The Magic Kingdom of Landover Volume 1

SNEEZE



Ben Holiday sighed wearily and wished he were somewhere else besides where he was. He wished he were anywhere else.

He was in the garden room at Sterling Silver. The garden room was probably Ben Holiday’s favorite of all the many rooms at the castle. It was bright and airy. Flower boxes crisscrossed the tiled floor in dazzling swatches of color. Sunshine streamed through floor-length windows that ran the length of its southern wall, tiny motes of pollen dancing on the broad bands of light. The windows stood open and fragrant smells wafted in. The room looked out on the gardens proper, a maze of flower beds and bushes that spread their way downward to the lake on which the island castle rested, mixing and mingling their colors like paints run together on a rain-soaked canvas. The flowers bloomed year-round, reseeding themselves with commendable regularity. A horticulturist from Ben’s old world would have killed to study such treasures—species that grew only in the Kingdom of Landover and nowhere else.

Just at the moment, Ben would have killed to escape them.

“… Great High Lord …”

“… Mighty High Lord …”

The familiar calls of supplication grated on him like rough stones and reminded him anew of the cause of his disgruntlement. His eyes rolled skyward momentarily. Please! His gaze shifted furiously from flower box to flower bed and back again, as if somewhere among all those tiny petals the escape he so desperately sought might be found. It wasn’t, of course, and he sagged back further in his cushioned chair and contemplated the unfairness of it all. It wasn’t that he was trying to shirk his duty. It wasn’t as if he didn’t care about these things. But this was his refuge, for Pete’s sake! This was supposed to be his place for time away!

“… and took all of our hard-earned berry stores.”

“And all of our ale kegs as well.”

“When all we did was to borrow a few laying hens, High Lord.”

“We would have replaced those that were lost, High Lord.”

“We intended to be fair.”

“We did.”

“You must see that our possessions are returned …”

“Yes, you must …”

They went on, barely pausing for breath.

Ben studied Fillip and Sot the way his gardener studied weeds in the flower beds. The G’home Gnomes rambled on unself-consciously and endlessly, and he thought about the vagaries of life that permitted misfortunes such as this to be visited on him. The G’home Gnomes were a pitiful bunch—small, ferretlike burrow people who begged, borrowed, and mostly stole everything with which they came in contact. They migrated periodically and, once settled, could not be dislodged. They were regarded in general as a blight upon the earth. On the other hand, they had proven unswervingly loyal to Ben. When he had purchased the Kingdom of Landover from Rosen’s Department Store Christmas Wishbook and come into the valley—almost two years ago now—Fillip and Sot, on behalf of all of the G’home Gnomes, had been the first to pledge their loyalty. They had aided him in his efforts to establish his kingship. They had helped him again when Meeks, the former Court Wizard, had slipped back into Landover and stolen his identity and his throne. They had been his friends when there were precious few friends to be had.

He sighed deeply. Well, he owed them something, certainly—but not this much. They were taking advantage of his friendship in a way that was totally unconscionable. They had traded on it to bring this latest complaint before him, deliberately circumventing the regular channels of a court administration he had worked hard to implement. They had brandished it like a fiery torch until he was hounded to this, his last sanctuary. It wouldn’t be so bad if they didn’t do this every single time there was a complaint of any sort—which was every five minutes, it sometimes seemed—but, of course, they did. They didn’t trust anyone else to be fair and impartial. They wanted their “Great High Lord” and their “Mighty High Lord” to hear them out.

And hear them out, and hear them out …

“… a fair disposition would be a return of all things stolen and a replacement of all things damaged,” said Fillip.

“A fair disposition would be for you to order to our service several dozen trolls for a reasonable period of time,” said Sot.

“Perhaps a week or two,” said Fillip.

“Perhaps a month,” said Sot.

It would also help matters if they didn’t bring most of their problems on themselves, Ben thought darkly. It was difficult to be either objective or sympathetic when he knew before the first word was out of their mouths that they were at least as guilty of causing the dilemma as whomever their latest complaint was to be lodged against.

