No Quest For The Wicked

His fanaticism for his cause warred with the magical compulsion of the Eye as he struggled between trying to stay and trying to leave. The result was an odd quivering as he shifted his weight back and forth between his feet and twitched his shoulders.

“Well, go on!” she said with a haughty wave. “Your cologne is making my eyes water. God, but that stuff is vile, and practice a little moderation. You don’t have to bathe in it.” For a moment, I felt kind of bad for the guy, since the cologne wasn’t his fault. That lasted about two seconds. After all, I’d sprayed him in self-defense.

The room had fallen totally silent while Mimi had her outburst, and all the workers turned to watch the minion leave. Mimi noticed everyone staring and shouted, “Well, what are you all looking at? Back to work! The guests will start arriving in less than an hour, and we’re nowhere near ready. The tables still aren’t set, the flowers aren’t done, the bandleader is unconscious, and the lighting is all wrong. This is a disaster!”

Mimi’s moment of crazy made her momentarily forget about us. When she rushed off to supervise the setting of the tables, Owen and I regrouped with Granny.

“So, we’re down one elf lord and one puritan,” I said. “That should make this a little easier.”

“But you heard her, we’ve got less than an hour before the guests are here,” Owen said, “and she’s going to be especially guarded from now on.”

“You know, at this point, I’m not sure anyone would so much as blink if one of us tackled her and took it away from her. They’d probably cheer for us.”

“Okay, then. Let’s do that.”

I turned to stare at him in shock. “Seriously?”

“Yeah. I’m tired of this. We’ve tried everything else. I don’t like her. And I’m sure you’d enjoy it.”

“Oh, yeah,” I sighed. “I spent a year dreaming about the chance to do something like this. Dreams do come true!”

All this time, Granny had been watching Mimi across the room. Actually, I wasn’t sure if she was watching Mimi or tracking the Eye. “How are you holding up?” I asked her.

“I could use a drink, but the bartender isn’t set up yet.”

“I meant, are you feeling any strong thirsts for power, or anything like that?”

“Honey, I don’t know what I’d do with real power at my age. Ruling the world would take too much energy. I’d miss all my TV shows.”

“You managed some control over Mimi earlier,” Owen said. “Do you think you could do it again? We just need to distract her enough to get her off guard.”

She snorted. “Piece of cake. Her mind’s pretty weak. I meant what I said about her doing all this bossing people around because she doesn’t have real power. The moment someone truly powerful comes along, she’ll hand over that brooch before she knows what she’s doing, and she’ll be the first one to sign up to be his flunky.”

“I should have had you come visit me when I worked for her,” I said wistfully. I rolled up my sleeves to match Owen’s, then said, “Let’s do this.”

Together we advanced on Mimi, who was back to criticizing the ice sculpture. We had to step around Sylvester’s prone body, which the elves had left where it fell. Lyle and the other elves had their heads together in a corner, probably hashing out their own plan. Earl kept trying to join the group, only to be shoved out.

We’d just passed Sylvester when Thor emerged from under the table where Owen had shoved him. He still looked a little wobbly and reeled as he walked. If Granny hadn’t been certain that the bartenders hadn’t set up yet, I’d have suspected him of drinking under that table. He staggered away from the table, dragging the tablecloth with him and sending the centerpiece crashing to the floor.

The noise got Mimi’s attention, foiling our plan, but that wasn’t the most immediate concern. Thor had seen his enemy lying helpless on the ground and was heading straight there—well, as straight as he could stagger—with his battleaxe in hand.

“No, you don’t,” Owen said, catching him by the collar of his jacket and taking the axe away from him.

“He owes me money,” Thor slurred. I bent over to see if I could smell alcohol on him. Maybe he had a flagon of ale as part of his gear. My nose might have been dazed by so much forced proximity to that awful cologne I’d sprayed on the puritan, but I didn’t smell anything. I supposed he really had been that addled by running into the magical force field around Mimi.