"Zel, I really don’t think going to Marrigan is a good idea!" Lara protested as she struggled to keep up with Zelgadis’ determined pace. They were already two hours out of Triskela and three days out of Marrigan, if Lara was determined to go along; Zelgadis would have been able to move much faster without a mortal in tow.
        Zelgadis didn’t pause or even turn around. "I told you: You don’t have to come with me. In fact, I’d feel better about it if you didn’t."
        "You believe that man, don’t you?" The doctor cried in disbelief. She ran ahead of him, turned around with her hands on her hips, stopping him in his tracks. "You think I’m a demon!"
        Zel rolled his eyes. They’d already had this discussion. "I’m just worried about you. Marrigan is a dangerous place for mortals. With my body, I can come and go freely, but it just wouldn’t be safe for you!"
        They stared each other down for a few seconds, then Zelgadis started walking again, straight past her. "My friends are in Marrigan and they’re in trouble. One of them might even be dying, if what Urlich said is true—"
        "I thought you weren’t in love with Amelia? And I thought you thought Urlich was Xellos!" Lara taunted from several paces behind. She still hadn’t moved to follow him.
        "I was startled when he showed up and not thinking clearly. I’ve never known Xellos to be without his staff or to use a sword—and his hair isn’t that long." He added through clenched teeth: "And I don’t have to be ‘in love’ with a friend to care if they might be dying!"
        Lara didn’t reply but she did start following him again. "This plan looked so good on paper," Xellos-Lara thought to himself bitterly, "except the part that had me sleep with him!" And now, thanks to Lina Inverse’s usual dumb luck, his much-loathed twins knew about his plan and were, as usual, trying to ruin everything for him! Zelgadis may not have been convinced that Dr. Lara Sorez was really Xellos the Trickster Priest, but the seeds of doubt had definitely been planted, watered, fertilized and were now sprouting. Worse, Zelgadis had it in his head that he had to go to Marrigan to join his friends, who would really wreck his plan! On the bright side, Xellos realized he probably wouldn’t have to do with Zelgadis again.
        The truth of the matter was, the "seeds of doubt" in Zelgadis’ mind were already mature enough to bear fruit. There was no way Urlich could have known about Zel’s brief acquaintance with Zhara unless Zhara, herself, had told him. Zel hadn’t talked about Zhara since he’d begun his studies with Rezo, so there was no way Lina, Gourry or Amelia could’ve known about her. Unless Zhara had told Xellos, if he was in fact her father, as Urlich had claimed. So, Zelgadis found himself more inclined to believe the mysterious Urlich than the woman (?) he’d spent the morning in bed with. If she was Xellos…
        Zelgadis shook that sickening reality out of his head. His only consolation in that case was that Xellos was probably suffering because of it as much as he was. Small comfort. Well, this was just the story of his life, Zelgadis thought sourly. He’d been so sure he’d found the woman of his dreams: A travel-loving sorceress, intelligent, interesting, pretty—and she turned out to be Xellos. Maybe. Urlich had said the real Dr. Sorez had been murdered. Zel wondered if she’d been anything like the fake Xellos had concocted. Allegedly had concocted. Damn! Why would Xellos do this to him, anyway? The Trickster never did anything without a reason (however bizarre and twisted that reason might seem to others), so what was his reason this time? And why go so far as to actually have sex with him? Was the game plan to have his baby? A chimera child that could be used against him? The notion had merit but still begged the question: Why him? What was he to Xellos, or Beast Master, or her master—or whatever demon lord had ordered Xellos to do this to him?
        Lara’s hand on his arm startled him out of his thoughts. "I’m sorry, Zel," she said, looking up at him with big, green eyes; if this was Xellos, Zelgadis thought, it was a damn fine disguise. "You’re right, you can come and go as you please in that evil place. But I’m still worried. It could be trap!"
        That fed into Zel’s previous line of thought perfectly. "But why trap me? And go to so much trouble to set the trap, as well? That’s the part I don’t understand: Why me?"
        She hooked her arm through his and gave him a flirty nudge. "Maybe Zellas Metallium thinks you’re cute!"
        "Who?"
        Oops! "Well, isn’t that the name of Xellos’ master? Beast Master, right? Zellas Metallium. Ha-ha!"
