"Well, this is just perfect," Janine Majius said. "'I'll take care of dinner', says the great and powerful wizard. 'You won't have to lift a finger'. No, I'll be lifting a mop and bucket, is what I'll be lifting." She stomped from the room to retrieve cleaning supplies (or possibly to call her lawyer).
Albert Majius sighed. "You'd think I could get consistent results, at least with minor things like this," he said, contemplating the putrid puddle of slop oozing from the dining room table onto the floor.
"Two things, Al," his familiar said. "First, conjuring a meal isn't really minor. You are either finding and teleporting the exact items you want, or you're making them out of the ether (magical ether, I mean, not that stuff they thought outer space was full of)." Githros shifted position, probably to scratch an itch on what passed for his ass, and Majius had to suppress the urge to jam a finger into his left ear to make the little homunculus hold still.
"Aargh, quit squirming," Al said. "You know that drives me crazy. And tell me the second thing. I hate it when you say, 'x many things, Al', and only tell me x minus one of them."
"The second thing, oh mighty one -- excuse me while I snicker -- is that magic is essentially a way of harnessing chaos. And chaos -- isn't -- consistent! If magic was reliable, magicians would rule the world instead of being hangers-on to people with money and/or great mobs of goons to do their bidding."
"The really good ones get to be hangers-on." Al said. "And they do get consistent results, or at least more consistent than I can manage. Me, the only things I'm hanging on to are Janine and this house -- if I'm lucky."
Janine returned, hauling a bucket of soapy water and a sponge mop with a patented never-get-your-hands-wet wringing mechanism that was only slightly more reliable than Al's magic. She began mopping up the puddle of greenish, foul-smelling goo that Al had intended to be a nice surf-and-turf dinner, with baked potatoes and a tossed green salad.
"If this ruins the floor, you're getting me a new one," she said, glaring at him with such heat that Al would have sworn that she was hurling hexes at him. But no, Janine had always tested out as a null when it came to magic. Some people did have latent powers, usually manifesting themselves as unusual luck -- unusually good, or unusually bad -- but not Janine.
On the other hand, with the ability to glare like that, Janine didn't need powers. And The Glare always worked.
Al muttered a few words and made a series of intricate hand movements. The green slop on the dining room table vanished with a faint pop. That was good, Al thought. But then he heard a second pop followed by a loud splat from someplace altogether too close for comfort.
"That was in the kitchen, wasn't it?" Janine asked. Al leaned to one side to peer through the propped-open door. He winced, then nodded.
"New floors, Al," Janine grunted as she finished cleaning the dining room floor and hoisted the bucket to carry it into the kitchen. "Dining room and kitchen. And no magic. We're still paying big liability insurance premiums because of that carpet you put in that took off and nearly crippled poor Mr. Farquar."
"Yes, Janine," Al said. "I'll put together the money right away."
"And no counterfeiting!" Janine shouted from the kitchen. "No fairy gold, and especially no enchanted paper money. We're lucky we're not in prison."
Al closed his eyes in shame, remembering one of his less-successful days. He had tried to produce the modern equivalent of a Gilbert-and-Sullivan-style 'ever-filled purse', and had been thrilled when he wound up with a wallet that had a never-ending supply of crisp twenty-dollar bills. The thrill had faded when he realized that (a) the bills all had the same serial number, and (b) the pictures of the president had an unfortunate habit of giggling when examined too closely. He was lucky, he supposed, that it was Janine who noticed these little problems rather than the manager of the restaurant where he had first tried to use his newly-created wealth.
Since Janine had ruled out trying to conjure the flooring or the money to buy it, that left earning the money -- a lot of money, if his estimates of the cost of replacing that much flooring were at all accurate -- the old-fashioned way. Al reached into his pocket and withdrew a crystal sphere the size of a golf ball. He tilted his head to the left and snapped his fingers, signaling Githros to leave his hiding place. Githros scrambled out of Al's ear and ran down his arm to the hand holding the crystal.
"The usual message, Al?"
Al nodded. "'Wizard available for short term work. Certified Level 4 necromancy, divining, etc.'"
