for quite a while.
“Ah-fat lady wake now? Fat lady sleep hard; Snapper Jo was lonely!”
Gilla stared. The voice which had uttered these words of welcome was very deep,
with a kind of curdled quality that made her think of the bottom of a vegetable
bin that had been left alone too long. For a moment her eyes struggled to sort
through a confusion of piled boxes and dusty hangings, then she focused on a
shape that was tall, and gaunt, and gray. It made a gurgling sound that could
have meant anything, and lit a lamp.
Gilla blinked. The creature’s general grayness was more than compensated for by
a pair of purple pantaloons and a shock of orange hair. He treated her to a
sharp, snaggle-toothed smile.
“Fat lady talk to Snapper Jo now?”
Gilla cleared her throat. “Does this place belong to you?”
“Oh, noooo-” The warts on his gray skin seemed to crawl as Snapper Jo glanced
fearfully over his shoulder. “Great Mistress rules here! Great Lady, very
beautiful, very strong …” He ducked his head with a kind of fearful reverence.
Gilla thought he was overdoing it, but it was obvious that whoever had brought
her here did have plenty of power. Beneath the dust she caught the unmistakable
dank perfume of the White Foal River, so she knew she must still be in
Sanctuary, and there were only two sorceresses here with that kind of power. Her
skin chilled as she thought about it. It was the kind of riddle children asked
in play: Would you rather be eaten by a she-panther or a tigress? By Ischade or
by Roxane?
Suddenly the dust and clutter around her seemed stifling. Gilla got to her feet