Myth-Chief

NINE

My employer didn't find it easy to endure the hours that followed.

"How can you sit and ... and play?" Marmel said, pacing around us like a dog on a short leash. "How does that help get rid of him?" He tilted his head toward the stairs and the imperious guard who stood there staring at us.

"It would help if you could just calm down," I said.

"But he could kill us all!"

"He won't," I said. "Not until he gets what he wants, anyhow. Then I think he will leave. He seems pretty goal-oriented. Three disks. Call." I tossed in my bet.

"Elf-high flush," Guido said, and spread out his cards. I moaned. With a chuckle he raked in the pot of glass disks, which had been supplied by Marmilda in lieu of coins. We had all agreed not to play for money. I am not and have never claimed to be a great cardplayer, but I enjoy the camaraderie of the game. In fact, I realized, as I threw my hand in in surrender, that I had missed my friends more than I realized. It was good to be back—only I wasn't back. This detente was temporary. We'd go back to our separate businesses when all this was over. I felt my heart sink into my belly. If only I had been able to find Aahz and ask him the best way to reintroduce myself to the business. I hoped the Duchess was all right. She was eccentric with a capital "ECCENTRIC," but she was Aahz's mother, and what hurt him hurt me.

"My deal," Chumley growled, holding out an enormous purple hand for the deck.

"Nah, it's Tuesday. The dealin' reverses itself every seventh hand."

"Wha? Okay." For the sake of our company the Troll pretended to be confused about the rules. The look of puzzlement on his face was so convincing I nearly broke down and explained it to him. I stopped myself before I made a fool of myself again. He was generally the one who reminded us of the subtleties of Dragon Poker during our friendly games. It had been too long.

I felt eyes on my cards, and looked up. Marmel hovered at my elbow. The Imp wound his hands together nervously.

"Are you all right?" I asked. "What if he comes down again?" Marmel asked. "He won't," I assured him. "We made a deal. He's going to look. We'll wait." "Are you sure?"

"I am sure," I said. "I gave him my word."

"Yeah, he's the Great Skeeve, remember?" Guido said. "You gonna bid or just shop?"

"Uh, I'll bid," I said. "Three coins."

"Yeah, Narwickius wouldn't dare do anything," Marmel said. "That's right. You're the most powerful wizard in the world, right?"

"Nah," Guido said. "Crunch, you in?"

"Fold," the Troll growled.

"Raise," Guido said.

"You're bluffing."

"Call me and see," the enforcer said, with a grin.

"Yeah," Marmel said again. "I shouldn't have anything to be afraid of. No!" He shouldered up to the Titan at the bottom of the stairs. "You wouldn't have the GUTS to take on the Great Skeeve, would you? Big guy? Tough guy?" He punctuated every word with a poke of his bony pink forefinger. "Huh? Huh?"

The Titan growled low in his throat.

"Marmel?" I called.

"Yeah, Skeeve?"

"Did you hire me to help you find your inheritance, or not?"

"That's exactly why I hired you!" Marmel said.

"Well, then, did you buy the insurance rider against grievous bodily harm? Because I don't remember signing up to fight Titan bodyguards when we discussed the contract."

The Titan grinned down at him, silver-white teeth gleaming.

"Uh, no ..." Marmel said.

"Then maybe you ought to say 'excuse me' to the nice, big Titan and come over here before you have an accident?"

Marmel didn't need long to assess the situation. The forefinger retracted into his fist, and he backed away three steps. "Sorry, Mr. Titan, sir."

The bodyguard showed his big, square teeth. "No problem, squirt. Boo!"

Marmel jumped. He scurried away from the staircase and cowered in the corner of the room farthest from it. I sighed and shuffled my hand facedown.

"I hope Tananda's all right," I said, staring upward. She had not yet revealed herself, but I knew she was keeping an eye on things.

"She's fine," Guido said. "Watch the cards. Dis is a little trick I picked up on Taro."

