Chapter 5

Charming's blade, Excalibur, grunted with the weight of Frike's blow, bent like a willow, and then snapped back. Excalibur beat down hard on Frike's iron casque, forcing him backward. Frike took two steps to recover balance, then stomped forward again, his sword swinging in blind­ing patterns of advance and foil. Excalibur met the other's thrusts and parries with equal ardor and undaunted skill. The guests, who had gathered on the staircase and on the small interior balcony above to watch the fight, gasped and held their breaths.

Then Frike smiled, for he knew the fatal flaw in Excalibur. It was a demented demon-sword, and upon the signal, it re­sponded to a hellish master. Fitting that description fully, Frike waited until their swords were crossed once again. Then he cried, "Come to thy master, O mighty Excalibur! Come to me!"

"Not likely!" snarled Excalibur, slashing off Frike's right arm.

"I command you!" shouted Frike, his high berserk temper feeling no pain as he whirled a battle-ax around his head with his good, or rather remaining, hand, the left, or sinister one.

"But you didn't say it in Runic," Excalibur replied, lopping off Frike's other arm in response to Prince Charming's valiant swing.

"Spare me this fuscating of quiddities!" Frike shouted, now attacking with both feet, which were armed with scythes of a wicked temper. "By the arts of the ancient wicked ones, I bespeak thee, come now to me and at once and without further palaverations!"

"Why," Excalibur said, "if you so desire, then so be it!" And the great shining sword sprang from Charming's grasp, described a graceful arabesque in the air, and came to Frike point first, not stopping until it had pierced the man's armor and run him through his deepest extent.

"Alack, I am finished," Frike said.

Charming turned to the Princess. His eyes were ablaze. It was in his mind to end all ambiguity now.

"Give me one final kiss!" Charming said. "And then stab away to your heart's content, if this desire still be present, for no death is as dear as that bestowed by the beloved at the moment which should, if things had worked out otherwise, be that of highest bliss."

"I'll give thee kiss, and kiss for kiss, and then more kisses to repay those kisses betides!" Scarlet said. "Speak not of death. That was the old way. Now shall we go on forever in our pleasures!"

And so it was.

Chapter 6

Moondrench was a young spirit who had not had his sexual awakening. Although he was called "he," he was in fact a neutral in matters of sex­uality. Agrippa was an older spirit who had been around for a very long time and was more than a little jaded. He did like fresh young spirits, however, and he may have had something of a sporting nature in mind when he invited Moondrench. He liked the naive responses of young spirits. They gave him some­thing to be superior to.

They arrived at the north entrance to Limbo at the time appointed for the Millennial Awards Dinner. Together they mounted the cloud-staircases that led to the building where the banquet was to be held. Clouds are not easy to walk on, even if you are a demon. In no time at all, Moondrench began com­plaining.

"I'm sick of walking," he said. "Let's fly."

"It's not allowed," Agrippa said.

"But we always fly! Remember that flying game you taught me?"

"Please, let's not speak of that here. It is said that we walk today in honor of our victim's ancestor, Adam."

"Adam, shmadam," Moondrench said. "I just don't want to get my new outfit sweaty."

"Stop complaining, " Agrippa said.

Ahead lay a great cloud-pasture. It seemed to expand like an unbounded metaphor. It had Corinthian columns which added to its classical look.

They walked to the entrance. A demon in a powdered wig and beige silk stockings checked Agrippa's invitation, holding it up to the light to make sure it had the watermark. The Millennial Awards was such an important event that many spiritual beings tried to lie their way in, or get by with forged credentials. Luckily for Agrippa, his excellent connections with the High Demon Council, for whom he threw parties and lit­erary soirees, had assured him and his friend of places at the banquet.

Agrippa, many centuries old, had the leathery skin and deep wrinkles of a rottweiler.

The attendant verified his invitation and let them continue inside.

Within the banqueting hall they came to a table so long that it disappeared from sight at either end. Luckily, Agrippa and Moondrench's seats were near the middle. They found little name tags in the form of paper pennants stuck into grapefruits.

Taking their places, they nodded to their neighbors on either side. The speeches from the high table had already begun. Agrippa found himself sitting next to a Nubian angel with an ebony halo. Moondrench looked around, still considerably in awe, and saw food being passed.

"Can I eat now?" he asked Agrippa in a loud whisper.

"Yes, but don't make a pig of yourself."

Moondrench snarled at him and speared a turkeydogleg from a platter as it went by. He followed it up with a glass of mescal ichor. This had the embryonic dragon at the bottom of the glass, identifying it as genuine. He munched and looked around. He stared at the tall blond creature with big blue eyes who sat across the table from him. "Hot damn," he remarked to Agrippa. "That's what I call some kind of sexy."

"Forget it," Agrippa said. "That's an angel and he's not for the likes of you."

It was a fact that demons were always lusting after angels, who, it is said, were flattered by the attention. This occasion of the Awards Dinner was one of the few times they were able to mingle freely with each other.

Waiters hurried back and forth with trays of food and drink. Many of them wore the ethnic masks which were so popular in celestial circles. Their masks matched the type of food they were serving. Italian angels served tiny pizzas, Viet­namese angels had eggrolls and Pho soup, and Arab spirits bore silver trays with kebabs piled high on them.

The food was good, of course, but Moondrench was more interested in strong drink. "Pass the ichor," he told a tall skinny spirit diagonally across the table from him. Agrippa was getting a good start, too. Moondrench considered joining a group of devils off by themselves in a corner, where they drank ichor out of each other's shoes and giggled immoderately. At a dif­ferent part of the table, a fat demon in a clown's outfit cut into a large pie, releasing four-and-twenty blackbirds, which flut­tered around the heads of the guests.

"Having a good time?" Agrippa asked Moondrench.

"It isn't bad," Moondrench said. "But who is that over there waving his hands?"

"That's Asmodeus," Agrippa said. "He's in charge of this section of the banquet."

"And the dark lady beside him?"

"That is Hecate, Queen of Night. If they look in your direction, just smile and raise your glass. They are very im­portant."

"You don't have to tell me how to behave. What is As­modeus doing? He seems to be reading something. But I didn't know that Lord Demons could read."

"Very funny," Agrippa said. "If he hears you saying things like that, you'll see how humorous he'll feel." Agrippa peered more closely. "He seems to be studying the notes for his speech."

"What speech?" Moondrench asked. "You didn't say any­thing about the speeches."

"I thought you understood what this is all about."

"Just some sort of big party, isn't it?"

"Rather more than that," Agrippa said. "This is the oc­casion when they announce the winner of the Millennial contest which determines the quality that will dominate men's lives for the next thousand years."