Ogre, Ogre (Xanth 5) (45 page)

"Yes!" Smash grunted. He shoved the demon headfirst at the gourd! Because Fiant was dematerialized, he passed right through the peephole, headfirst. Suddenly
Smash
remembered the bottle ifrit inside this same gourd. Wasn't the gourd another kind of container? "You want to force your way into something? This is a good place." Smash fed the rest of the demon through, arms, torso, legs, and feet, until all of him was gone.

"Let him find his way out of that!" Tandy cried jubilantly. "Oh, this really serves him right!"

Smash put his ear to the peephole. He heard a faint, angry neighing, as of an aroused stallion, and a startled scream. It seemed the demon could not dematerialize very effectively in a world where everything was already immaterial. Then the beat of hooves faded away in the internal distance.

Smash smiled. As Tandy had suggested, it would be long before the demon found his way out of that situation!

He drew forth Tandy's fillet of soul and handed it back to her. Suddenly he felt his full strength return, and saw Tandy brightening similarly. Their two half souls had been returned!

Smash realized what it was. The nightmares had made a fair exchange for the two halves of Fiant.

Smash straightened up, keeping his eye averted from the peephole. He squinted at Tandy, perceiving her disheveled but pert nudity. "Ogre
confess
, like she dress," he said.

"Oh, you're a sight for sore eyes yourself!" Tandy said in nurselike fashion, wiping Smash's battered face. "And sore nose, too! But do you know something? I love you just as much in the ogre view."

He kissed her then, using his sore lips, not caring what point of view it might be. Love was, after all, blind.