Chapter Five: The Announcement (cont.)
Elsewhere, the cloaked woman rounded yet another clump of bushes and stopped suddenly. Before her, at a small table pleasantly located beneath a tree and set for two, Lala and Philodim sat together on the far side.
The boy held an extremely sharp-looking dagger to the blindfolded woman's neck.
"So," he said pleasantly. "It is down to you; and it is down to me."
The hooded woman's eyes flickered once, before she walked closer to the table.
"By all means, if you wish her dead," the small boy said, "come closer."
The woman in red spread her hands and slowed down. "Let's talk about this."
"There's nothing to talk about. You're trying to kidnap what I've rightfully stolen. And you're killing her." He pushed the point of the dagger to Lala's carotid artery. She tilted her head up and away, desperately trying to escape the prick.
Amelia paused. "I'm not quite sure about the dialogue in the next bit," she apologized, "but I'll do the best I can."
"That's quite all right," Sylphiel accepted.
"Can't we work something out?"
"I doubt it, oni -- oneechan. You're obviously planning to hold the Princess for ransom, and my plans depend on killing her."
"Then we are at an impasse."
"It appears so. I couldn't beat you in a physical battle, and you're no match for my brains."
"You're so smart, then?"
"Smart? Let me put it this way; have you ever heard of Shazard Lugandi? Big Mom? Rei Magnus? Mind Healer Yui?"
"Ye - es... "
"Morons."
"HEY!" Gourry protested.
"I don't expect we're supposed to pay attention to what the villain says," Sylphiel offered, nonplussed.
"Oh -- that's right!" Amelia said. "Her full name is Yui Gabriev, isn't it?"
"Of course!"
"Well, Mother didn't mean that Mind Healer Yui was stupid, she meant to say that my uncle Philodim was a jerk! Which he was. Mother said that one of the important things to know in life was that her younger brother Philodim Brezirao Ragnarokkthrasir was a jerk, and another was to never say so where he could find out about it, unless you were her, because it would be more of a bother to slap her down than he'd want to take."
"What were some of the other important things?" Sylphiel asked.
"Um... a lot of stuff about her relations. A couple of things about Daddy's. Insulting a girl's figure is punishable by death."
Lina nodded very firmly.
"Never wave irresistible temptation in front of a bakegitsune, youko, or other kind of fox spirit, because the thought of resisting won't even speculate about the possibility of crossing their mind. Always double-check and triple-check your work. Don't argue with your waiter until the bill has arrived. You should never judge a book by its cover. Destructive potential is Inversely proportional to the height of the person responsible."
Zelgadis chuckled. Everyone else looked blank.
"A man may smile and smile and be a villain. Do the best you can with what you've got. Always-always-always make a backup. Don't expect a cat to follow orders. Take a knife to a fist fight. Take a sword to a knife fight. Take a juu to a sword fight. Stay out of a juu fight."
"What's a juu?" Sylphiel asked.
"You point it and it throws sling bullets at you harder than a crossbow shoots bolts and that Ohta person likes them, Oneechan said Mother said. Never get in a martial arts war with some person called Ranma; a knife, attrition, or technowar with the Rabbit General Bun-Bun; a sword war with the hitokiri Battousai -- whomever he or she is; a juu war with either Saeba Ryou or someone with the alias Jigen Daisuke; or a magic war with some legendary Miprossian heroine the Akage Hime."
"Who's that?" Zelgadis asked.
"Oh, she was the greatest sorceress ever," Gourry said cheerfully.
Lina snorted.
"The Chibas, the Spenglers, and the fon-dem Gabrievs throw easily englamoured sons, but that doesn't mean they'll stay englamoured. Never threaten the life of Yukimura Keiko -- I don't know who that is either. Always be true to yourself and the rest will follow of its own accord. Never wear a shirt the general color of your blood when exploring somewhere new and possibly dangerous. There are certain things Daddy doesn't really need to know, because they'll just upset him. Don't trust Shazard Lugandi's inventions."
"Hear, hear," Lina said.
"Look under things, on top of things, and behind things. Pick up anything not obviously claimed that isn't nailed down; if it can be pried up, it isn't nailed down. Wear clean underwear, brush after meals, and remember that nothing, nothing, is as it seems. Life's too short to waste worrying about the inevitable -- oh, wait, that was Riff."
"Who's Riff?" Gourry asked.
"Oh, someone I met once when I was under a couple of spells back when I was really little. Standardsoft is really slow. Take responsibility for your own actions. It's never the Lovely Angels' fault; but stay well out of their way anyway. No man is an island, but Maryam's son from Smallville as spilt rosehip tea on Nanya-the-baxter's white festingday dress is going to try his best to be."
Zelgadis choked.
"Back up thoroughly and often. Never give up on your dreams. Always stand up for what's right. Never mess with the mommy. Call no one happy until the last day of their life has come and gone unclouded; only the dead feel no pain. Be careful with alcohol. The larger the group of people, the stupider it is. Never get between Mother and her morning Turkish coffee. And some others which will show up in the story if I can ever get back to it... "
"But you were the one -- " Gourry began.
Amelia slid down and kicked him under the table.
"You've heard of Shazard Lugandi? Big Mom? Rei Magnus? Mind Healer Yui?"
"Ye - es... "
"Morons."
"I see." The woman in cobalt thought for a moment. "Shall I challenge you to a battle of wits, then?"
"For the Princess?"
Nod.
"To the death?"
Nod.
"I accept." The boy resheathed his dagger. Lala breathed a sigh of relief.
The woman in red walked up to them, removed a tube from one of her many pouches, and pulled out its stopper, offering it to the small figure in violet. "Inhale this, but do not touch."
The boy leaned over and sniffed. "I smell nothing."
"What you do not smell is called iocaine powder. It is odorless, tasteless, magic-null, dissolves instantly in water, and is among the more deadly poisons known to mankind." She took the two goblets from the table and then turned around, shielding them with her body as she busied herself with them. After a moment, she turned and set them back on the table; one in front of her, one before her diminutive opponent. "Where is the poison? The battle of wits has begun. It ends when we both drink and find out who is right... and who is dead."
