“Do you see a green path?” Apoca asked her.

  The girl brightened. “Yes.”

  “Follow it,” Nolan said. If what they had seen so far were incidentals, he was ready for the essence. Baton wanted them here; there had to be a reason.

  Vinia led them to—another baton. This one seemed female, having tresses on her head, tied back by a pink ribbon. She was floating in an alcove, evidently waiting for her next assignment. She seemed to be asleep.

  Baton flew up to Batoness. He bobbed before her.

  She woke with a start. A little speech balloon appeared just over her head. Words materialized within it. “What do you want, bulbhead? You know I’m not interested.”

  So Baton had a would-be girlfriend! Did he think Nolan could help? That was chancy indeed.

  Baton nodded in the direction of Nolan.

  Batoness did a start of surprise so sharp her ribbon almost fell off. “You brought a mortal man here? What were you thinking of? You know they’re not even supposed to be aware of us.”

  Baton bobbed.

  “And the mortal can see us? This is way beyond the pale!” Nolan noted the spelling; she was not referring to a bucket.

  Apoca touched his shoulder so that she could see what he saw; the bugs must have been sleeping and forgotten to relay the sight. “Wow!” she murmured.

  In the better part of a moment Vinia and Gent were touching Apoca, forming a kind of chain. “Oops,” Aurora said. “Nimbus and I got distracted by the weirdness. We’re back on duty now.”

  The chain separated, now that the others could see the action.

  Batoness flew out of her alcove and hovered before Nolan. Her speech balloon fairly quivered with ire. “Baton tells me you can see the imaginary, including us. It’s your talent. You’re a born snooper. So you tell me: what are you doing here?”

  Suddenly he was on the spot. He had little or no idea what he was doing here, maybe even less. But he was a prince; he had learned never to show indecision. So he parried with a question of his own. “What is your problem?”

  “What the bleep do you care?” The bleep symbol looked like a coiled Mundane rattlesnake that had just been trodden on, seething with righteous rage and dripping poison.

  There had to be a reason that both the baton and the green path had led them here. In some devious manner this setting had to relate to the accomplishment of the Quest. Nolan was not at all sure that Demon Chaos had tuned out yet. Was there another important hint, if only they could comprehend it?

  Baton hovered, nodding. There was relevance here.

  Nolan parried again. “Maybe I can do something for you. What do you want?”

  “What do I want?” the batoness’s print fairly screeched, flashing into italics, then capitals, before reverting to normal. The speech balloon was looking bedraggled; soon it might burst and spray words and letters across the landscape. “I want to get the bloop out of this Protagonism business and do something interesting for a change. Have you any idea how dull it can be?” Now her bleep was the color of poop.

  Protagonism was dull? That must depend on perspective. “No. Can you show me?” That sent the mud-ball back to her.

  “Here is a recording of one of my early assignments, ‘Little Red Riding Hood.’ Hang on and watch.”

  Batoness dissolved into mist, in the manner of a Demoness. An image formed from that mist, a three-dimensional picture. Apoca was sucked into it, becoming a girl wearing a red cape with a hood, the Protagonist. Batoness hovered discreetly overhead, now an image within the story. Nolan became an invisible observer.

  The girl walked through the woods, carrying a covered basket. Soon she came to a cottage labeled grandmother’s house. She knocked on the door, then pushed it open without waiting. “Hello, Grandma,” she called gaily.

  A figure was in bed, wearing a shawl and tight cap that concealed her head except for her projecting muzzle. “You look good enough to eat!” she said.

  The girl peered more closely. The woman did not look familiar, though she did wear her regular shawl. “Oh, Grandma, what big teeth you have.”

  “The better to eat you with, my dear.” The figure flung off her shawl as she leaped out of the bed and was revealed as the Big Bad Wolf. He had eaten Grandma and taken her place. The girl was able to get out only half a scream before the wolf was on her, gulping down the other half of the scream.

