Castle Perilous

Keep — East Wing — Armory

“Hey, you look great,” Gene said as Linda came out of the storeroom.

“Thanks. You really like it?”

“Sure.”

Linda twirled once. She had chosen not to go around attired as most women did in this world, in long gowns and coif. Instead she had picked an outfit more befitting a teenage boy. It was composed of a yellow long-sleeved undertunic, a brown overtunic with a hood-collar and pleated sleeves to the elbow, tan hose and brown soft-leather boots to mid-calf. The hem of the overtunic rode high on her thighs.

“It’s a little too short,” she said. “My rear end sticks out a little.”

“Well, that’s not necessarily bad.”

She laughed. “Maybe not.” She touched the scabbard of the dagger hanging on her narrow leather belt. “This thing,” she said, “is not me at all.”

Gene withdrew his sword (one-handed, double-edged, broad-bladed and cross-hilted) halfway from its sheath. “This isn’t exactly my métier either.”

“Your uniform looks nice.”

“Thanks.”

Gene had taken a Guard’s uniform, minus the chain mail, which he had found inhibitingly heavy. Over his red undertunic he wore a black leather jerkin with winglike leather shoulder flaps. The front of the jerkin was covered with silver studs. The rest of the outfit consisted of black padded breeches, red hose, and high black boots.

“Actually, it’s kind of kinky. I feel like a gay medieval Nazi.”

Snowclaw came back from relieving himself in a privy down the hall. “Hey, Gene, you look like a gay medieval Nazi.”

They laughed.

Gene did a take. “Hey, you said that in English.”

“I heard you. You can turn off the running translation if you listen closely. Funny language, Englitch.”

“English.”

“Whatever. I’m having a little trouble with Nazi, but medieval comes out to mean ‘middle years’.”

“Close.”

“Yeah. Are Nazis usually happy?”

“Happy? Oh. That’s not what I meant … Uh, forget it.”

“Anything you say.” Snowclaw scratched his stomach. “When’s lunch?”

“You hungry? I’m not. Kinda stuffed myself at breakfast. Which should have been supper for me.” Gene yawned. “I’m tired, myself.”

Linda said, “I could use a bite to eat. Do you want to go back to the dining room?”

“That won’t do me much good, actually,” Snowclaw said. “I didn’t care for that stuff much. I wish I could find someplace to hunt.”

“Rawenna — that’s my maid — said that if you want —”

“Oh, we have a maid, do we?” Gene twitted.

“All us noblewomen do, didn’t you know? What I was saying, Snowclaw, was that if you need special food, you just have to tell the cook and he’ll whip up a spell or two and give you what you want.”

“Yeah? Magic, huh?”

“Pretty much. All that food upstairs was created by hocus-pocus. Leastways, that’s what Jacoby told me.”

“The guy who looks like Sidney Greenstreet?” Gene asked.

“Is that who he looks like?”

“Only shorter.”

“Hm. Well, that’s what he said.”

“Look, why don’t you try whipping up something for you and Snowclaw?”

“Me whip up something. Huh?”

“Yeah. Materialization. Isn’t that what you have, what you can do?”

“Whoa, there. Valiums are one thing —”

“Why should Valiums be one thing?”

“You know what I mean.”

“No, I don’t. Why don’t you try it, Linda? An experiment. I mean, this magic stuff is really fascinating.”

“Oh, come on.”

“Seriously.”

Linda threw up her hands. “Where?Here? ”

“Anywhere. On this thing.”

Gene cleared helmets and other accouterments off a small table.

Linda looked at it.

“Well,” Gene said.

“ ‘Well’ what?”

“Do your thing.”

Linda was annoyed. “Really.”

“No, come on, Linda. You can do it.”

“This is so insane.”

“Seriously. Go ahead.”

“Oh, shit. All right.”

“Think of food.”

Linda closed her eyes. “I’m thinking of food. What kind of food am I thinking of?”