"Well, now," the boy said, rubbing his hands, eyes bright. "Only a great fool would choose what he was given. I am not a great fool, so I can clearly not choose the wine in front of you." He paused. "But you must have known I was not a great fool -- you would have counted on it -- so I can clearly not choose the wine in front of me! Hmmm... "
"Wait a moment, Amelia," Lina interrupted. "Haven't you got that backwards?"
"Uh-uh. That's the way Mother said it. I remember because it was so weird."
"But it doesn't make sense," Zelgadis agreed with the sorceress. "It would make sense if it were the other way around."
"It does, so, make sense," Gourry contradicted.
"How so?" Lina demanded.
"See, if he were stupid, she'd put it in his cup. But he isn't, so it would be in the other cup. But she might know all that -- it's called ahead-step thinking, and Dad told me all about it. Ahead-step thinking is thinking that if you hit the waiter THEN he might not bring you food, or if the leader of some people says something rude and you toss a spell at him THEN all his people will be mad at you, which is a problem if you want something from them.
"So he's using ahead-step thinking to think that she's using ahead-step thinking, and that's the part where I always get all confused, because I never was very good at ahead-step thinking, even though Dad and Mom are really good at it. But it's all right and I get along fine and don't worry, even though I can't do it right, especially since Lina never uses ahead-step thinking, either!" He smiled radiantly.
"Very true," Zelgadis said. "If she did, we might never have had the wonderful experience of running for the hills with the entire population of a recently Dragon Slaved village hot on our heels."
"Gee, that would be too bad."
Lina hastily changed her intentions from Doing Something Annoying And Probably Painful To Zelgadis to Thonking Her Head Into The Table At Yet Another Example Of Total Gourry Cluelessness, in which latter she was joined by Amelia.
"So," the flame-haired sorceress said, wiping a bit of spilt gravy off her forehead with one of the few remaining clean spots of her napkin, "that was clear as mud. I don't suppose you can tell us where the poison is while you're about it?"
"Uh... the poison's in the potion in the chalice in the palace?"
This time she just dropped her head into the heel of her hand.
"What palace?" Amelia said, blinking.
"It still doesn't make sense," Zelgadis groused.
"Ah, excuse me," Sylphiel said diffidently, "but I think you left a little out at the beginning. I think it's supposed to go like this... "
"But it's so simple! All I have to do is divine from what I know of you: are you the sort of m -- woman who would put the poison in her own goblet or her enemy's? Now, a clever person would put the poison in her own goblet, knowing that only a great fool would reach for what he was given. I am not a great fool, so I can clearly not choose the wine in front of you. But you must have known I was not a great fool -- you would have counted on it -- so I can clearly not choose the wine in front of me!"
"You've made your decision, then?" the woman in maroon asked.
"Not remotely!"
"That's it!" Amelia yelped. "That's exactly the way Mother said it! How in the world did you know?"
"Well... my grandfather used to tell me a story that sounded sort of like this, about a princess bride... and that's what the nasty little man said in his story."
"Wow, that's amazing. I wonder if your grandfather knew Mother or something. Anyway, that reminded me how the rest went, so... "
"Not remotely!" He smiled happily. "Because iocaine, you know, is sold out of the free ports, and everyone knows that the free ports are entirely populated with criminals. And criminals are used to having people not trust them, as I am not trusted by you, so I can clearly not choose the wine in front of you!"
"Actually," Lina contradicted, "swindlers are used to people trusting them. It makes it so much easier to swindle them."
"How do you know so much about swindlers, Lina-san?" Amelia asked.
"My aunt's relation-of-some-sort-or-another visited when I was little and told me all about them -- of the people living in the free ports across the Ihrine, half of them are smugglers and most of the rest are swindlers. And if they swindle money out of other people, that makes them fair game for him to swindle."
Amelia and Sylphiel blinked.
"I suppose," Sylphiel murmured in Gourry's general direction (he, fortunately for the patience of the company, didn't hear her), "it makes more sense than Ohsto-Ralia, wherever that is."
"Truly," the cloaked woman murmured admiringly, "you have a dizzying intellect."
"Wait till I get going!" Philodim paused. "Where was I?"
"The free ports."
"Oh, yes. The free ports! And you must have suspected I would know of the powder's origins, so I can clearly not choose the wine in front of me."
"You're just stalling now," the woman in crimson told him.
"You'd like to think that, wouldn't you!" the boy spat. "You've beaten my heroine, so you must be insanely lucky or a hero yourself. You could have put the poison in your own goblet, trusting to your heroine's luck to save you, so I can clearly not choose the wine in front of you. But you've also beaten my sorceress, and to do that you must have studied, and in your studies you would have learned that humans are mortal, so you would have put the poison as far from yourself as possible, so I can clearly not choose the wine in front of me!"
"You're trying to trick me. It won't work."
"It HAS worked, oneechan! You've given everything away! I know where the poison is!"
"Then make your choice." The masked woman's voice was colder than the winter gales that sweep north of Sairaag.
"I do, and I choose -- what in the world can that be?" He pointed.
The masked woman spun and stared in the indicated direction. Philodim quickly switched the goblets.
"I see nothing," the woman in cobalt said, twisting herself back around.
"Probably just my eyes playing tricks on me," the boy shrugged, eyes bright. A giggle escaped his lips.
"What's so funny?" the woman asked.
"I'll tell you later, oneechan. Now, let's drink. Me from my glass, and you from yours."
The hooded woman twitched her scarf down, revealing a pointed chin and a narrow gash of a mouth that, while well enough formed, made no pretense to surpassing beauty.
They drank.
She pulled the scarf back up over her nose. "You have guessed wrong."
