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Authors: Andrew J. Offutt
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over the left, folding down thumb and all fingers save that on which the odd ring glittered. She closed her eyes.
“Brynda,” she murmured.
And she vanished.
6. The girl who was Elizabeth Taylor
I stood there and stared through the spot where Jadiriyah had been. Stupid; she wasn’t coming back. I’d saved her life (or at least saved her from Vardor servitude), not to mention the traditional fate worse than which death isn’t. (That she had apparently not been entirely discommoded by her ravishment is beside the point, surely. It was rape.)
She hadn’t thanked me. She’d just—I reconstructed. Yes, I had it right the first time. She’d just rubbed the ring she’d snatched from me and—disappeared.
So it was a magic ring. So I’m an American, and I don’t believe in magic. Didn’t. Apparently it was time to start.
I had rescued the fair maiden in distress, and not only was she presumably not the daughter of the planetary ruler, she was an ungrateful bitch. And a vanishing witch. And I had thought all damsels in distress were princesses and their saviors became warlords, emperors, king—princes at the very least!
I sat down. (I didn’t decide to. My legs did.) I looked around, and up, and around again. Aros. I had now met two Arones, unless one counted Vardors—I didn’t, and don’t. Kro Kodres had not (at least so I assumed) been a prince or anything of the sort. I wasn’t even certain if the poor guy had been a warrior; maybe he was a courier. Packing a ring belonging to a witch—whose face had seemed vaguely familiar.
I squinted my eyes, then closed them, trying to call up a mental picture of the girl whose face I’d seen so briefly. (And at that, not under the best conditions: it was night, she was dirty, and her hair was a mess.) Besides, she was naked, so that I didn’t study her face much. I couldn’t evoke her image. She couldn’t look familiar: I must be déjà-vuing, I thought. I probably have a mental picture of her from K.K.’s mind, and from hers. That makes me think she’s familiar.
Having thus handily disposed of the most minor of the mysteries, I opened my eyes again. Back to Kro Kodres. One: not royalty.
Two: he was carrying a message. He’d forgot to tell me who it was for. Maybe for Miss bitchwitch Jadiriyah, who hadn’t give me time to deliver it. I repeated it to make sure I still had it: Hai azul thade cor zorveli nas Yeah: the golden cup is big bones. OK. I still had that. So what?
Three: I’d killed the two Vardors. I glanced over at them. Ugh. Don’t let anybody kid you. A stiff is a stiff, and they’re all bad stuff. True, some are worse than others. Like: these two. Not just that they were gray, and too tall; they were all over blood, and I was not a man who’d seen a lot of blood. As a matter of fact I couldn’t remember having seen any other than my own, in any quantity worth mentioning. Oh—and all that red stuff in the Peter Cushing movies, but I hardly counted that.
I stood up. Well, I thought, I’m in possession of two god riding slooks, food (how could I have forgotten how hungry I was?), water, a good-sized munitions dump—their weapons, Kro Kodres’, and Jadiriyah’s. And clothing: what I wore and, again, the Vardors’ and—hers. She’d departed in the same state she’d been in when I had come belatedly bound to the rescue: bare.
I packed up everything there was, mounted one slook, hung onto the reins of the other, and got the hell away from there.
No, I did not bury them, either. Why should I try to cheat buzzards, jackals, or whatever?
I ate as I rode. An hour or so later I halted, made sure my Arone beasties were all hobbled, and I stretched out. I was asleep in about seventeen seconds.
None of it made any more sense in the morning. As a matter of fact it made less, because I awoke knowing who the Jadiriyah looked like. My subconscious had been ferreting about through my memory banks while I lay asleep, and proudly it produced its
“Brynda,” she murmured.
And she vanished.
6. The girl who was Elizabeth Taylor
I stood there and stared through the spot where Jadiriyah had been. Stupid; she wasn’t coming back. I’d saved her life (or at least saved her from Vardor servitude), not to mention the traditional fate worse than which death isn’t. (That she had apparently not been entirely discommoded by her ravishment is beside the point, surely. It was rape.)
She hadn’t thanked me. She’d just—I reconstructed. Yes, I had it right the first time. She’d just rubbed the ring she’d snatched from me and—disappeared.
So it was a magic ring. So I’m an American, and I don’t believe in magic. Didn’t. Apparently it was time to start.
I had rescued the fair maiden in distress, and not only was she presumably not the daughter of the planetary ruler, she was an ungrateful bitch. And a vanishing witch. And I had thought all damsels in distress were princesses and their saviors became warlords, emperors, king—princes at the very least!
I sat down. (I didn’t decide to. My legs did.) I looked around, and up, and around again. Aros. I had now met two Arones, unless one counted Vardors—I didn’t, and don’t. Kro Kodres had not (at least so I assumed) been a prince or anything of the sort. I wasn’t even certain if the poor guy had been a warrior; maybe he was a courier. Packing a ring belonging to a witch—whose face had seemed vaguely familiar.
I squinted my eyes, then closed them, trying to call up a mental picture of the girl whose face I’d seen so briefly. (And at that, not under the best conditions: it was night, she was dirty, and her hair was a mess.) Besides, she was naked, so that I didn’t study her face much. I couldn’t evoke her image. She couldn’t look familiar: I must be déjà-vuing, I thought. I probably have a mental picture of her from K.K.’s mind, and from hers. That makes me think she’s familiar.
Having thus handily disposed of the most minor of the mysteries, I opened my eyes again. Back to Kro Kodres. One: not royalty.
Two: he was carrying a message. He’d forgot to tell me who it was for. Maybe for Miss bitchwitch Jadiriyah, who hadn’t give me time to deliver it. I repeated it to make sure I still had it: Hai azul thade cor zorveli nas Yeah: the golden cup is big bones. OK. I still had that. So what?
Three: I’d killed the two Vardors. I glanced over at them. Ugh. Don’t let anybody kid you. A stiff is a stiff, and they’re all bad stuff. True, some are worse than others. Like: these two. Not just that they were gray, and too tall; they were all over blood, and I was not a man who’d seen a lot of blood. As a matter of fact I couldn’t remember having seen any other than my own, in any quantity worth mentioning. Oh—and all that red stuff in the Peter Cushing movies, but I hardly counted that.
I stood up. Well, I thought, I’m in possession of two god riding slooks, food (how could I have forgotten how hungry I was?), water, a good-sized munitions dump—their weapons, Kro Kodres’, and Jadiriyah’s. And clothing: what I wore and, again, the Vardors’ and—hers. She’d departed in the same state she’d been in when I had come belatedly bound to the rescue: bare.
I packed up everything there was, mounted one slook, hung onto the reins of the other, and got the hell away from there.
No, I did not bury them, either. Why should I try to cheat buzzards, jackals, or whatever?
I ate as I rode. An hour or so later I halted, made sure my Arone beasties were all hobbled, and I stretched out. I was asleep in about seventeen seconds.
None of it made any more sense in the morning. As a matter of fact it made less, because I awoke knowing who the Jadiriyah looked like. My subconscious had been ferreting about through my memory banks while I lay asleep, and proudly it produced its
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