Githros grinned, his smile far too wide for his tiny head, spat into his hands and rubbed them together, and dived headfirst into the crystal sphere. There was a minuscule splash as he entered the glass, and then ripples spread from the pinprick-sized point of impact and seemed to travel up Al's arm before they dissipated.
Janine leaned around the corner, her hair lank and dripping with sweat. "Was that Gitlost, or whatever his name is?"
Al nodded. "I just sent him to drum up some work so I can pay for the new floors."
Janine rolled her eyes. "It never occurred to you to get a real job, did it?"
Al opened his mouth to reply, but Janine beat him to it. "'I have been given a Talent, and I am obligated to use it'," she recited. Retreating into the kitchen to continue the cleanup, she said, "I could have married Jack Milhous, you know. He's an accountant, and makes about sixty grand a year, plus bonuses. But noooooo, I had to fall for the glamorous magical twit!"
Al grinned ruefully. It was true. She had fallen for him, and he for her. And they still loved each other, in spite of his frequent screw-ups. It was also true that when it came to using his talent, he was a twit.
#
Some hours later, Githros climbed back out of Al's crystal. "Got a hot prospect, Al," he said, toweling himself off with Al's sleeve. "Lady needs to raise her late husband to finish up some paperwork that hadn't been finished when he shuffled off to Buffalo."
"That's 'shuffled off this mortal coil'," Al said.
"'Mortal coil, Buffalo, what do I care?" Githros retorted. "Anyway, here's her phone number. She doesn't have any Talent of her own, so you can't call her on the crystal." He produced a tiny slip of paper with ten digits written on it in handwriting so precise that Al could feel his sphincter tightening up just from looking at it. It didn't help that Al knew that Githros, being naked, had no pockets. Al really didn't want to know where or how Githros had been carrying the note.
As he dialed the number, Al frowned. "Sounds like she wants a physical resurrection. Not exactly my specialty."
"You have a specialty?" Githros snorted.
Al heard the phone ring at the other end of the line. Then a woman's voice said, "Hello? Marion Hardbottom speaking."
Al rolled his eyes. No doubt it's hard from clenching, he thought. Aloud, he said, "Mrs. Hardbottom, this is Albert Majius. I'm a Level 4 necromancer; I understand that you wish to speak to your late husband?"
"Not just speak to him," Marion said. "There were certain papers relating to his estate that his lawyers were still working on when poor Stuart passed away. I need him to sign those papers to settle things; they tell me that so long as he is raised before witnesses by a certified necromancer, his signature will still be legal."
Al sighed. "Mrs. Hardbottom, I must tell you that I have had very little experience performing physical resurrections of departed ones. As I said, I'm a Level 4 -- usually the sort of thing you're asking for is done by at least a Level 5. Would it be sufficient for him to give verbal instructions for the lawyers to sign on his behalf?"
"I'm afraid not," Marion said. "The documents in question relate to the disposition of some major assets, too valuable for other interested parties to accept a mere -- voice from beyond."
"Major assets, Al," Githros whispered. "Ka-ching!"
"I really would recommend that you try to engage the services of a Level 5 or 6," Al said. "I -- ow!"
Al reached up and flicked Githros across the room, then rubbed his throbbing earlobe. He covered the telephone mouthpiece with one hand and hissed, "If you drew blood where it shows, you'll be sorry!"
"Mr. Majius, are you still there?"
"Um, yes, sorry for the interruption." He kept one eye on Githros as the little demon made his way back across the carpet. The little bugger was not above having another unscheduled blood snack if he thought he could get away with it, and he had bitten Al in places that Al preferred not to think about.
"The Level 5 and Level 6 necromancers recommended by the lawyers insisted on a rather substantial payment in advance," Marion said. "Unfortunately, until the papers are signed, most of the estate's assets are tied up, and I cannot meet their price."
Al nodded to himself. Marcos the Black (born Mark Feinbaum, but who would tremble in awe at a name like that?) had been known to charge fifty thousand up front when major money was at stake. Some of the real superstars demanded even more.
