Somewhere, deep in the controlled mind of the enchantress, the need to seek publicity overrode Rattila's spell. She hesitated, then tottered toward me.

"That's it," I crooned. "Come on. The reporters all want to talk to you. Come right in—" Clunk!

Cire whacked her across the back of the head with his rolling pin. She sagged bonelessly to the ground.

"She's out for the count for the time being," I announced. "Now, for Rattila."

I stepped out into the hallway, just in time to see the basilisk's tail disappear around the next corner.

"He is running away! He is cowardly without his minion!" Eskina crowed, taking off after the fleeing snake.

"Well done, Cire," I remarked, grudgingly.

The Walroid smirked, clutching his wounded arm.

"So you finally forgive me for all those other times when things didn't exactly go right?" Cire asked.

"When you screwed up," I corrected him. "It's a start. Now we've got to fix your arm and snap Chlory out of her trance. Sibone!"

"I am here, darling Aahz," came the sultry voice. Sibone undulated to me and wound a couple of arms around me, while one sinuous arm extended to charm golden bubbles out of thin air. When the heady aroma of fresh coffee began to percolate down to us, Chloridia's four purple eyes fluttered open. She reached for the nearest iridescent sphere. It turned into a substantial pottery mug full of ink black liquid.

"Oooh, my head!" she moaned.

"I will take care of them," Sibone assured me, turning her lidless eyes my way. "Go!"

I took off in the direction of Eskina's energetic baying.

The sounds of battle echoed from the high ceiling when I got to Atrium K. Eskina ducked and wove between the examples of statuary that adorned this particular intersection, all the time trying to get closer to her quarry. He had changed form again. I spotted him as he dove behind a granite plinth holding the image of a gryphon rampant. He was now a Deveel, but his ears still retained the double point of a Flibberite. Something was going wrong with his magik!

"Hey, ratface!" I shouted. "I'm over here!"

Rattila turned my way and threw a chunk of energy at me. I flattened myself on the floor as it went sizzling overhead. Not sizzling, really, but fizzing. I rolled over in time to see the bolt hit a bar table at a nearby inn. It made St. Elmo's fire dance in the ribs of the umbrella, but after that it dissipated harmlessly. I thought it looked more like static electricity than lightning.

He had lost his connection to the lines of force! We had him now!

Rattila saw me get to my feet with a broad grin on my face. He must have known he was history now. Even his disguise slipped. No longer a Deveel, Dragonet, or Djinn, he was reduced once more to being a plain old black rat. Fear huge in his red eyes, he eluded Eskina one more time and started running down the hall.

"He's wearing out," I panted to Eskina, as we jogged after him.

"He must not be carrying the device," Eskina pointed out. "He must seek it again, or the new power will desert him. If he succeeds in getting to it again, he will become as powerful as he was before."

Tired as I was, that news galvanized me. I started pumping my arms to make my legs move faster. I wished Cire would catch up with us again. We could certainly use his flying ability.

"To The Volcano!" I puffed.

TWENTY-SEVEN

When we reached The Volcano it looked markedly different than it had only minutes before. All the fighting had ceased. The Djinnies and the mall-rats seemed to have been cooperating to put the merchandise back on the shelves, but now they all stood, gawking, in the direction of the entrance to the Rat Hole. Massha floated on the air toward the back of the store.

"He went thataway, Big Spender!" she called, as I thundered down the orange aisle.

"He seeks the device," Eskina explained. Massha swooped down to join us.

"He doesn't have it?" she asked, surprised.

"He's running out of gas," I stated. "We can knock him out once and for all if we can get to the device ahead of him."

"But where is it?" Massha inquired.

"Under the throne," Chumley exclaimed, an enlightened expression on his face. "He calls it the Master Card. I saw him stow it there after he had used it." The glowing aisle under my feet felt hot, as if the volcano under the floor sensed the turmoil going on above it.

We hammered down the ramp into the Rat Hole.

"One Card to Rule The Mall, One Card to Charge it..." Rattila had reached the mound ahead of us. Chanting, he dug his paw into the rotting trash and came up with a gleaming rectangle of gold. Suddenly, the black rat was replaced by a glowing golden wyvern. It spat a stream of acid at us. Chumley caught a whole load in the chest. Howling in pain, he beat at the spreading blob of blackness in the middle of his purple fur. Massha flew to his aid.

Rattila let go with another gob. It splashed at my feet, burning a few holes in my pants hems.

I was too furious to care. This whole adventure started with me getting fireballs thrown in my general direction. This was the being to blame for my partner's damaged reputation, for the trouble we'd all been through. I wasn't about to let him get away again, no matter how much punishment I had to take to get to him. I stepped over the acid and advanced on him.

Massha was ready with a few tricks of her own. Like trying to see one tree in a thick forest, I had never noticed one particular piece of jewelry or another in her formidable ensemble. The solid gold lemon was new to me.

"Here comes the spoiler," she called. She waved it, and the spurting acid turned into huge potted plants, which landed with a thud on the cluttered floor. I laughed. Rattila snarled and changed shape. I growled now; he had transformed himself into the attractive Pervect I had first seen in Rimbaldi's shop.

Evidently the original had had a purseful of heavy-duty hardware. Rattila dipped into the handbag and came up with a fully automatic repeating crossbow. We all dove for cover as the armor-piercing rounds sprayed out.

I took advantage of the muzzle flash blinding my adversary to start crawling, commando fashion, to my left. Once his sight cleared Rattila was looking where I had been, not where I was. He let the enchantress's image drop. I was glad; the mangy SOB didn't deserve to wear a Pervect face.

I figured two or three or four could play at the identity-theft game.

"Massha," I hissed, "disguise me as him. All of us!"

"One special coming up!" Massha announced.

I couldn't see the change in myself, but suddenly there was a big black rat hovering in midair, one lifting an end table to use as a missile, and another one sneaking up behind Rattila.

Eskina had entered the field of battle now. She had a pair of handcuffs dangling from one hand as she crawled up the mound. I stood up, making as much noise as I could. Rattila stared at me, then at Chumley and Massha. He looked shocked and angry; then he grinned, showing all his teeth.

"So, you like my face," he smirked. "Well, I like yours, too!" Beginning the interminable chant again, he changed into the image of Massha. "Don't I look pretty? An oversized Jahk with garish taste in clothes?"

"Not everyone looks good in basic black, you scum," Massha retorted furiously, clasping her hands together.

Rattila's face contorted as he started to choke. Abruptly he recovered, and an evil grin spread across his face. "How do you like turnabout, Jahk?" He closed his/her hands, and the floating rat that was Massha began to cough, clutching her throat. "And your pathetic little toys—those aren't real power!" Her necklaces and bracelets began to shatter. The fragments rained down. "Yes, that one, too!" Her flying belt disappeared. She thumped to the ground.