"He's a real clam!"

"We wanted you to get to know Goody first," Che said. "Rather than as the son of a chief."

"What?" Gwenny asked.

"You heard, dottle ears!"

"So if you didn't like him, you could let him go without considering his lineage," Cynthia said. "That's more romantic."

Gwenny focused on Goody. "You never said a word!"

"He's a dummy!"

"I'm not proud of it," Goody said. "They don't want me at my mound."

"But then you qualify!"

"Qualify for what? I'll never govern there."

"You don't have to! You just have to be of chiefly lineage. You could come to Goblin Mountain, where you would be respected. Your home mound would have to accept the liaison, by goblin custom."

"We had something of the sort in mind, if it worked out," Cynthia said.

The two goblins stared at each other. The parody made vulgar kissing and smacking noises.

"I believe we should redefine our a.s.sociation," Gwenny said. "From business to social."

"But I never intended such a thing!"

She smiled. "You may not have a choice. As the ranking goblin, being a chief rather than a chief's offspring, I have the prerogative of proposing a liaison, if I find it expedient. You would then have to accept or decline. Do you think you could decline?"

"Ha ha ha!"

"I-" He would not be able to decline, and she knew it. Even the peeve knew it.

"But I am not yet certain that such a liaison is appropriate," she said. "So I am not putting you to that question. But I reserve the right to do so, at my convenience."

"Of course," he said weakly.

"Now can we be friends?"

He hesitated. "I don't think so. Not now."

"Haw haw haw!"

"I mean boy and girl friends. Dating."

Oh. "If you wish."

"Then we can kiss openly."

"I'm not sure that's wise."

She stepped into him, put her arms around him, and drew him in close. She was all softness and niceness. "All you have to do is tell me no," she murmured. "You do have that prerogative, during the courtship."

"Tell her to buzz off, weak knees!"

She drew his head down. "Are you saying no?"

"No!" Then he corrected himself, embarra.s.sed. "I mean, I'm not saying no."

"That's what I thought." She put her face to his and kissed him on the mouth, sweetly and lingeringly. Little hearts flew out so hard they ruffled the parody and smacked into the surrounding trees.

When he recovered, he was lying on a bed of gra.s.s someone had provided, gazing blankly at the sky.

"You should have put up more of a fight, mush mind," the parody reproved him.

"I couldn't fight," he said, sitting up.

Hannah came across to help him stand. "You never had a chance, once she oriented on you. The centaurs were smart to hide your chiefly lineages from each other, or we'd have gotten nothing done."

She was probably correct. "Hannah, you're a woman. Can you tell me-"

"She's not a woman, she's a s.l.u.t in a tin can."

Hannah didn't bother to correct the bird about the distinction between metallic armor and a tin can. "Yes, she likes you, and means to marry you. But two things hold her back: she wants to be sure it would be good for Goblin Mountain, and she wants to give you more time to get over Go-Go."

Go-Go! She had been well away from his mind, amazingly. "How can I even consider-what would Go-Go think?"

"We already know she would want you to be happy, Goody. And Gwenny can do that. I have talked with the centaurs. She really is a nice person, quite apart from being a chief. So I think you will have to relegate Go-Go to the past, with no disrespect. Gwenny is your future, if she chooses to be."

So it seemed. "Thank you."

"As if you helped, cave girl."

"If we knew your gender, peeve, we might find a mate for you too," the barbarian said evenly. That shut the bird up for the moment.

"Now we need to see about recruiting the dragons," Goody said.

"Vortex and Vertex are already on it. They feel responsible for bringing the robots. They were tricked too."

They rejoined the others, who were holding a dialogue. Gwenny beckoned, and he went to her without question. She took his hand. "We think the naga should be the next recruited, or the harpies. We can't decide. What do you think?"

That was tough, because goblins had had many wars with both species. "Do we have any contacts who might help?"

"Princess Nada Naga," Che said. "She could also help with the demons."

"But they're an entirely different species."

"She married a demon prince, forming an interspecies alliance," Cynthia said. "They have a child."

Oh. "Then maybe we should seek her first. I know we'll have to approach the harpies too, but they give me the creeps."