Philodim exploded into high-pitched giggles. "You only think I guessed wrong -- that's what's so funny! I switched cups when your back was turned! You fell into one of the classic blunders! The most famous, of course, is 'Never get involved in a land war in the Alliance of Coastal Cities!' But only slightly well known is this: 'Never go up against a Maha'asura when death is on the line!' Kukukukukukuku! Kukuk -- "
He abruptly fell over dead.
"What?!" Zelgadis said.
"I can't help it," Amelia protested, "that's what he did."
"Then," Gourry, who had been looking blanker and blanker during the whole I-can-clearly-not-choose-this-or-that-wine discussion, said, "he drank the wine with the poison in it after all?"
"He drank poisoned wine, yes," Sylphiel said.
"But how did the lady with the mask know he'd switched them?"
"Oh, come on." Lina rolled her eyes. "'What in the world can that be?' Like it wasn't obvious?"
"So what was it?"
Lina bonked her head against the table. (Fortunately for her hair, it was the place on which she'd dropped her napkin.)
"It was a red herring," Sylphiel said firmly.
"Oh, yes. Those turn invisible really quickly. My great-uncle Colly nearly caught one once that was as long as my leg, but it snapped the line and vanished before anyone else on the boat could see it."
Lina bonked her head again.
"But I thought a herring was a dinky little fish," Amelia said, holding her thumb and forefinger apart to demonstrate.
"That's a normal herring," Gourry told her. "Red herrings come in all shapes and sizes and can do all sorts of things. We told my mother's sister all about them when she came to visit, back when I was three or so, and she said they sounded almost as powerful as the dread illess goodtimes."
"The what?" Sylphiel said.
"The dread illness goodtimes. Only golems and automata and thinking gadgets can get it, and it's a very powerful illness. It destroys their brains and breaks all your dishes and fries any pet mice they may have and throws a dead horse's head in your bed -- "
"As opposed to a live horse's head?" Lina murmured.
" -- and causes plague and havoc and war and makes noise outside your neighbors' windows at the third watch of the night and sings all your favorite songs very loudly and summons Pauly Shore whoever that is into your automata and makes messes all over the kitchen and has unlawful carnal relations with your grandmother and it doesn't even matter if your grandmother's dead because the terrible powers of goodtimes are so strong that it'll bring her back on purpose to do perverted things to her and -- Zelgadis, why are you laughing?"
"Oh... oh... oh... " Zelgadis whooped, doubling over. "Oh... my... " He clutched his stomach, apparently not trusting it to stay in one piece.
Lina stared at him, at Gourry, and then burst into a fit of giggling herself. (It seemed less painful than bonking her head against the table again.)
"And this all happened when you were three?" Sylphiel asked. "How can you remember it so well, Gourry-sama?"
The other two girls gave him equally inquisitive looks.
"Because Dad was home then, and he laughed even harder than Zelgadis did just now, and I never did understand exactly why. I think it has to do with where he came from."
"Where did he come from?" Lina asked.
Gourry looked clueless. Especially clueless, that is. "I'm not quite sure. He fell out of nowhere through Mom's roof and smashed one of the kitchen chairs to kindling when he landed. He was all hurt and bonkers and stuff, so Mom healed him, and then she kept him."
"How romantic!" Amelia enthused.
The other two girls gave her weird looks.
Zelgadis managed to pull himself up, sort of.
In one swift movement, the cloaked woman jerked Lala to her feet and ripped the blindfold from her head. The blonde stared down at her rescuer wonderingly.
"So all the time, it was your own cup that was poisoned."
"They were both poisoned," the hooded woman said brusquely. "I've spent the last few years building up a resistance to iocaine powder."
"Sneaky," Lina said admiringly.
"Mitradatis he died old," Zelgadis quoted, attempting not to snort in the middle.
"Someone has defeated themself," Rezo declared, straightening up from the Amelia-shaped crater at the foot of the bluff. "There will be great suffering in Yamainu if she dies."
"If Amelia dies?" Gourry blinked.
"He means Lala, Gourry-sama."
The mention of tall-blind-and-purple had apparently finally pulled Zelgadis out of his uncharacteristic laughing fit. His eyes narrowed.
"Oh, I forgot to say that the cloaked woman caught Lala by the hand and they started running off," Amelia quickly said.
Some distance away, the cloaked woman half-dropped Lala onto a nearby boulder. "Catch your breath."
"If you'll release me, whatever you ask for ransom, you'll get it," Lala told her. "I promise you!"
The woman in cobalt laughed. "And what is that worth? The promise of a landed woman... very funny, Denka."
Lala sucked in a great gulp of air. "I was giving you a chance. There is no greater seeker than Akahoushi Rezo, prince of Ookami. He can track a piece off the top of the Staff of the Gods through half of recorded history; he can track you."
"You believe your 'dearest love' will save you?"
"He's not my dearest love," the blonde denied, "and yes, he will save me. That I know."
"You admit you do not love your fiance?" The other woman's tone was reflective.
"He knows I do not love him."
"Are not capable of love, is what you mean." Biting, now.
"I have loved -- have cared about someone -- more deeply than a killer like yourself could ever dream."
The woman in crimson slapped her.
Lala gasped.
"That was a warning, Denka. Next time, it won't be anything so gentle. Where I come from, there are penalties when someone lies to a woman."
"And rightly so," Lina mumbled.
Rezo raised his hands from the corpse under the tree -- which had, in death, taken on all the years its owner had never permitted it to wear in life, and was now a shrivelled, withered thing guaranteed to turn the stomach of all but the most hardened.
"Iocaine," he said. "I'd bet my life on it. And there are the Princess's footprints. She is alive -- or was an hour ago. If she is otherwise when I find her, I shall be very Put Out."
"Don't sound so much like him," Lina joked. "You're scaring me."
"It's all right," Gourry said, patting her on the back. "It's just a story. We're all right here."
Mistress Heel-of-the-hand, please let me introduce you to Mistress Forehead.
