Myth-Gotten Gains

"So, you see, Lord Fistula," Highperin said, with a smile, "we are very security-minded here. See you in six days." He started toward the door. His torturers, with a backwards look of regret toward their working tools, set down their irons and followed him.

"I salute you, Margrave," I called after him. "In fact, I want to offer my respects."

Curious, he turned back to me. "And how would you do that?"

"Let me drink a toast to you. What would it matter if our six-day fast starts now, or in a minute?"

"Are you thirsty, Lord Fistula?" Highperin said, returning to me with a gloating look spread across his plump little face. "Why not use the object of your most convoluted theft?"

As I hoped he would do, he snatched the Cup off the table and waved it in my face. The dented, time-dulled goblet didn't look like much, but I recalled how miserable Ersatz had seemed until I knocked the tarnish off him. The Cup was similarly disguised. No Klahd would look twice at it. Unlike Pervects, they can't smell gold. We can.

I sneered at the goblet, trying to let none of the eagerness I was feeling show on my face. "You really don't expect me to drink out of something that tacky."

"If you consider it beneath your notice, perhaps you will tell me why you wanted a boy's cheap trophy?" the Margrave asked. "I don't see anything special about it."

"My associate probably wanted me to see it," I said, shrugging as best I could with the weight of the chains. "We were interviewing the kid about the race he ran to win it, after all."

"Fine, then," the Margrave said, waving his hand impatiently. "Drink my health. I don't see why not, since you're all going to die in this cell, once His Grace confirms that you are all frauds. In celebration of your last moments of daylight, go ahead."

One of the guards poured the cup full of murky water from a rain barrel next to the window. I guessed that it was used to quench irons used for torture. "What, not even wine?" I asked, aggrievedly.

"You're lucky to get that, you criminal," the guard said haughtily.

I shrugged. "I can put up with water once in a while. I just don't overdo."

"I almost salute you, Lord Fistula," the Margrave said. "Showing such nonchalance in the face of doom."

"Suave's my middle name," I said.

The guard held it out to me. I reached for it. He tilted it and deliberately let the water splash to the floor. I stifled an outburst and glanced at the Margrave. The big cheese was getting a kick out of this. I couldn't wait to get my powers back. I'd give him a kick he'd remember the rest of his soon-to-be-shortened life. At his employer's nod, the guard dredged up another cupful and handed it to me.

My hands trembled as I took the cup. The anticipation was nearly killing me. I was seconds from getting my powers back, after all these years. I was almost floating. In the vision I had quaffed the whole cupful. The water smelled unappetizing, and there was a dead bug floating on the surface, but anyone who'd ever eaten Pervish food had had worse.

What to do first when the joke powder had been flushed out of my system? Should I just get us the heck out of there, or should I bounce the arrogant SOB all over the walls? Should I tear him into little pieces and rearrange them? I thought I'd begin by making the chains float in the air like clouds, then drop them on the Margrave's round little head.

I raised the cup high. "Your very good health, Margrave. You're the epitome of a government official, and I mean that from the bottom of my heart."

I drained the cup in a single gulp. Well-being flooded through me. I felt stronger than I had in years. Every bruise and bump that I had gotten from the mob who had jumped us and dragged us here faded away. My eyesight seemed clearer. I could hear birds twittering miles away outside the window. I felt co

The Margrave gestured impatiently to a guard to take the cup away from me.

"There, you've drunk my health. Does that make you feel better?"

I gri

I took a deep breath, balancing myself on the balls of my feet. I pushed back the manacles so my hands were clear, wound up, and threw my hands toward the Margrave. Maybe I had put a little too much body English into it, but it was worth it. I opened my eyes.

Nothing happened.

I stared at my hands. What went wrong? I reached far down inside me and hoisted up all the energy I could, drew back, and threw it at the Margrave.

"And what am I supposed to see?" Highperin asked, one eyebrow most of the way toward his thin hairline.

"Uh."

He should have blasted apart into six pieces, by lightning that ought to be still ricocheting around the room! I felt around for the force lines. There ought to be plenty of power in reach, since Tananda was still using it to maintain our disguises. I reached deeper and came up as embarrassed as a diner who'd forgotten his wallet. There was nothing there. The rush of power that had gone through me had left

me feeling absolutely terrific, but I was still bereft of magik. My shoulders sagged.

"I see," the Margrave said, flicking his fingers derisively at us. "You're just wasting my time. See you in six days. I don't know precisely what I will have done to the three of you, but I promise you, it will be humiliating."

It couldn't be any more humiliating than the way T felt at that moment.

Chapter 6

THE HUGE IRON door slammed shut behind him. The noise echoed in the stone room, battering at my ears. I hung from my manacles, too brought down even to stand up under my own power.

"Slick," Tananda said.

"Shut up," I growled, not bothering to look up. "That should have worked."

"Diplomacy's not an exact art." Tananda was being nice to me. I couldn't stand it. "What's he going to do when he finds out there's no Lord Fistula?"

"There is one," I said, swaying mournfully from my chains. The cockroaches and rats swarmed out of the walls and began to circle our feet. "The trouble we're going to have is when he finds out that the real one is still at court, or was, last time I heard."

"What's the penalty for impersonating a favorite of the local duke?"

"Same as always, death." I stood up and tried the chains again to see if I could dislodge them from the wall. No, the staple had to have been driven in at least a foot. The force required was beyond even that of a Pervect in good shape. I doubted anything short of a Troll could have yanked them free.

"Are you sure?" Tanda gulped.

"Klahds just aren't that imaginative, Tananda," I said. "They like torture and killing. Most of their hobbies revolve around one or the other. Hunting. Cockfighting. Football. Skeeve's a peace freak compared with his fellow demons."

Calypsa looked even more taken aback. "This is my fault. I apologize. If I had not thought out loud, we would not be in this sorry predicament."

"I wouldn't have called it thinking, girly," I said, grumpily. "I don't know how you lived to the age you are without having someone strangle you for blurting out whatever comes into

your head. Look at what they did to my clothes. This jacket came from Bond of Savylle. I haven't had shoulders fit this well in thirty years."

"Woe is me," Calypsa said, enlarging upon her theme of self pity. She clasped her hands together and jangled her manacles as she beseeched the sky. "Now I and my champions are locked up in a foul dungeon, and my poor grandfather languishes without a hope of rescue." A bug touched her foot and she recoiled on tiptoe. "Eek!"