The Wizardry Consulted (Wiz, #4)(74)

Unlike most of the non-magicians in her world, Malkin could read. Literacy is a handy skill for a thief who wants to know what she is stealing. Thus the keyboard on Wiz’s workstation wasn’t completely alien to her. Further, burglary is as much a matter of attitude as technical skills. Malkin knew nothing about computers and security, but she had seen Wiz type his log-on sequence repeatedly and she had memorized it.

Unfortunately her memory wasn’t that good. The keys were small and fairly close together. What’s more, Wiz’s program didn’t echo the password on the screen and to top it off, Malkin’s typing technique was primitive. Twice she blew the password and she was hesitating with her index finger hovering over the keyboard when Widder Hackett took a hand.

“Not that one dummy!” the Widow Hackett screamed in her ear. Malkin didn’t hear of course, but Bobo jumped up on the desk and walked across the keyboard, placing his paws very deliberately.

Malkin sneezed as the cat’s tail brushed under her nose and when she opened her eyes she was in.

The fiery letters above the desk formed a list of items, each with a number after them. At the top of the list, blinking in and out of existence, was a tiny black demon with a spindly tail and long nose wearing red shorts with two big white buttons in front. When she moved the steel mouse on the table the demon moved. Obviously it was what Wiz called a “mouse,” although it looked like no mouse she had ever encountered.

She moved the mouse and the on-screen mouse skittered over the first item on the list. As she had seen Wiz do so often, she pressed the steel mouse twice. The screen changed and she saw a series of messages. Another push on the mouse and the mouse demon on the screen flipped the first message down to reveal the next one. Malkin started going through them and puzzled out the messages as they came up.

What she got was extremely confusing. The first group of messages seemed to be jokes, except they were about pieces of knotted string-frayed knotted string-and mouse testicles. Malkin couldn’t understand why that was supposed to be funny and most of the stories didn’t make any sense anyway. There was another series which consisted mostly of a four-way argument with the participants hurling vituperative abuse at each other. The subject was obscure and she didn’t recognize all the words but she guessed that a complete translation would have made a fishwife blush.

The next batch of messages consisted of a host of extremely creative ways to kill off a being who was apparently some kind of demon-at least it was described as large and purple and the only things Malkin could think of that matched that description were demons. Judging from the hatred in the messages it must be an exceptionally evil demon. It also seemed to have a fondness for children. Perhaps it ate them, she couldn’t be sure.

Several of the messages mentioned a being called “Kibo” who seemed to be an extremely powerful demon. At least these people seemed to believe that mentioning the name brought them luck.

There were even some messages that seemed to bear upon magic. But they were obscure and often couched in strange combinations of runes which made her eyes water just to look at them.

Finally, unknowingly, she clicked out of the stored messages and into the next item on the menu, which happened to be chat mode.

Jerry was working late. Which meant it was dawn and he was still at his desk. He was deep in a piece of code when a slate-blue demon wearing a dress and sporting a telephone headset in her 1940s hairdo popped up at his elbow. “Wun-ringy-dingy,” the creature pronounced in a nasal voice, “teew-ringy-dingy.”

“Gotta get a new chat demon,” he muttered. Then he saw who was asking to chat and hit the call button for Danny and Moira.

Danny had been in the kitchen getting a snack before he went to bed. He showed up with a slab of gingerbread liberally smeared with butter in his hand, a mouth so full he could barely breathe and a generous trail of crumbs leading down the hall.

Moira was right on his heels. Her face was puffy, her red hair a tangled mess and a green silk robe had been wrapped hurriedly around her.

“He’s on IRC,” Jerry said over his shoulder. “But so far he hasn’t said anything.”

“Here,” Danny said around the gingerbread, “let me take it.”

“But . . .”

“Get the search demon started,” Danny hissed. “Use my workstation.” Somewhat reluctantly Jerry gave up his seat and Danny set down his snack and began to type.

A message formed itself in fire at the level of Malkin’s eyes.

“How you doing?” it said.

Malkin had seen this happen with Wiz before but it was still a little surprising.

“All right,” she picked out on the keyboard.

In chat mode a person’s method of typing is almost as distinct as a telegrapher’s “fist,” especially when you’re expecting a very fast typist and you get someone whose method is obviously more hunt than peck.

“You’re not Wiz,” Danny typed.

“Shut up,” Jerry hissed. “Keep him on the line until we’ve got the location.” Beside him the tracing demon was scribbling furiously as it unraveled link after link.

“Right about that,” came the laborious reply. “I’m Malkin.”

“Where’s Wiz?”

“In over his head is where,” Malkin typed. “He’s out fighting a dragon.”