Farther north and several ridges over, along the edge of a deep ravine, Lala and the red-clad woman were still running. The masked woman stopped abruptly, nearly dropping the blonde flat on her face -- or, more likely, her attributes. "Rest, Denka."
"Now I know who you are!" Lala declared in ringing tones. "Your cruelty reveals everything: you're the Dread Pirate Emeraldas, admit it!"
"With pride." Emeraldas bowed mockingly. "What may I do for you?"
"You can die slowly, cut into a thousand pieces."
"So harsh, Denka? What have I done?"
Lala had thought that her heart could grow no colder than it had when she finally emerged from her room five years ago. Now she knew that she had been wrong.
"You killed the person most important to me."
"It's possible," Emeraldas shrugged. "I've killed many people. What was this important person of yours like? Another prince? Ugly... rich... passionless?"
"No," Lala snapped. "A farmhand. Poor. Poor and full of fire. Fairly self-centered -- "
Zelgadis, Sylphiel, and Gourry nodded.
" -- and short-tempered -- "
They nodded again.
" -- and seldom thinking ahead -- "
They nodded again.
" -- and often greedy -- "
They nodded again.
" -- and so confident as to be practically arrogant -- "
They nodded again.
" -- slight of stature and of figure -- "
They nodded again. (Lina tried to shoot glares of death in four directions at once and ended up aiming at a spot over Sylphiel's left ear.)
" -- stubborn -- "
They nodded again.
" -- sort of perverse -- "
They nodded again.
" -- tricking people with her charm -- "
They nodded again.
" -- looking down on anyone weaker -- "
They nodded again. (Smoke began to rise from a spot on the inn's common room's wall directly behind and slightly above Sylphiel's left ear.)
"Quite the paragon," Emeraldas commented irritably.
"Oh, yes," Lala said, mind distant. "I needed her. More than anything. She had great carnelian eyes that kindled their own fire -- "
"Now that," Lina said, "is a flattering description."
"No it isn't," Gourry contradicted. "It's true."
Zelgadis and Sylphiel blinked.
Lina, uncertain whether to clobber Gourry for the implied insult or smile at him for the veiled compliment, settled for giving him a dirty look.
" -- and hair the color of the cliffsides of Hellofaplacetoloseacow Canyon."
Sylphiel swallowed something that was trying to be a hysterical giggle. Lina shot both her and Amelia more dirty looks.
"Very poetic," Emeraldas said dryly.
This time Lala couldn't miss the tone. She glared at the shorter woman. "On the high seas, your ship attacked. The Dread Pirate Emeraldas never takes prisoners."
The woman in crimson shrugged. "I can't afford to make exceptions. I mean, once word leaks out that a pirate has gone soft, people begin to disobey you and it's nothing but work, work, work all the time."
"You mock my pain!"
"Life is pain, Denka!" Emeraldas shot back. "Anyone who says otherwise is selling something." She walked over to the lip of the nearby ravine and looked across it. "I think I remember this farmhand of yours. About five years ago, right?"
Lala nodded; then, realizing the shorter woman couldn't see it, made a noise of agreement.
"Does it bother you to hear?"
"Nothing you can say would upset me."
"She died well," Emeraldas said. "That should please you. No sobbing, no pleas for mercy -- she just said: look. 'Look, I need to live.'
"It was the 'look' that caught my memory," she continued. "I asked why, and she said 'Ishin-denshin.' And then she spoke of a woman of surpassing loveliness; not the brightest wick of the bunch, perhaps, but loyal with the simple uncomplicated loyalty of an innocent, whose heart was the deepest and truest ever encountered." Her voice turned venemous. "I can only assume she meant you. You should bless me for destroying her before she found out what you really are."
"What do you mean?" Lala demanded.
"Faithfulness, madam, she spoke of, your enduring faithfulness!" The blue-clad woman paced back and forth along the ravine's lip in short, jerky bursts. "You who only awaited her return to take off on a career of adventuring! When you found out she was dead, did you affiance yourself to your 'prince' that same hour, or did you wait an entire week out of respect for the dead?"
"You mocked me once. Never do it again," Lala spat. "I died that day."
Emeraldas turned sharply, noting a line of horses -- Rezo's party, had she but known it -- along the crest of a ridge some ripples away.
"You can die too for all I care," Lala hissed, and shoved the other woman, overbalancing her and sending her over the edge.
And as the smaller woman tumbled pell-mell down the steep slope of the ravine, her words drifted up: "Lala... you... idiot... "
"Sonna, Lina," the blonde whispered, "what have I done?"
And she threw herself over the ravine's brink.
"Lala, you idiot!" Lina said. "You don't just go and throw yourself down a cliff with no idea how you're going to get back up! I don't think even Gourry would do something like that!"
"Uh... " Gourry said.
"But, Lina-san," Amelia said, "didn't we do just that when... "
"That," Lina said with sublime indifference to details, "was different."
"Aah... itai.... yow... ooh..." the cloaked woman gasped, rolling over and over downhill. Her hood came off, letting a flood of burnished copper hair out where it could snag in the few bushes that clung to the slope and generally get in the way.
"Ooh... ow... yow... itaiiiii.... " Lala, being taller, was finding all sorts of more numerous interesting things to bonk into on the way down. Her left hair-bun was in the process of falling apart.
"Gyah... yowf... ooh... " One of the bushes snatched off Lina's half-mask; the terrain had already clawed the white scarf down past her chin. She rolled a little more and came to a stop on the ravine's grassy floor.
"Ooh... kyaa... mmph... ahh... " Lala's hair was completely down by now, and in a tumble of golden hair and pink taffeta she rolled four yards past Lina and ended up flat on her back.
Lina crawled over to her. "Are you all right?"
"You're alive," Lala whispered. "You're ALIVE! If you want, I think I could fly." She caught Lina into a fierce, crushing hug, reassuring herself that the redhead was really there.
"I told you I'd always come for you," Lina said, leaning on one elbow. "Why didn't you wait?"
"Well... You were dead."