He sorted out the Dragon suit from the deck and spread it out on the table. With a wink at me, he waved his hand across them. We waited, as though we were in a seance hoping the ghost of our rich old aunt would communicate the location of her hidden cache of treasure. Suddenly, the deuce, the lowest-value Dragon card, twitched itself out of the pack. Guido pushed it back.

"She says 'bupkis,"" Guido confirmed, in a voice too low for the Titan nearest us to hear. "They have failed thus far to find anythin'. Private signal. Works real good. Your deal, Skeeve." He gathered up the cards and handed the deck to me.

I suppose we didn't really need the confirmation. Narwickius would have stopped throwing things out of the window if he had been successful. More objects hit the ground while we waited. Chairs, books, knickknacks of every description precipitated from above like an unusually heavy rain. Shattered glass filled the street.

"There go the souvenir shot glasses," I observed, watching them tinkle to the pavement.

The littering had alarmed the residents of Sirecoose, but when a policeman came by to demand it stop, I invited him to go upstairs and reason with the army of Titans on the premises. At die mention of Titans he retreated, never to return.

Marmel had a hard time with the wait, but the rest of us allowed ourselves cautious enjoyment. Marmilda was a terrific hostess. She kept beverages coming, and at meal-times brought us food she had cooked herself, then carefully translated according to our dimension of origin. She served me a marvelous fish-and-potato pie, just like my mother used to make from troutpikes I caught in the brook on my father's farm.

"I gotta buy me one of dose wolidgins," Guido said, patting his stomach with satisfaction. "When I remember all the places I been where the food ain't really been to my taste, I could just run it in one end of dese and get a steak dinner out the other end."

"We'd make you a very special price," Marmel said, rubbing his hands together. "I mean, what with the advertising value of being able to say the Great Skeeve uses our product. And his friends," he added nervously, as Guido shot him a dirty look. I didn't miss it.

"Good," Chumley said, carefully extracting a long orange tentacle from between two molars and placing it carefully in his dish. "Food good." He grinned at the two Imps, who backed up a pace. I thought by this time they would be used to him, but a Troll of his size can be daunting.

"Get them up here!" a voice roared from above.

"I think I see a break in the case," I said, rising to my feet.

The Titans thundered down the stairs, single file and made for us. Two of them grabbed me by the shoulders, but I was ready for them.

"Ahhh!" They jumped backward. I grinned. That magikal shocker I had bought in the gag shop worked every time.

"Never lay hands upon the Great Skeeve," I informed them haughtily. Guido and Chumley shook off their grasp, and the three of us made our way upstairs toward the bellowing Narwickius.

"What's the holdup?" Narwickius shouted. He came rushing out of the small bedroom, nearly barreling into me. "Where is the Hoho Jug?"

"I told you, we have no knowledge of its whereabouts," I said calmly. "The owner passed away without informing his children. I have not seen it, nor have my colleagues. I gave you my word on that."

"Aaggh!" Narwickius said, clutching at his hair. He had clearly been tearing out handfuls of it in frustration. I could see silver strands liberally scattered over the waist-high mounds of junk that literally filled the room.

The Vipe wizardess had been at work: gone were the Triple-D maps and the souvenir rock collection from Bezoar. The furniture had largely been reduced to boards and rags. As I watched, she pointed her poison green wand at a heap of brightly colored teddy bears. They vanished with a small explosion.

Boom!

"I found another hiding place, great master!" one of the Titans announced, holding up a small, cut-glass box. I sensed the magik in it. I'd seen its like before. 'No, wait!" I shouted.

Too late. The big, blue oaf flipped open the lid, and hundreds of spring-loaded snakes leaped into the air.

"Aargh!" Narwickius bellowed, batting at them. He lunged for me and grabbed me by the throat.

"Gack!" I choked, as I hung in the air.

"Where ... is ... it?" he demanded, shaking me at every syllable.

Guido and Chumley were at my side in a moment, wrestling the Titan back. He dropped me.

