“Help!” Abernathy cried.
“Questor!” Ben screamed.
He started forward and tripped over the G’home Gnomes, who had somehow edged in front of him.
“I… I have him… High Lord!” Questor Thews gasped between sniffles. His hands tried desperately to regain control of the swirling dust.
Abernathy’s eyes had opened even wider, if that were possible, and he was straggling to climb free of the pooled light, calling out to them frantically. Ben tried to untangle himself from the G’home Gnomes.
“Be… calm!” Questor urged. “Be… ca… ah, ah, ah… ACHOOO!”
He sneezed so hard, he lurched backward into Ben and the others and knocked them all sprawling. The silver dust flew out the windows into the sunlit gardens. Abernathy gave one final cry and was sucked down into the light. The light flared once and disappeared.
Ben pushed himself up on his hands and knees and glared at Questor Thews. “Gesundheit!” he snapped.
Questor Thews turned crimson.
Bottle
“Well?” Ben demanded. “Where is he? What’s happened to him?”
Questor Thews didn’t seem to have a ready answer, so Ben diverted his attention from the flustered wizard long enough to help Willow up, then turned quickly back again. He wasn’t angry yet—he was still too shocked—but he was going to be very angry any second. Abernathy had disappeared just as surely as if he had never been—vanished, just like that. And, of course, Ben’s medallion, the medallion that protected the kingship and his life, the medallion Questor had assured him would be perfectly safe, had vanished as well.
He changed his mind. He wasn’t going to be angry after all. He was going to be sick.
“Questor, where is Abernathy?” he repeated.
“Well, I… the fact of the matter is, High Lord, I… I am not entirely certain,” the wizard managed finally.
Ben seized the front of the wizard’s robes. He was going to be angry after all. “Don’t tell me that! You’ve got to get him back, damn it!”
“High Lord.” Questor was pale, but composed. He didn’t try to draw away. He simply straightened himself and took a deep breath. “I am not sure yet exactly what happened. It will take a little time to understand…”
“Well, can’t you guess?” Ben shouted, cutting him short.
The owlish face twisted. “I can guess that the magic misfired, of course. I can guess that the sneeze—that wasn’t my fault, you know, High Lord, it simply happened—that the sneeze confused the magic in some fashion and changed the result of the incantation. Instead of transforming Abernathy from a dog back into a man, it seems to have transported him instead. The two words are quite similar, you see, and the magic’s likewise are similar. It happens that the results of most incantations are similar where the words are similar…”
“Skip all that!” Ben snapped. He started to say something further, then caught himself. He was losing control of the situation. He was behaving like some B-picture gangster. He released the front of the wizard’s robes, feeling a bit foolish. “Look, you think that the magic sent him somewhere, right? Where do you think it sent him? Just tell me that.”
Questor cleared his throat and thought a moment. “I don’t know,” he decided.
Ben stared at him, then turned away. “I don’t believe this is happening,” he muttered. “I just don’t believe it.”
He glanced momentarily at the others. Willow stood close, her green eyes solemn. The kobolds were picking up a planter that had been knocked over in the struggle. There was dirt and broken flowers scattered in a six-foot circle about them. The G’home Gnomes were whispering together anxiously.
“Perhaps we should…” Willow started to say.
And then there was a bright flash of light from the spot where Abernathy had disappeared, a popping sound as if someone had pulled a cork free, and something materialized from out of nowhere, spun wildly about, and came to rest on the floor.
It was a bottle.
Everyone jumped, then stared. The bottle lay there quietly, an oval-shaped container about the size of a magnum of champagne. It was corked and wired tightly shut and it was painted white with red harlequins dancing on its glass surface, all in varying poses of devilish gaiety, all grinning madly.