Lina shook her head. "Death cannot stop Ishin-denshin; never and always touching and touched.... the most it can ever do is delay it for a while."
"I will never doubt again."
"There will never be a need," Lina promised, taking her in an embrace that was no less sincere for its gentleness.
Lala felt the smaller woman's head on her shoulder and thought :This is a good thing. Go away, World -- :
"Hold it, hold it, hold it!" Zelgadis, Lina, and, oddly enough, Sylphiel, were all protesting.
"Enough reunion, already!" Lina's cheeks were flushed. "We get the picture."
"It seems sort of private... " Sylphiel said hesitantly.
But Zelgadis was the most vocal. "They're hugging again. And talking about their feelings. Hurry up and get back to the Rezo stuff."
Amelia shrugged. "You're obsessed. I'll humor you."
After a moment of looking for all the world like some bizarre bloodhound sniffing out his prey, Rezo smiled. "She must have seen us and panicked, which accounts for her error. Now that they cannot fly, unless I am wrong -- and I am never wrong -- they are headed dead into the Fire Swamp."
"Why couldn't they fly?" Zelgadis wondered.
"It's scary," Gourry told him.
"That's not a reason," Lina groused. "If I can drag you along, that other Lina could drag Lala."
"Okay," Lina said some time later. "This will be much too much of a pain to climb out of, so I'll just levitate us out and then -- " A very peculiar look crossed her face. "It can't already be... dammit, Oneesama said stress could bring it on early, and if what I've been going through for the past week isn't stress, I don't know what is."
"Battling Shabranigdu?" Zelgadis said.
"Nearly getting killed by an insane copy of Rezo?" Sylphiel said.
"That mess with the annoying brat and the big black thing and the crystal stair?" Gourry said.
"Actually, that did," Lina grumbled. "The day after, a whole week early and with especially awful cramps... " She blushed a flaming red. "We are NOT having this conversation."
Equally blushing, Zelgadis and Gourry nodded firmly. (Amelia had been blushing for some time, ever since she recalled that half of her audience was male.)
"Why don't you skip to the Fire Swamp," Sylphiel suggested, apparently the only unfazed one of the five. "That seems interesting."
"They're almost on us!" Lala gasped, pointing at horsemen on the very brink, as it seemed, of their ravine, several hundred yards behind them. She wasn't quite sure how she had gone from abductee to fugitive, but in this sort of situation she had long since decided that the best thing to do was not even to try to think about wherefores, but to trust Lina and leave all the thinking to her.
"That works great," Gourry agreed.
Sylphiel and Zelgadis gave him weird looks.
"Don't worry," Lina said, half-pulling Lala towards the thick trees filling the ravine shortly before them. "Before they can get down here, we'll be safe in the Fire Swamp."
Lala blinked. "Is that some meaning of 'safe' everyone knows but me?"
"Oh, never mind safe," Lina growled. "Come on. I didn't cross half the world to lose you now."
"We'll never survive," Lala predicted.
"Nonsense. You're only saying that because no one ever has."
"That sounds like Lina, all right," Zelgadis said.
"Yes, but I don't think that this Lina is that much like our Lina."
"Whyever not, Sylphiel?" Lina asked.
"I... just don't."
The trees of the Fire Swamp grew thickly enough to make it much darker inside. Creeper vines hung in festoons and garlands overhead; earth clung to tree roots and spread, so that mucky patches were few and far between. It was unseasonably, uncomfortably warm, and there was a noticeable, heavy, alive smell.
A thousand years and more ago, the Ookami Channel (or Channel of Yamainu, whatever) had been a deep river valley. Then the sea had risen or the land had fallen or both, drowning the valley up to its terrible cliffs (which had fallen in on the western -- Yamainu -- side in the aftershocks of that same cataclysm and crumbled to a manageable slope since) and flooding the volcanic terrain of the river's headwaters, creating the Fire Swamp to be an eternal bone of contention between the two nations. (Ookami insisted it belonged to Yamainu, and Yamainu was equally convinced that it was Ookami's headache.) It sort of messily blurred into the channel, except for where one long spur of land from the Ookami side stuck out into the sea, wooded with larches and possessed of several nice caves that were a smuggler's paradise.
"What's with all the description?" Lina demanded.
"It's to help you visualize the place they're going through," Amelia said.
"It's nasty, damp, dark, and hot. What more do you need to say?"
Lina had drawn her sword and was whacking low-hanging vines and stray branches out of her friend's way. "Come to think of it, it's not that bad."
Lala gave her an incredulous look.
"Well, I'm not saying I'd like to build a summer home here, but the trees are actually quite lovely."
There was an odd popping sound from the piece of ground right before Lala.
As the blonde stepped forward, a gout of fire spurted up right next to her, setting her gown alight. She yelped and jumped aside, frantically beating at the pink cloth.
Lina calmly knelt and helped smother the flames with more of the gown's skirt. "Well, now, that was a bit of an adventure. Singed a bit, were you?"
Lala dumbly shook her head. "You?"
The redhead shook her head in turn, offering Lala a hand up and continuing on their way.
There was another popping sound. With an "oof," Lina swung her larger and heavier friend out of the way as another flamespout shot off and then died. "Well, one thing I will say: the Fire Swamp certainly does keep you on your toes."
"Next time," Lala told her, "I'm doing that. I'm going to be your protector, after all."
Lina blinked. "I don't need a protector. If anything, you do."
"Uh-uh. I let you out of my sight, and you went off and died, even if you didn't. So I'm going to protect you, no matter what anyone thinks, even you, or what did I spend all that time training for?"
"That's right," Gourry said firmly.
"You can protect me if it makes you feel better," the blonde offered.
Lina, recognizing an orihalcon wall when she ran into one, shrugged. "This will all soon be just a happy memory." She whacked through a curtain of vines blocking their way. "Once we get through this, Emeraldas' ship, the Queen Emeraldas II, is banked in a cove at the far end. And I, as you know, am Emeraldas."
