The Wizard of Karres

It took itself off to wherever vatches went, leaving behind little black patches of vatch stuff. Pausert collected it all up, and that was when he relled vatch—again.

This time it was the little silver-eyed vatch.

Hee hee! it crowed with glee. You got him good!

Suddenly he smelled a rat, a vatchy-rat. You lured that vatch here, didn't you? he thought at it, suspiciously. You wanted me to beat him up!

Sure. I want to get bigger and you can help me. And you know what? I'm not sure you're a dream thing at all. I think you might be a real thing, coming into my dreams, like another vatch.

Suddenly, Pausert felt very cold all over. Here was something he had worried about for a long time, staring him in the face. The vatches were some sort of interdimensional beings who thought of Pausert's universe as nothing more than a dream, and good only for entertainment value. So they were inclined to meddle and make trouble for the amusement of it, but that also meant that they didn't take any of what they saw and did too seriously. But if they actually realized that all of this was as real as their own universe, what would they do? Try and destroy it, for instance?

Oh, don't be such a fraidy, the vatchlet said scornfully. I won't tell. You help me, Big Maybe-Real Thing, and I'll help you!

How? he asked skeptically.

Give me that vatch stuff, so I can get bigger. I'm tired of being little. They pick on the little ones.

I'm not sure that's a good idea. Pausert reminded himself forcefully that he couldn't actually control this sort of vatch, only distract it. Even as little as it was, the thing had been something of a nightmare. Grown big and powerful . . .

I'll help you, the vatchlet countered. I promise! If you give me the pieces of vatch stuff, I'll only do what you ask me to. Well, pretty much. Please?

He wanted to ask Goth for advice, but there wasn't time.

And this vatch, while full of mischief, had never actually done anything malicious . . .

Unlike the Big Windy, for instance. Now there was a vatch that could stand having a few more bits pulled out of it!

All right, he agreed, pulling the vatch stuff out of his pocket. But you have to ask me before you go luring any more vatches here for me to beat up. And if I don't have the time right then, you'll just have to wait.

It absorbed the shadowy patch of vatch stuff before it answered, and even as it grew bigger, it also seemed to become a little more serious.

All right, I promise. You must be a real thing. I finally figured out this place has linear time. I wouldn't dream something as silly as linear time, so you've got to be real. Anything you want me to do?

Oh my, he thought. Not only more serious, but more intelligent! It made him wonder just what the vatches actually were. And how they normally 'got big.'

Not right now, he said hastily. His next cue was coming up. Just, er, watch, and enjoy the show. This is—is —kind of awake-dreaming that we real-things do, to tell a story to each other.

Is it? What fun! Oooo— Pausert sensed it somehow looking over the audience. It's just a story? Like a dream? But they're excited like it's all real!

Yes, and some of them already know what the ending will be, but they're still excited. He was pleased to have given it a new sort of diversion. Watch them watching us, and you'll see.

Then his cue came, and he swaggered back onstage.

By now the audience had decided that they liked him, especially when he played his bawdy tricks on Juliet's Nurse. They were laughing at the slapstick humor of it, and even though half of his attention was on the vatch, he thought he had completed the job that Richard Cravan had set him—to make the audience care about him, so that when Tybalt killed him—

Well, that was for later. He took his exit, and realized that the little vatch was gone. He heaved a sigh of relief. One less thing to worry about.

For now.

* * *

'—and that was when it stopped, well, acting like a vatch,' he concluded, as Goth and the Leewit stared at him. 'Or at least, like the vatches I've run into before.'

'We always knew there were some vatches that couldn't be controlled, even by a really good vatch-handler like you. What I'm wondering now is whether that's just because the vatches we usually run into are just, well, vatch-style village idiots?'

The Leewit scowled, but it was her thinking sort of scowl. 'You did all right, Captain,' she said, finally. 'I think maybe Goth's right. It's not a new sort of vatch, but just one you don't run across too often. You think if it eats vatch stuff and keeps getting smarter, maybe someday it'll get smart enough to leave us alone?'

Pausert shrugged. 'As long as it's willing to play nice, I don't care. I'm not going to give it too much vatch stuff, though. What if it gets smart and big, then decides to really mess with us? By that point it'd be so big I couldn't distract it anymore by tickling it with klatha hooks.'

'Good thinking,' the Leewit agreed, just as her chrono chimed. 'Oops! Got to get to the Big Top!' She scampered out of the dressing room so fast she might just as well have teleported to the circus side of the ship. Pausert glanced at his own chrono; she had about half an hour to get into her clown costume and makeup before the Entrance Parade. It was the first time he'd ever seen the Leewit making sure she was on time for anything.

That worried him. She was enjoying her role in the circus; maybe enjoying it too much.

'We're fitting in here entirely too well,' said Goth, in an echo of his own thoughts.

Pul shouldered his way into the dressing room, growling back over his shoulder at the Nartheby Sprite and Hulik, who were following him. '—and you're liking this too much!' he said. 'What about our mission? What about the Nanite plague? What about the Empress?'

Hulik, smiling faintly, leaned back against a wall, and started removing the long wig she wore as Juliet. Hantis folded herself into a chair. 'I am liking this, but I haven't forgotten, Pul,' she said seriously. 'The trouble is, there are entirely too many people trying to find us. The Agandar's pirates, not to mention the ISS. For all I know, the Sedmons might even be looking for us! One at a time we could evade, but until we shake some of the hunters off, every time we start to run, we're only going to run into someone else. And the only way we can shake them is by doing what we're doing: going to ground, not poking our noses up until we've lost some or all of them.'

'We're going to ground?' the grik-dog said, blinking. 'I thought we were earning fuel-money, repair-money, our passage and buying the Venture free.'

'We're also in hiding, in the best way possible way,' said Hulik. 'We're not hiding.'

Pul shook his head rapidly, his ears flapping like a pair of frantic wings. 'Hiding? Not in hiding? You two are making my head hurt!'

'Mine too,' said Pausert, 'And I have to agree with Pul—I think you all like this life too much.'

'If we tried to actually hide anywhere, chances are that we'd be found,' Hulik insisted. 'Believe me, it's the hardest thing in the world, trying to stay underground. You have to eat, you have to drink, and sooner or later, you nearly go crazy for a bit of open space around you. And people will always be looking for you and looking at you if you act as if you don't want to be seen. But if you do what we're doing—why, we're not in hiding, are we? We're some of the most visible people on the Petey B! Three shows a day, for most of us, two shows in the Freak Show or the Big Top and one on stage, out in front of thousands and thousands of people. Obviously we're not trying to hide! But—!'

She held up a finger, as Hantis nodded. 'Do we look like the people that the ISS and the pirates are trying to find? Do we act like them?'

'Well, no,' admitted Pul.

Goth was apparently rethinking the matter. 'If we do witchery here, people will just assume it's tricks,' she admitted. 'And they'll figure we're working on something new for the acts. Nobody believes in Karres witches on the