"They are foul birds," Gwenny agreed, giving his hand a squeeze. "But perhaps Gloha Goblin-Harpy will help us there."

He vaguely remembered. "Gloha would be a crossbreed? Between a goblin and a harpy?"

"Yes. She looks like a winged goblin girl. She married an invisible giant."

"Ho ho ho!"

"This is no joke, peeve," Che said. "Magician Trent transformed the giant to a winged goblin male, and they are starting a new species of winged monster."

"Then she seems like another good contact," Goody agreed. "We'd better get on it, because those robots are surely multiplying."

"They are," Che said. "But they haven't found Iron Mountain yet. They could have, had they had the wit to befriend and question the right living creatures. But they don't think the way living folk do, and that limits them. But they are steadily canva.s.sing, and it can't be long before they find it. That will be the end."

They got on it. The centaurs flew them to the naga tunnels near Goblin Mountain. Gwenny rode behind Goody again, wrapping her arms around him for security, she said. He felt her softness against his back, and wondered whether she had to cling quite that closely, but could hardly object.

"Yes, I am being seductive," she murmured. "I am trying to fathom what marriage to you would be like. I have not had a fraction of the experience with the opposite gender that you have."

"Hee hee hee!"

She nevertheless controlled their relationship, as the bird understood. He was delightfully powerless.

A cloud of smoke appeared, pacing them. "What have we hearken?"

"Look what the wind blew in: a stinking ball of smog."

"Have we what?" Goody asked.

"Sound, noise, blare, racket, listen-"

"Hear?"

"Whatever," the cloud agreed crossly.

"Fade out, Metria," Gwenny snapped. "That's a h.o.m.onym, not a synonym."

"A what?"

"A word that sounds the same, but means something else," Gwenny said. "What you wanted was 'here': 'What have we here?' not 'hear.'"

"How the bleep can you hear the difference between hear and here?" the peeve demanded rhetorically.

"You know Metria?" Goody asked Gwenny, belatedly surprised.

"We all know the demoness," Cynthia said. "Wherever something interesting is happening, she pokes her nose in."

"And sometimes sets up embarra.s.sing confusions," Gwenny said.

"But there's nothing interesting here," Goody protested. "We're just flying to see the naga folk."

"Hoohoohoo!"

"The bird's right," the cloud said, forming into a face. "Gwenny's seducing another innocent man. Naturally I had to investigate."

"Another?" Goody said, before thinking.

He felt Gwenny's flush against his back. "She told me a human man was a prince looking for a match, three years ago. He wasn't."

"Wasn't a prince, or wasn't looking for a match?"

"Wasn't either one," she said. "Can we drop this?"

"And Surprise Golem had already spoken for him," Metria said smugly.

Goody fathomed that this had been a considerable embarra.s.sment. So he decided to get rid of the demoness. "As it happens, we have an important mission," he said. "We need to contact the demons, to enlist their aid. You would be ideal to-"

He broke off, because she was gone.

"Thank you," Gwenny said, giving him a squeeze.

They came toward a mountain. A winged dragon circled it and came toward them, but neither centaur lifted a bow. "That's Draco," Cynthia explained. "We know him from winged monster conventions. He knows we wouldn't try to molest his mountain den."

The dragon came close enough to recognize them, did a wings wigwag, and flew away.

They landed on a strip near the base of the mountain. There was a shelf cut into the mountain slope, piled with folded cloth and clothing. "What are those rags for?" the peeve demanded.

Cynthia smiled. "You'll see in a moment."

A large snake slithered up, and formed a human head. "Who are you?"

"Who wants to know, fang face?"

"That's an obnoxious talking bird," Cynthia said quickly. "Ignore it."

"Che and Cynthia Centaur," Che said, answering the challenge. "Bringing Goody and Gwenny Goblin to see Nada Naga."

"The princess does not see goblins."

Gwenny jumped down. "Are you sure, naga?"

The naga took a better look at her, and bowed his head. "Apology, Chief. I did not make the connection." He slithered into a hole.

Soon another snake appeared. This one formed a lovely female head with a small crown. "Welcome, Gwenny! Cover me while I change."

Gwenny looked to Hannah. "Would you bring a cloth, please? You are tall enough."