Robert Asprin - Sween Myth-tery of Life

"Hi, Marley. I'll have a Bloody Mary," Cassandra said. "What do you want, Tiger?"

I'll spare you the image which my mind came up with to associate with the name of her ordered drink. While I knew from my earlier visits that vampires don't necessarily drink human blood exclusively, the idea of imbibing any kind of blood was pretty low on my list for taste treats.

"Urn ... What all do they have?" I stalled. "I'm pretty much just used to wine."

"Don't worry, it's a full service bar," she informed me brightly. "They've got pretty much ... Oh! I get it!"

She threw back her head and laughed, then gave my arm a playful slap.

"Don't get uptight, Tiger. They do have drinks for off-worlders."

Again I was relieved, but at the same time, I wasn't wild about being laughed at. I seemed to be losing ground in the "impress your date" department.

"No, I'm serious, Cassandra" I said. "I really don't have much experience drinking except for wine."

"Hey. No problem. I'll order for you."

That wasn't exactly what I had in mind, but she had turned to our waiter before I could stop her.

"Bring him a Bloody Mary, too, Marley. A regular one, not the local version," she said. "Oh, and we'll be running a tab. Here's his credit card so you can make an imprint."

The waiter accepted the card without batting an eye ... apparently waiters are harder to impress with credit cards than doormen ... and moved off through the crowd. And I do mean through the crowd.

Truth to tell, I had been so busy ogling the club, I had completely forgotten that Cassandra still had my card until she handed it to the waiter. Inexperienced though I was with credit cards, I was aware that losing track of one's card is not the wisest idea, and I resolved to reclaim it when the waiter brought it back.

In the meantime, there was one minor matter I wanted to take care of ... to wit, my outfit.

As you may recall, I spent a certain amount of time choosing my ensemble for this date, but that was before I knew we were headed for Limbo. The clothes I was wearing were fine for Klah, or even Deva, but here on Limbo they were conservative to the point of looking drab. Normally, I wouldn't squander my magik on something so trivial, particularly on Limbo, but I had already scouted a strong force line directly over the club and ... what the heck, I was still trying to impress my date.

At the moment, she was busy chatting with some friends of hers who had stopped by the table, so I figured now was as good a time as any. Closing my eyes, I went to work on my outfit courtesy of my good old trusty standby ... the disguise spell.

Since I wasn't really all that dissatisfied with the outfit I was wearing, I didn't go for any radical change, just a few adjustments here and there. I deepened the neckline on both my shirt and vest to show a bit more of my chest ... such as it was. Then I lengthened the points of my collar and added a bit more drape to the sleeves to be more in line with some of the more billowy outfits the other men in the club were wearing. As a final touch, I added a sparkly undertone to my shirt so that it would match my date's dress ... in texture, at least.

Like I said, not much of a change. Just enough so I wouldn't look dowdy sitting in a club with flashy vampires. I couldn't see the changes myself, of course, which is one of the few drawbacks of a disguise spell, but I had enough confidence in this, one of my oldest spells, to know it was effective. I knew my date would be able to see the changes. The only question was, would she notice?

I needn't have worried.

Not that she noticed right away, mind you. Cassandra's friends had moved on, but she was still quite busy waving and calling to others in the crowd. Apparently she was quite a popular young lady. Not surprising, really.

The fun started when the waiter brought our drinks to the table. Setting them them carefully in front of us, he leaned over to speak directly into my ear.

"This first round is compliments of the manager, sir," he said, with notably more deference than he had shown when taking the order originally. "He asked me to tell you he's honored you're visiting our club, and hopes you enjoy it enough to make it a regular stop."

"What?" I said, genuinely taken aback. "I don't understand."

"I said, the manager ..." the ghost started to repeat, but I cut him off.

"No. I mean, why is he buying us a round of drinks?"

"He saw your name on the credit card," the ghost said, handing the item in question back to me. "I didn't recognize you on sight, myself ... I hope you aren't offended."

"No. It's ... no. No offense," I managed, still trying to figure out what was going on.

"What was that all about?" Cassandra said, leaning close again. She had noticed my conversation with the waiter, but hadn't been able to hear the exact words over the music.

"It's nothing," I explained. "The manager just bought us a round of drinks."

"Really?" she frowned. "That's odd. They don't usually do that here ... at least, not for the first round. I wonder who's on duty?"

She started craning her neck trying to get a clear look at the bar. While she was doing that, I turned my attention to our drinks.

They appeared innocent enough. Basically an opaque red fluid over ice cubes with some kind of greenery sticking out of it. Hers was a darker red than mine, but aside from that, they looked the same. Cautiously, I took a sip ... and discovered, to my relief, it tasted sort of like tomato juice.

"Hey! This is pretty good," I declared. "What's in it, anyway?"

"Hmm?" Cassandra said, turning her attention to me again. "Oh. Yours is just tomato juice and vodka."

I didn't know what vodka was, but tomato juice I could handle. The first sip had reminded me how thirsty I was after all our running around, so I downed most of the glass with my next swallow.

"Hey! Take it easy, Tiger," my date admonished. "Those things can pack a wallop if you aren't used to them ... and it can leave a stain, so don't drip any on your ..."

She stopped in mid-sentence and stared at my outfit.

"Say. Weren't you wearing a different shirt before?"

"Oh, it's the same shirt," I said, as casually as I could. "I just changed it a little bit. I think this is more appropriate for this place, don't you?"

"But how could you ... I get it! Magik!"

Her reaction was everything 1 could have hoped for ... except she wasn't done.

"Wait a minute. You're a friend of Vic's from Klah, and you know magik ... right?" she said, eagerly. "Do you know a magician there named the Great Skeeve?"

This really surprised me, but the pieces were starting to fall into place. The picture was incredible, but I managed to keep my cool.

"As a matter of fact, I know him rather well," I said with a faint smile.

"Whatdaya know!" Cassandra declared, slapping the table with her palm. "I thought Vie was just trying to impress me when he said he knew him. Tell me, what's he like?"

That one threw me.

"Vie? He's a nice enough guy. I thought you ..."

"No, silly. I mean Skeeve! What's he like as a person?"

This was just getting better.

"Oh, he's a lot like me," I said. "I'm just surprised you heard of him."

"You've got to be kidding!" she declared, rolling her eyes. "He's about the hottest thing going as far as magicians go. Everybody's talking about him. You know, he engineered a jailbreak right here on Limbo!"

"I think I heard about that," I admitted.

"And just a while back, he got barred from the Dimension of Perv. Can you believe that? Perv?"

"It was a bum rap," I grimaced.

"So you really do know him! Come on, tell me more. When you say he's like you, do you mean he's young or what?"

As much fun as this was, I figured it was time to stop before it got out of hand.