Castle Perilous (11 page)

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.