        Zelgadis wanted to pick her up and throw her as far as he could and run for his life but he forced himself to remain calm and just keep walking. "Oh, that’s right. I forgot. I was distracted." He knew very well who Zellas Metallium was, but only because Xellos had told him. It was possible she could have learned that name through her studies (his hadn’t progressed that far before Rezo had changed him), which still left Urlich’s claims in doubt. If only he knew a spell to break down, or even detect, illusions! That would settle the matter in an instant, if his spell proved stronger than Xellos’ spell. He pondered that for a few paces, ever mindful of the so-called woman beside him. Her perfume was intoxicating, a mix of woody and spicy notes, like the incense she’d burned when they’d—
        Zel turned his thoughts away from the memory of their morning activities once again, then it occurred to him that she’d burned an almost identical fragrance of incense when he’d met with her in her office. She’d also worn the same perfume (not that women weren’t known to wear a "signature scent", a bit of trivia he’d learned from the ever-informative Lina Inverse, who fancied herself a "lady" for some reason). Perhaps it was the fact that doubt was already thriving in one part of his thinking that this new worry found such fertile soil. Or maybe he was as clever as Amelia liked to tell him he was, and there really was something suspicious about the scents surrounding Dr. Lara Sorez. Was a spell woven into the incense and possibly even her perfume to make him more susceptible to suggestion? That would explain why he’d been so willing to hop in bed with a woman he’d only known for a few days, something that had been bothering him since last night. He’d never been "easy" by anyone’s standards and since gaining a stone hide he’d become even more reluctant to put himself in potentially romantic situations. True, Lara possessed all the traits he’d always imagined his dream girl would have…and she was the one who had made the first move. After all, what’s a healthy man to do when faced with an attractive, naked woman, who was just dying for a piece of him? Zel’s heart sank: A woman being hot enough for him to actually take all her clothes off and invite him into her bed in no uncertain terms? Hmph. Right. Even Amelia had never been so forward as to even suggest they go to bed, much less go as far as Lara had to get him.
        Oh great. Amelia naked. As if he didn’t need anything else to screw up his day. He might have had sex with Xellos, and now his brain was conjuring an image of the Princess of Seyruun in the buff. "I really hate my life," Zel thought miserably, then did the stupidest thing he could have done: He wondered how things could possibly get worse, essentially issuing the Universe a challenge.
        "What was that?!" Lara cried in alarm, stopping dead in her tracks and almost toppling him when he didn’t immediately stop walking, since she still had hold of his arm.
        "What was what?!" Zel’s hand flew to his sword as he regained his balance and strained his supernaturally strong senses for signs of anything out of the ordinary. He scanned the thick foliage along both sides of the road, then probed more deeply into the forest beyond. Something rustled in the underbrush to his right, and Zel adjusted his defensive posture accordingly. Lara hugged as close to him as she could get, which struck Zelgadis as unusual, considering how quick she’d been with a fireball when Urlich had appeared that morning. More evidence that she was Xellos—damn!
        "It’s in the bushes!" She hissed in his ear.
        Zelgadis shook her off. "I realize that! It’s probably just an animal." He relaxed his guard and resumed walking, leaving the whatever-it-was to get back to its regularly scheduled life. "It sounded too small to be anything dangerous," he encouraged his companion with a smile he didn’t feel. Nervous, shrieky women were not on his "dream girl" list. Either Xellos was slipping, or Lara was showing a new facet of her personality. She clung to him until they were well away from the source of the disturbance, filling Zelgadis’ nostrils with her intoxicating perfume and making him want her closer to him. As subtly as he could, Zelgadis pulled his turtleneck over his mouth and nose, hoping to reduce the effects. If, in fact, he wasn’t just imagining a conspiracy.
        Behind them, a red fox darted out onto the road, pausing in one of the wagon tracks to watch the two travelers round a bend and move out of sight. The fox started to leave the road again, then froze, ears and nose twitching worriedly. Then, just as the net swooped down to catch her, the little fox dashed into the bushes on the other side of the road, through the underbrush and into a hole between the roots of a massive oak. She turned about in the hole and watched the huntress approach, her feet making no sound in the carpet of fallen leaves and dead wood. "Here, foxy-foxy-foxy!" She called in a wicked voice, and the fox edged deeper into her hiding place and concentrated on not breathing, not thinking, not making any sound at all that could be heard with any of the huntress’ many senses. Beast Master held a large butterfly net high above her head as she scanned the forest floor with wild-looking golden eyes. She was impeccably attired in a gold velvet riding suit, her yellow hair piled atop her head in a stylishly untidy knot. Even the handle of her net was gold-colored, as were her boots and the gems which dangled from her ears. In the hand not occupied with the butterfly net, was a long, gold cigarette holder with a smoldering cigarette in it.