“I give up.”

“Well, what should I think of? Come on, Svengali.”

“What do you want to eat?”

“Uh … uh … a Big Mac. And french fries … and a real thick strawberry shake.”

“Yuck. Okay, think of that.”

“I’m thinking, I’m thinking.” She opened her eyes. “Whaddya mean, ‘yuck’? Who’s the magician here?”

“Okay, okay, go ahead.” Gene turned, saw Snowclaw, and said suddenly, “Hey, wait a minute. You have to think of something for Snowclaw.”

“Oh, gee. How can I do that?”

“Forget about me, Linda. See if you can do it.”

“Isn’t there something …?”

“Well, I like kwalkarkk ribs marinated in shrackk and done just right, but forget it.”

“Well, I’ll think of barbecued ribs. Maybe that will do it.” Linda closed her eyes. “Okay, here goes.”

She took a deep breath and stood motionless for a moment. Then she opened her eyes, threw out her arms and said, “Abracadabra. Nothing.”

“Oh, come on,” Gene chided. “You can do better than that.”

“Silliest thing I’veever done. Okay, one more time.”

She tried again, same result.

“This is ridiculous. The pill must have been a fluke — or maybe I had it on me all the time and didn’t realize it.”

“That’s unlikely,” Gene said. “Do you remember how you did it?”

“Well, I was just —” Linda broke off and dismissed the whole thing with a disdainful sweep of the hand. “Look, I’m definitely not in a magical mood today. Let’s forget it.”

Gene sighed. “Okay. Sorry. Actually, I was thinking that a little magic might help us find a way back home.”

Linda bit her lip. “You know, you’re probably right.” She thought about it. “But I’m no magician. I really don’t think I am.”

“It’s okay. Well, we should head back to the dining room, I guess.”

“We ought to find a way out of here, is what we should do.”

“Yeah. But how is the question. Snowclaw? You have any ideas?”

“I’m not an idea man.”

Gene snickered.

Linda asked, “Do you guys think you could find your way back to the part of the castle where you came in?”

Gene shook his head ruefully. “I’m very pessimistic about that, but I think we have to try.”

“Snowclaw, when did you stumble into this place?”

“Just a short time before Gene did.”

“And you guys met up right away. That might mean that your gateway and Snowclaw’s are close together.”

“Might,” Gene said, “if they still exist at all. What about the one you came through?”

“Forget that. I know it disappeared right after I crossed over. I saw it.”

“Hmph. Straight through your bedroom closet, huh?”

“Yeah. Right out of a kid’s nightmare.”

“Wow. ’Course, coming through by way of a parking garage in an office building isn’t exactly rational either.”

“Not much about this place is.”

“Yeah. Well.” Gene placed his left hand on the hilt of his sword. “What do you say we poke around a little, try to get the feel of this place, if that’s possible? If we can get our bearings, maybe we can search systematically without getting ourselves lost again. We just might luck onto another gateway back home. Maybe not the one we came through, but a way back nonetheless.”

“But the way these aspects pop in and out seems so random,” Linda said. “We might come out in the middle of the Gobi Desert, for all we know.”

“Or Times Square … or Red Square, for that matter. We’ll have to take our chances.”

“I guess we will.”

“Snowclaw, can you hold off eating for a while?”

“Sure. I’ll probably faint, but —”

“A big guy like you?”

“How do you think I got to be such a big guy?”

Linda said, “You know, I really could go for a Big Mac. It’d be a little piece of home. And I really am hungry. I just picked at breakfast, and after running around all morning —”

“Linda.”

“— I think I really worked up a — Huh?”

“Linda, turn around.”

“Turn ar — Oh, my God.”

There, on the table, was a cardboard box bearing the familiar symbol of a fast-food restaurant chain, a red cardboard envelope full of french fries, a strawberry milk shake, and two plates: one, of normal size, held a rack of barbecued spare ribs; the other was large and bore what looked like the entire spine and rib cage of a fair-sized animal.

