Piers Anthony - The Source of Magic

"Yes," she agreed. "Married men are best. They are-broken in, experienced, gentle, durable, and they do not talk gratuitously. For my return to life, for the first experience, it would be so nice-"

"You don't understand," Bink said. "I love my wife, Chameleon."

"Yes, of course you are loyal," Millie replied. "But right now she is in her ugly phase, and in her ninth month with child, and her tongue is as sharp as the manticora's stinger. Right now is when you need relief, and if I recover my life-"

"Please, no more!" Bink exclaimed. The ghost was striking right on target.

"I love you too, you know," she continued. "You remind me of-of the one I really loved, when I lived. But he is eight hundred years dead and gone." She gazed pensively at her misty fingers. "I could not many you, Bink, when I first met you. I could only look and long. Do you know what it is like, seeing everything and never participating? I could have been so good for you, if only-" She broke down, hiding her face, her whole head hazing before his eyes.

Bink was embarrassed and touched. "I'm sorry, Millie, I didn't know." He put his hand on her shaking shoulder, but of course passed right through it. "It never occurred to me that your life could be restored. If I had-"

"Yes, of course," she sobbed.

"But you will be a very pretty girl. I'm sure there are many other young men who-"

"True, true," she agreed, shaking harder. Now her whole body was fogging out. The other guests were beginning to stare. This was about to get awkward.

"If there is anything I can do-" Bink said. Millie brightened instantly, and her image sharpened correspondingly. "Find my bones!"

Fortunately that was not easily accomplished. "I'll look," Bink agreed. "But I have no better chance than anyone else."

"Yes, you do. You know how to do it, if only you put your marvelous mind to it. I can't tell you where they are, but if you really try-" She looked at him with ardent urgency. "It's been so many centuries. Promise me you'll try."

"But I-what would Chameleon think if-"

Millie put her face in her hands. The stares of the other guests hardened as the ghost's outline softened. "All right, I'll try," Bink promised. Why hadn't his talent protected him from this? But he knew the answer: his magic protected him from physical, magical harm. Millie was magical but not physical-and what she intended for him when she became physical would not ordinarily be construed as harm. His talent had never concerned itself with emotional complications. Bink would have to solve this triangle by himself.

The ghost smiled. "Don't be long," she said, and drifted off, her feet not touching the floor.

Bink spotted Crombie and joined him. "I begin to comprehend your view," he said.

"Yes, I noticed her working you over," Crombie agreed. "She's had her secret eye on you for sometime. A man hardly has a chance when one of those vixens starts in on him."

"She believes I can locate her bones first-and now I have to try. Really try, not just dawdle."

"Child's play," Crombie remarked. "They're that way." He closed his eyes and pointed upward at an angle.

"I didn't ask for your help!" Bink snapped.

"Oops, sorry. Forget where I pointed."

"I can't! Now I'll have to look there, and sure as hell her bones will be there. Millie must have known I'd consult you. Maybe that's her talent: knowing things ahead of time."

"Why didn't she skip out before she was murdered, then?"

Good question. "Maybe she was asleep, when-"

"Well, you're not asleep. You could skip out. Someone else will find her, especially if I give him the hint"

"Why don't you find the bones?" Bink demanded. "You could follow your finger and do it in an instant."

"Can't. I'm on duty." Crombie smiled smugly. "I have woman problems enough already, thanks to you."

Oh. Bink had introduced the woman-hater to his former fiancée, Sabrina, a talented and beautiful girl Bink had discovered he didn't love. Apparently that introduction had led to an involvement Now Crombie was having his revenge.

Bink set his shoulders and followed the direction indicated. The bones had to be somewhere upstairs. But maybe they still would not be obvious. If he did his honest best but could not locate them-

Yet would it be so bad, that date with Millie? All that she had said was true; this was a very bad time for Chameleon, and she seemed fit only to be left alone. Until she phased into her beautiful, sweet aspect, and had the baby.

No, there lay ruin. He had known what Chameleon was when he married her, and that there would be good times and bad. He had only to tide through the bad time, knowing it would pass. He had done it before. When there was some difficult chore or problem, her smart phase was an invaluable asset; sometimes they saved up problems for her to work on in that phase. He could not afford to dally with Millie or any other female.

He oriented on the room that lay on the line Crombie had pointed. It was the Royal Library, where the lore of centuries was stored. The ghostly skeleton was there?

Bink entered-and there sat the King. "Oh, sorry, Your Majesty. I didn't realize-"

"Come in, Bink," King Trent said, fashioning a warm smile. He looked every bit the monarch, even when half slumped over the table, as now. "I was meditating on a personal problem, and perhaps you have been sent to provide the answer."

"I lack the answer to my own dilemma," Bink said, somewhat diffidently. "I am ill-equipped to comment on yours,"

"Your problem?"

"Chameleon is difficult, and I am restless, and someone is trying to kill me, and Millie the ghost wishes to make love to me."

King Trent laughed-then stopped. "Suddenly I perceive that was not a joke," he said. "Chameleon will improve and your restlessness should abate. But the others-who seeks your life? I assure you there is no royal sanction for that!"

Bink described the episode with the sword. Now the King was thoughtful, "You and I know that only a Magician could actually harm you by such means, Bink-and there are only three people of that class in Xanth, none of whom wishes you ill and none of whom possesses the talent of animating swords. So you are not really in danger. But I agree, this could be very annoying. I shall investigate. Since you made the sword captive, we should be able to trace down the root of its imperative. If someone has co-opted one of the weapons of my arsenal-"

"Uh, I think that is where it came from," Bink said. "But Chester Centaur spotted it and took it-"

"Oh. Well, let's let that aspect drop, then; the alliance of the centaurs is important to me, as it has been to every King of Xanth throughout history. Chester can keep the sword, though I believe we shall turn off its self-motivating property. But it occurs to me that there is a certain similarity here to your own magic: whatever opposes you is hidden, using other magic than its own to attack you. The sword is not your enemy; it was merely the instrument of the hostile power."

"Magic like my own…" Bink repeated. "I suppose that could be. It would not be identical, since magic never repeats in Xanth, but similar-" He looked at the King, alarmed. "That means I can expect trouble anywhere, from anything, all seeming coincidental!"

"From a zombie, or a sword, or moat-monsters, or a ghost," the King agreed. "There may be a pattern here." He paused, considering. "Yet how could a ghost-?"

"She is to be restored, once I find her skeleton-and that may be in this room. What bothers me most is that I find myself tempted."

"Millie is a very fetching figure of a slip of a woman," King Trent said. "I can well understand the temptation. I suffer temptation myself; that is the subject of my present meditation."

"Surely the Queen can fulfill any, uh, temptation," Bink said cautiously, unwilling to betray how freely palace speculation had dwelt on this very subject. The King's private life should be private. "She can make herself resemble any-"