Robert Asprin - Myth-ion Improbable

Actually, all in all, this was one of the most beautiful di mensions I had visited. I wondered what kind of lucky people lived here.

Tanda turned a full circle, her sharp eyes taking in things I knew I didn't see.

"Ten percent?" Aahz said, his teeth still grinding.

Tanda put her finger to her mouth for Aahz to be silent. I instantly started searching the tree-line for any sign of danger. There was nothing that I could see. No natives with weapons, no crouching tigers, no charging bears.

Nothing.

But clearly from Tanda's actions and the attitude and hesi tation of the Shifter, this wasn't a friendly place. Beautiful, but not friendly.

"The map," she whispered to Aahz. "Quickly."

Then she motioned that we should all crouch down.

The weeds and flowers covering the meadow were no more than knee-high and would give us no cover at all. They smelled like my dragon when he got wet.

I figured we should move to the edge of the trees. At least there we might have a fighting chance if something came at us. But Tanda was the ex-assassin among us. She knew what she was doing. Or at least I hoped she did.

Aahz opened the map and laid it out carefully on top of the weeds. It was clear instantly that the map had again changed. Bumppp, the dimension we were in, showed clearly, with only one path leading from this world toward the dream of our very own golden cow. And that path led to Vortex #4.

Not #2, as I would have expected, or even #3, but #4.

Tanda nodded and motioned for Aahz to quickly fold up the parchment and put it away. Then she stood.

I stood right with her, and the moment I did I saw move ment. Not just some movement, but all around the edges of the meadow the weeds and flowers were jerking and swaying as if something was running under them at us.

Then a head poked up about a hundred paces from us. A massive snake head that was larger than my head, with yellow, swirling slits for eyes and huge fangs. There was no telling how long the snake's body was, and I really didn't want to wait around and find out.

And then another stuck its head up to the right of the first one. And another and another.

I spun like a dancer. We were surrounded by giant snakes with very nasty-looking fangs. If we didn't do something quickly we were going to end up the main course for lunch.

"Nice place," Aahz said as the moving grass got closer and closer around us.

"Any time now," I tried to suggest, but the only thing that came out of my still sealed mouth was "Aggghhh tgggghhhh ."

What's the matter?" Tanda asked, smiling at me. "Afraid Of a little snake?"

I nodded vigorously as another monster snake head popped up not more than fifty paces from us. It looked not only hun gry, but angry.

"Yeah," she said, "me, too."

With that we were back in the dust storm on Vortex #1.

"Skeeve!" Aahz yelled as the dust pounded into us.

Before I could even act, Tanda said, "Don't bother."

Then we were back in the Shifter's tent, staring at the crea ture who now looked just a little too much like the snakes we had just left.

"I am glad for my percentage to see that you have returned," it said.

"I'll bet," Aahz said.

"Vortex #4 please," Tanda said, getting right to business.

"The total is now fifteen percent."

"I understand our agreement," Tanda said before Aahz could say a word. "Vortex #4 please."

The snakelike-shaped Shifter nodded, and again we were whisked through to another dimension.

And right back into the same stupid dust storm.

Okay, I have to admit that when we dimension-hopped back into the dust storm, I was shocked.

Tanda motioned that we should follow her. It took me almost all the way to our destination before I realized where we were. Now granted, I had the excuse that it was blowing heavily. And to me, one dust storm looks just like another. But it wasn't until the old log cabin loomed up out of the dust like a ship in the fog that it dawned on me that we were back in the same place.

Only it wasn't the same place. This was supposed to be Vortex #4, not Vortex #1.

Inside the old building it became clear that we were in a slightly different place. This time, instead of being bare, the inside of the log cabin was filled with branches and some old furniture, and there was no sign of the fire I had built.

"Did you see them this time?" Tanda demanded.

"See what?" Aahz frowned.

"Out there in the storm." she said. "This time I got a good look at them."

"What was it?"

"Dust bunnies. A whole pack of them." She wrapped her arms tightly around herself and shuddered.

Aahz and I looked at each other and shrugged. Again we seemed to be oblivious to whatever it was that was setting Tanda on edge.

By the time I got a new fire going and Tanda had put a containment protection around the cabin to keep the wind out, my lips had unsealed. They were chapped and sore, but at least they were loose.

"So Vortex #4 is a lot like Vortex #1," I said.

"Makes sense," Tanda said. "Otherwise, why give them the same names with only different numbers?"

"Any other dimensions so similar that they could be num­ bered like this?"

"More than likely," Tanda said, "but I've never seen or heard about any."

"So we paid another five percent to that thief for this?" Aahz said, dearly disgusted. "We could have found this on our own."

I had no idea how he thought we could have done that, but since I didn't know much about dimension-hopping, I said nothing.

"Not likely," Tanda said. "We are a long, long way from Vortex #1. We're farther away in number of dimensions from the Bazaar at Deva than I have ever been before."

"Oh," Aahz said.

"And you know that how?" I asked. "Is there some sort of mileage marker I keep missing in the blink of eye it takes to hop to a new dimension?"

Tanda laughed. "Don't we wish."

"When a person is dimension-hopping," Aahz said, "and they have powers to do it, like Tanda does, you get a sense of how many dimensions away you have jumped. Not precise, but just a sense of distance."

Tanda nodded. "And the farther away in number of dimensions, the harder the jump. And the greater the chance of missing the target and getting lost."

"So that's why you took us back through Vortex #1 from Bumppp?"

"Safer that way," she said.

"And each of our jumps following this map is getting us farther and farther away from home?" I didn't much like the idea of that happening. My job as the Royal Court Magician wasn't much, but at the moment it was better than this place.

"So far," Tanda said. "But this is a treasure map we're following. It isn't supposed to be so easy that just anyone could do it."

I didn't like the sound of that, either.

Aahz pulled off his gloves and took out the map, spread ing it on the floor so we could all see it by the light of the fire. As expected, the map had changed again. There were now six lines leading from Vortex #4, all to points that now had names. All six lines headed in the general direction of the point marked as the treasure, but none directly. This map wasn't making anything easy, that was for sure.

The names on each dimension this time were stranger than normal. All were combinations of the same five letters. Starting from the left, the names were Et, Cet, Era, Etc, Etc, and Ra.

"You know any of those dimensions?" Aahz asked.

"No," Tanda said. "You?"

"No," Aahz said. "There goes another five percent."

Tanda shrugged. "Can't be helped. I suggest we head for the center one."

"Etc it is, then," I said.

All Aahz did was growl deep inside his throat as he stood and put the map away.

"I hope this means we're going back to Vortex #1 again." I said. "Tell me we're not visiting the snakes again."