Myth-Ing Persons By Robert L Asprin

With that I headed across the courtyard for the fountain stairs to our offices….

Courtyard? Fountain stairs?

What happened to the humble tent I was walking into a minute ago?

Weelll… I said I was a magician, didn’t I? Our little stall at the Bazaar is bigger on the inside than it is on the outside. Lots bigger. I’ve lived in royal palaces that weren’t as big as our “humble tent.” I can’t take any credit for this particular miracle, though, other than the fact that it was my work that helped earn us our current residence. We live here rent-free courtesy of the Devan Merchants Association as partial payment for a little job we did for them a while back. That’s also how I got my bodyguards … but that’s another story, Devan Merchants Association, you ask? Okay. For the uninitiated, I’ll go over this just once. The dimension I’m currently residing in is Deva, home of the shrewdest deal-drivers in all the known dimensions. You may have heard of them. In my own home dimension they were called devils, but I have since learned the proper pronunciation is Deveels. Anyway, my gracious living quarters are the result of my partner and I beating the Deveels at their own game … which is to say we got the better of them in a deal. Don’t tell anyone, though. It would ruin their reputation and maybe even cost me a cushy spot. You see, they still don’t know they’ve been had.

Anyway, where was I? Oh, yes. Heading for the offices. Normally after sneaking out I would stop by the stables to share breakfast with Gleep, but with a crisis on my hands I decided to forgo the pleasure of my pet’s company and get to work. Gleep. He’s the dragon Aliman was talking about. . . and I’m not going to try to condense that story. It’s just too complicated.