"But how is that possible," Lala marveled, "when she's been marauding for twenty years, and you only left me five years ago?"
"I myself," the redhead grinned -- and her grin was one of stunning charm -- "am often surprised at life's little quirks."
"That's flattering, too," Lina approved.
"Well, that part could be taken as applying to you," Sylphiel said, "but in general you really shouldn't think Amelia-san's mother was talking about you."
"Shush!"
"You see, the part about saying 'look' was true. It intrigued her, I think, as did my descriptions of your... um... personality. Finally she seemed to decide something; she said 'All right, Lina. I've never had a maid; you can try if you like. Most likely I'll kill you in the morning.'
"For three years she said that. 'Good night, Lina; good work; sleep well; I'll most likely kill you in the morning.'"
"It must have been terrible," Lala sympathized.
"Actually, it wasn't bad at all. You should have been there. It was a fine time for me; I was learning to fence, fight, cast high-level spells -- including the Dragon Slave -- anything anyone would teach me. Fresh air, good exercise; especially after I pointed out to her when she was feeling bored that it made much more sense to hunt down other pirates. It'd be more of a challenge, and that's where the money is anyway, particularly if you raid their strongholds... "
"I suppose that's better than preying on innocent people," Sylphiel said, "but it isn't very nice to rob other people, is it?"
Lina rolled her eyes. "Bad guys don't have rights."
"Everyone has rights."
"Even Hellmaster?"
"Interesting as this discussion of comparative morality is," Zelgadis said, "can you have it some other time? I want to hear the story."
"Emeraldas and I eventually became sort of friends," she continued, "and her first mate was very friendly. That is to say, sometimes he taught me all sorts of important things, sometimes he was a general pain in the ass, and sometimes he flirted with me; I think he did it just to be annoying."
Lala gritted her teeth.
Lina looked at her. "Whatever -- oh." She paused for a moment. "Look, he was my second-best friend, or maybe my third-best friend or something, but it was nothing like having you around. I, um, missed you." Her cheeks were flaming. "Anyway, it was about a year ago that It happened."
"What?" Lala asked. "Go on."
"Well, Emeraldas had grown so rich that she wanted to retire. She called me into her cabin and told me that she had a secret to tell me. 'I am not,' she said, 'the real Dread Pirate Emeraldas. My name is Alexa-Lasthenia Maetel Lum. I inherited this ship from the previous Dread Pirate Emeraldas, just as you will inherit it from me.
" 'The woman before me was not the real Dread Pirate Emeraldas either -- her name was Luna the Lesser of the Clan Inverse, and I'd originally meant to drop you off with her before I realized how interesting you were.' " Lina winced.
Lina winced.
" 'The real Dread Pirate Emeraldas has been retired for fifteen years and living like a queen in Sailoon, and she borrowed the name from the legendary Space Pirate Emeraldas anyway. Now I shall leave you the name, the ship, and the reputation, and go settle down on a deserted island, hunt down door-to-door salesmen, and try to talk your sister into moving in with me.' "
"And what?" Zelgadis said.
"Yes, the door-to-door salesmen part sounded weird to me too," Amelia said. "Mother said all you needed to do to keep THEM away was to put up a slime-dripping fence with glowing-eyed skulls on very sharp stakes, but that the Huntress always did like to play with her food, and that the real problem was telemarketers. The Rabbit General Bun-Bun devotes a fair portion of his time to attempts to exterminate them."
"That's not what I meant," Zelgadis muttered.
"Amelia," Lina said, ignoring the chimera, "she isn't meant to be Las, is she?"
"Who's Las?" the princess asked.
"A friend of Oneesama's. She was tall, and, um, built," Lina's hands descried an hourglass shape -- "tanned, with silvery hair she kept tinting different colors -- it was silvery-pink one week, silvery-cyan the next, silvery-gilt the week after that -- she drank a lot, wore skimpy clothing, smoked these little thin cigars, flirted with everyone -- including my uncle and my aunt and me and even Oneesama -- I think she did it to keep in practice -- and was really really good at black magic. She taught me the Dragon Slave because black magic wasn't really Oneesama's specialty, and I got the impression that she was older than Oneesama and that neither my aunt nor my uncle really approved of her."
"With that description, are you surprised?" Zelgadis asked.
Lina rolled her eyes. "Well, they never actually said it. I know my mother wasn't too fond of her, because Oneesama told me so, but that my mother respected Oneesama's judgment and trusted her to look after herself while she, my mother, was off working."
"Was your mother off working a lot?" Sylphiel asked.
Lina shrugged. "She worked in another city and visited us; it used to be every month, and then it was every two months, and it was twice a year by the time I left."
"Alexa-Lasthenia... Las... " Amelia said. "Your sister's friend might have been my Aunt Alexa-Lasthenia Maetel Lum; I never met her, but Mother said she smoked like a chimney, drank like a fish, and spread like an eiderdown, and it is a long name."
Lina's, Sylphiel's, and Zelgadis' faces froze into polite masks.
"What does 'spread like an eiderdown' mean?" Gourry asked.
Lina blushed brick red.
"I don't know," Amelia said. "I was hoping you did. Do you know, Zelgadis-san?"
Now it was Zelgadis' turn to blush.
"Never mind," Sylphiel rescued him.
"It's rude," Lina explained.
Amelia thought about it for a minute, and then blushed herself.
Gourry still looked blank.
Lala lifted her friend over a large fallen tree.
"Thank you," Lina told her. "She explained that the name was important for inspiring the necessary fear. After all, no one would surrender to the Dread Pirate Lina."
"I would," Gourry said.
"Most definitely," Sylphiel seconded.
"Count me in," Zelgadis agreed.
"Me too," Amelia conceded.
Lina tried her Four-Way Death Glare again, with about as much success as she'd had the last time.