“Kwalkarkk!” Snowclaw shouted, throwing down his broadax. He went to the table, tore off two or three ribs and bit into them, crunching both meat and bone between his huge, gleaming teeth. He chewed briefly, swallowed, and said, “Hey, these are great! How did you do it, Linda?”

Gene was awed. “I don’t believe you ate the bones.”

“Best part.”

Linda opened the box and peeked in. “It’s a Big Mac,” she said quietly.

“Wow.” Gene picked up the fries and sniffed. “They’re warm.”

“So’s the burger.” She wiped a tear from her eye.

“Yeah, and the ribs … What’s wrong, Linda?”

Another tear rolled down her cheek. “Scared,” she said.

“Gee, I don’t know why. This is great.” Gene scratched his stubbly chin. “Yeah. I guess I do know why. It’s all very …” He shrugged. “All very hard to get used to. Are you okay?”

“Yeah,” she said, sniffing. “I’m okay.”

Gene went to her and put his arm around her shoulders. “Sure you’ll be okay?”

“Sure I’m sure. I’m a goddamn magician, aren’t I? I’m a witch.” She gave a short, semihysterical giggle. “Just call me Samantha.”

“Yeah, and I’m Darin. And this is all a TV sitcom.”

She laughed, tilting her head to his shoulder. “Now, if I could only wiggle my nose.”

“Try it.”

She did it, and they laughed.

Snowclaw had already wolfed down most of the kwalkarkk. “Anybody want these little ribs here — what’re these from, a bird, or what?”

“Go ahead,” Gene said, still laughing.

Snowclaw picked up the plate, flipped the spare ribs into the air and caught them in his mouth. He crunched and chewed clinically. “Not bad,” he pronounced. “Kinda tasteless, though. Hey, are you guys gonna eat any of this?”

“Oh, help yourself, Snowclaw,” Linda said, recovering from the giggling bout. “If I get hungry, I’ll just go poof and conjure up a cheeseburger or something.”

“Is that what this is?” Snowclaw asked. He popped the Big Mac into his maw, gave it three perfunctory chews, gulped it down, then tilted his head back and upended the box of fries into his wide-open jaws.

“Let’s go, Emily Post,” Gene told him, walking arm in arm with Linda out the door.

“Be right with you, Darin!”

“Are we lost again?”

Gene looked around. “Oh, hell, I guess —”

They heard pounding feet. Three castle guards rushed out of a crossing corridor and double-timed it away from them down the hall. One of the Guardsmen looked back, giving Gene’s uniform the eye. But he didn’t stop.

“Looks like something’s up,” Gene said. “I wonder what.”

Linda said, “Well, there’s a war going on outside.”

“Yeah, a siege. I wonder what happens if the besiegers win — happens to us, I mean?”

“We can hide.”

“Let’s hope.”

They walked on down the corridor. Along the wall here and there were empty niches and alcoves. Arches swept across the hallway at even intervals, supported by massive columns to either side. One door led through to a spiral staircase. They came to the intersecting corridor and stopped.

“Which way, gang?” Gene asked.

“I think we’ve been here before,” Snowclaw said. “I smell you guys.”

“You’re no rose petal yourself, kid,” Gene retorted.

“I didn’t say you stank,” Snowclaw said, sounding a little miffed, “now did I? It’s just that I’ve got a good nose, and you hairless types have a distinctive smell.”

“Just kidding, Snowclaw. I can’t say you have any sort of scent at all. Humans don’t have a well-developed olfactory sense.”

“Olwhatory?”

“Smell, smell. Anyway, I apologize. I didn’t know you were sensitive.”

“Oh, it’s all right. For some reason I’m edgy.” Snowclaw sniffed the air. “Don’t know what it is.”

Suddenly the floor began to vibrate and a low, growling rumble came from what seemed like the entire structure of the keep.

