Errant and Woody had trekked across the city after their quarry. They hadn’t seen him

in person, but they had run into a few things that Errant had to put down in the course

of his duties. He didn’t like it but he couldn’t allow another growing death worm, or

a spreading vine, to remain in the city and eat their fill.

Eventually they would have wiped out the city as they tried to keep up their dietary

requirements. And he had a duty not to allow that.

Still, their quarry was staying ahead of them despite Woody’s sharp wooden nose on

the trail. There were a lot of circles around various schools. And then the trail led

them to a residential area that looked well lived in by the residents. The dog paused

at an alley by an alchemy shop. He snorted.

“He was here?,” said Errant. He pulled out his wand and a light clicked on in the

alley. “He’s not here now from the looks of things. Did you see the house down the

street? It looked brilliant.”

Woody barked.

“I know,” said Errant. “I haven’t seen anything like it in a long time.”

He put his wand away and walked down the street and looked at the protections on

the house. He nodded, as he rubbed his hands. He walked up to the door and knocked.

He wondered if he knew who had built the layers of lights he saw.

They seemed familiar.

He traveled a lot, and dealt with a lot of magicians. Maybe this was one of the people

he had dealt with coming into their own.

It would be nice to know they hadn’t turned into slobbering madmen.

Woody sat beside him on the porch. He put on his best friendly dog face. That was

easy for him to do.

Errant knocked again. He conceded he might have come at a bad time. He might have

to go on with his search and circle back to the house later.

The door opened. A squarish face looked at the man in blue. Recognition flared in the

soft eyes. Then a punch knocked Errant back a few steps.

“What was that for?,” asked the Queen’s Knight, rubbing his face.

“That was for leaving us in that viper’s nest against the Rhiem,” said Pavel. “Where

is my axe?”

“Let’s not be hasty, Pavel,” said Errant. “It was something that had to be done. I tried

to come back for you, but there were some complications.”

“What kind of complications?,” asked Pavel.

“There was a thing that caused some problems, and I lost a few years,” said Errant.

“Tell him, Woody.”

The dog howled at the top of his lungs. It was the kind of howl that caused all the

other dogs in the neighborhood to howl back in sympathy. Pavel looked down at the

howling dog on the porch and frowned.

“Shut up,” said Pavel. “I don’t want to hear your excuses either, fiend of the

Underworld.”

Woody quit howling and tried to look friendly again.

“The puppy look is not going to work either,” said Pavel. “You’re too old to be a

puppy.”

“Don’t hurt his feelings,” said Errant. “He’s been thinking about his age lately.”

“Husband?,” asked Sonya. “Who is at the door?”

“Errant,” said Pavel.

Sonya appeared with some others behind her, mostly girls. Another man appeared

with his hand on the hilt of a straight sword with a basket hilt. Puzzlement covered

his face.

“Your daughters are quite lovely,” said Errant. “Hello, I’m Errant.”

He bowed slightly.

“Madman with a wooden dog,” he heard one of the girls say.

“They are not my daughters,” said Sonya. “They are clients. Excuse us. We need to

discuss this. Don’t go anywhere until we are done talking.”

She closed the door in his face.

“I should have known this was Sonya’s work,” said Errant. “She was always great on

defenses.”

Woody huffed.

“Not everyone is going to believe you’re not a fiend,” said Errant. “That’s just a

hazard. You know that. Good howl for mercy. I liked it.”

Woody wagged his tail.

“I should have known Pavel and Sonya would come through,” said Errant. “They

complement each other, and Sonya is a powerful magic user.”

Woody barked.

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“I know, but I should have checked anyway,” said Errant. “I just moved on because

it was easier to assume they were dead than thinking how ten years in the clutches of

Mim would have been for them.”

He also believed they had gotten free because he had destroyed most of Mim’s

command and control. So the villain had likely not had much left at the end of their

duel if he survived. He definitely wouldn’t have had enough to stop Sonya.

He had lost ten years because of that.

Maybe defending reality wasn’t all it cracked up to be as a job, but he was going to

keep trying the best that he could.

The door opened. Pavel and Sonya stood there. They frowned at him.

“You may go inside, Woody,” said Pavel. “Don’t touch anything. The monster hunter

will take you to the parlor.”

“Come along, wooden dog,” said the monster hunter. “This might be more fractious

than what you want to watch.”

Woody barked and entered the house, sliding by Pavel with his great bulk. He barked

once at Sonya, then followed his guide through the house. He took care his huge body

didn’t knock any of the bric-a-brac to the floor, or upend some of the numerous

tables.

“It’s been twenty five years, Errant,” said Sonya. “And now we have troubles, and

here you are again.”

“I have been doing a lot of traveling,” said Errant. “It’s just happenstance that I ran

into you again.”

“Really?,” said Sonya.

“Yes,” said Errant. “If I had known you were here, I would have come by sooner. I

just saw all the magic defenses and thought these are brilliant. I need to meet

whomever put them up. That’s why I knocked on the door.”

“You just knocked on the door to meet the person who put up the defenses around the

house?,” asked Pavel. He rubbed his face with both hands. “You haven’t changed a

bit.”

