The Color Of Her Panties by Piers Anthony Page A

princess now.”
    “I wonder if I will ever be like that,” Gwenny murmured, awed.
    “Surely you will, dear, when you are chief,” Queen Irene said.  “Your mother is excellent with clothing and manners.”
    Actually, she was not far from it now, Che reflected.
    Gwenny, like all goblin females, was petite and pretty, and in the dress she was wearing at the moment she was winsome.  But she did not know it, which was surely part of her appeal.
    They ate well, for all the fruits of the orchard that had tempted them were served.  There was even a nice plate of cat treats for Sammy.  Che realized that Queen Irene had noticed, and made sure to please the guests.
    Yet why should the Queen have gone to such trouble?
    They were merely three creatures on a private mission, hardly worthy of royal treatment.
    No, that was not correct.  They were special people.
    Jenny was a representative of a species of elf never before seen in Xanth, whose story was as yet incomplete.  She had pointed ears and four fingers, and her folk, in their own realm, had the ability to communicate mind to mind.
    Gwenny had the chance to be the first female chief of a goblin tribe, and that could transform the relations of goblins to other species as dramatically as the change of clothing had done for Electra.  And Che himself was supposed to change the history of Xanth, though the way of that was not yet clear.  Perhaps he would be instrumental in helping Gwenny achieve the chiefship, or perhaps it would happen in some other manner.  So the three of them, though young, were not ordinary, and Queen Irene was well aware of that.  Possibly his sire and dam had notified the Queen that they were coming; centaur adults left little to chance.  Still, he appreciated the courtesy which was being extended, and knew that the girls did too.
    After the meal, Electra invited them to join her and her daughters in Princess Ivy's old room to see the magic Tapestry.  She carried the twins in a large bassinet.  “They like to watch it,” Electra explained.
    “So we watch it before they go to sleep for the night.  It is always interesting.”
    The Tapestry turned out to be a big woven picture, of Castle Roogna hung on the wall.  It had been made back in Electra's time, almost nine hundred years ago, by the Sorceress Tapis.  The Sorceress had given it to the Zombie Master in the form of a puzzle, and he had not appreciated its nature until he had assembled it.  Now the Zombie Master lived in the present, but had elected to leave the Tapestry where it was most useful at Castle Roogna.  It had helped educate Princess Ivy and Prince Dolph, and any number of other folk.
    For the picture on the Tapestry was not fixed.  It constantly changed, showing facets of the history of Xanth or contemporary events.  It was possible to spy on others, using it, though of course good folk would never do that.
    Still, that did make it a most interesting item.
    “What would you like to see?” Electra inquired.  “The twins don't mind what is on; they're too young, yet, to be choosy.” Actually, at the moment the twins weren't looking at the Tapestry at all; they were watching Sammy Cat, who had joined them in the bassinet.  He was playing with a loose thread on their blanket.
    Gwenny shrugged, but Jenny looked concerned.  “Do you think it might show Okra Ogress?” she asked hesitantly.
    Immediately the picture changed.  It showed a strange crystal rock garden with white rock roses and sheeplike white phlox.  A crystal spring flowed from a little crystal mountain, making miniature waterfalls until it formed a pool below.  The scene was beautiful.
    But there were no figures in it, ogre or otherwise.  Only a block of crystal which propped open a door.
    Then a figure appeared:  a rather large human woman, heavy boned and lightly furred.  Her strawlike hair flared outward from her head and down her back in knots and tangles.  With her was a smaller but more