Linda clutched at Gene’s sleeve. Gene took her hand and pulled her back down the hall, ducking into a nearby alcove. “Come on, Snowclaw!”

Snowclaw crowded in with them.

About five seconds later the alcove began quickly to rise.

“Whoa!” Gene yelled, poking his head out the opening. “Hey, we’re —”

Snowclaw yanked him back just as the thick stone edge of the ceiling — and the floor above — swept past. “You’d look funny without a head.”

“Thanks. Sorry, that was stupid.”

Another floor went by, then another. Then the moving alcove slowed. A fourth cross-section of stone slid down across the opening, coming to a stop at a level smoothly flush with the floor of the alcove.

“Is this lingerie, do you think?” Gene asked.

The three jumped out.

Linda marveled, “A stone elevator.”

The vibrations grew stronger.

“Hey, look,” Snowclaw said, pointing down the hallway, which was identical to the one four stories below except that it ended in an archway leading to the outside, or so it looked. Bright sunlight poured through the opening.

“An aspect, I guess,” Gene said.

“Oh, look at the walls,” Linda said.

The stone around them glowed faintly, emitting an ethereal blue light. The rumbling sound grew, and the floor became uncomfortable to stand on, transmitting nauseating vibrations up through the body.

“Let’s get out of here,” Gene said.

They ran for the opening, dashed through, and came out into a jungle clearing.

The ground was motionless. Stopping, they looked around. Tall palms with scaly bark bordered the clearing, and dark green fronds grew within, a wide footpath cutting through them. A tropical sun warmed the heavy, moist air.

“Shashrackk vo hunnra nok,” Snowclaw said. “Ba nan irrikka vahnah damn unak valvalackk.”

Gene and Linda were staring at him.

“Huh?” Gene said. “Snowclaw, what did you say?”

“Bok?”

“What? Hey, wait a minute.” He beckoned for Snowclaw to follow, walked back to the portal and stepped across the boundary.

When the big white beast had stepped across, Gene said, “Now, what was that you were jabbering about?”

“I said, we ought to explore this place, I’m tired of that dreary old castle — that’s what I said. What was all that noise you were making?”

“You can understand me now, right?”

“Sure.”

Gene walked a few paces forward, crossing the boundary. He turned and said, “What about now, when I’m standing on the other side of the interface?”

“Oh, I get it. You’re outside the castle, so the spell is cancelled. Is that it?”

Gene walked back across the line.

“Huh?”

“Gonna be kinda hard to communicate.”

“You said it.”

“Yeah. What do you want to do?”

“I don’t know. But I still want to get out of this cave.”

“Maybe we can work out some sign language,” Linda suggested.

“Sure, I guess,” Gene said.

“Let’s go,” Snowclaw said. “I’ll just keep my mouth shut.”

They left the corridor and walked down the well-worn path. As they neared the middle of the clearing, they found an intersecting trail, this one narrower. Snowclaw, in the lead, stopped to sniff the air, looking about, his pointed ears cocked.

Gene was pensively regarding the portal. It stood unsupported on the ground like a frameless life-size photograph. A fresh thought occurring to him, he walked back to it and stood at the interface, peering into the dim interior. A draft of cool air flowed out from the opening, carrying with it the musty smell of the castle. Gene walked to the right, coming to the edge of the portal, went beyond it and stepped behind the plane of the opening.

“Oh, hell.”

“What, Gene?” Linda’s eyes searched around. “Gene! Where are you?”

“Behind the portal.”

Linda walked back to the opening, Snowclaw following.

“Where?”

“Behind. Go around and come back here.”

They did, walking around the portal as if it were a movie screen — one which, they found, had no thickness at all. Gene was standing a few feet from the juncture, peering into what looked like an identical aspect of the corridor they had just exited.

Gene left them, walking around to the front again, then returned shortly.

“I was expecting the damn thing to disappear when you went around it. But it doesn’t. And this corridor is a mirror image of the other one. See that alcove on the left? It’s on the right if you go around front.”

