We don't have

much time to pull this off."

There was a stricken silence below as Guido absorbed

my ultimatum and weighed the possibilities.

"Pull what off?" Aahz demanded. "Why doesn't

anybody tell me anything? If this master plan of yours is

riding on that sorry excuse for a bodyguard, you might

as well give up right now. I've told you all along that he

was too lily-livered to be any good at. ..."

"Who's lily-livered?!" Guido shouted. "Look, Big

Mouth, as soon as we get you out of there, you and me

are going to settle this once and. ..."

"First, we've got to get him out, Guido," I inter-

rupted. "The rope."

"Right, Boss. One rope coming up. We'll see who's

lily-livered. The last person who called me that was my

mom, and by the time I got done with her...."

Our whole formation began to rock dangerously as he

fumbled through his coat one-handed in search of the

rope. For a minute, I was afraid he was mad enough to

Robert Asprin

108

let go with both hands to speed his search.

"Easy there, Guido," I cautioned. "We can.... ."

"Here it is, Boss!" he said, flipping the rope up so

violently that it almost whacked me in the face. "I hope

you can use it to hang the son of a...."

"Hanging isn't enough!" Aahz taunted. "It takes

more than a piece of rope to do me in."

"Yeah. It takes a little girl with blue eyes and a spiked

drink," my bodyguard sneered back. "If you think I'm

going to let you live that one down...."

I forced myself to ignore them. While it was tempting

to rally to Luanna's defense, there were other more

pressing matters to attend to.

Moving as carefully as I could, I looped one end of

the rope up and around Massha's waist. It took a couple

of tries and a lot more rope than I would have liked, but

finally I managed to catch the dangling end and tie it off

securely.

"What's with the rope, Hot Stuff?" Massha said

calmly, the only one of our group who had managed to

keep her cool through the entire proceedings.

"Well, with any luck, in a little while we're going to

be heading down... with Aahz," I explained. "Even

though I know you're strong, I don't think your hands

are strong enough to keep a grip on all three of us while

we make the trip. This is to be sure we don't lose anyone

after we spring the cell."

"Speaking of that," Aahz called, "I'm still waiting to

hear how you're going to get me out of this thing. You

might even say I'm dying to find out."

He wasn't the only one. The dragon's head was

watching my every movement through slitted eyes. I'm

not sure how much pride it took in its job, but it was ob-

vious the beast wasn't getting ready to overwhelm us

with its cooperation.

MYTH-ING PERSONS 109

Everything was as ready as I could make it, so I de-

cided it was time to play my trump card.

"There's nothing to it, really," I told my partner with

a smile. "Talk to me."

It isn't often I catch my old mentor totally by surprise

... I get him upset on a fairly regular basis, but total

surprise was a real rarity. This was one of those golden

times.

"Say WHAT?" Aahz exclaimed loudly.

"Trust me, Aahz," I insisted. "I know what I'm

doing. Just talk to me. Tell me a story. How did you

first meet Garkin?"

"Oh, that," he said, rolling his eyes expressively.

"Well, we were at the same boring cocktail party, see

... you know, one of those dreary affairs where the

crowd has you pinned against the wall and you get stuck

talking to whatever the tide washes up against you?

Anyway, he was trying to impress some little bit of fluff

with his magic, which really wasn't all that hot in those

days ... let me tell you, partner, anytime you start get-

ting depressed with your lack of progress in the magic

business, remind me to tell you what your old teacher

Garkin was like when we first met. But, as I was saying,

out of respect for the craft, I just had to wander over

and show them what the real stuff looked like... not

that I had any interest in her myself, mind you...."

I felt Guido tugging on my pantleg.

"Say, Boss," he complained. "What is this? I

thought we were in a hurry."

"This is what we needed the time for," I whispered

back.

"For thisV he grumbled. "But Boss, if we don't get

started. ..."

"We're started," I answered. "Now pay attention to

what he's saying."

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Robert Asprin

I was afraid our side comments might have distracted

Aahz, but I needn't have worried. As per normal, once

my partner got on a verbal roll, he wasn't that easy to

stop.

"...so there we were, just the three of us, mind you,

and remember, our clothes were five floors away at this

point...."

"What's going on, Hot Stuff?" Massha hissed from

her position above me. "I know you've heard this story

before. Heck, I've heard it four times myself."

"Keep your eye on the dragon," I advised her. "And

be ready to act fast."

I was going through the motions of reacting to Aahz's

story and fielding the impatient questions of my assis-

tants as best I could, but my real attention was focused

on the dragon's head. My strategy was already working.

Aahz's droning account of past glories was starting to

take effect.

The dragon's eyes were definitely starting to glaze.

"...of course, after all that, I just had to take her

home with me. It was the least I could do for the poor

thing under the circumstances."

Aahz was winding up his story already! I had to keep

him going just a little bit longer.

"Was that the party where you met Tananda?" I

said, deliberately feeding him another cue.

"Tananda? No. That's another story completely. I

met her when I was sitting in on a cut-throat game of

dragon poker over at the Geek's. We had a real pigeon

on the line, the kind of idiot who would bet a busted