"I don't know," I gasped out, massaging life back into my neck. "He hid it here somewhere. That's what I surmise."

"I can't stand it!" the Titan exclaimed. He yanked open what seemed like false drawers in the dismantled head-board, releasing streams of silk scarves, commemorative whisky bottles (full) and rare birds' eggs (empty), leaving us chest high in clutter. "Get rid of this trash!"

" Yessss, massster," the Vipe wizardess said. She pointed the wand.

Boom! Boom! Boom! I staggered as the mass of junk collectibles vanished. Chumley swooped to keep me upright with one massive paw. Narwickius kept pulling down hidden trapdoors, flicking open hatches secreted behind decorative wall plaques, and releasing false bricks in the fireplace. Every one of them catapulted a ton of junk out onto the floor.

"Find it for me," the Titan growled. "Then I will leave, maybe even with the rest of you alive!"

"That wasn't our bargain," I said, calmly. "You just have to keep looking. If you kill me, it will let loose more magik than you have ever had to deal with in your life. It will follow you no matter what dimension you go to. I will haunt you when you are asleep. I will whisper ugly secrets about you to your girlfriends. I'll tell everyone at the poker table that you have a ten-high nothing in your hand ..."

"You're bluffing," Narwickius said, though he didn't look at all certain.

"Try me," I said, putting up my chin. "I haven't died since ... gee, last Wednesday, wasn't it, Guido?"

"Thursday, Boss," the enforcer said, with a glint in his eyes.

The bluff worked. Narwickius spun away. He took out his frustration with me on the room. He pulled down every shelf and threw it on the heap in the middle of the floor. With a mighty wrench, he ripped the mantelpiece off the wall. The objets d'art went flying in every direction. The stuffed squid hit the floor with a wheezing noise.

"Hoho."

Chumley's eyebrows went up, almost hidden in the purple fur of his face. I signed to him to be calm.

"Aaaagh!" Narwickius bellowed. "I can't stand it! Are there any more collections?" he asked the Vipe.

She scanned the room with her wand. "I don't sssee any more, massster."

"Do they know of any more?"

The cold, black eyes swiveled toward us, and the end of the wand leveled at my nose.

"No," I said, before the Vipe could discharge magik in my direction. "Neither do my associates. Didn't I give you my word?"

"What does the word of a Klahd mean to me?" Narwickius demanded. "That means it is out here already!"

"Or you had her make it vanish already," I said, tilting my head toward the wizardess. I didn't want him getting any closer to that squid until I could examine it.

"What?"

"Well, you've been having her destroy things in your way," I said. "Did you check everything before they went out? I bet she blew it up right under your nose."

The Titan's eyes flew wide. "Never!"

"Well, it's understandable," I said. "We're in pretty tight quarters here. You don't want all this stuff underfoot, but I just wonder... did you check ALL of those mamushka dolls before you threw them out? I mean, open every one of them down to the baby in the center? Some of them have maybe thirty layers, like onions ..."

Narwickius tore at his hair. "No! No! Not after all these years!" He spun to confront the Vipe. "Did you do it?"

"I only do what you tell me, massster," she said, fear showing in her eyes for the first time. She gave me a very dirty look. "Those things were ordinary, with no magik to ssspeak of."

"Go find it! Wherever you sent those things, go look!"

"As you wisssh," the Vipe said, sulkily.

BAMF!

I grinned. My biggest threat had just been defused.

"Keep looking," I advised him. "I mean, if you're sure that it's still here ..." I leaned casually on the discarded mantelpiece and surreptitiously shuffled the squid behind it for safekeeping. I presented the Titan with my most innocent expression, all the while casting an illusion over it to make the squid look like one of the hundreds of costumed teddy bears already on the floor. Without the Vipe there to check it, he'd miss the glamour of magik upon it.

But I had planted the seeds of doubt. I had to admit I got a kick out of watching Narwickius turn over the thousand and two artifacts scattered everywhere over and over again. He had pulled out almost all his hair.