"I understand," Al said. "I'll need to spend some time preparing, and -- I can't guarantee the results, so I suppose we'll have to make payment contingent on the success of the ritual."
After a lengthy pause, Marion said, "Very well, Mr. Majius. I hope you won't require more than a few days to prepare. As you can imagine, even day-to-day expenses are becoming difficult to manage with most of my husband's assets frozen. As for your fee -- "
Al waited for the ceremonial dropping of the other shoe. He hoped it was a nice strappy sandal, but prepared himself for the thud of a steel-lined construction boot.
"The lawyers have recommended a fee of thirty thousand dollars, payable, as you said, upon successful resurrection of my husband."
Al managed to suppress the urge to laugh, and did not make audible gulping noises (he hoped). "That would be fine," he said. "I should be ready to attempt the ritual within a few days."
"I will have a contract prepared and brought to you for your signature," Marion said. "Please begin the preparations you spoke of as soon as possible."
She hung up without any further comment, leaving Al to stare at the receiver in happy shock.
"Thirty thousand dollars if I can pull this off, Githros. Thirty thousand dollars!"
Janine, who had finally finished wiping down and disinfecting the kitchen, said, "I'll believe it when I see the money, and it doesn't wink at me."
#
Al spent the next day doing research, on the Internet, in his modest library of occult texts, and through his crystal. There were surprisingly few special materials required for the most promising ritual, and these proved to be fairly easy to obtain from the local Magik Barn outlet (although not inexpensive) or with a little scrounging by Githros.
Finally, he was ready for a few trial runs. Using his remaining funds, Al purchased a goldfish and a hamster from a pet store, and adopted a cat at the local pound. He killed the goldfish by removing it from its bowl (looking away until it ceased to struggle); killed the hamster by drowning it (almost fainting from the guilt he felt listening to its frantic attempts to escape) -- but couldn't bring himself to harm the cat. Githros, however, dispatched the feline (a rather plump gray tabby) with frightening ease, without so much as ruffling the cat's fur.
"How did you -- ?"
"Gave it a magical coronary," Githros said with a shrug. Al wasn't sure if the homunculus was kidding, and really didn't want to know. There were a lot of things about Githros that Al really didn't want to know, even if the little creature did spend most of his time in Al's left ear.
Al performed the resurrection ritual as carefully as possible, and was elated when the goldfish began to flop around on the tabletop, its eyes regaining their shine and its decomposing-fish odor magically receding. He was somewhat less elated when he returned the fish to its water-filled bowl.
"It's swimming backwards, Al," Githros remarked. "And upside down, too."
Al sighed. "I noticed that, Githros."
"It didn't do that before, Al," Githros said.
"I know," Al snapped. He picked up the old book from which he had read the spell, cringing at the odd feel of the leather binding (not cowhide, not pigskin, not sheep or goat skin, not reptilian or fish leather -- which led to possibilities that Al found truly revolting). "Maybe I blew the pronunciation on this middle bit -- what is this, Urdu?"
Githros peered down at the page. "Dunno. Looks like a bad Arabic phonetic transcription of Second Dynasty Egyptian. If you mispronounced it, who would know?"
On the second attempt, the revived hamster seemed fine, sitting up in its cage, grooming itself, and even drinking from its little water bottle and eating a food pellet or two.
"Hey, I think I got it right this time," Al said. "But wait a minute, what's the little furball doing now?"
The hamster had scuttled over to the door of its cage, then started biting and clawing at the latch.
"It almost looks like it knows how the latch works, and is trying to get out," Al said. "But that can't be, can it?"
The hamster somehow managed to raise the latch and push the door open. It jumped out of the cage and scurried across the table until it was only a couple of feet away from Al.
Al looked down at the hamster. The hamster looked up at Al. The hamster had a decidedly unhamsterlike look in its eyes, rather like the one Janine had displayed after the surf-and-turf dinner disaster.
"Um, Githros, aside from being very smart, do you get the feeling there's something not right about this hamster?"