"So," Lina continued, "we put in to shore and took on an entirely new crew, and she stayed aboard for a while as first mate, all the time calling me 'Emeraldas.' Once the crew believed, she left the ship and took off to go invite my -- eep -- sister to come live on her island with her, and I have been Emeraldas ever since. Except now that we're finally back together -- I came as soon as I could from the other side of the world, only to find out that you were about to marry that Rezo and settle down. Talk about nasty shocks -- anyway, now that I have you, I shall retire and hand the name over to someone else. Is everything clear to you?"
"Uh... I lost track about where Emeraldas said she wasn't Emeraldas. Could you repeat it?"
"Lala, you idiot!"
"Could you?" Gourry looked hopeful.
"Gourry, you idiot!" Lina elbowed him.
Lina sighed theatrically. "Look, 'Dread Pirate Emeraldas' isn't a name, it's a title. It means 'the captain of the Queen Emeraldas II.' I'm the captain now, so now I'm the Dread Pirate Emeraldas. There were other captains before me, so they were the Dread Pirate Emeraldas then. See?"
"Oh, I see," Gourry said. "Those Emerald pirate ladies sure were lucky, having a ship whose name sounds so much like their title and all."
Lina smote her head into the heel of her hand again.
"Oh, I see," Lala said. "Those -- kyaa!"
She had stepped onto a flat-looking patch of white sand, and it had proved to support her weight as well as so much butterscotch custard.
"Mmm... butterscotch..." Lina drooled.
"I prefer caramel," Gourry said.
Lina stared at the gently rippling sand where Lala had been for a horrified half-second before cutting one end of an overhanging vine free, wrapping it around her left arm, and diving into the sand pit.
Snow Sand, although often mistaken for the more common Lightning Sand, is different in that it is completely dry. Therefore, its victims don't even have the natural buoyancy of water to work with.
For long minutes, all that any observer would have been able to see was the vine going down into the sand, quivering now and then.
And then the two women emerged from the Snow Sand with a ghastly dry smacking sound, beaching themselves on the solid ground and squirming up on their bellies, sand-covered, sobbing and gasping for breath, away from that horrible deathtrap.
"We'll never make it," Lala choked out.
"We already have," Lina contradicted, vigorously brushing the sand from herself before turning to do the same for her blonde friend. "There are three legendary perils of the Fire Swamp, right?
"First, the flame spurts. No problem. They make a convenient popping noise right before they go off, so they're easily avoided.
"Second," she stood up, tugging Lala to her feet, "the Snow Sand. You managed to discover what that looked like, so we can avoid it from now on, too!"
Lala looked at her for a moment, then thought visibly, holding three fingers up and moving her lips silently as she folded all but one down.
"That's only two perils, Lina. What about the MOUSs?"
"Marmots Of Unusual Size? I don't believe they exist."
A slavering marmot as big as I am hurled itself on Lina from the underbrush.
"How big were you then?" Zelgadis asked.
"No, no. Mother said it was as big as she was, and I'm about the size now that she used to be, so that's how big the marmot was."
"Marmot?" Lina repeated, incredulous.
"It was some sort of family running joke," Amelia said. "I think Aunt Katharinvictamaris came up with it, and then Uncle Randy took it up... even now, all you need to do is say 'marmot' in the right tone to make Uncle Christopher and Aunt Opabinia burst out laughting."
"Did we ever meet your Aunt Opabinia?" Gourry wondered, scratching his head.
"I don't think so," Amelia said dubiously. "When Daddy was pretending to be dead, she was teaching the summer and autumn seasons at Maldeen."
"Does she have hair about the color of yours that keeps falling out of its bun?" Sylphiel asked. "And bounce about and wave her arms when she gets excited?"
"Yes, that sounds like Aunt Opabinia."
"She taught the class I took on... ahem... 'Necessary Illusions, the Nature of Belief, and the Reality-Mutation Process.' "
"The nature of belief and reality mutation?" Zelgadis asked. "What do they have to do with one another?"
"What are they?" Gourry asked.
"Um... " Lina began.
"If you believe people are worse than they are you won't be disappointed very much," Amelia said, "but then you might not notice the pleasant surprises when you come across them. And if you believe they're better than they are hard enough they start believing it too and Things Happen then."
"That's an admirable summary, Amelia," Sylphiel said, blinking.
"Oh, you have to know these things when you're a Sailoon princess."
"I imagine you do," Lina muttered to a still-confused Gourry.
"So when did this ever work?" Zelgadis asked. "And what if it doesn't?"
"Um... " Amelia said. "Well... "
"My sister said," Lina remarked, studying the overhead beams, "that the stories and the ideals were all true, but that reality failed them a lot, so you had to learn to deal with it and go on."
"I'd like to meet this sister of yours someday," Sylphiel said.
Lina shook her head frantically. "Nope. Uh-uh. Not really. Just... don't. Okay?"
Gourry had been visibly thinking for some time now. "Is it maybe like the way Mom knew Dad was worth something for so long that he finally started believing that she might be right because it was less bother than arguing with her?"
"Th -- " Lina choked. "That's EXACTLY right, Gourry!"
He beamed.
Zelgadis and Amelia stared at Gourry, stunned, before the latter continued her story.
The force of the MOUS's leap knocked Lina flat on her back and the wind out of her, as screams of agony were wrung from her throat. Lala scrabbled about on theground, looking for a rock, a stick, anything.
Lina finally managed to pry its jaws free. With a swift kick to the belly, she shoved it off her. The MOUS rolled back onto its feet, noticed that it was pointing in a Lala-wardly direction, and charged the blonde.
Lala finally found and cought up a fallen tree branch just in time to ward the MOUS off with it. She feinted at it with the branching end (and broke a few of the smaller twigs) a time or two before reversing it and clipping the overgrown rodent a good blow on its tender nose.
"Bet that hurt," Gourry said.
It squealed in pain, turned, darted away (aided by another blow to the hindquarters), ran almost directly into the struggling-to-sit Lina, and bit her viciously in her left side.
The redhead's scream nearly tore her throat open.
