"No!" Electra was trying not to cry, knowing that the demoness would like that.

"You would rather die, and see him marry the one who doesn't love him and isn't right for him, rather than do what is necessary?" Metria inquired, interested.

Electra really didn't have much of an answer for that, but she did the best she could. "I just want him to be happy."

"How happy will he be, with the wrong woman, even if she takes a love potion?"

"Nada's not wrong! She's a princess! She was betrothed to him before I was!" Despite her best intention, she was arguing the case and playing into the demoness' trap.

"If you marry him, and he becomes king, you will be queen," Metria said. "Won't that be right for him?"

"Only if he chooses it!" she protested, not really absorbing the demonic logic.

"But he's a boy!" the demoness said derisively. "What does he know about choosing well? He can't see farther than the naga-wo-man's bosom."

"That's not true!" Electra cried. "He can see to her—" But she realized that she was only getting deeper into trouble.

"Her panties," Metria finished triumphantly. "He sets great store by those, doesn't he."

"Well, all men do." But it seemed awfully lame.

"And after he's finally seen them, what will remain of that marriage for him? Life with an older woman who's a real reptile?"

"That isn't fair!"

"And by the time he realizes his mistake and comes to appreciate you," the demoness continued inexorably, "you will be dead. You could hardly have a neater revenge than that."

"Get out of here, you—" But Electra, being still most of a week under the magic age of consent, did not know the word. "You intemperate complaint!"

"What?"

Electra blinked. The demoness had faded away, and she stood before Godiva. She was appalled.

Gloha stepped in. "The demoness was here, teasing her cruelly," she said. "She didn't mean you, Cousin Godiva."

Godiva frowned. "The demoness. It figures. But what are the two of you doing down here? Don't you know that the mountain is under siege?"

"We're here to bargain," Gloha said. "We want the violence to stop."

"Come in," Godiva said, showing the way into her suite. "Gouty is indisposed, so I am handling things for now."

Inside was a very nice apartment, with tapestries and cushions and daylight from a shaft leading up. There was some rubble and dust in the bottom of the shaft that seemed to be of recent origin, but the goblin woman ignored it.

They sat on cushions. "I have asked Che Centaur to be a companion for my daughter, Gwendolyn," Godiva said. "He is considering his response. Until he makes it, we can not end the siege, unless the winged monsters withdraw."

"But Cheiron will destroy the whole mountain!" Electra protested. "He will not let his son be captive!"