“Which means what?” Linda asked.

Gene stooped, searched the ground and found a pebble. Picking it up, he threw it through the portal. The stone ticked off the flagstone of the corridor floor, bounded a few times and skidded to a stop.

“It means Euclid’s mother wore combat boots, but that’s not news.”

“Huh?”

“Never mind. I don’t know what it means. Who comes out this way? And what happens if we go in? Or is this just another exit in another part of the castle?”

The three of them exchanged baffled looks, then walked back around the portal, going down the path a few feet.

“Where to?” Gene asked.

“Let’s stay on the main path,” Linda said. “I see footprints all over it, so somebody must come here regularly. I hope it means that this portal is one of the stable ones.”

“Probably does. Hey, maybe this is Earth.” Gene reached to touch a frond, which immediately recoiled, rolling itself up until it looked like a long green cigar. Gene sighed. “Then again, maybe not.”

They made their way along the path, moving through the clearing and into the trees. Here the undergrowth wasn’t shy, though it was lush, almost impenetrable.

They became aware of sounds. All around, insects clicked and chirped. Whooping cries came from a distance, echoing among the trees.

They walked through deep shade, the soil of the path soft and loamy. Smells were numerous, and Gene was reminded of a greenhouse. The odor of damp earth and rotting vegetation was heavy.

“Reminds me of Phipps Conservatory,” Gene said.

“Where’s that?”

“My hometown — botanical gardens. I remember going there on grade-school field trips. Thing is, the vegetation looks weird. Kinda reminds me of the Carboniferous.”

“The Carbon … oh, you mean millions of years ago.”

“Yeah. Actually, maybe early Jurassic.”

“Maybe we’ve gone back in time.”

“I doubt it. I don’t recognize anything, and I took a few courses in paleontology.”

“Do you think this is another planet out in space?”

“My guess is we’re on another planet for sure, but the location is, like,real moot.”

“You mean we might be in the fifth dimension or something?”

“Well, ‘fifth dimension’ doesn’t really mean anything. Neither does ‘alternate world,’ to my way of thinking. Actually, the word alternate means ‘every other one,’ so it should be ‘alternative world,’ if you want to get semantically fussy.” Gene thought about it. “No,alternative really means a choice between two things, so … Hell, what would the proper word be?”

“You’ve lost me.”

“Doesn’t matter. Damn. How about ‘optional metrical frame’?”

“Anything you say.”

“ ‘Option frame’ for short. Yeah, I like that. This is one of many option frames.”

“Kvaas ejarnak kevak bo nera?” Snowclaw growled.

Linda answered, “We were talking about where this place could be, Snowclaw, and Gene was saying that —”

Linda stopped in her tracks and looked stunned.

“Hey,” Gene said. “I understood him, too, a little. Wasn’t what he said something like, ‘What are you people jabbering about?’ ”

“Yeah, that’s what I understood too.”

“Snowclaw, raise your right arm.”

Snowclaw shrugged and did so.

“Wave it.”

Snowclaw smiled and waved. “Vo keslat.”

“Yeah, you look silly too. I’ll be damned. It’s not like back in the castle, but … Snowclaw, can you understand us?”

Snowclaw nodded and made a gesture that qualified the affirmative to,More or less.

They walked on.

“Give me some time to think about this,” Gene said. He took some time, then said, “I think we didn’t understand him at first because we were so surprised, though we shouldn’t have been. Now that I remember, I sort of got his meaning then.”

“I think I did too.”

“Can’t figure it out, though.”

They came to another clearing, this one wider and looking completely different. Neatly trimmed grass grew along a spacious corridor running between walls of trees, and to the right lay an oval patch of grass that was a darker green and looked even more manicured. A thin pole with a flag was planted in the middle of it.

Gene began, “Of all the —”

“Fore!”