Githros shrugged (which sort of tickled, as he was back in Al's ear) and said, "I don't know, Al. I don't know how a hamster is supposed to act when it is right."
While Al pondered this response (he had to admit that he didn't really know anything about hamster behavior either), the hamster launched itself from the table, climbed nimbly up the front of Al's shirt, and went for his throat.
"Yaaaaaagh! Get it off me!"
Al grabbed at his small, furry assailant managed to get it away from his neck before it did more than superficial damage, but then had to contend with being bitten repeatedly on his hands and wrists. He would have throttled the little beast if it had paused in its attack for even a few seconds, but every time he tried to close his hand, it slashed at his fingers and palms with its surprisingly sharp rodent teeth.
"Githros, a little help!" Al screamed. "I'm bleeding here, damn it!"
"Bleeding? Why didn't you say so? Dibs on the arterial wounds!"
Githros zipped out of Al's ear so fast that Al's earlobe felt hot from the friction of the homunculus's passage. In an instant, the little demon was face to face with the berserk hamster.
Al wondered exactly what Githros could do against an opponent hundreds of times his size. He expected another demonstration of the "magical coronary" trick, but was stunned when Githros dived into the hamster's blood-stained mouth with the same aplomb he displayed when entering Al's crystal.
The hamster's eyes bugged out in surprise, and it stood up on its hind legs, clawing at its throat. Then it shuddered and fell from Al's hand to the tabletop, where it twitched feebly for a few seconds, and then was still.
Githros emerged from under the hamster's tail, covered in blood and other things. "Ptooie. Hamster blood really sucks, Al. And the other stuff inside a hamster is worse."
Al choked, on the verge of throwing up. He made a complicated gesture, and the blood (and other things) boiled away from Githros's skin and vanished in a foul-smelling cloud.
"Oooh, that felt good. Haven't been that warm since I've been with you."
Al grunted. "No way you were getting back in my ear without a good cleaning," he said. "Now, like I said, I'm bleeding here. All the loose stuff is yours if you'll close up the wounds."
Githros jumped for joy (a good half-inch, Al estimated) and went into blurring motion. Everywhere the hamster had bitten or scratched Al, Githros went, consuming dried blood, tacky blood, and finally fresh blood. And everywhere Githros had been, Al's wounds were closed, leaving only faint pink scars that faded within seconds.
When he was finished, Githros collapsed in a heap on the tabletop, his belly swollen to the point where it looked like he had swallowed a basketball (a tiny basketball, that is, suitable for use by fleas). "Oh, Al, I am so stuffed. It's a good thing you don't get cut like that too often, or I'd explode. And I mean that literally."
Al stared at Githros and the dead (again) hamster. "Is that how you killed the cat, too?" he asked. "Did you burrow through the poor thing and mess up its insides?"
Githros belched. "Al, if I told you, it would take all the mystery out of our relationship. And believe me, you wouldn't like that."
Al nodded. "Sometimes you don't tell me enough, and sometimes you tell me way more than I want to know. And I'm pretty sure you do it deliberately."
He consulted the book again, this time not caring what (or who) had contributed the skin for its binding. "We definitely have to get the kinks out of this before we try it on the cat, let alone Stuart Hardbottom," he said. "I mean, the hamster nearly killed me. A berserk cat would finish me off, kill Janine, and then start in on the rest of the town. And there are enough psychotic people out there without me making one from the corpse of a presumably-sane rich guy."
Fortunately, the revived cat seemed perfectly normal. When Al let it out of the pet carrier into which he had placed the feline corpse (before sealing the cage with layers of reinforced tape and wrapping it with chains), the cat mewed, jumped down from the table, slithered between Al's legs, and padded over to the food and water bowls. Then it had curled up on the rug and closed its eyes to sleep.
After a few minutes of watching the cat to make sure that it wasn't planning to attack, Al lowered the baseball bat and removed the catcher's mask he had donned just in case. "I said it before and was very, very wrong, but I'll say it again. I do believe I've got it."
