Roger Zelazny - A Farce To Be Reckoned With

"Well, it should do more than signal," Azzie said. "I don't want there to be any doubt about their finding the candlesticks."

"In that case you're better off going with a half-spell operation."

"I don't think I know that one," Azzie said.

"Chaldean. A spell like that comes in two parts. The wizard—that's you — puts half the spell in a place the recipient wants to get to. A place of safety, say. Then let's say the recipient, the holder of the half spell, is in a battle. It grows very dangerous. He turns on the half spell and it spirits him away to where the other half spell is. This is the best way if you want to get someone out of somewhere fast."

"Sounds good to me," Azzie said. "I can put seven half spells near the candlesticks, and give the other half spells to my people, and when they invoke them, that'll get them there."

"Precisely. Now, do you also want a set of magic horses?"

"Magic horses? What on Earth would I want magic horses for? Are they necessary?"

"Not really, but if you're planning this for an audience the magic horses provide a spirited spectacle. They also add another layer of complication."

"Not too serious a complication, I hope?" Azzie asked. "I don't know how smart my contestants are going to be. But assuming they're like most humans…"

"Point taken," said the clerk. "The magic horses complication should be easy enough to manage. And it does add a lot of class."

"Put me down for seven magic horses," Azzie said.

"Right," said the clerk, scribbling on an order form. "Now, do you want the horses to have any real magical qualities?"

"Such as?"

"Well, extra puissance, nobility, comeliness, ability to fly, ability to talk, ability to metamorphose into another animal— "

"Those sound like expensive additions."

"You can have anything you want," the clerk said, "but you do have to pay for it."

"Make them magic horses then, but without any extra qualities," Azzie said. "That ought to be good enough."

"Fine. Are there any other complications you want to introduce between the receipt of the half spells and the arriving at the candlesticks?"

"No, if they just get that bit done, that'll be fine," Azzie said.

"Okay, what caliber spell?" the clerk said.

"Caliber? Since when did they come in calibers?"

"New ruling. All spells must be ordered by caliber."

"I don't know what caliber I need," Azzie said.

"Find out," the clerk said.

Azzie gave the clerk a bribe and said, "Each spell should be able to transport a human being from a location in one realm of discourse to a location in another. Then it needs to take him on to another destination."

"Then you need double-barreled spells rather than half spells," the clerk said. "Can't ask all that of an ordinary spell. There's a lot of energy required, changing realms of discourse. Let's see, how much do these humans weigh?"

"I don't know," Azzie said. "I haven't met them yet. Let's say a maximum of three hundred pounds each."

"The caliber is double if the spell has to move more than two hundred and fifty pounds."

"Make it two fifty, then. I'll make sure none of them weighs in above that."

"Okay," the clerk said. He found a scrap of paper and did some figuring. "Let's see if I've got this straight. You want seven double-barreled spells that'll each transport a two-hundred-fifty-pound human

— and that includes anything he's carrying—to two different spots in two different realms of discourse.

I'd say it'll take forty-five-caliber spells. Which brand do you want?"

"There are different brands?" Azzie said.

"Believe it," said the clerk. "Moronia Mark II is a good make. So's Idiota Magnifica 24. Makes no difference to me."

"Give me either."

"Hey, you've got to make the choice yourself. Do I gotta do everything for you?"

"Make them Idiota spells."

"We're out of Idiota spells. I expect some more in by next week."

"I'll take the Moronia spells, then."

"Okay. Fill in here and here. Sign here. Initial here. Initial to indicate you've initialed yourself. Okay. Here you go."

The clerk handed Azzie a small white package. Azzie opened it and examined its contents.

"They look like small silver keys," he said.

"That's because they're Moronias. The Idiotas look different."

"Will these work as well?"

"Some say better."

"Thanks!" Azzie cried, and he was gone. Back for the weary round back through Grand Central Clearing Station, and then to Earth again. But he was elated. He had what he needed. The legend. The story. The candlesticks. The spells. Now he just needed the people to act out his story. And that ought to be the fun part.

On a brilliant morning in June, on an unpaved country road to the south of Paris, a coach and four came round a bend from behind a clump of majestic chestnut trees with a jingling of harness and a pounding of horses' hooves. Aside from the noises made by the horses, and by the creaking of the swaying coach, there was nothing to be heard but the hum of the cicadas and the loud cry of the coachman: "Gee up there, Holdfast!"

The coach was a big one, painted yellow and red, and it had two footmen on top behind the driver.

There was a similar coach fifty feet behind it, and behind that, several horsemen moving along at a smart canter. A dozen mules were at the rear.

Inside the lead coach were six people. Two children — a good-looking young boy of nine or ten, and his sister, a girlwoman of fourteen with a head of crisp red curls and a pert expression on her comely face.

The others were adults, wedged together uncomfortably but making the best of it.

The coach had begun to lurch badly. Had one of the following horsemen galloped up beside it, he would have seen that the right front wheel was making a curious looping movement. The coachman felt the change and pulled his horses back just as the wheel came off, and the coach came to rest on its axle.

The leading horseman, a corpulent, red-faced man, pulled up beside the window of the coach.

"Hallo! Everybody all right in there?"

"We're fine, sir," the boy said.

The horseman bent over and peered inside. He nodded to the adult passengers, but his eyes rested on Puss.

"I am Sir Oliver Denning of Tewkesbury," he told her.

"I am Miss Carlyle," she said, "and this is my brother, Quentin. Are you part of the pilgrimage, sir?"

"I am," the man said. "If all of you will get out of the coach, I'll have my man Watt see what he can do with that wheel." He jerked his head at Watt, a dark little Welshman.

"We are obliged to you, sir," said Puss.

"Not at all," said Sir Oliver. "We could have a bit of a picnic while Watt gets the wheel back on." His vague glance didn't quite include the other occupants of the coach.

They found a sunny, grassy spot in a small clearing not far from the coach, and Sir Oliver unfolded a camp blanket that smelled not unpleasantly of horse. He was evidently an old campaigner, because he had victuals and even some utensils packed in a leather saddlebag.

"This is very nice indeed," Sir Oliver said, once they were settled down and he had a nicely roasted drumstick in his hand. "How often have I eaten like this during the recent wars in Italy, where I had the honor of serving with the renowned Sir John Hawkwood."

"Did you see much action, sir?" Quentin asked, more to be polite than any other reason, because he had decided that Sir Oliver spent most of his time around the quartermaster's wagon.

"Action? Oh, yes, a goodly amount," Sir Oliver said, and he spoke of a clash of arms outside of Pisa as though all the world should have heard of it. After that he alluded familiarly to other armed encounters in and around the Italian cities, which he termed desperate engagements. Quentin had cause to doubt this since he remembered his father telling him that most of the warfare in Italy consisted of bellicose public words and behind-the-scenes private negotiations, after which a city would fall or a siege be abandoned according to what had been agreed upon. He also remembered hearing that that wasn't true when the French were involved, but held for the most part in dealings between the Italians and the Free Companies. Sir Oliver never mentioned the French. Only the Colonnas and Borgias and Medicis and suchlike foreigners. Sir Oliver had some rousing tales of early-morning engagements in which small groups of warriors would engage similar groups with sword and lance. He spoke of midnight vigils in the south of Italy, where the Saracens still held sway, and told of sudden desperate encounters at little walled cities where death might drench you from above in the form of boiling oil and molten lead.