gone. Somewhere out there my partner's in trouble, and I'm not going to back away from at least trying to help him. I'd do the same if it was one of you, but we're talking about Aahz here. He's saved my skin more times than I care to remember. I can't just…'
I caught myself and brought my voice back under control.
'Look,' I said, starting again. 'I'll admit we never expected this vampire thing when we started out, and the limited magic handicap is enough to give anyone pause. If either or both of you want to head back, you can do it without hard feelings or guilt trips. Really. The only reason I'm pushing on is that I know me. Whatever is up ahead, it can't be any worse than what I would put myself through if I left Aahz alone to die without trying my best to bail him out. But that's me. If you want out, go ahead.'
'Don't get your back up. Hot Stuff,' Massha chided gently. 'I'm still not sure how much help I'm going to be, but I'll tag along. I'd probably have the same problem if anything happened to you and I wasn't there, that you'd have if anything happened to Aahz. I am your apprentice, you know.'
'Body guarding ain't much, but it's all I know,' Guido said glumly. 'I'm supposed to be guardin' that body of yours, so where it goes, I go. I'm just not wild about the odds, know what I mean?'
'Then it's settled,' I said firmly. 'All right. As I see it, our next stop is Blut.'
'Blut,' Massha echoed carefully.
'That's right. I want to look up this Dispatcher character and see what he has to say. I mean, a town is a town, and we've all visited strange towns before. What we really need now is information, and the nearest source seems to be Blut.'
'The Dispatcher,' Massha said without enthusiasm.'
'Blut,' Guido repeated with even less joyful anticipation.
It occurred to me that while my assistants were bound and determined to stay with me on this caper, if I wanted wholehearted support, I'd better look for it from the natives… a prospect I didn't put much hope in at all.
Chapter Six
'An agent is a vampire with a telephone!'
REMEMBER how I said that if you've seen one town, you've seen 'em all? Well, forget it. Even though I've visited a lot of dimensions and seen a lot of towns, I had to admit that Blut looked a little strange.
Everything seemed to be done to death in basic black. (Perhaps 'done to death' is an unfortunate turn of a phrase. Whatever.) Mind you, when I say everything, I mean everything. Cobblestones, walls, roof tiles, everything had the same uninspired color scheme. Maybe by itself the black overtones wouldn't have seemed too ominous, if it weren't for the architectural decorations that seemed to abound everywhere you looked. Stone dragons and snakes adorned every roof peak and ledge, along with the inescapable gargoyles and, of course, bats. I don't mean 'bats' here, I mean 'BATS'!!! Big bats, little bats, bats with their wings half open and others with their wings spread wide… BATS!!! The only thing they all seemed to have in common (besides being black) was mouths full of needle-sharp teeth… an image which did nothing to further the confidence of my already nervous party. I myself felt the tension increasing as we strode down the street under the noses of those fierce adornments. One almost expected the stone figures to come to life and swoop down on us for a pint or two of dinner.
'Cheerful sort of place, isn't it?' Massha asked, eyeing the rooftops, 'I don't like to complain, Boss,' Guido put in, lyings blatantly, 'but I've been in friendlier-looking graveyards.'
'Will you both keep your mouths shut!' I snarled, speaking as best I could through tightly pressed lips. 'Remember our disguises.'
I had indeed turned on my disguise spell as we entered town, but in an effort to conserve magical energy, I had only turned our eyes red. If any of the others on the street, and there were lots of them, happened to spot our non-vampirish teeth, the balloon would go up once and for all. Then again, maybe not. We still hadn't figured out why the couple we met on the road had been so afraid of me, but I wasn't about to bank the success of our mission on anything as flimsy as a hope that the whole town would run at the sight of our undisguised features.
Fortunately, I didn't have to do any magical tinkering' with our wardrobe. If anything, we were a little drab compared to most of the vampires on the street. Though most of them appeared rather young, barely older than me, they came in all shapes and sizes, and were decked out in some of the most colorful and outrageous garb it has ever been my misfortune to encounter as they shouted to each other or wove their way in and out of taverns along the street.
It was night now, the clouds having cleared enough to show a star-studded night sky, and true to their billing, vampires seemed to love the night life.
'If everybody here is vampires,' Guido said, ignoring my warning, 'how do they find anybody to bite for blood?'
'As far as I can tell,' Massha answered, also choosing to overlook the gag order, 'they buy it by the bottle.'
She pointed to a small group of vampires sitting on a low wall merrily passing a bottle of red liquid back and forth among themselves. Despite our knowledge of the area, I had subconsciously assumed they were drinking wine. Confronted by the inescapable logic that the stuff they were drinking was typed, not aged, my stomach did a fast roll and dip to the right.
'If you two are through sightseeing,' I hissed, 'let's try to find this Dispatcher character before someone invites us to join them for a drink.'
With that, I led off my slightly subdued assistants, nodding and waving at the merrymaking vampires as we went. Actually, the goings on looked like a lot of fun, and I might have been tempted to join in, if it weren't for the urgency of our quest… and, of course, the fact that they were vampires.
Following the instructions I had gleaned from the couple on the road before their panicky flight, we found the Dispatcher's place with no problem. Leaving Guido outside as a lookout, Massha and I braved the stairs and entered the Dispatcher's office.
As strange as Blut had appeared, it hadn't prepared me for the room we stepped into.
There were hundreds of glass pictures lining the walls, pictures which depicted moving, living things much like looking into a rack of fishbowls. What was more, the images being displayed were of incredible violence and unspeakable acts being performed on seemingly helpless victims. The overall effect was neither relaxing nor pleasant… definitely not something I'd want on the wall at home.
I was so entranced by the pictures, I almost missed the Dispatcher himself until he rose from his desk. Perhaps 'rose' is the wrong description. What he actually did was hop down to the floor from his chair which was high to begin with, but made higher by the addition of a pillow to the seat.
He strode forward, beaming widely, with his hand extended for a handshake.
'Hi there Vilhelm's the name Your problem is my problem. Don't sit down Standing problems I solve for free Sitting problems I charge for Reasonable rates Just a minor percentage off the top What can I do for you?'
That was sort of all one sentence in that he didn't pause for breath. He did, however, seize my hand, pump it twice, then repeated the same procedure with Massha, then grabbed my hand again… all before he stopped talking.
All in all, it was a little overpowering. I had a flash impression of a short, stocky character with plump rosy cheeks and a bad case of the fidgets. I had deliberately tried not to speculate on what the Dispatcher would look like, but a cherub vampire still caught me a little off-guard.
'I… ummm… how did you know I have a problem?'
That earned me an extra squeeze of the hand and a wink.
'Nobody comes in here unless they've got a problem,' he said, finally slowing down his speech a bit. 'I mean, I could always use a bit of help, but does anyone leap forward to lend a hand? Fat chance. Seems like the
