The Philosophical Strangler(122)
“That’s better,” grumbled the witch. Then she pulled a sewing kit out of her witch’s bag and went to work. The process took quite a while on account of the teeny little stitches Magrit was making, and all the incantations she droned over each and every one. At one point, Wittgenstein lost enough of his fear of the Cat to start whining, but Magrit shut him up right quick.
“You wanna look like Wittgenstein—or Frankenstein?”
She and the Cat started howling. The salamander’s eyes bugged even further, and he hissed with outrage. “That’s Frankenstein’s monster, you ignoramus!”
An instant later, he was squealing. Magrit shook her head sadly. “Oh, look. You made me drop a stitch.”
Magrit and the Cat went off into another round of maniacal cackling. Thereafter, the wretched little beast maintained his own counsel.
After a while, I lost interest and started studying the surroundings.
A “grotto,” I believe I called it. Well, forget that. Now that I had a chance to really examine the place, I saw that the space we were in was much too big to be called anything except a “cavern.” The Mother of All Caverns, to be precise.
Huge—in every dimension. The reason I’d been fooled by those first glimpses was simply because there were peculiar columns all over the place. Those drippy-stone things—you know, what they call something like catamites except there’s no pedophilia involved. And the columns were all veined with that inner-glittering gold-fire substance.
My greed would have been aroused except that even I could tell this wasn’t real gold. Not even fool’s gold. Even from a distance, the stuff had a nasty look to it.
The wizard confirmed my suspicions immediately. He was over by one of the columns poking at the stuff with his staff. Shelyid was standing by his side, leaning against the huge sack.
“No doubt at all, my loyal but stupid apprentice. ’Tis indeed the fell mineral known as overthebrimstone.” He poked it again, his lips pursed with distaste. “A dreadful substance. Magrit will be delighted.”
Magrit must have overheard him. “I want no less than three pounds of it, Zulkeh! That was part of the deal!”
Shelyid sighed. The mage didn’t even have to give him the order. The dwarf opened the sack and disappeared within. A minute or so later he reemerged, clutching a large stoppered jar—what sorcerers call an amphora—and a rock pick. Soon enough he was hard at work, chipping pieces of the stuff into the jar.
Moved by some odd impulse, I wandered over to give him a hand. But Shelyid waved me back.
“Don’t come no closer, Ignace,” he hissed. “Really is nasty stuff. Saps your moral fiber like nothing you ever ran into. And since you don’t have much to begin with, you wouldn’t last more than a few seconds.”
I retreated hastily. Chip, chip, chip. Shelyid muttered: “What does she want it for, anyway?”
Zulkeh had moved back a few feet himself, but was still in hearing range. “Bah!” he oathed. “The vile harridan is the mistress of foety, apprentice. You should know that by now! There is none on earth can match her skills at revenge-work.”
The sorcerer pointed at the jar with his staff. “Not more than a few flakes of that horrid substance, ground into powder and mixed with an enemy’s food or drink, will do the trick. Transform their venial sins into mortal ones, their mortal sins into no mere turn of phrase. Within a fortnight, the glutton will be dead of gluttony, the miser of starvation, the envious of a burst spleen. Dire stuff, indeed!”
Still sewing, Magrit cackled. “And you should see what it does to lechers! According to the books, anyway. Never used the stuff before, myself. Can’t get it anywhere except here, in the Place Even Worse Than Hell. Half the reason I agreed to come.”
That reminder of how dangerous the place was made me look for Jenny and Angela. To my relief, they weren’t nosing around like they usually would be. Instead, they were sitting cross-legged next to Greyboar and Gwendolyn, chattering away like magpies.
That sight didn’t bring much relief, however. Gloomily, I was quite certain that they were exchanging stories about me with Gwendolyn. You know the kind of stories. The ones women swap about their menfolk, running along the theme of: Yeah, He’s No Good But There’s Hope For Him And We’ll See To It, We Will.
Sigh. I could see it coming, a mile away. The Great Ignace Rehabilitation Project. The cheerful eager smile on Greyboar’s face confirmed it, along with the way he was nodding his head like a witless orangutan. You know the one. The smile reformed sinners get around their womenfolk when the ladies are chattering away on the theme of One Down, One To Go.