Living in the Bazaar for years. I had met some mad collectors, but Narwickius took first prize for obsessiveness. Even someone in search of the last lost Magikal Decoder Ring of Marfus Ayoodi would have given up long ago. Night came and went again. I was hungry, my feet hurt, and I was dying to go find the necessary, but I sensed the end was coming soon.

Narwickius called all of his men from the floor below. One at a time, the Titans felt around in the safes, caches, and niches. One at a time, they palpated pillows, stuffed toys, and articles of clothing. They shook bottles, emptied boxes, and turned socks inside out.

The sun was setting for the second time when Narwickius flopped down on what was left of the old man's mattress.

"Give up?" I asked pleasantly. "Curse you," he hissed.

"We had an agreement. We had every reason to believe that your old rival hid the item you wanted so badly some-where in here. You have given this place the most thorough search you possibly can. Are you willing to concede it's somewhere else?"

"You took it," he gritted.

"If I had, would I have spent the last two days helping you look?" I asked.

"No ... I... you might... I don't know!" Narwickius shouted. "You're confusing me."

"Let me help you make the decision, then," I said, moving close enough to place a fatherly hand on his shoulder. "Give up."

"No! I mean ... I never give up!"

"But you have already searched everything here," I said amiably. "What benefit is there in doing it again and again? You were sure you would recognize your prize right away, weren't you?" "Of course!"

"Well, everyone knows about the great Narwickius's powers of discernment," I went on smoothly. "If you haven't seen it, then it's not here, is it?"

"Well, when you put it like that... I suppose ..."

I could feel Guido and Chumley let out a huge sigh of relief at my back. The Titans, with armloads of Kewpie dolls, sounded just as relieved.

"Okay, then it's settled," I said, in a brisk tone, before Narwickius could change his mind. "You're finished looking. You promised once you were satisfied you couldn't find it you'd go. Right? You don't have any more time to waste on one little gizmo, not when there's an estate sale in Warfengang starting in about... five hours."

The light went on in the Titan's gray eyes. "What? I know several Fen in Warfengang! Is it Olbius? He was on his last legs when I saw him."

"Sure to be," I said, mentally crossing my fingers behind my back. "I don't recall the name ..."

"All right!" Narwickius said, shaking off my hand. He rose magnificently and drew his hand up to his chest. "I must get to the viewing before all of the good things are taken. We leave this wretched place, never to return. I, Narwickius, state this to be true."

"Good," I said. "Nice doing business with you."

He gave me a haughty look and waved a hand.

BAMF! All of the Titans vanished.

"Nice work, Skeeve," Guido croaked out.

"Which one is it?" Chumley asked, kicking at the debris on the floor.

I reached around the chunk of wood that had once been a handsome mantelpiece and drew out a rainbow-colored teddy bear.

"This is it," I said. "I hope. Let's go see Marmilda and Marmel."

The Imps were asleep, sitting up on a couch with their arms around one another's necks.

"Sweet family concord, what?" Chumley asked.

I nudged them awake with the toe of my shoe. They leaped up.

"This is all your fault," Marmilda exclaimed. Marmel went on guard.

"I didn't make a deal with a Titan!" "I didn't have a choice!"

"If you had told me you promised our inheritance to someone else, I might have understood."

"If you hadn't been so greedy, it might have been possible to hold a civil conversation with you!"

"Excuse me," I said, waving a hand between them. The Imp siblings turned to glare at me. "He's gone."

"What?" They both turned to look at us.

"Narwickius gave up," I explained. "It took a while, but it's over. I don't think he's ever coming back."

Marmilda jumped up and hugged us all. "Oh, thank you! You've all been so wonderful I... I just didn't know what to do. You just came in on such short notice, took charge, and you were all so calm. I was terrified! I don't know about Marmel..."

"I was terrified, too," the Imp admitted.

