Myth-Ing Persons By Robert L Asprin

“Wait a minute. You mean you ain’t got no corpus delecti?” Guido said, straightening in his chair. “Sorry to interrupt. Boss, but you’re playin’ in my alley now. This is somethin’ I know a little about. You can’t go on trial for murder without a corpse, know what I mean?”

“Maybe where you come from,” Vilhelm corrected, “but things get a little different when you’re dealing with vampires. If we had a body, or even just the pile of dust, we could revive him in no time flat. As it is, the problem is when there’s no body . . . when a vampire’s been reduced to dust and the dust scattered. That’s when it’s impossible to pull ’em back into a functional mode.”

“But if there isn’t a body, how do you know the victim is dead at all? ” I asked.

“There’s the rub,” Vilhelm agreed. “But in this case, there’s a matter of two eyewitnesses.”

“Two of ’em, eh?” Massha murmured thoughtfully. “Would you happen to have descriptions of these two peepers?”

“Saw ’em myself. They were both off-worlders like yourselves. One was a young girl, the blonde and innocent type. The other was a pretty sleazy-looking guy. It was her who sold us on the story, really. I don’t think anyone would have believed him if he said that were wolves were furry.”

My heart sank. I had wanted very badly to believe the girl who had warned us of Aahz’s danger was somehow an innocent bystander in the proceedings. Now it looked as if….

“Do the descriptions sound familiar, Hot Stuff? Still think Guido and I were being paranoid when we said this might be a set-up? Sounds like they framed your partner, then came back after you to complete the set.”