“Oh, my goodness,” she said. “I would have been dead, just like that!” Then she broke down into tears.
Jumper changed back to manform so he could comfort her. He put his arm around her. “You’re safe now.”
She turned into him. “Oh, Jumper! Thank you!”
“You’re welcome, of cour—”
He was cut off by her fierce kiss. It was so passionate that it threatened to freak him out. Phanta wrapped her arms and legs about him, still avidly kissing him. She was hot and soft and fantastically exciting. Then something happened. Jumper wasn’t sure exactly how, but the next thing he knew he was exploding in plea sure that radiated from his midsection throughout his body. Phanta was with him, sharing it, never relinquishing the kiss.
For a timeless yet eternal moment they clung together, immersed in the sheer delight of the experience. Then at last it faded, and they fell apart.
“What was that?” Jumper panted.
Phanta started laughing, helplessly. “Maybe you can guess!” she gasped.
Then he caught on. “The stork!”
“We signaled the stork,” she agreed. “Not in imagination, not in a dream, but for real. Are you disappointed?”
“No! But I never meant to—”
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She kissed him again, briefly, signaling affection rather than passion. “Jumper, you aren’t experienced, but I am. You know that. I was so grateful for being rescued from doom that I forgot myself and seduced you. I apologize.”
Now he had to laugh, weakly. “Where is Haughty, to make a note?”
“That a bad scare can tumble a person into seduction? We’ll inform her in due course.”
“We must marry,” he said.
“What?”
“When a man has his way with a woman, he must marry her. Isn’t that the human rule?”
She shook her head. “Oh, Jumper, you’re so sweet! There’s no such rule. It’s just a convention in some circles. You are under no obligation to take it further.”
“I’m not?”
“Not,” she agreed.
“But I was supposed to resist. I got carried away.”
“Jumper, Jumper, Jumper,” she said fondly. “We both got carried away. Sheer emotion of the moment did it. But I don’t know how emotional the Demon Pluto is. Still, I want to clarify this: I am one of six very angry girls, and I want to destroy Pluto for the mockery he made of my love. But I like you, Jumper, and don’t mean you any harm. So this is only an incident, not meaning any romantic commitment. I’m glad to have given you a moment of plea sure, and now we must get on with the mission.”
“The mission,” he agreed, remembering. She had certainly set him straight. “So we remain . . . just friends?”
“Friends who shared an experience. We must put it behind us for now, without rejecting any part of the memory.”
“Put it behind us? Why?”
“Because I think we are about to meet the Demon.”
He followed her glance. Button was hovering near a large stone door, and the door was slowly swinging open.
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The ghost floated through the doorway, and Jumper and Phanta cautiously followed.
And paused. For there lay a lovely freezing world of ice. There were mountains and valleys, plains and glaciers, crystalline trees and houses.
And a handsome woman whose hair was a mane of ice fibers and whose skin was glassy ice. “Welcome, travelers,” she said.
“Uh, hello,” Jumper said uncertainly. “We were looking for— that is—”
“I am the Demon Eris,” the woman said. “Or if you prefer, De mon ess. Assuming roughly human form for your con ve nience. The seeming ghost you followed was my trace spirit identity, the only aspect of me able to escape confinement.”
“Button wasn’t really a ghost!” Phanta exclaimed. “Yet he seemed like one.”
“The ghost of the hope of redemption,” Eris said. “Sent to lead someone to my prison.”
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best to verify the rest. “Is it— is it true that you need to marry a mortal prince, or something, to escape?”
“It is true,” the De mon ess agreed. “It is a standard ploy in our Demon wagers, because mortal princes are not a dime a dozen, and not many of those who exist would care to make any such commitment.” She glanced at Jumper. “You don’t happen to be a prince, by any chance?”
He laughed, embarrassed. “No, I’m just an ordinary mortal male spider. But one of our party thought the Princess Dawn might be interested.” Then he had to correct himself. “That is, we thought you might be male.”
“Lovely creature,” Eris agreed. “She could be a real asset when dealing with mortals, because of her understanding of living things.”
“You know her?” Jumper asked, surprised.
“In a manner. My spirit wisp is familiar with all the denizens of Castle Roogna, having been there for a century. Dawn certainly would do, though her sinister sister Eve is more intriguing. But it has to be voluntary, and male, which complicates things.”
“I suppose that would,” Jumper agreed. “We came here in search of the origin and continuation of the Prophecy.”
“Of course. Come into my parlor and I will clarify it.”
Her parlor turned out to be an elaborate chamber in an ice palace, with ice couches that were surprisingly comfortable. Their cushions were made of snow, which was resilient, and somehow not cold. In fact he was not cold at all, and Phanta did not seem to be either. Jumper reminded himself that this was not an ordinary setting.