  But the wolf had reckoned without Apoca. She grabbed his nose with both hands, forced his jaws together, and kissed him on the tip of his snout, making him her instant love slave. “Now, cough up Grandma,” she told him.

  The wolf hacked and coughed up Grandma, intact. “Why, thank you, dear. It was getting a bit close in there,” Grandma said, bringing out a little mirror and resettling her hair, which had gotten sadly mussed.

  Apoca uncovered her basket. “I brought you a basketful of cookies, Grandma.”

  The old woman smiled. “What a wonderful present, dear.”

  They sat down on the bed and ate the cookies, letting the wolf have the fallen crumbs. After all, love slaves needed to eat too.

  The scene dissolved. Batoness reappeared. “That wasn’t quite the way it happened, but I like this version better, though it is still pretty dull. Here is another, the Pied Piper of Hamelin.” She dissolved into mist again.

  A new picture formed. This was of a town overrun by rats. They were everywhere, stealing the children’s food, intimidating the cats, and pooping on the couches. The city fathers realized that something had to be done.

  Nolan was sucked into the scene. He became the Pied Piper. “I can rid your town of rats,” he said. “All I want in return is a bushel of gold and your fairest maiden for my wife.” He glanced at Apoca, standing beside and slightly behind the mayor, being his dutiful daughter. “She’ll do.” Apoca smiled shyly.

  “Done,” the mayor agreed. “Payment on completion.”

  Nolan brought out his pipe and started playing. Immediately the rats took notice. They swarmed toward him, mesmerized by the music.

  Nolan turned about and marched out of the central square. The rats followed. He walked all the way out of town and to the bank of the river that happened to be passing by. He waded in, and the rats followed, diligently swimming. Why did anyone think a rat would drown if caught in water?

  The river narrowed, channeling into a culvert that did not have an end. Instead it descended deep into the ground, never to be seen again. Garbage was conveniently disposed there. Nolan came to straddle the hole, playing his pipe, and the rats swam through obediently, right into the opening. When the last one disappeared, he stopped playing the compelling music and put away his pipe. His job was done. Maybe the rats would discover some sunless sea and be happy there. Regardless, they would never bother the town again.

  He returned to the central square, his trousers sodden. It was empty. The mayor and townsmen were gone. There was no bushel of gold. He was being stiffed.

  He sighed. This sort of thing had happened before. He had worked out a way to handle it that made other towns hesitate to renege on the deal. This was a new area, but word would get around soon enough.

  He lifted his pipe to his mouth and played a different melody. Suddenly children appeared, boys and girls of all ages from two to teen, scrambling out of their houses to run toward him, screaming gladly. And one more: Apoca. “I am one week short of maturity, still technically a child,” she explained. “I feel the call. I suppose I could resist it, but why should I pass up a man as handsome and talented as you?”

  There was something about her he liked, apart from her appearance.

  Nolan turned about and walked away from the square, playing the compelling music. Apoca walked beside him. The children followed. They went to a nearby mountain cliff. A door opened in the stone wall. They marched in to discover a marvelous realm of toys, pet bunnies, amusement park rides, and free candies. When the last child was in, Apoca closed the door behind them. The children were sealed in. If any of them noticed, they didn’t care.

  Nolan stopped playing. The children exploded into an orgy of fun.

  Apoca approached him. “I may be a child for one more week, but I do know how to kiss.” She demonstrated, and Nolan was of course happily lost. In real life Apoca was no teen, but that hardly mattered for the story.

  The scene dissolved. They were back in Xanth, with Batoness hovering before them. “Again, I like your version better,” her speech balloon printed. “Mine lacks the romance. Here’s another.” She misted. Nolan fell into the scene.

  Good King Nolan Wenceslas looked out on the Feast of Stephen, where the snow lay round about, deep and crisp and even. Loudly howled the wind that night, and the cold was cruel. Then a hooded poor man came in sight, gathering winter fuel.

  “Hither, page, and stand by me,” Nolan said.

  The page came, and he saw that it was Vinia. Well, why not? Pages could be male or female. They were merely animating an existing story with a set plot.

