of Michelle, or anybody else from the Committee.
Niobe wondered what Barbarian Days were like when a tank of gas didn't cost a small mortgage and people were more inclined to travel to the middle of nowhere. There were gaps in the midway where absent rides and games of chance should have been. She hitched up her skirt again. It hid her tail as long as she kept it curled around her waist. Her tail ached; it was like having a bad kink in her neck after sleeping funny.
Drake stopped next to an overflowing trash bin buzzing with wasps. "Are you sure," he said, retying his shoelaces, "she got the message?" He paused, watching her. "Niobe?"
She was staring at the trash bin, and the wasps. Niobe stepped closer to the bin, where the smell was stronger. "Thank God! Are we ever glad to see you."
"Who are you talking to?" Drake asked.
"Did Michelle send you? Or the Committee?"
Drake looked back and forth between the wasps and Niobe. He looked skeptical.
"Hello? Bugsy?"
The wasps did nothing to indicate that they were anything other than wasps. Damn.
Niobe sighed. "Well, it was worth a try. Let's get something cool and escape the sun for a while," she said. The sno-cone booth might give them some plain ice if they asked nicely; they couldn't afford to spend their last dollars on junk food. She could have sworn they had more cash. Drake's appetite at work again.
The sno-cone booth was situated next to a stand selling deep-fried candy bars. They stood in line behind a five-foot-tall Conan and a six-foot Valeria. Cute couple. Niobe eavesdropped on their conversation.
"But the Jackalope is dead weight," said Valeria. "I'll bet the Diamonds will drop him next. They have to."
Conan shook his head. "Jack hasn't had a fair shake yet. He can deliver. Unlike Spin Doctor. All he does is change his hairstyle every week and hope people like it. That's just freakin' sad."
Zane would have enjoyed the conversation. He'd followed the new season of American Hero as closely as living on the lam would allow, right up until he died.
The breath caught in Niobe's chest as she thought about it. She shivered, tucked the sorrow away where she could embrace it later, and thought about what to do next.
Drake touched her elbow. "Hey. Look." He pointed toward a row of picnic tables under a green plastic sun shade. Through the crowd Niobe glimpsed a very large woman taking up most of one bench, her back to them. She appeared to be wearing a cape. Not Michelle's usual attire, but it made sense if she wanted to try to blend in.
Niobe took Drake's arm and pulled him through the crowd, calling, "Michelle!" Michelle didn't hear them.
Somebody jostled her. Drake's arm slipped out of her fingers. Niobe turned to face a tall woman in a skintight leather bodysuit. It wouldn't have been out of place among the other costumes, except that it covered a body much shapelier than was the norm here. Niobe wondered if the woman was a prostitute.
"Hey!" Niobe said. "Please watch where you're going."
The hooker tipped her head at Niobe. She flicked a waist-long black braid over her shoulder. "My apologies," she said, and melded back into the crowd.
They made their way to the picnic tables. In addition to a cape, the overweight woman also wore plastic armor and a toy sword. She wasn't Michelle.
"Crap," said Drake. "Face it. She's not coming."
They made another round of the festival, then another. At times they glimpsed other obese women - many of the festival goers weren't exactly small - in line for rides, or the tour of the Robert E. Howard house, but no Michelle. Drake and Niobe also cruised the midway, where the highest concentration of people lingered.
The sun was low on the horizon when Drake went to go use one of the Porta-Potties. Niobe waited for him. Here, near the toilets and Dumpsters, Barbarian Days smelled overwhelmingly of outhouses and rancid grease.
The crowd was getting louder. Rowdier. Some of these people had been swilling beer all afternoon. Meaning they probably suffered from impaired judgment.
Which gave Niobe a sad, desperate idea.
Drake returned, wiping his hands on his pants. She asked him, "Can you wait here? I want to try something."
Drake wrinkled his nose, as he had done in Mandy's car. "It stinks here."
"Fine. How about you wait for me over by the Tilt-A-Whirl?" She pointed at the ride, farther down the midway. "I shouldn't be gone long."
"Why? Where are you going?"
"To