“Let me start closer to the beginning of this incident,” the De mon ess said as they relaxed with drinks of iced tea and cold cakes. “Approximately a century ago there came an opening for a promotion to full Demon status. In this region the main contenders were Pluto and me, both Dwarf Demons eager for advancement. So we gambled: the winner would get the promotion, while the loser would be relegated to oblivion. Since Demon wagers must depend on essentially random or nonsensical events, such as those determined by mortals, we set it up for a mortal decision: which of our planets would the mortals choose to 039-40892_ch01_4P.qxp 7/30/09 12:35 PM Page 238 238
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recognize first? I believed I had the advantage, as my planet was larger than Pluto’s, with a larger orbit. Obviously it was more important.”
She paused. Phanta took advantage to insert a question. “Is your planet one we know about?”
“No. That relates to the history of this incident. At the time we made the wager, neither of our planets was known to the mortals. They were bound to discover them in time. That was the randomness of it: we could not know which one. Naturally I did not leave it purely to chance. I asked my girlfriend Sharon to intervene on Earth.”
“Sharon!” Jumper exclaimed. “Your girlfriend?” This bothered him in more than one respect.
“Yes. She’s actually quite a woman.” Eris paused, contemplating him. “I see you are disturbed, so I will clarify that Demons are not bound by the rules of mortals, and we may associate with each other in ways not all mortals would approve. Yes, she was my girlfriend. Because she was not a primary in this wager, she could do what Pluto and I could not: influence the mortals. She agreed to visit Earth under cover and guide one of their primitive astronomers to search their sky in the right vicinity, so he would discover my planet. That would give me the victory. What I did not know then was that she was Charon’s sister, and Charon was Pluto’s minion. It was my foolish fault for not checking her background. So she influenced the mortal astronomer to search Pluto’s area of sky, and his planet was discovered first.”
“That must have
ended your relationship,” Jumper said, relieved in about one and a half ways.
She sighed. “It did. And thus did Pluto achieve promotion to full Demon status, while I was banished a century ago to this nether prison, to languish until rescued by a mortal prince. It was a foul deal, and I curse the memory of the De mon ess who betrayed me.”
A century! But of course time was different for Demons, who were eternal. “But wasn’t she true to her brother?” Jumper asked, still not completely comfortable with this news.
“Yes. And to her true lover, Pluto. That, too, I did not know at the time. She deceived me, and caused me to lose. She is not to be trusted. Not that I will ever have anything to do with her again.”
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That was understandable. But it left a hole in Jumper’s heart. He had somehow thought there could be something between Sharon and himself, maybe, possibly, if things worked out. Obviously he had been a fool. He was glad that he had never truly trusted her, yet grieved to have his cynicism vindicated.
“Now about the Prophecy,” Eris said. “I knew that I would never be rescued if I did not help myself to what ever degree was feasible. So I sought a way to alert the mortals to my situation. I could not address them directly, because of my confinement, but I could do so indirectly. My spirit wisp went out to spy on human events at the castle, which was as far as he could reach without extraordinary effort. Thus I learned the mortal language, and crafted the Prophecy. It was designed to lead a mortal prince to me.”
“But it was given to me!” Jumper protested.
“Not exactly. You see, I made many Prophecies. The problem was getting them to individuals who could or would act on them. I tried sealing them in bottles and floating them down the river, but the river emptied into an isolated nether sea no one visited, so they were lost. I tried blowing them out into the air, but these were mostly destroyed in storms. Thus for de cades I got nowhere. Finally I managed to stick one to a narrative hook that was swinging randomly about. You, it seems, were the one the hook caught, and the sticky Prophecy transferred itself to you. It was intended for a prince, but it seems the hook acted indirectly. It got the Prophecy to the attention of two princesses, perhaps somehow assuming that this equated to one prince. Thus it finally brought you to me. But perhaps we can yet save the situation, if you notify Princess Dawn of its true nature so she can locate a suitable prince.”
“But that Prophecy is guiding me!” Jumper insisted. “So I can repair the cable. That’s the whole point of it.”
“That may be the way you or your Good Magician interpreted it,”
Eris said. “That was not its original intent.”
Phanta seemed to be no more pleased than Jumper. “You mean we have all been following a false Prophecy?”
“Not false,” Eris said. “Merely irrelevant to your par tic u lar mission.”
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“Fighting monsters,” Phanta continued. “Falling in love, struggling to win through to ultimate victory— when it didn’t even apply to us?”
“That is the case,” the De mon ess agreed equably.
“It’s an outrage!” Phanta flared.
“How so?” the De mon ess asked.
“We were all betrayed by false love. Now we’ve been betrayed by the Prophecy itself. That’s just as bad in its way. It leaves me seething.”
“I don’t understand.”
Phanta looked fit to explode, so Jumper stepped in. “Demons don’t have souls,” he reminded her. “They don’t have human emotions. All they care about is status among their own kind. You are being emotional. She is being rational, by her definition. The Prophecy accomplished her purpose, so she is satisfied. She doesn’t care how it incon ve niences eight mortals.”
“You are marvelously understanding,” Eris murmured. “I admire that.”
For a moment it seemed Phanta was going to flare at Jumper, but she stifled it. “And do you care, Jumper?”