        The fox watched Zellas Metallium until she’d passed her hiding place, then the fox shot out of her hole and ran like mad back the way she’d come. With an elated hoot, Beast Master followed, giggling like a giddy school girl as she jumped over the bushes lining the roadway and charged down the road after her quarry. The fox put on speed, almost wiped out on the turn, spied Zelgadis and Lara and laid on the last of her strength to catch up to them. Hearing the commotion, the travelers spun about, Zelgadis taking up a defensive stance, Lara hiding behind him. The fox didn’t look too threatening, but before Zelgadis could relax, Zellas Metallium rounded the bend, cigarette streaming smoke from one hand, butterfly net waving exultantly over her coiffure from the other.
        "What the--?" Was as far as Zel got before the fox charged up chest, around his head and hid itself in the hood of his cloak, where it cowered, shivering, waiting for the net to fall. "Who-oa!"
        "Success!" Beast Master cheered and swung at Zelgadis’ head with her net. Zel grabbed the net with both hands and twisted it out of her grip with an annoyed grunt and tossed it aside. Disarmed but undeterred, Zellas chased Zelgadis around in circles, trying to snatch the little beast out of his cloak, cackling insanely all the while.
        Thinking he was being safely ignored both by his boss and his, uh, boyfriend, Xellos tried to pluck the fox from Zel’s hood, only to miss and get a cigarette burn as Zelgadis ducked and Zellas grabbed. Xellos yelped and sucked on his wounded hand as he waited for another opening. The fox for her part had managed to get out of Zelgadis’ hood and squeeze herself under his shirt, where she came to rest atop his belt, against his back and shivered. Only Zelgadis noticed the transition from hood to under-shirt, everyone else continued to make grabs for his hood.
        "EVERYBODY STAND STILL!" Zelgadis boomed, and all activity abruptly ceased: Demon lord, demon, chimera and fox froze. Zelgadis said carefully: "Alright. I’m going to take off my belt and the fox should drop out of my shirt. When that happens, you—" he pointed to Zellas Metallium "—may then resume your chase. Once you are gone, the two of us will continue on our way. Does that work for everyone?"
        Zellas grinned a wicked grin and gave him a courtly nod. Xellos-Lara tried to look harried and nodded. Satisfied that everyone was going to behave themselves, Zelgadis reached for his belt buckle. At that moment, the fox figured out what was up and made her opinion of his plan abundantly clear. Four sets of very sharp little claws dug into Zel’s hard flesh with a vengeance. "YEOWCH!" Zelgadis roared and decided the hell with his belt and ripped his shirt over his head and threw it right into Beast Master’s face. She, in turn, shook it out, hoping to find the fox inside; no luck. "Get it off me!" Zelgadis yelped as he spun around, trying to grab some part of the fox and missing the beast entirely as the little furball dodged up and down his back, using his belt and hair as grips. Xellos and Zellas tried to grab her, as well, leaving the poor creature nowhere do go but into Zel’s pants, where she latched onto a rather delicate part of his anatomy that had the unfortunate shape of a handle. Zel squeaked something unintelligible, grabbed at himself, got the fox and her pointy claws instead, cursed very colorfully, went cross-eyed, then fell flat on his face from the pain.
        Zellas rolled Zelgadis over, causing him enough pain to faint, then she and Xellos briefly debated the problem of how to extricate the fox from his pants. Zellas decided her status entitled her to the thrill, took hold of each pants leg and pulled downward. "Get my net!" She ordered Xellos-Lara, who quickly retrieved it and held it over his head, ready to strike as soon as the fox was exposed.
        The fox had other plans.
        "HA!" Zellas cried as she yanked Zelgadis’ pants over his hips. "Eh?"
        "Where’d she go?" Xellos-Lara asked anxiously.
        Zellas took a puzzled drag off her cigarette. "Hmph. She got away again. Clever girl." She shrugged. "Ah well, try again another day! Tootles, darling!" Zellas twiddled her fingers at a gape-jawed Xellos as she turned away. Two steps later and she’d disappeared in a puff of golden smoke. For all the effort she’d gone through to chase down her prey, Beast Master’s utter lack of concern over so mysteriously losing the fox was nothing short of infuriating (though not surprising) to her minion.