"... But I just absolutely have to say that everything we ever heard about M.Y.T.H., Inc. is true." The siblings beamed at us.

We all fell into an awkward silence. I was starting to get used to them. Guido cleared his throat.

"Uh, thanks, ma'am. We endeavor to give satisfaction." "Oh, you have!"

"Narwickius's departure fulfills the terms of our contract," Tananda said. "I hate to be a hero and run, but we have got some other appointments today."

"Oh, of course," Marmilda said. She gave Marmel an embarrassed glance. "Six gold coins was your fee, I think you said?"

"That's what we discussed," Guido said, "but we couldn't have done it without Mister Skeeve, so you'd better give him half of the dough."

"No!" I protested. Tananda gave me a sharp look that told me "not in front of the clients!" I subsided.

I turned to Marmilda with a smile. "Internal bookkeeping. Actually, if you will give it all to Big Crunch, he'll make sure the money gets back to our accountant and is distributed properly."

"Of course!" the Imp female said, counting coins into the enormous purple palm. "Thank you so much. I am going to tell every one of my customers how wonderful you have been."

"Yeah," Guido grunted. He gave me a sideways glance. "Well, we gotta go. Nice hangin' wit' you, Boss."

"The same, Guido," I said, putting out a hand. He gripped it.

Tananda gave me an all-encompassing hug. "Don't be a stranger."

"I won't," I said.

"Bye," Big Crunch, a.k.a. Chumley said laconically. Tananda went through some magikal gyrations and ... BAMF!

"Well," I said to the two puzzled Imps standing in front of me. "Marmel made a side deal with me. Your father's Hoho Jug is a valuable artifact. Not that he didn't leave you plenty of inheritance ..."

"Most of which is lying on the sidewalk outside," Marmilda pointed out.

"... But this is the only thing you two are really fighting over," I concluded. I brandished my rainbow-colored stuffed bear.

"That?" Marmilda asked, with every evidence of distaste.

I hastily undid my illusion, revealing the terrifying smile of the stuffed squid from Dover. "That?" she repeated.

"That," I said. "If you're the rightful heir to this piece, it should regain its ordinary appearance if you call it"

"That's easy." Marine! said. He held out a hand. "C'mere, Hoho Jug!"

The squid hung there in my hand.

"Then it's mine," Marmilda said, with a pleased smile. "Hoho Jug!"

The squid didn't change for her, either.

"What is this?" Marmel demanded. "Did you do something to it? It can't belong to neither of us! We're Dad's only heirs!"

A slow smile made its way from one of my ears to the other. "It doesn't belong to either of you. I will bet my fee that it belongs to BOTH of you. Didn't you tell me you were sitting together when he said he wanted you to have it?"

They looked at one another. "That only makes sense," Marmilda said. "No, it doesn't," Marmel whined. "I want it for myself! You'll just try and sell it."

"Selling it could help pull us out of debt." "It's our heritage!"

"Hey, hey, HEY!" I shouted over the escalating voices. "Look, if you two are going to fight about it, I'll go find Narwickius and tell him I located it after all. He might buy-it, or he might tear your heads off and take it after all he went through trying to find it. You can decide if you want to keep it in the family or not later on, after I go home. All right?" "Okay," Marmel said, sulkily. "What do you say, sis?" "Yes."

"Good." I brandished the squid at the pair of Imps. "Talk to it."

"And that was it?" Bunny asked, as I sat back in my chair with my feet on my desk. "That disgusting squid was the Hoho Jug?"

"Yup," I said, feeling pretty pleased with myself. Gleep sidled up and put his head in my lap, looking for a scratch behind his ears. I scrubbed his scales with my fingernails. "When both of them called it, it morphed back into a ewer. Incidentally, it does echo back 'ho-ho' when you holler into it. One question answered, one fee collected. We're in business."

"What about the others.'" she asked. I didn't have to ask who she meant.

"What about them?" "What did they say?"

I shrugged. "It was a little awkward, but it all worked out."