Myth Alliances

"You can't do it from here?" I asked. "On Perv they could communicate with the banks on Deva through their computers."

"That was with the cooperation of the Devan computers. The Pervect Ten will surely not want us reading their plans. We need to be close for my subterfuge to work. Our only fear then will be discovery."

"I'll keep us hidden," I vowed, grimly. "I won't fail again. I owe it to Wensley's memory." A thought occurred to me just then. "You know, I hate to say this, but it's just as well that he isn't around any more. If we had plotted this out in front of him he would have blabbed to the Ten about us."

"We're having to do this because of you, honey," Vergetta confided to the snow globe on the table as Niki dragged in the first invitee.

All their threats of torture, all their shouting and shaking had done nothing to dent the resolve of the Wuhs leader, Wensley. Vergetta had to admit to herself that she was pretty impressed, with the little guy. It took a strong person to defy a Pervect, let alone the whole minyan of them. Big, brave Trolls had broken down in tears when faced with the Ten in full fury. Even a bowl of purple Pervish gumbo had not been enough to make him open his mouth. A miniature picture of defiance, he sat crosslegged and arms folded on the bottom of the paperweight.

"Let's see how long you hold out when you see us take some of your friends apart." The little face turned away from her. Vergetta gri

"First things first," Tenobia demanded, when the fat Wuhs with black curls had been flung into the "hot seat," a chair in the middle of the room.

They had drawn straws to see who got to be "Lady High Executioner," and she had won. In celebration she had put on a silver bustier and a tight black skirt that she usually saved for wild parties at home on Perv. The ensemble looked suitably dangerous and very impressive, the virtual caricature of a dominatrix torturer. The Wuhs's eyes nearly started out of his head at the sight of her. She smacked her palms down on the arms of the chair and leaned into his face.

"Where's the D-hopper?"

"I d-d-don't know what you mean, madam…" Gubbeen babbled. "It's not my department to keep track… we are the friends of public health… the D-hopper is more of a safety issue…"

Charilor came back upstairs, grunting under the weight of a vast, lumpy bag. She threw it on the stone floor in front of the Wuhs. It clanked and banged like a suit of armor in a garbage disposal. Their guest nearly jumped out of his seat at the noise.

"I don't have it!" Gubbeen exclaimed, his eye on the sack, though none of them moved towards it. "I haven't had it for ages. It's been my turn… I mean, I would have safeguarded it on your behalf, but I really don't know, dear ladies, Ardrahan had it last time I saw it… please don't hurt me!"

"I don't know why we didn't do this six months ago," Loorna grimaced.

She kicked open the folds of the bag and extracted a metal implement with a rotating wheel and several long, sharp strands of metal. She pointed it at Gubbeen and rotated the little handle that made the tines clash violently against one another. The Wuhs recoiled into his chair, trying to meld with the wooden staveback.

Vergetta recognized the device as a whisk they used to aerate hot drinks. She hadn't seen it for months. It had probably gotten dumped into the hold-all drawer in the kitchen, or shoved into a box in a storage closet. She smiled. Obviously the Wuhs, who had never seen one, was making up his own uses for it in his head, and none of them made him comfortable.

They played with him a while longer, going up the threat scale from kitchen implements to sports equipment, and through to genuine torture devices, but the Wuhs continued to shriek out that he had given them all the information that he had about the missing D-hopper. They had no choice but to believe him. He was so overwrought that Vergetta called a halt to the questioning. Nedira escorted him down to one of the padded cells in the basement to calm down a little bit before they would let him go.

Vergetta waved her arms, bringing Wensley out again.

"We were interrupted, darlink. Your friend wasn't much help. Would you like to cooperate a little?"

"Never," the Wuhs declared. "We will be rid of you and your foul enterprises soon. The Great Skeeve will see to that!"

"What's this?" Vergetta demanded, leaning close to make sure she had heard him correctly. "What about the Great Skeeve?"

"He will defeat you." Wensley made a gesture that included every Pervect present. "All of you!"

"You?" Oshleen asked, narrowing her eyes. "You hired the Klahd wizard?"

"You got us thrown in jail? Fined? You got our merchandise confiscated!" Paldine gritted out crime after crime. She started toward the pale Wuhs with her claws out.

"That's it," Vergetta exclaimed, getting in between them. "You stop," she told the marketing specialist, then turned to point at Wensley. "You get a permanent time-out while I figure out what we are going to do with you."

She waved her hand, and the Wuhs was restored to his spherical prison. "But you heard what he said!" Paldine exclaimed, trying to get around her elder.

"Yes, and what good will it do to tear him to pieces? It won't solve our problem. But now we have at least some of the answers. We've been looking for the cause of our troubles all over the dimensions, and it was right here under our noses. I bet the Great Skeeve got Zol Icty involved, got him to condemn us for a favor."

"If it really was Zol Icty," Oshleen cautioned. "Skeeve's supposed to be such a great wizard it was probably one of his illusions."

"Here's the next one," Niki grunted, hauling in another Wuhs.

"We'll finish with you later," Paldine promised Wensley, gold veins standing out in her yellow eyes. "Count on it."

"Cashel's your name, right?" Tenobia asked, planting a silver spike heeled boot on the Wuhs's knee and sticking her fists into her hips. "I've seen you in the castle a lot lately. But you don't work here, do you? Where do you work?"

"Factory number nine," Niki supplied.

"Right. So what are you doing down in the treasury all the time? You wouldn't be the one who's always extracting money, even though you know that we've got rules about requesting hard currency."

"M… money, dear ladies?" Cashel gulped, his eyes darting warily to all the various pieces of hardware that Tenobia was idly fondling. "I wouldn't break rules, not at least ones I understood to be absolute strictures against… certain behaviors…"

"Just what did you think that money was for?"

The Wuhs looked up hopefully. He must have thought he knew the answer to this one. "… Er, buying things?"

"What things?"

"… Uh… things for you?"

"No, you fool!" Tenobia roared, throwing up her hands in exasperation. "Supplies. Staples. Building materials. Food. Equipment. A consulting contract that your leaders signed willingly two years ago! Things for you! Your spending habits are driving us crazy!"

Cashel looked from one Pervect to another in deep confusion. "Then… I don't understand, ladies, why you're upset. We're buying things for us. I mean," he added, recoiling at the furious expression on Loorna's face, "whoever's taking the money. It's certainly not me. I'm in favor of public support, really."

Vergetta shook her head. They were getting nowhere. Naturally the ones they interviewed were never the ones who had brought in new merchandise or stolen the money. It was always somebody else.

"Who has the D-hopper?" Tenobia interrupted before the Wuhs could start another string of evasions and lies. "Who had it the last time you saw it? Answer now!"

"Coolea," Cashel sobbed, dropping his face into his hands. "Yesterday. He ought to be back by now. I hope. He really wouldn't listen to the instructions, he was so eager to see other dimensions…"