  “If thou knowest it, telling,” he continued. “Yonder peasant, who is he? Where and what his dwelling?”

  “Sir, she lives a good league hence, underneath the mountain,” she answered. “Right against the forest fence, by St. Agnes’s Fountain.”

  She? Well, peasants were of both genders too. It was necessary so that they could reproduce their kind. Vinia went on to describe the peasant residence in more detail.

  Nolan made a decision. “Bring me flesh and bring me wine,” he ordered. “Bring me pine logs hither. Thou and I will see her dine.”

  Then the two of them bundled up and went outside, determined to locate the peasant and bring her to the palace for a good holiday meal. Page and monarch forth they went, forth they went together, through the rude wind’s wild lament and the bitter weather. The snow had already filled in the peasant’s tracks they tracked, but Vinia followed the green that only she could see.

  The deep snow and cutting wind soon proved to be too much for the page. “I can go no further,” she gasped. “There’s snow in my boots.”

  “Nonsense, child. Tread thou in my footsteps.”

  She did, carefully, dubiously, and heat was in the very sod he had printed. They made it to the peasant’s rickety shack, where the poor shivering, bundled woman was trying to light a fire in the aged stove. They brought her back to the palace, where they all unbundled in preparation for the meal. Lo, she was uncommonly fair as her face and figure emerged from the masking hood and cloak. In fact she was Apoca, animating the role.

  “Thank you so much, sire,” she said, smiling. “I’m starving.”

  That smile dazzled him. He leaned across and kissed her.

  The scene exploded into smithereens. “That’s not how it goes!” Batoness’s speech balloon printed. Then she reconsidered. “But I do like it better.”

  “So do I,” Apoca said, forming an air kiss with her lips. The kiss floated across to catch him on the nose, then dissipated in a fragrant little pink, heart-shaped cloud.

  “Wow!” Vinia said. “That’s the first time I was ever in someone else’s story.”

  They discussed the larger situation. The batoness was stuck with common old tales ad infinitum and was sick of it. She craved original, interesting, exciting stories, rather than SOS—Same Old Stuff. The last word was printed sloppily, as if it had been overwritten from another word before realizing there was a child present.

  Baton bobbed agreement. He wanted to help her but didn’t know how. That was why he had brought Nolan here.

  A bulb flashed over Nolan’s head. Batoness was a kind of Damsel in Distress! She was what these mini tales had in common. Baton wanted to rescue her and win her love, such as it might be, but didn’t know how.

  But Nolan knew how. He faced Batoness. “Go see Squid, the cuttlefish girl. Make yourself visible to her alone, and introduce yourself via your speech balloons. Tell her how you met us via Baton. Then ask her for a favor. She can’t do it herself, but she has a friend who can. Tell her you want to join our narrative as a Co-Protagonism Batoness. We have a much more original, interesting, and exciting story. It’s not about dull fairy tales but about tackling a balky Dwarf Demon. There could be real trouble. You won’t be bored with us.”

  Baton looked excited. This was how he might win her company.

  “Genius,” Apoca murmured appreciatively.

  Batoness’s hair flared. This interested her. It might indeed get her out of her dull track. Then she vanished.

  Ghorgeous Ghost appeared. “You’re shmarter than I took you for, Nolan.”

  “Thanks, I guess.”

  “You had no business kissing me in that Xmas story,” Apoca said.

  “I apologize. You just seem to be made for kissing, regardless of the role.”

  “I am.” She closed on him and kissed him with magical passion. But this time he didn’t float.

  “I’m immune,” he said. “You know why.” Because he had fallen in love with her naturally, and that was more potent than love slavery.

  “I do. But I will turn up the power.” She kissed him again. This time his feet did leave the ground.

  Batoness returned. “I did it,” her balloon printed. “And her friend did it, after her girlfriend became a boyfriend with him inside the body. That was weird. I am now part of your narrative.” She considered briefly. “He’s some person, if that’s what he is. I felt the awesome power as he twitched one finger.”