“I wouldn’t say that,” said Errant. “I’m a little bit crankier now than I used to be.”

“I guess that is something,” said Pavel.

“We do have a problem,” said Sonya. “Maybe you could help us.”

“I would love to,” said Errant. He grinned. “Woody and I have come across someone

giving away magic secrets and we’re looking for him, but I would love to take a

whack at whatever you have brewing. It might be a simple fix to it that I can arrange.”

“What kind of magic secrets?,” asked Sonya. She shared a glance with her husband.

“Someone gave an amateur a set of circles that can link people’s minds over long

distance so they can share the same mental space,” said Errant. “The amateur trapped

some people inside after telling them it was a war game, and they should hunt their

fellow players.”

“It was to trap them into killing each other, wasn’t it?,” asked Sonya.

“Yes,” said Errant. “He was harvesting magic potential.”

“What did you do to him?,” asked Pavel.

“Nothing,” said Errant. He frowned at the disbelief in their faces. “Nothing. He

came at me, and I put him to sleep. He’s dreaming of ruling the universe wherever his

body really is.”

“What do you think, Husband?,” asked Sonya.

“I trust the wooden dog more,” said Pavel. “He never ran out on us, and then came

back with a big lie like I slept ten years away.”

“It’s not really a lie,” said Errant. “I was stuck somewhere else for ten years. Things

happen. It’s not like I can control where a hole in reality will dump me.”

“You could if you wanted to,” said Pavel.

“I would have to have time to prepare to change wherever the hole went to where I

wanted it to go,” said Errant.

“How long a time would that take?,” asked Pavel.

“More than an instant,” said Errant. “Let me tell you there’s a bunch of math

involved.”

“Say no more,” said Pavel. He held up a hand to forestall any explanation of the math

that might come spewing out.

“You are the same old Errant,” said Sonya. “A little more ragged, a little more

absentminded, but the same old man who talks a lot to cover what he’s really

thinking.”

“I wouldn’t go that far,” said Errant.

“We need your help,” said Sonya. “We can’t not accept it when we have four human

bombs in my parlor.”

“I will be glad to look at them,” said Errant. “I don’t usually get a chance to help

before something goes wrong.”

“Something has already gone wrong,” said Pavel. “Someone is turning girls into

monsters.”

“We can’t have that,” said Errant. “There are already too many monsters around as

it is.”

Pavel and Sonya led him through the house. He paused every now and then to

examine something on a stand, or some particular spellwork. He gave oblique

answers to questions about what he had been doing since he had came home

except for talking about a student and her pet. He implied that Woody would

like to go back there and keep an eye on things.

“I don’t remember Woody ever leaving your side,” said Sonya.

“He wants to settle down,” said Errant. “We roam a lot, and I think he wants a place

of his own to look after.”

“He would be a terrifying sheep dog,” said Pavel.

Errant smiled.

“He’s really friendly and likes children,” said Errant. “But not squirrels.”

“Who does?,” asked Pavel.

They led their guest into the parlor. Errant looked around.

“This is a nice use of space,” he said.

“I’m glad you approve,” said Sonya.

“So these are your problem children?,” said Errant. He frowned at Woody chasing a

stick thrown by the girls. The monster hunter stood out of the way to let them play.

The Queen’s Knight smiled as he watched. It had been a long time since they just

played instead of taking care of other people’s problems. He decided to let it run its

course.

He went to the desk and started poking through the paperwork there. He frowned

as he sorted things more to his liking. He didn’t like what he was seeing.

“We took care of the one here,” said Pavel, looking over his shoulder. He indicated

a section of reports around an inn. “Nasty monster using candy to make her

demirealm.”

“Really?,” said Errant. “That’s the stuff of nightmares.”

“Tell me about it,” said Pavel.

“What do you think about all this?,” asked the monster hunter.

“Not much,” said Errant. “I mean right now there are at least eight manifestations of

mental problems given life and allowed to hunt people to fuel their abilities and

domains. Theoretically, someone who knew something about domain doors could

shut these eight domains off from our reality and leave the monsters in there to starve.

At that point, the domains would close on their own. But we also have a secondary

problem which I don’t like.”

“The Alvas is making them out of girls, and he won’t stop unless we stop him,” said

the monster hunter.

“Exactly,” said Errant. “Until we find all of the girls he has infected, and do

something about that, more of these domains will open. That will lead to more deaths

and so forth. And eventually he will find a girl he can use to wipe the city off the

map.”

“Are you sure about that?,” asked the monster hunter.

“A lot depends on the mental strength and the obsession of the girl involved,” said

Errant. “It’s possible that he will find one capable of turning the city into her domain.

If that happens, Bern is as good as gone. The only people who will survive are the

ones who can cross dimensions.”

“So we have to find this Alvas,” said Jason. “I need to get my partner on this. He can

find anything.”

“Go ahead,” said Sonya. “The girls will be safe with us. Be careful. You might be

seen as a weak piece to be taken off the board.”

“I would like to meet him,” said the monster hunter. “Tilda, stay here. When I get

back, we’re moving.”