Myth-Chief

I had plenty of other friends, Tananda included. But to have Skeeve waltzing back into the Bazaar after an absence of months and expecting to take over M.Y.T.H., Inc. again like he had never left didn't take into account anyone's past feelings or present positions. We'd all moved on.

Including me.

Except we hadn't. Not really. That's what hurt. We trusted him, and he walked off without looking back. The whole M.Y.T.H., Inc. enterprise was possible mostly because of his ... I don't want to say leadership; call it glue. He was the glue. Once he was gone we hung together in a kind of loose fashion, mostly because of inertia. We liked each other, but, well, maybe I understated it when I said we liked him. I never knew a Klahd who could engender such loyalty, and all without seeming to know what he was doing.

He said he had his reasons. Maybe we had too high expectations where he was concerned. Not me. I knew what Klahds were capable of. Skeeve just exceeded those capabilities most of the time. He should have been born a Pervect. Together we could have taken over dimensions.

Nah. The upkeep'd kill you.

"... And what do you think, after all that? She says the treasury's not up to her expectations, and what am I go

I made a face. Back to business. I snapped on my asset-counting hat.

"Can you increase exports of anything?" I asked, mentally going down the checklist.

"We don't really export anything, sir," said Matfany, ruefully. I raised an eyebrow.

"So how do you make money?"

"I thought you said you'd heard of Foxe-Swampburg? Hospitality, sir. Ours is an economy based upon visitors, especially repeat visitors. We used to get plenty of guests from off-dimension looking for a little getaway, if you understand me?"

I leered at him. "Sure do."

Matfany looked sternly at me. "Sir, we're not Vaygus. I mean, you want to go and empty your pockets while having your eardrums and your eyeballs pounded, that's where you go. If you want a quiet week drowning bait or stumping up hills, lying on a beach and maybe sucking down some local brew, we're the stop for you. Food's pretty good. People are nice. You can just relax yourself to pieces."

"I've been there," Tananda put in, with a mind-blowing smile at Matfany. "It's pretty."

"Don Bruce went fishin' there one time," Guido put in. "We rubbed out about fifty-eight trout. The Don offered Foxe-Swampburg his official seal of approval. We also got some business accomplished during the trip." He gave us a significant look with one brow raised. I could make an educated guess what kind of business had drawn the Mob

Boss to an out-of-the-way locale like Foxe-Swampburg. Matfany looked baffled. I cleared my throat.

"Not my usual kind of vacation, but it has its place. So, what happened to derail Foxe-Swampburg's success story?"

"Pinchbugs," he said. "Some empty-headed fool imported a few breeding pairs because their wings make pretty jewelry. Thought they could get an accessories trade going. Could've told you that'd come to no good. If anyone had asked the government, and by that I mean me, for an import license, I would have said no way. Man didn't think things through, you can just tell."

"And what happened?" I asked.

"Well, sir. no one can relax when flies the size of your linger are biting you every other second, now can they? Some species don't care, but most of 'em canceled their reservations in a hurry. We lost about seven years' bookings all in one week. Those darned flies also ate about every leaf and needle on every plant and burrowed holes in nearly everything except metal. I've got clothes that're so well ventilated I don't need a fan in the summertime, sir."

"Don't draw me a picture," I growled. "And what about the pinchbugs? Is that what you need us to do?"

"Oh, we got rid of them pinchbugs, sir," Matfany said. "Soon's we figured out that was the big problem, we found a wizard from Shelf who came in and took care of them, no problem. Big fee, though. Took about everything that was left in the treasury. And when that was gone, that girl was still honking on about what was she going to use for clothes money? The treasury's about empty. That was when I realized that girl was only going to cause more problems than she was go

I exchanged glances with Tananda. This case sounded like a financial dead end, but I had taken the bet.

"You must have some kind of asset we can raise money on," I said. "Something that you might not even see. Let's go and take a look."

FOURTEEN

"Let them eat cake."

"Candles?" I said, comparing my list with the contents of the enormous pile of cloth sacks on the floor.

"Check," said Nunzio.

"Doilies?"

"Check."

"Noisemakers?"

"Check."

I put the list down with a sigh and looked at my client. "That's everything, your highness."

"Well, good," Hermalaya said, pleased. "Now, all of you scoot on out of here while I get ready. I'll let you know when you can come back in. Shoo, shoo!"

That had been our third foray out into the Bazaar to shop for the Cake ceremony. Hermalaya wouldn't settle for second best in anything. The elaborate service took a lot of time to prepare. She took over our kitchen, which she immediately declared ill-equipped, and sent me ru

"Let's get some lunch, what?" Chumley asked. "We can discuss possibilities over a comestible or two."

"I could murder a strawberry shake," Nunzio said, and gri

Bu