  “He’s her boyfriend,” Apoca said. “Let it go at that.”

  Sage advice.

  Nolan looked around. There, on the trunk of a nearby tree, was the plaque with the words not here. Too bad it couldn’t have been at the beginning of the path, instead of at the other end, saving them a fair amount of hassle.

  “I see it,” Apoca murmured. “I’m not sure it was there before.”

  Or was there reason? Could part of their progress be to pick up something that might help them further along the way? Like the batoness?

  Chapter 8

  Zombie

  Batoness was hovering close to Apoca. Then Baton winked out.

  Apoca was startled. “What happened to Baton? He just winked out. I thought he wanted to romance you.”

  The speech balloon appeared, and the print formed in it as Batoness answered. “Not while we’re on duty. Because there are now two of us, we can alternate, and the one not on duty can go elsewhere to relax. It is your turn to protagonize, and I will handle it unless you object.”

  “I don’t object. I like being able to talk with you. Nolan sometimes wonders what Baton wants, as he doesn’t speak.”

  “Males tend to think of themselves as strong, smart, silent types, but sometimes they are simply silent.”

  “Amen to that! But without them there’d be no one to admire our special qualities.” Apoca inhaled, emphasizing a quality. Sure enough, Nolan’s eyes sneak peeked.

  “True. They are useful to that extent. That just about makes up for their liabilities.”

  They were walking back along the seventh path. Soon they came to the nexus. There were the other six paths, each leading into the unknown.

  Apoca sighed. “DD Talents is bound to be on the least likely path. But these all look similarly unlikely. I fear there could be not here plaques on every one of them. I wish they were labeled.”

  “There are hints. The nearest one has a loose screw on the ground that a robot must have lost. The next one has a torn strip of a sheet that a ghost could have left. Another has a rotting piece of flesh, evidence of the passage of a well-aged zombie.”

  Apoca shuddered. “I don’t much like zombies. I don’t want to go there.” She paused, reconsidering. “Which may make it the least likely path.”

  “Bleep,” Nolan muttered. He of course had heard their dialogue, because of his talent.

  Apoca sighed. The one thing about that was that to do it properly she had to inhale fully, compelling Nolan’s attention.

  They took the path. It soon took them to a sign saying zombie country—abandon life all ye who enter here.

  “Ignore that,” Nolan said. “The zombies just want to scare off raiders who otherwise might steal their goods.”

  “It is after all the border,” Batoness printed.

  He nodded. “All the same, let’s check first. Ghorgeous, can you—”

  The ghost appeared, deep cleavage first, then face. “I can fhirm up anything you want to get your hands on.” She had been flirting with him ever since kissing him, to Apoca’s muted annoyance.

  “—verify what’s ahead and let us know?” he continued with only a trace of a pause.

  “Just enough pause to make a mental snapshot of that mountain valley she flashed, that he can process later when you aren’t close,” Nimbus said cynically. “I doubt it was that impressive when she was alive.”

  Apoca nodded. Ghorgeous lacked substance but had malleable appearance.

  “I hear and obey.” The ghost was gone, leaving behind only a trace of evocative perfume.

  Apoca adjusted her own cleavage. The living could play that game better than the dead could, when they had the mountains.

  They gazed across the border. A zombie shuffled along it, dropping bits of rotten flesh, which seemed to regenerate so that he remained repellingly intact. He was probably a border guard. The trees were zombies, too, with moldy trunks and spoiling leaves. There was even a zombie bird, a vulture, pecking at one of the pieces of rotten flesh the guard had left behind.

  Apoca shuddered. She did not like to think of herself as prejudiced, but this was not a region she liked.

  In due course, perhaps a little longer, Ghorgeous was back, this time appearing tight-skirt first before her full thighs descended into legs and reached the ground. “There’s an imprisoned living phrince,” she reported. “In a haunted-house cellar, alone. No jailers, just strong bars. There must be an interesting story there.”