#
Rather than complicate matters by attempting to use magic to remove Stuart Hardbottom from his grave, Al arranged to have the body exhumed by conventional means. The cemetery staff were quite obliging, being used to this sort of thing. They left the actual opening of the casket to Al and Mrs. Hardbottom, however.
"Weak stomach," one of the men said. "Mr. Hardbottom hasn't been in here long, but you never know. Anyway, let us know when you want to put him back." They walked and rode away, carrying shovels or being carried on the small backhoe they had used to do the excavation.
Al laid out the candles, silver ankh, and other paraphernalia, then pried open the casket. He held his breath, prepared for a face full of cadaverine and other corpse-related fragrances, but was surprised when to find only the scent of expensive cologne wafting from the coffin.
Stuart Hardbottom's body was perfectly preserved, so perfectly that Al wondered if he was actually under a suspension spell rather than being dead. Al looked quizzically at Marion Hardbottom, and said, "Are you entirely sure he's dead?"
Marion laughed bitterly. "He had a massive stroke and died before the ambulance reached the hospital. He was in excellent physical condition, but had a weak spot in an artery in his brain. They were going to operate to repair the embolism, but -- well, he went and died before they could schedule the surgery."
"But his body is so -- perfect," Al said.
"A preservation spell," Marion said. "A very expensive one. If he hadn't had it done instead of regular embalming -- the vain fool -- it would be a Level 5 or 6 necromancer standing here instead of you."
Al felt a bit uneasy. With another spell already in place, his resurrection ritual might have some unanticipated side effects. As Githros had warned, magic was intrinsically chaotic; laying one spell on top of another was chaos squared.
"I know what you're thinking, Al," Githros whispered. "And I agree, it's a little risky. But you really need that thirty thousand if you want to stay in that house with Janine."
Al sighed. Well, if Stuart Hardbottom turned into a berserk zombie, Githros could probably take him down. He said the words, made the gestures, and sprinkled the potion into the casket.
Stuart Hardbottom gasped, his eyes opening wide, and sat up. He looked frantically around, seeing Marion, Al, and a handful of lawyers and other witnesses (including a notary), and frowned.
"Marion, what have you done?"
"Stuart, please try to be calm," Marion said. "You died suddenly, before you could sign the papers we had agreed on. This gentleman brought you back -- temporarily -- to fulfill your promises to me. Most of the others I'm sure you recognize as representatives of Dewey, Scroom and Howe, your lawyers."
Stuart laughed. "I'm not signing anything, you gold-digging witch. I had another law firm set up a trust fund for the children, and one to support the Hardbottom charities, and I did sign those papers, while you had Dewey and the boys working to change my will to cancel the prenuptial agreement and leave damn near everything to you."
Marion's lips thinned until they turned white. She picked up a shovel forgotten by one of the cemetery staff, and walked over to her deceased-and-revived husband, who still sat in his coffin. "Did you know that you are still legally dead, Stuart? That you have no rights? You can complete actions such as signing an amended will, but you are nonetheless a non-person in the eyes of the law."
She swung the shovel so that it struck Stuart's head edge-first, sinking deep into his skull and knocking him from the coffin. Al moved to stop her from continuing to attack, but Githros hissed, "Wait, Al. Look at Stuart!"
Stuart Hardbottom reached up, grasped the handle of the shovel, and jerked it out of Marion's hands. He pried the blade out of his head and threw the tool aside. By the time he had climbed to his feet, the wound in his head had vanished, leaving only a few streaks of dirt and blood on his face.
"I may be legally dead, Marion, but apparently I'm also impossible to kill," he said. He looked toward Al. "What do you think, Mr. Magician? Preservation plus resurrection equals invincibility?"
Al shrugged. "Beats me, Mr. Hardbottom."
Marion turned toward Al, her face white. "This is not what I asked for," she said stiffly. "I refuse to pay!"
One of the lawyers leaned close and whispered in her ear. She closed her eyes, exhaled sharply, and then said, "Apparently I am obligated to make partial payment, under the terms of the contract that these idiots made up. You will receive a check for half the amount we agreed to, since you accomplished half of what I required."
