Bring Me the Head of Prince Charming

Chapter 1

After Brigitte released Azzie from his captivity, Ylith tied together two of her broomsticks with a stout straw rope and, with Azzie clinging behind her, rode them back to Augsburg. The sensation of the virile young demon clinging to her was very sweet to Ylith. She felt a frisson of delight when his claws, gripping her shoulders, acciden­tally brushed her breast. What bliss it was to ride with the beloved high above the clouds! For a while all thought of sin or sinner was forgotten, all question of good and evil put aside as she cavorted in the high blue of the sky, through violet-tinged clouds formed into fantastical shapes, melting and re­forming before her eyes. Azzie liked it, too, but urged her to hurry home. They had to recover the young couple from the Harpies.

Back at the mansion, Ylith had a chance to wash her hair and pin it up securely. Then she was ready for the journey.

Using a freshly charged broomstick, Ylith mounted the heights, flying alone now, darting and sweeping with quick control. The earth fell away, and soon she was in the sparkling realms of the sky. There she searched and searched, but not a sign of the Harpies could she discover. She circumnavigated the world by its outer edge and still did not find them. But then a slow-moving pelican appeared and told her, "You're looking for the Harpies with the two stiffs? They told me to tell you they got bored and have parked the couple in a safe place and gone back to rejoin their sisters."

"Did they say anything else?" Ylith asked, making slip­stream movements to keep her speed down to that of the slow-moving pelican.

"Just something about a mah-jongg game," the pelican said.

"Didn't they say where this safe place was?"

"Not a bit of it!" said the pelican. "I thought about re­minding them, but they were off, and there was no way I could overtake them. You know how fast they go with those new­fangled brazen wings."

"In which direction did they fly?" Ylith asked.

"North," the pelican said, motioning with his wing tip.

"True north or magnetic?"

"True north," the pelican said.

"Then I think I know where they are," Ylith said.

She turned her course to the north and piled on the speed, even though she knew the wind force would make her eyes red and unattractive. She overflew the land of the Franks in no time, then passed the deep fjord-pierced coast where Northmen still worshiped old gods and fought with hammers, axes, and other farm tools. She went past the lands of the Lapps, who sensed her passing as they trekked over the snow with their reindeer herds, but pretended not to see her since the best thing to do with ambiguous phenomena was to ignore them. And at last she came to the North Pole, the real one which existed within the imaginary point of true and absolute north and could not be reached by mortals. Slipping through the fold of reality in which it lay, she saw, below her, Father Christmas' Village.

It was built upon the solid sheet of ice with which the North Pole was capped. The buildings that had been set up here were very fine indeed, being half-timbered and wainscoted. Over to one side Ylith could see the workshop, where Father Christmas' gnomes made gifts of all sorts for mortals. These workshops are well known. What is less well known is the fact that there is a special room at the back where essences of good and evil are received from the secret storage places of Earth.

In each gift, a bit of good luck or a bit of bad luck was inserted. Exactly who got what kind of luck was a matter no one could tell. But it seemed to Ylith as she strolled through the workshop, watching the little men with their hammers and screwdrivers, that the process was more or less random. There was a hopper in the center of the big worktable, and into it fell glistening bits of good or bad luck, each of them like a little bouquet of herbs. A dwarf would reach in and insert the luck into the Christmas gift without even looking to see what it was.

Ylith asked the dwarves whether a pair of Harpies had come by recently carrying two frozen people. The dwarves shook their heads irritably. Making and stuffing Christmas pres­ents is precision work, and if people talk to you, it spoils the rhythm. One of them jerked his head toward the back of the workshop. Ylith went that way and saw, at the end of the long room, a door with an inscription on it: SANTA'S OFFICE. She went there, knocked, entered.

Santa was a big, fat man with the sort of face that smiled easily. But looks don't always tell the story. Santa was frowning, and his face was long and drawn as he talked into a magical seashell.

"Hello, is this Supply? I need to talk to someone."

The answer came out of a baboon's head, stuffed and mounted on the wall.

"This is Supply. With whom am I speaking?"

"Claus here. Santa Claus."

"Yes, Mr. Claus. Are you authorized to speak to us here in Supply?"

"I guess you haven't heard of me," Santa Claus said. "I'm the one who brings presents around every December twenty-fifth by the new calendar."

"Oh, that Santa Claus! When do you start bringing pres­ents for demons?"

"I'm overworked enough bringing presents for humans," Santa Claus said. "I've got this problem-"

"Just a minute," the voice said. "I will connect you with the problems clerk."

Santa Claus sighed. He was on hold again. Then he noticed Ylith, who had just entered the room.

He blinked three times rapidly behind his little rectangular spectacles. "Goodness gracious! You're not a dwarf, are you?"

"No," Ylith said, "and I'm not a reindeer, either. But I'll give you a clue. I got here on a broomstick."

"Then you must be a witch!"

"You've got it."

"Are you going to bewitch me?" Santa asked, slobbering slightly as he perceived Ylith's charms, which had been brought into prominence by her windblown clothes. "I wouldn't mind being bewitched, you know. Nobody ever thinks of bewitching Santa Claus. As if I don't need a little cheering up from time to time, eh? Who brings Santa Claus presents, eh? Ever think of that? It's give, give, give all the time around here. But what do I get out of it?"

"Satisfaction. You bask in everybody's love."

"It's the presents they love, not me."

"The giver is part of the given," Ylith said.

Santa Claus paused and considered. "Do you really think so?"

"How could it be any other way?"

"Well, that's better, then. Might I inquire what you are doing here? There's never anyone but dwarves and reindeer around here. And me, of course."

"I came," Ylith said, "because I need to pick up some packages that were left for me here."

"Packages? What kind of packages?"

"One male, one female. Both humans. Both frozen solid. The Harpies brought them here."

"Oh, those terrible Harpies!" Santa said. "They've left the snow yellow for miles around!"

"What about the frozen people?"

"They're out in back, in the woodshed."

"I'll pick them up now," Ylith said. "Oh, and one thing more. There's a little girl on Earth named Brigitte Scrivener."

"Little dirty-faced kid with a saucy manner? " Santa always remembered the children.

"That's her. What I'd like you to do is bring her a dollhouse this year. The sort you usually only give to princesses. Filled with moving figures, wallpaper, radios, and other magical things."

"This kid was real good, eh?"

"Goodness had nothing to do with it," Ylith said. "She got a promise from a demon and this is part of the payoff."

"Why isn't the demon himself here to get it?"

"He had other stuff to do. You know how demons are."

Santa Claus nodded. "Okay, she'll get the present. Do you want me to take special care to make sure it gets a bit of good luck in it?"

Ylith thought it over carefully. "No, just give her whatever comes up. The dollhouse is enough. She'll have to take her chances on the luck it'll bring her just like anyone else."

"Sagely put," Santa said. "Now, before you go, let me give you a present."

"What are you talking about?"

"This!" Santa cried, tearing at his nether clothing.

"Thanks all the same," Ylith said, fending him off easily, "but I really don't need your gift now. Keep it for some other lucky lady."

"But no one ever comes this way!" Santa said. "It's only elves and reindeer!"

"Tough!" Ylith went to the woodshed. She carried out the bodies of Charming and Scarlet. They were both frozen stiff as logs and heavy as sin. Ylith had to call on all her witch strength to lift them.

"Send me one of your witch friends!" Santa shouted. "Tell her I give presents!"

"I'll tell them," Ylith said. "Witches love presents." And then she rose into the air, bearing Scarlet and Charming, head­ing for Azzie's mansion in Augsburg as fast as she could fly.