Air Apparent Read Free

no.
    “And we have unfinished business in the bedroom,” the Gorgon said.
    “Woman, don’t—”
    “Now,” she said firmly. “You know it supplements the youth elixir you use to keep your age at an even hundred.” She took him by the ear and tugged.
    Slowly, reluctantly, grumpily, he went. The Gorgon led him away. Only she could have done it. “It’s up to you, dear,” she said in passing to Wira. “I can give you half an hour, maybe a little more.”
    “But I hardly know—”
    “Now,” the Gorgon said, with what registered as about five eighths of a smile. Then they were gone.
    Wira sat on the Good Magician’s stool and oriented on the open Book of Answers. She couldn’t read it, of course, but she ran her hands across the pages. There was, of course, nothing. She had assumed that the Gorgon would read the entries or see the smudges or whatever. What could she do on her own?
    A cloud appeared; Wira felt its ambiance. “Whatever? I heard that thought.”
    Oh, no! “Demoness Metria, go away!” she snapped.
    “By no means. Humfrey’s distracted at the moment—I can’t think by what—” The cloud assumed the form of a truly evocative bare female torso with serpentine curves. Wira knew, because she knew the demoness’s nature. “So I took advantage to pop in while the magical repulsion is off. Is that the Book of Dissolvings?”
    “The Book of Whats?”
    “Solutions, Rejoinders, Responses, Retorts, Replies—”
    “Answers?”
    “Whatever,” the demoness agreed crossly. “There, I said it. Whatever are you up to?”
    “Please, Metria, I have only a little time. Let me work.”
    “Wira, you can’t even see it! What work could you possibly be doing?”
    It was not in Wira to prevaricate. “I’m looking for signs of whoever abducted Hugo.”
    “Hugo was stolen? That is a news flash! What girl lured him away?”
    “No girl,” Wira said grimly. She was trying not to let the demoness bother her, but of course Metria was succeeding anyway. “It was the murderer.”
    “A murderer! Whodunit?”
    “I beg your pardon?”
    “Never mind. I can see I missed something interesting. So you’re looking in the Book to find your murderer. What’s keeping you?”
    “The entries are scrambled.”
    The demoness looked. “Why so they are! That must complicate things.”
    “Yes.” Wira ran her hands over the pages. There was nothing. She turned to open two new pages, then two more—and felt something. “Hugo!”
    “That’s not Hugo,” Metria said. “That’s just a fruit stain on the page.”
    “That’s the feel of Hugo! His talent is to summon fruit. He must have been here. Metria, will you help?”
    The demoness hesitated. “You want my help? Is this a trick?”
    Wira remembered how to handle this creature. “Of course it is! I’m pretending to need you so that you’ll go away just to spite me.” That was a half truth, or maybe a quarter truth, so was not a full-fledged prevarication; she could manage it in this emergency.
    “What do you want me to do?”
    “Read the entry I have identified.”
    “Well, I will. It’s about Cumulo Fracto Nimbus, the ornery cloud.”
    Wira was disappointed. “Not Hugo?”
    “No known connection to Hugo.”
    “Still, it must be a Clue.”
    “A What?”
    “Suggestion, lead, intuition, indication, intimation—”
    “Hint?”
    “Whatever,” Wira agreed crossly. “Something that will help me find Hugo, or the murderer, in some devious way.”
    “You must be tetched in the head, girl.”
    But Wira was turning more pages and running her hands across them. Soon she felt another trace. “This one.”
    “That’s about the pet peeve, the perpetually irascible bird. You think it stole your husband?”
    “I don’t know what to think. Maybe it’s irrelevant.”
    “Let’s turn some more pages. I think you’re making random selections to turn me off.”
    Wira wasn’t, but did not argue. The demoness actually was helping, so it was better to let her