Al was still too stunned by Stuart's immunity to physical damage to protest. Besides, fifteen thousand dollars was enough to do most of the work Janine had demanded.
Marion and her lawyers marched away, their voices tangled in what was obviously a heated argument. Al suspected that she was attempting to squirm her way out of paying their invoice as well.
"Mr. -- what is your name, anyway?" Stuart said.
"Albert Majius, Level 4 necromancer and general magic practitioner," Al replied. "Sorry about, er, disturbing your rest."
Stuart laughed again. He had an easy, hail-fellow-well-met way about him that Al found somewhat charming in spite of the bizarre circumstances. And he was a handsome man, too, which made Al more conscious of his own exceedingly ordinary looks.
"Mr. Majius, I'm afraid I'm at loose ends," Stuart said. "As Marion pointed out, I am legally dead. At some point, your resurrection spell will probably decay, at which point, so will I," he said, grinning again. "In the meantime, however, I have no home. Would you mind if I stayed with you for the few hours or days until the inevitable end comes -- again?"
Al's mouth fell open, and he closed it only when Githros prompted him to do so. "I -- um -- I don't know what my wife would think about that," he said. "I mean, I understand your position, but -- "
"It's settled then," Stuart said. "I think I can convince your wife that I can be an excellent guest for however long I have left."
Feeling steam-rollered by Stuart's charm and self-confidence, Al agreed. To his surprise, Janine was not upset when Al introduced his guest and explained who he was. In fact, Al thought that she was actually flirting with the once-rich, now penniless, once-alive, now -- something else -- man. He hoped that his mention of the fifteen thousand dollar payment had simply put her in a good mood -- it wasn't the promised thirty thousand, but it was more than she had really expected.
Stuart ate very little, helped with the housework, and even offered to do most of the repairs and renovations himself.
"I worked for my uncle's contracting firm for several summers," he explained. "I got to be pretty good at carpentry, plumbing, plastering, even basic electrical work -- you'd still want to get sort of thing checked by a real electrician, though. And I should be able to get you a good discount on materials, too. I may be dead, but I still know a few people!" Again, he flashed that dazzling smile.
"Good thing Stuart's dead," Githros said. "Otherwise, I think Janine would trade you for him in a heartbeat. Incidentally, does Stuart have a heartbeat now?"
Al said nothing, but he was afraid that Githros was right. Stuart Hardbottom was the undead equivalent of Janine's dream man: handsome, charming, handy around the house, and no doubt capable of rebuilding his fortune if he "lived" long enough. But surely he had little time left; the spell Al had used had specified that the risen one "would rest again before the next moon". That meant that Stuart's shelf life couldn't be more than one month . . .
#
Two months later, Stuart had finished installing the new flooring in both the dining room (a lovely parquet with inlays of rosewood and walnut) and the kitchen (polished granite, which Stuart had obtained for the price of good linoleum). Janine was ecstatic; she never missed an opportunity to praise their undead guest or to point out Al's inferiority.
"This can't go on, Githros," Al said. "The longer Stuart hangs around, the more Janine likes him, and the less she likes me!"
"Not to be disloyal, Al, but you have to admit, for a dead guy, he is pretty appealing," Githros said, snickering.
While Janine was out picking up groceries, Al cornered Stuart in the living room and launched a spontaneous combustion spell that burned the revenant to ashes while doing only minor damage to the drapes and the wall behind him.
"'Invincible', my ass," Al said, stirring the ashes with his toe.
But within minutes, the preservation/resurrection spell had reconstructed Stuart's body out of the smoke-tinged air. Stuart shook leftover ashes from his hair and gave Al a very creditable hurt-puppy look. "Al, I thought we were friends," he said.
Before Al could try another spell, Janine walked in. She dropped the groceries, looked at Stuart's Greek-god nakedness, looked at the scorched wall and curtains, looked at Stuart again, looked at Al, looked at Stuart again, then glared at Al.
"New drapes, Al," she said. "Or maybe vertical blinds this time. And I guess we'll have to repaint, too!"