A small white ball thumped into the turf a few feet from Gene, hit his right arm, and bounded away to roll into the expansive sand trap in front of the green.

“Ow,” Gene complained, rubbing his arm. “What the hell?”

Moments later Thaxton, whom Gene recognized from the dining hall, came running over a rise a few yards down the fairway. He looked peeved.

“I say,” he shouted, “would you mind awfully getting out of the bloody way?”

“Sorry,” Gene told him.

“If you hadn’t been standing there, I’d be putting for an eagle. Now I’m in a bloody hazard! Blast it all.”

Thaxton stalked by and gave Gene a grouchy look.

“Excu-u-u-se me,” Gene said, and backed away toward his companions.

Thaxton waited off to one side of the green. Another ball shot over the rise, arching down to hit the lip of the trap. It bounced cleanly, lobbed onto the green, rolled, bounded off the pin and came to rest a few feet from the cup.

“Oh, bloody hell!” Thaxton despaired. “Of all the bleeding luck!” Grumbling, he sat down on the edge of the bunker.

A few moments later Cleve Dalton came sauntering over the rise.

“Hello there!”

He came down to where Gene and company were standing.

“Sorry to interrupt your game,” Gene told him.

“Oh, don’t worry about it,” Dalton said amiably. “I heard Thaxton giving you a hard time. Don’t pay him any mind.”

“Mind telling me what a golf course is doing in the middle of the Jurassic?”

“Is that what this is?” Dalton smiled. “I didn’t know.”

“Well, it’s close. We were hoping that this is one of the more stable aspects.”

“It is. Very stable — at least it has been for the three years I’ve been a Guest.”

“Good. Then we can get back to the castle.”

“Easily, as long as you don’t wander too far.”

“Fine. Now, about this course …”

“Nobody I know remembers when it was put in,” Dalton said. “It’s maintained by castle servants, though, so I imagine Incarnadine had it built for the delectation of his Guests.”

“Hmm. No kidding.”

“Rather glad he did, myself. Golf’s one of my passions.” He crossed his ankles, put the head of his seven-iron at his feet and leaned on the shaft. “In addition to good books and straight gin. The latter is my one vice.”

“Where the devil is that lummox of a caddy?” Thaxton griped. “Oh, to hell with it.”

He stood up, trudged over to the ball and addressed it.

“It’s like the bloody Sudan here,” he muttered. “You have to be bloody Chinese Gordon to play this course!”

His trap shot hit the lip of the bunker and bounced back into the sand. A bout of potent cursing ensued.

“There’s a lady present,” Dalton told him.

“Eh?” Thaxton looked, Linda’s gender hitting him. “Oh. Frightfully sorry. Do forgive me.”

“Oh, that’s all right,” Linda called.

“It is a difficult course,” Dalton conceded. “Impossible to find a ball in the rough.”

“Yeah,” Gene said. “Is there anything else here besides the golf course?”

“No, except for a small clubhouse. Mostly lockers and things. It does have a bar, however.”

“Hm. No civilization, then. Rats.”

“Well, I wouldn’t exactly say no civilization.…”

“There you are, you great bumbling twit!” Thaxton shouted to the strange figure coming over the rise. “I need my wedgie chop-chop!”

Linda’s hand shot up to cover her mouth.

The caddy, a green, seven-foot-tall saurian beast resembling a kangaroo, broke into a loping run. Spindly forelegs struggling with two golf bags and a plastic cooler, it ambled down the grade, dropped one of the bags, back-tracked and bent to pick it up, and in so doing, emptied the other bag of its clubs.

“Oh, for God’s sake.”

After some effort and a few more mishaps, the caddy finally arrived at the green, dumped its burdens, fetched one of the bags back up, and frantically rummaged through it.

Thaxton looked on, scowling. Losing patience, he barked, “The wedgie, the wedgie! No, no, no, not that one, for God’s sake. Yes, that one. Yes! Can’t you bloody hear? Right, now give it to me.”