“Oh, yes! I really liked Sharon, and I still like the rest of you, and I hate to see you hurt. I am also frustrated by the problem of our mission. I don’t see how we’ll accomplish it now.”
“You are halfway rational. Maybe that’s best. Maybe we should address this rationally, the way Eris does.”
“Yes, of course,” Jumper agreed. “We should bargain with her. But I don’t see what we can offer her to make her complete the Prophecy to address our mission.”
“I do.” Phanta turned to the De mon ess, who was waiting with perfectly rational passivity. “You need to marry a mortal prince to abate your situation? It won’t make you a full Demon, but will at least free you from your prison.”
“Correct.”
“And we have one or two princesses in our group who surely know some princes. Just one prince would suffice.”
“Correct.”
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“And those princesses are just as angry at Pluto as I am, having suffered similarly.”
Jumper began to see where she was leading, thanks to his ability to appreciate human emotion.
“Correct,” the De mon ess said.
“And they will be just as mad as I am when they learn about the irrelevant Prophecy.”
“Correct.”
“Then why the bleep should either of them want to help you?”
Eris was taken aback. “They would decline?”
“Yes. Their foolish irrational emotion would make them tell you to go to hell.”
“Actually, Pluto governs Hell, or more properly, Hades,” the De mon ess said. “With his wife Persephone. I could not go there.”
“It is an established principle that princesses do not marry men they are mad at, or help women they are mad at,” Phanta continued inexorably. “So the rational approach is to make them un-mad.”
“Correct. But what would un-madden them?”
“Gee, I don’t know.” Jumper recognized irony there, and kept silent. “But it might help if the girls got their dream men back, this time for real, and found a way to complete the mission. That might not make them eager to help anyone, but at least they wouldn’t be as angry as before.”
Eris turned to Jumper. “This seems to be manipulating emotional states. I do not understand emotion. Does this program make sense to you?”
“Yes,” Jumper said simply.
“How might we achieve such details?”
“Maybe if we all met together and discussed it,” Jumper said. “The girls are reasonably smart. One of them might come up with something feasible.”
“Then let’s meet, here and now.”
“There’s a problem,” Jumper said. “The girls are stuck at various places along our route, protecting it so we can return safely.”
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“If we can negotiate a deal, and a princess finds a prince for me, I will no longer be confined, and the way will no longer be blocked. There will be no further need to guard it.”
“That’s rational,” Jumper agreed. “I will go back and tell them to come here.”
“There is no need. My ghost aspect can notify them and lead them in.”
“They may not believe him,” Jumper said. “Unless he carries a credible message.”
“What would that message be?”
Jumper considered, but didn’t think of one.
“Vengeance is ours,” Phanta said. “Follow Button.”
“But that’s not true,” Jumper said. “We haven’t negotiated any deal yet, let alone achieved any revenge.”
“We will,” Phanta said. “Trust me.”
So they made a printed sign with those words, and Phanta touched it, ghosting it, so that the ghost Button could carry it. He took it and flitted back the way they had come. Belatedl
y Jumper thought of another complication. “Dawn— she’s afraid of depths. She can’t come here.”
“There is a more direct route,” the De mon ess said. “One that lacks depths. Button knows that route.”
Soon the girls started appearing, led in by Button Ghost. The first was Olive. “Coinroy is still marveling over Shep’s fantastic coin collection. I doubt he even misses me. But what’s this about?”
“We will be negotiating with the De mon ess Eris,” Phanta said. “For our mission, and the return of our dream men.”
Olive made a moue. “Our phantom dream men? Tell me more.” The two walked away, conversing.
“You associate with pretty girls,” Eris remarked.
“Coincidence,” Jumper said. “I did not choose them.”
“The Prophecy did. I did not wish to be rescued by an ugly prince.”
Jumper had to laugh. Then he had to try to explain why, because the De mon ess did not understand laughter. It had not been all that long since Jumper learned it himself, but he made the attempt, and the De mon ess seemed to be getting it. She seemed to be quite intelligent. 039-40892_ch01_4P.qxp 7/30/09 12:35 PM Page 243
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Eve appeared. “What a castle!” she exclaimed. “Of course it needs more carpets on the walls, so it won’t look so cold.”
Jumper introduced them. “This is the Princess Eve, a Sorceress. This is the De mon ess Eris. As you surmised, she needs to marry a mortal prince.”
“You are wondrously lovely,” Eris said, surveying Eve’s nude charms.
Eve paused part of a moment, amenable to flattery, then decided.
“Sorry, I have another agenda.”
Oops. Eve thought the De mon ess was hinting at something else.
“But your sister?” Eris asked.
Eve’s lips quirked. “Maybe. That is for her to say.”
Jumper decided to keep his mouth shut.
“Still, let’s look around your castle,” Eve said. “It looks worthy.”
They walked off.
Jumper wondered what Eve’s other agenda was. A De mon ess would be a considerable catch, even for a prince.