"I'll help you pick out the colors," Stuart said. "And I should be able to get you a good deal on the blinds, too."
Three more weeks passed. Stuart had finished repainting the living room except for some of the trim, and had installed the new vertical blinds. Janine seemed to be even more taken with him, always touching his shoulders or chest or arms when she talked to him (which was more often than she talked to Al).
Finally, Al could stand no more. When Janine went out to get her hair done (something she hadn't bothered with for some time), Al tried the only thing he could think of: he used a simplified version of the resurrection spell that had brought Stuart into the Majius's household.
"Stuart, I think it's time you went back where you belong," Al said. He squirted Stuart with the potion he had prepared, quickly recited the spell and made the required gestures. As he had hoped, the results were completely different from the last time, magic being not reliable, as Githros kept pointing out.
Stuart's face took on an expression of extreme surprise. "Al, I feel very strange," he said. Then he collapsed in a literally-dead faint. His body decomposed rapidly as both the resurrection spell and the earlier preservation spell imploded.
Al cleaned up the mess (using copious amounts of air freshener) just in time for Janine's return.
"Where's Stuart?" Janine asked. "And why does it smell like a Christmas tree in here?"
Al hemmed and hawed and fumfuhed, then admitted that he had sent Stuart back to his grave. Before Janine could paralyze him with her glare, he managed to explain why.
"I thought I was losing you," he said. "Stuart was everything I'm not. He was good looking, smart, charming, good with his hands -- with tools, I mean -- and he used to be rich, and probably could be again."
"It figures," Janine said. She looked around the room, admiring the new flooring, paint job (complete except for some of the trim), and drapes, all financed by the partial payment from Stuart's wife. "The place looks nice, though, doesn't it?"
Al was puzzled. "You’re not upset that Stuart’s gone? I thought you would have preferred it if he had removed me somehow."
Janine laughed. "He was cute, Al, but he was dead, walking around, talking, flirting, but dead. It was a stretch for a nice Catholic girl like me to marry a wizard, but I don't even want to think about the penance for doing you-know-what with a dead guy."
"Then you didn't get your hair done to look better for him?" Al asked.
Janine stuck out her tongue. "I repeat, for the slower members of our audience, Janine Taylor Majius does not put out for zombies, even attractive handyman formerly-wealthy zombies. I did this for me, because it was long overdue."
Then she raised an eyebrow, leered, and said, "If you can get Gitlost to finish up painting the trim -- he should be good at detail work, at his size -- maybe we can spend a little quiet time upstairs."
Al tilted his head and snapped his fingers so fast that he felt something in his neck crack. Githros tumbled out of his ear, looking peeved. "I'm a familiar, not a house-painter. And anyway, you don't have any brushes my size."
Al watched Janine as she walked slowly up the stairs, pausing every few steps to throw him a look whose effect was the opposite of the intimidating glare he had seen all too often. He mumbled a cantrip that temporarily eased the pain in his neck (for which he would pay dearly tomorrow), and made a gesture that looked like a limerick recited in American Sign Language.
"Gaah!" Githros said. He grew rapidly to a towering height of almost ten inches, large enough, Al guessed, to handle a small paintbrush.
"Get to it, Gitlost," Al said.
"But Al, how am I gonna get back into your ear? I mean, I can get a little of your blood with no problem, but you know I like a little ear wax for dessert!"
Al gagged. "Too much information and not enough painting, Githros. We'll deal with that problem tomorrow."
Al climbed the stairs, whistling a little tune that he had learned from a Tantric magician around the time he had stolen Janine away from her live-in accountant.
Githros hefted the smallest paintbrush he could find, pried open a small can of semi-gloss paint, and started on the baseboards. "The things I do for ear wax," he sighed.
Upstairs, Janine was sighing too, for entirely different reasons.
Bio:The author is currently helping to figure out how to shoehorn post-September 11 security measures into an airport (Toronto) that wasn’t designed for them. Several of his stories have appeared in Aphelion, most recently The Return of The Other King (December, 2001).
E-mail: bmoriyam@pathcom.com
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