“Is that thing intelligent?” Gene asked in wonder.

“Not bloody likely,” Thaxton answered, striking out into the endless wastes of the sand trap.

“I mean, is it sentient?” Gene amended.

“Oh, yes, very,” Dalton said. “This one’s not the best of the caddies, but he tries. They all belong to a local tribe.”

“Tribe? Wow.”

Dalton turned to the beast and said, “Lummox, old boy, could I trouble you for a drink?”

Lummox nodded and opened the cooler, which was filled with bottles and other containers nesting in shaved ice. He withdrew a small plastic pitcher, opened the spout on the cover, took out a long-stemmed frosted glass and filled it. Gene and Linda were amazed at how humanlike and dexterous the hands were. Bearing the glass and moving his huge feet carefully, Lummox walked over to where Dalton stood, but stopped just short.

His face, generally saurian but capable of much expression, suddenly developed a guilty look.

“O-live!” Lummox wailed apologetically.

“Never mind, old boy,” Dalton said mildly. “Give it here.”

“Damn!” Thaxton’s shot had wound up a goodly distance from the cup; the ball hugged the edge of the green. “It’ll be a good twenty feet for a bogey! Damn!” He trudged out of the sand. “Damn, damn, damn!”

“Well,” Gene said, sighing. “I guess there’s not much use in us staying here. Unless you’re in the mood for golf, Linda. How ’bout you, Snowclaw?”

Snowclaw snorted.

“You know, he’s kind of cute,” Linda said, walking up to Lummox. The caddy gave her a shy smile and scurried back to the cooler.

“Yeah, really,” Gene said. He turned to Dalton. “What would you suggest we do?”

Dalton sipped at his drink. “I’ll say one thing for Lummox — he makes a damn good martini. I’m sorry, what did you say? What should you do? Why, anything you want. You’re young — there’s a very good aspect just down from the Queen’s dining hall. You might try that if you like white-water rafting. There are some good guides available.”

“White-water …? No, what I meant was, what’s the best way to go about finding a way out of the castle?”

Dalton was appalled. “Why in the world would you want to do that? There’s absolutely nothing out there.”

“No, I mean a way back to our world.”

“Oh, that. Well, if I were you I’d disabuse myself of that notion in short order. The gateways to the world we come from are very erratic. No telling where or when one will appear. In three years I’ve never caught a glimpse of a way back.”

“But I don’t understand,” Linda said. “Why are some portals so stable, like this one, and others not? It doesn’t make sense.”

Dalton shrugged. “It’s a random process, I suppose. It just so happens that the aspects opening onto our world are of the now-you-see-it-now-you-don’t variety. No explaining it.”

“But if we conducted a systematic search —”

“You might find one, for all I know. But it might open up in the middle of the Pacific, or the bottom of Death Valley in July — or fifty thousand feet in the stratosphere. There’s no telling where. And it might stay open only for seconds.”

Gene protested, “But surely the castle can’t be so big that you’d never run across one at some point.”

“As I said, for all I know, you might get lucky. But I wasn’t, and believe me I tried.” Dalton took another sip. “Well, maybe I didn’t make an all-out effort. I like it here. If you don’t, maybe it’ll give you the motivation to succeed.”

“Maybe,” Gene said dourly. “But if no one has ever succeeded in getting back, fat chance we’ll have.”

“Nobody I know has, but I keep to myself, mostly. So, why don’t you ask some of the other Guests? They may be able to help.”

“Yeah, thanks.”

“Excuse me, I have to mark my ball.”

“Sure.”

Gene’s attention was drawn across the fairway, where thrashing noises had commenced among the trees. A deep-throated roar sounded, and ponderous footsteps shook the ground. Gene started walking toward Linda and Snowclaw, who had turned toward the noise.

Lummox was squawking nervously, fumbling with corkscrew and bottle, his attention drawn toward the disturbance.

