Roc And A Hard Place Read Free

going to let it balk her.
    She crested the mountain—and abruptly lost her footing and slid helplessly down toward the moat.  Here the sugar was loose and granular, offering no purchase.  Soon she was unceremoniously dumped into the moat.
    And promptly booted out again.  She sailed back over the mountain and landed on the ground beyond.  The grass hopped out of the way before her derriere struck; it was the grass hopper variety.
    “That's boot rear!” she exclaimed aloud.  “The moat is filled with it.”
    'I think I begin to see a pattern here,' Mentia remarked.
    'I think I'll leave you to your challenges.’
    'Oh no you don't!' Metria retorted.  'You talked me into this nuisance; you'll help me see it through.  Besides, I don't trust you with my husband while I'm away.  You might promise him heaven, and give him hell, and I'd get the blame.’
    'Curses!  Foiled again.’ Metria tackled the mountain again.  From the outside it was solid sugar, easy to climb.  As she approached the crest, she trod extremely cautiously, but found no break in the steep sandy slope.  The moment she stepped on that, she would be dumped into the moat with a kick.
    This was definitely a challenge.  That meant that not only would she have to struggle to find her way past this one, there would be two more beyond it.  “What a pity!” she swore in frustration.
    'What a pity!' her worser self mimicked.  'That half soul has denatured you.’
    'So it made me into a nice person,' Metria retorted.  'So what's wrong with that?’
    'It's undemonly:  I'll bet you can't even say poop.’
    'Of course I can say peep!’
    'Point made.’
    'Well, if you're so demonly, how do you propose to get us across this sweet mess?’ Mentia considered.
    'The mountain is sweet, but the moat isn't.  It likes to kick donkey.’
    'So it boots rear.  That's its nature.  Tell me something I don't already know.' Metria rubbed her booted rear; if she weren't a demoness, that would really be smarting along about now.
    'Maybe if we made it sweet, it wouldn't have so much of a kick.’
    'Make it sweet?  But how—' Then Metria saw the point.
    'Let's get busy.’ She formed her hands into scoops and began scooping loose sugar down the slope.  Soon she managed to start an avalanche.  Sugar slid grandly down and plunged into the moat.
    After she had scooped as much of the mountain into the water as she could, she found that she was able to descend without sliding.  She-had taken the edge off the slope.  She went down and stood at the bank of the moat, which now looked somewhat soggy.  She poked a finger into it, and tested a drop of soggy water on her tongue.  There was only a little bit of tingle.  Sure enough, she had pretty much denatured its kick.
    However, the moat was now a mass of sickly sweet muck.
    The mere touch of her feet in it was enough to make her feel somewhat sick, as if she had overeaten or overimbibed.  Since demons neither ate nor drank, she knew this was more magic.
    She would be very uncomfortable if she waded through all that, even if she didn't get her rear booted out.
    So she walked around the edge until she came to the drawbridge, which was in the down position.  She had not been able to reach it before because the steep slope had dumped her where it chose to in the moat, but now it could not stop her from reaching it.  She had surmounted the first challenge.
    ‘This becomes dull,' Mentia said.  'I'm going to take a nap.’
    ‘You handle the next challenge, and I'll handle the third, okay?’
    'Okay,' Metria agreed.  She wasn't concerned about her worser self, as long as she knew where Mentia was.
    She set foot on the planks of the moat—and something buzzed up before her, barring the way.  It seemed to be two dots, like an incomplete ellipsis, except that they were up and down instead of across.  “What in tintinnabulation are you?” she demanded.
    “I don't understand:  What in what?” the dot formation