Lala ran to her beleagured companion and smote the MOUS twice, both times cracking and staving in ribs, both times missing the wildly thrashing backbone. Lina, unable once again to reach her sword (still standing upright in the ground next to the Snow Sand, where she had tossed it), could only try once again to tear the huge incisors loose from where they savaged her.
And then there was a popping sound to Lina's right.
The petite woman's eyes widened, and she twisted, rolling the marmot to her right just as fire spurted up, roasting it, scorching her. It let go, wailing, and Lala stepped back, grabbed Lina's sword, and thrust straight and true into its heart, sobbing mutely.
The MOUS shuddered and died.
Gourry let out a breath he undoubtedly hadn't realized he was holding.
Lina thumped him on the back in a friendly way. "Gourry, you idiot, remember to breathe."
Some time, one healing spell -- which used up most of Lina's reserves and did little more than stop the bleeding and ward off hydrophobia -- two wrong turns, and a great deal of walking later, they had emerged from the Fire Swamp and were walking through an aspen wood carpeted with autumn leaves.
"It's not too far now," Lina told Lala for the third time in the last ten minutes.
And then a troop of horsemen rode out in front of them, Rezo in the lead. Around and behind them, black-garbed men stepped from behind trees, crossbows cocked.
"Surrender!" Rezo said, voice ringing.
"You wish to surrender to me?" Lina shrugged. "Very well. I accept."
"There are fifty of us," Rezo said reasonably. "You are one small woman."
"You're right; you are rather overmatched, aren't you?"
"Don't act the fool."
"Who's acting foolish? We know the Fire Swamp. We can live there quite comfortably for some time. Do you feel like following us?"
"Surrender!"
"Will not happen."
"For the last time, surrender!"
"Death first!" Lina snarled, hand going to her sword hilt.
"Do you promise not to hurt her?" Lala's voice cut through the tension like a knife.
Both Rezo and Lina stared at her. "What?"
"I said," Lala stepped forward, deliberately not looking at the redhead, "if we surrender, do you promise not to hurt her?"
"May I live a thousand years, and never do good deeds again." Rezo's cat-eared smile was back in full force. "Just tell me where she belongs, and I'll take care of everything."
"She is a sailor on the ship Queen Emeraldas II. See that she is returned to her ship."
Lina smote her head against the heel of her hand.
Lina smote her head against the heel of her hand.
"What is it?" Gourry asked.
Lina rolled her eyes. "You DON'T tell royal guards 'This is my best friend the bloodthirsty pirate!' "
"She didn't say 'bloodthirsty pirate.' " Gourry looked confused.
"The only people on the Queen Emeraldas II are bloodthirsty pirates," Lina sighed. "Since she's a sailor on that ship, she must be a bloodthirsty pirate."
"Oh. Okay. I see. But, Lina?"
"Yes?"
"How did the royal guards know?"
"Wakarimashita," Rezo said. He held his hand out to Lala.
She took it and was hoisted up to ride pillion behind him.
"Very smooth," Zelgadis said grudgingly. "Sound as if you're guaranteeing something without actually making any promises at all."
"But he promised not to hurt Lina!" Gourry said indignantly. Then his face took on the muddled look that meant he was attempting to work his way through a thought. "Didn't he?"
"Nope!" Amelia smiled brightly.
Lina stared up at Lala, her face showing her feelings all too clearly.
"I lost you once," the taller woman said half-apologetically, "and it almost destroyed me. I could not bear it if it happened again, not when I could save you."
Rezo clicked his tongue and slapped the reins against the horse's neck. "Fifth level!" he called to Schteindorf, before trotting off with half the mounted guard.
Lala waved to her redheaded friend until she and the rest were lost among the trees.
"Fifth level?" Lina said.
"Of the Zoo, right?" Sylphiel said.
"Of the laboratory, yes, Sylphiel-san."
When they had left, Count Schteindorf rode out a little ways in front of the remainder of the mounted guard. "Come. We must take you to your ship."
Lina shook her head mock-chidingly. "Tsk, tsk. We are users of power. Lies do not become us."
"Very true," Schteindorf said, raising his right hand. "Sleeping."
"He lied!" Gourry said indignantly.
"No, actually he didn't," Zelgadis said.
"But -- "
"He didn't lie," Sylphiel said, soft voice angry. "He tricked Lala."
"What a creep," Gourry agreed. "This Rezo really sounds like a bad guy."
Lina, Amelia, and Zelgadis stared at him. "OF COURSE HE IS!"
The last thing Lina noticed was that the Count had six fingers on his right hand, and she really couldn't recall coming across that particular oddity before...
"The Schteindorf I met didn't have six fingers," Lina said.
"Neither did my great-uncle. Mother said it was artistic license because of what the story needed."
"Because of the needs of the story," Sylphiel corrected.
"Anyway," Amelia said, "Chapter Six: The Festivities."
The Space Pirate Emeraldas (and her ship, the Queen Emeraldas) belong to Matsumoto Leiji.
Amelia's mother's "Things to Keep in Mind" are liberally quoted and paraphrased from Harukami's "All I Really Need To Know I Learned From Watching Slayers," Michael Sampson, The Rocky Horror Show, Shakespeare, a Disney special, Roland J. Cole, Kristian Overstreet's "Redneck" Undocumented Features story arc, Sigel Phoenix's list of classic mistakes, Marcus Aurelius' Meditations, Dave Marinaccio's All I Really Need To Know I Learned From Watching Star Trek, guides to Sierra's King's Quest computer games, Pete Abrams' Sluggy Freelance, Pretty Samy OVA #2: Revenge of the Imperial Electronic Brain, Dirty Pair, John Donne, the cover of Holly Lisle's Minerva Wakes first-printing paperback edition, Sophocles' Oidipos Tyrannos, and Men In Black, among others.
I am responsible for bedizening Amelia with an amazing assortment of aunts and, as I should have mentioned before, for inflicting Schteindorf on the Sailoon Royal Family Tree. As far as I know, the creators have no such idea in their heads.