“I want that glass of Madeira sometime this week, Lummox,” Thaxton snapped. “Come on, then, it’s just one of the big ones — nothing to worry about.”

A towering beast, two-legged, cavern-jawed, and hungry, broke out of the trees. It took three thumping steps out into the grass of the fairway and stopped, scanning to the left, then to the right. Its eyes, a good twenty feet from the ground, found the grouping of foodstuffs on and about the green. Its maw opened and a liver-colored tongue flopped out then retracted slowly, trailing across rows of spiky teeth. It turned on its powerful hind legs and began to walk toward the green, picking up speed as it moved.

“Jesus, a Tyrannosaurus?” Gene yelped, taking Linda’s arm and leading her back.

“Harak!” Snowclaw shouted.

Lummox threw the glass and the bottle of Madeira into the air and broke for the woods.

Dalton had calmly marked his ball and now was walking toward his bag. Thaxton was addressing his ball, chin almost to chest in a concentrated putting stance.

“I say, Dalton, old boy. Would you mind —”

“Make your putt,” Dalton said, sliding a strange-looking weapon out of the bag. Basically rifle-shaped and constructed of blue-green metal, it had a curving wire stock and a bell-shaped business end. Dalton put the stock to his shoulder and aimed at the animal.

There was no sound.

The beast slowed, a vaguely puzzled expression forming on its saurian countenance. Then the tough, canvaslike skin of its head and neck changed color rapidly, from a flat gray-green to an angry red. A plume of steam issued from the top of its bony skull.

Then the head exploded in a fountain of blood, pulp, and ghastly pink mess. The eyes popped out and the sockets gushed streams of boiled brain. The dinosauroid shambled a few steps more before its massive hind legs collapsed, sending its bulk crashing to the ground. It lay unmoving, the area about its head looking and smoking like a mound of hot beef stew.

Thaxton putted. The ball described a wide curving orbit across the green, approaching the cup. It caught the rim, spiraled around like a planet spinning into its sun, and dropped for a bogey.

“By Christ, did you see that? I —” Thaxton looked around for an audience. Linda was staring past him, hands clapped over her mouth, her eyes rounded, her complexion ashen. Snowclaw and Gene were running toward the fallen creature, Dalton following at a jog.

“Bloody hell. Best shot of my life and it’s an anticlimax.”

Thaxton began calling for Lummox, who was nowhere in sight.

Gene stood examining the mess. “Good God,” he said, waving fumes away from his nose. “Whew! What a stink.”

Dalton walked up. “The big ones usually keep to the low ground, but every once in a while a rogue wanders out of the valley and gives us trouble. This one is probably old, and lost his harem to a young buck.”

“Where did you get that thing?” Gene wanted to know.

“This?” Dalton displayed the weapon. “I traded it for gold I panned in a desert aspect a while back.”

“I don’t understand. If technology like that is available —” Gene swatted at the hilt of his antiquated weapon. “— why all the silly swordplay?”

“Good question,” Dalton answered. “It so happens that devices like this don’t work inside the castle. Almost nothing does, including electricity.”

“What about gunpowder?”

“I’m told that gunpowder works, but a simple spell can prevent it from exploding with any force. Consequently, that particular technology has fallen into disuse.”

“No kidding. Say, how does that thing work? Do you know?”

“No, I don’t. And I don’t know what aspect it came from.”

Linda was edging up to them, seeming drawn to the carnage by a morbid fascination she couldn’t quite overcome. She eyed the mess queasily.

“Oh, my,” she said. “Yuck.”

Deadpan, Gene asked, “Hey, Linda. Would you mind getting a spoon from the cooler, if Lummox has one?”

Linda’s jaw dropped. “A sp —”

“Yeah, or a fork or something.” Gene unsheathed his sword, slid the point into the mess and ladled out a gob of gore. “Hard to eat with this thing.”

“Oh … oh —” Gagging, Linda turned and ran.