        Xellos muttered to himself as he put Zelgadis’ pants back on and sat down next to him to wait for him to revive. "What did I do to that woman to deserve this?" He wondered under his breath. He didn’t notice the spider sneaking up behind him. In the blink of an eye, the spider became a tall, willowy woman with long, curling red hair. Xellos didn’t notice that, either. "I’ve been loyal. Faithful. I never grovel unless she demands it. Where did I err?"
        "When you turned your back on me, fool!" Said the woman behind him. Xellos got a fuzzy feeling in his head, then the world went dark for a while. When he awoke some time later, he was alone.

        Zelgadis followed the fox-woman away from Lara, though he wasn’t really sure why. She’d told him to follow her, started to run away, and he’d just…followed. No questions, just obedience. Three miles away from where Xellos was just waking up, Zelgadis and his escort left the road and headed into the forest. As they jumped a stream, Zel noticed the woman was growing weaker. She stumbled when she landed on the far bank, regained her footing but continued at a slower pace, carefully picking her way over fallen branches and around muddy patches. She never looked back to see if Zelgadis was following her, but he was. Disobedience never occurred to him. When she crawled through a hole in the bank of another stream, he followed her into what turned out to be the entrance to a large den that was just high enough for him to stand up as he left the tunnel. End to end, the burrow couldn’t have been more than eight or ten feet. Leaves, pine needles, fur and blankets were piled wall-to-wall on the dirt floor. The walls were bare, except for two odd-shaped wooden doors: The one through which they’d entered and another directly across from it. In the center of the floor was a flat-topped mound of dirt into which were stuck dozens of candles of every color imaginable. Exhausted, the woman fell to her knees beside the mound, waved her hand at it, and the candles ignited, filling the den with a warm, golden glow. Another gesture, and the door closed behind Zelgadis.
        She looked up into his eyes and said in a polite tone: "Please be comfortable, Zelgadis." She patted a spot next to her, and he unquestioningly took the place she indicated. "Forgive me for using my power to coerce you," she apologized, her voice as soft as a whisper, her eyes downcast, "but it was the only way I could get you away from him before my strength gave out."
        Zelgadis felt the fog clearing from his mind. "What--? Who are you?" He asked her muzzily.
        Still not looking directly into his eyes, she told him: "My name is Sylph. Zhara sent me to rescue you, since Urlich failed."
        At the mention of the twins’ names, Zelgadis snapped back to himself with a shock. He looked about as if only just then realizing where he was. "Where’s Lara?" He demanded.
        Sylph frowned. "Dr. Sorez is dead, Zelgadis. I thought Urlich told you that." From between her ample breasts, she pulled a small, folded piece of paper and handed it to him. "It’s a newspaper clipping from five days ago. I’m sorry, Zelgadis, but the woman you thought was Lara Sorez, is actually Xellos, servant of Zellas Metallium." Zelgadis’ face tightened as he read the article. Sylph went on: "That was Zellas Metallium you saw, with the butterfly net. She almost had me this time."
        Zelgadis finished reading the article and just let the clipping fall from his limp fingers. The real Dr. Sorez had been dead for weeks, murdered and her body thrown into a river. He could feel his eyes misting and fought for control, balled fists trembling on his knees. "Why?" He croaked, his gaze on a snarl of fur and pine needles just beyond his boots. "Why her? Why me?" Zelgadis looked up at his rescuer (for such he now believed her to be), his whole body shaking with rage and confusion. "I don’t understand! What was Lara to Xellos—or his master—that they murdered her?!"
        Though obviously weak and longing to rest, Sylph patiently answered him. "Lara because of her spotless reputation and connection to the Seyruun Royal family, the princess in particular. Amelia is your friend, Lara was hers. Who else would she recommend to you when urging you to see a therapist? As for ‘why you’…I don’t know. I also have no idea how they knew so far in advance that you would seek help from her. Hmm…I just had a thought: What if Dr. Sorez wasn’t murdered by Xellos or anyone else involved in this plot against you, and all Xellos did was assume her identity, which is still unforgivable." She sighed and made a weak gesture of surrender with her hand. "The only ones who could tell us for certain are Xellos and Zellas Metallium, and I doubt they would be willing to share that information." Sylph shrugged. "You must realize, however, that it’s entirely possible this is just some bizarre whim on Beast Master’s part. She’s rather…odd."
        Zelgadis barely seemed to be listening. "I slept with Xellos," he choked. "Oh, gods, I’m going to be sick."