“I can open the doors for her,” said Shelyid.
Before his master could fully grasp the meaning of these words, Shelyid darted out of the tunnel and seized a tuft of the snarl’s throat fur.
“Come on!” cried the gnome, tugging the monster toward the far door, “you and me’ll go the other way! I’ll meet you back at Magrit’s house, master!” he shouted over his shoulder.
“Shelyid!” exclaimed Zulkeh. “Halt! Cease and desist in this madness!” His voice rang with sure command.
The dwarf stopped abruptly. His little shoulders hunched. He turned around and looked at the wizard.
“No,” he said. Very softly, very firmly.
Zulkeh’s face assumed the aspect of apoplexy. “Impudent dwarf!” raged the sorcerer. “Disobedient wretch! Not only stupid but-now-revealed-to-be-disloyal apprentice!”
“I’m not disloyal,” stated Shelyid. “I’m not at all, that’s not fair, and besides you’ll be all right because you’ll have Greyboar and Ignace to look after you.” He stopped, groped for words, then said: “It’s just, well, I have to be loyal to her too.”
But ’twas clear as day the wizard was in no mood for argument.
“Bah!” he oathed. “My safety is beside the point! The issue here is your impertinence! Your rebellion ‘gainst my authority! Your—”
The silence which now fell upon the mage was total, sudden, complete.
In later time, Zulkeh would reminisce more than once on the new experience he was now undergoing. On such occasions he would allow, with quite atypical modesty, that the vast theoretic knowledge which he had acquired beforehand, even when added to his own empirical observations, had never prepared him for the actual reality of Greyboar’s choke.
” ‘The Hand of Fate,’ ’tis called in southwest Grotum and the Grenadine,” he would comment to his rapt audience. “In the Crapaude, Mortemain; in east Grotum, ‘Doomclasp’; throughout the Ozarine, of course, ‘the Great Crunch’ is common, though many prefer ‘the Devil’s Grip’; in Alsask, ’tis invariably called simply ‘the Squeeze,’ which is further embellished among the Kushrau to ‘the Big Squeeze.’ But”—here he would wag his finger solemnly—”I have personally experienced the phenomenon, and I can assure you that none of these names—though they each capture some aspect of its essence—approaches in exactitude the phrase which is universal in Greyboar’s own homeland of Sfinctria, I speak, of course, of ‘the Thumbs of Eternity.’ ”
“You know,” growled Greyboar, “sometimes you piss me off.”
“Take it easy, big guy, take it easy!” exclaimed Ignace, prying himself between Greyboar and the mage.
“You don’t want to piss him off,” he said to Zulkeh. “Trust me on this one.”
‘Twas apparent, by his gestures, that the mage was attempting to indicate his full agreement with Ignace’s last point. Words, of course, failed him.
“Greyboar,” came Shelyid’s shrill voice, “let go of him!” And, astonishingly: “Now!”
A moment’s hesitation, then the strangler released Zulkeh. The wizard gasped for breath. Greyboar turned to Shelyid.
“I was just—” He stopped, stared.
Truly an incredible sight! For there was the dwarf, perched on top of the snarl’s shoulders, for all the world like a tiny mahout riding a carnivorous elephant!
“I know,” said Shelyid, “but you still shouldn’t choke the master. He just gets excited sometimes, especially when I irritate him, which happens pretty often.” Then, to Zulkeh: “Are you all right, master?”
The wizard wheezed and whistled. “Of course . . . not . . . all right . . . imbecile! Just been . . . throttled . . . world’s . . . premier strangleur . . . what a . . . question! Rattlepated runt . . . half-witted homunculus . . .”
“He’s okay,” announced Ignace.
“He’s right, master!” cried Shelyid. “You’ll be back to normal—”
“—moronic midget . . . pinheaded pygmy . . .”
“—in no time!” The dwarf tugged on the snarl’s left ear, turning the beast around—for all the world like a champion equestrian! “We gotta go! I’ll see you at Magrit’s house later!” And so saying, dwarf and snarl-mount headed toward the door leading to the main corridor. But Shelyid stopped almost at once and turned to look back, consternation on his face.
“Oh! I almost forgot! The master’s sack!”
He looked appealingly at Greyboar. “I really can’t take it with me,” he said, “I was wondering if, well, maybe you could—”