Myth 13 - Myth Alliances, Asprin, Robert [microsoft ebook reader TXT] 📗

as one of the outfits he called his “casual Friday” wear, though why a day of the week should make a difference in how one dressed I'd never worked out. A pale-​green shirt open at the collar blended nicely with a pair of trousers the color of a sweet I had come to like called “butterscotch.” His scaly, green, clawed feet bore no adornment and needed none. He'd tried to educate me about dress sense, but it was really Bunny who had taught me how not to look so much like a...Klahd.

He looked startled as he glanced our way. It had been a while since the last time, and I was the one who was re?sponsible for our parting. But I thought that our mission was of sufficient importance to interrupt my self-​imposed exile, and I knew Aahz would feel the same urgency.

“You want me to do what?” Aahz gasped, spitting a mouth?ful of beer clear across the open dance floor. The tuba player gave him a chiding glance and turned his instrument over to empty it. “Ten female Pervects? A dimension full of Wuhses? The Deveels cheated them out of their last dime, and the Pervects got it back for them? And now they want us to throw the Pervects out? Mmm, mmm.”

He slammed his mug down. I recoiled slightly at the vi?olence of the gesture. His lips twisted. His shoulders started to heave.

“Mmm mmm mmm. Ha ha ha ha. HAWHAWHAW-​HAWHAW! HAWHAWHAWHAWHAW!”

He laughed until the building rang with the sound of his voice. The other patrons watched him nervously as he slapped me on the back, stood up, slipped to his knees, and slid down the trestle of the table until he was sitting on the floor laughing.

Soon, he recovered and climbed up to his feet again. He took my hand in a crushing grip.

“Aw, part Ñ Skeeve,” he gasped, wiping tears from his yellow eyes. “I've missed you, kid. That is one of the best jokes I've heard in months. Really did me good. Fraulein!” He held up a hand and snapped his fingers. “A round for my friends!”

“But I'm serious,” I insisted, as a Deveel maiden whose pointed tail stuck out beneath the frills of a tight dirndl skirt slapped a mug into my palm and held out her own for payment. I felt in my belt pouch for a coin.

Aahz drank deeply from his own mug. “No, you're not, kid. Nobody is going to march into a dimension taken over by Pervects and politely ask them to leave. At least, I'm not. That would be as pointless an exercise as asking a shark to give back the arm he just chewed off your shoulder.”

“What's a shark?” I asked.

Aahz grinned, but there was a touch of sadness in his expression. “Just like old times, huh, kid? Well, if you're serious about it and you really want my advice, you'll scratch this one. I wouldn't do it for all the tea in China, and don't ask me where China is. I'm not in charge of your education any more. You don't really need me to explain to you why this is a bad idea. If you've already made up your mind to go and you're talking to me pro forma, good luck. Just make sure you leave burial instructions with Tananda, okay? I'll miss you. Nice to see you, Bunny. Tell your un?cle I said 'Hi.' Sorry, Curly,” he turned to Wensley, “but when you guys grow the backbone to take care of this on your own you'll find it a lot easier than you think.”

“I'm afraid your friend didn't comprehend the serious nature of our... situation,” Wensley bleated in my ear as we left the beer garden.

“I think he understood it just fine,” I replied, glumly.

Now that I'd said it out loud it did sound like a suicide mission, and it would be one, without the aid of someone who really understood the way Pervects thought. I'd already tried to get in touch with Pookie, a female Pervect who'd worked with us before, but she was off on a mission with an?other one-​time associate named Spider and couldn't be reached. Most likely she'd give us the same advice Aahz had: give up and let the Pervect Ten leave when they felt like it. The Wuhses certainly weren't worse off than when they'd arrived, but I agreed with Wensley that it was better to stand on your own. Pareley deserved to be freed from their yoke.

I felt in my belt pouch for the D-​hopper, but to tell the truth I wasn't ready to go back to Klah yet. I didn't have an idea how to proceed. Wensley looked at me with those big sad eyes of his. I just couldn't let him down.

Bunny hadn't said a word. She probably agreed with Aahz. That made me all the more resolute to figure out a way to solve Wensley's problem. That would show every?one that I didn't need a dozen shoulders to lean on, that I could take care of a sticky situation on my own.

“As long as we're here, we may as well get some lunch,” I decided, drawing inspiration from the dusty, aromatic air. “It would be nice to have a change from home cooking.”

Bunny smiled. “How about kebabs at Ali Ke-​Bob's?”

I crooked my elbow so she could put a hand through it. “Sounds delicious. How about you, Wensley?”

“Well,” our guest