Fillip and Sot rambled on. Their grimy faces twitched as they talked, their eyes squinting against the light, their fur wrinkled and worn. Their fingers curled and straightened as they gestured, and bits of dirt crumbled and broke away from beneath the nails where it was caked from digging. Their shabby clothes hung on them, leather and sackcloth, colorless save for a single incongruous red feather stuck in the headband of their caps. They were bits of wreckage that had somehow washed up on the shores of his life.

“Perhaps a tribute would help serve as recompense,” Fillip was saying.

“Perhaps a token gift of silver or gold,” Sot echoed.

Ben shook his head hopelessly. This was quite enough. He was about to cut them off when he was saved from the need to do so by the sudden, unexpected appearance of Questor Thews. His Court Wizard burst through the garden room doors as if catapulted by some giant sling, arms waving, white beard and long hair whipping about, gray robes with their colorful patches trailing after in what appeared to be a desperate effort to keep up with their wearer.

“I have done it, I have done it!” he proclaimed without any preliminaries. He was flushed with excitement, his owlish face made positively glowing by whatever it was that he had done. He seemed oblivious to the presence of the G’home Gnomes, who mercifully stopped their presentation in midsentence and simply stared at him open-mouthed.

“What is it that you have done?” Ben inquired mildly. He had learned to temper his enthusiasm where Questor was concerned, because it was often sadly misplaced. Questor accomplished on the average about one half of what he thought he had accomplished.

“The magic, High Lord! I have found the magic! Finally, I have found the means to …” He stopped, hands gesturing emphatically. “No, wait a moment! The others must hear this, too. All of our friends must be present. I have taken the liberty of sending for them. It should only be a few, brief … This is such a glorious … Ah, ah, here they are now!”

Willow appeared in the open door, stunning as always, more beautiful than all the flowers about her, her slender form a whisper of white silk and trailing lace as she slipped into the sunlit room. Her pale green face glanced toward Ben, and she smiled that special, secret smile that she reserved only for him. A fairy creature, she seemed as ephemeral as the warmth of the midday air. The kobolds, Bunion and Parsnip, trailed after, gnarled bodies skittering along, wizened monkey faces grinning doubtfully, all teeth and sharp angles. Fairy creatures, too, they had the look of something conjured from a nightmare. Abernathy came last, resplendent in his scarlet and gold Court Scribe uniform, no fairy creature, but a soft-coated Wheaten Terrier who seemed to think he was human. He held his dog’s body erect and dignified, his soulful eyes darting at once to the hateful, carnivorous G’home Gnomes.

“I see no reason to be present in the same room as these loathsome creatures …” he began indignantly and was cut short by the sight of Questor Thews advancing on him with arms stretched wide.

“Old friend!” the wizard gushed. “Abernathy, the best of news for you! Come, come!”

He seized hold of Abernathy and propelled him into the center of the room. Abernathy stared at the wizard in disbelief, finally shaking himself free of the other entirely.

“Have you lost your mind?” he demanded, brushing at his garments to straighten them. His muzzle twitched. “And what is this old friend business? What are you up to now, Questor Thews?”

“Something you cannot begin to imagine!” The wizard was beaming with excitement as he rubbed his hands together and beckoned them all closer. They crowded in, and Questor’s voice lowered conspiratorially. “Abernathy, if you were to wish for that which you most desire in all the world, what would it be?”

The dog stared at him. Then he glanced momentarily at the G’home Gnomes, then back again. “How many wishes do I get?”

The wizard lifted his bony hands and brought them to rest gently on the other’s shoulders. “Abernathy.” He breathed the scribe’s name. “I have found the magic that will change you from a dog back into a man!”

There was stunned silence. Everyone knew the story of how Questor had used the magic to change Abernathy from a man into a dog to protect him from the old King’s spiteful son some years earlier, when that reprobate was in one of his more hateful moods, and then had been unable to change him back again. Abernathy had lived since then as an imperfect dog who retained human hands and speech, always with the hope that one day a way would be found to restore his human self. A chagrined Questor had searched in vain for that way, frequently claiming he would find it when he found certain books of magic hidden by Meeks on his departure from Landover. But the books had been destroyed while being recovered, and not much had been heard on the subject since.

Abernathy cleared his throat. “Is this simply an over-generous dose of your usual nonsense, wizard?” he asked cautiously. “Or can you really change me back?”

“I can!” Questor declared, nodding vehemently. He paused. “I think.”

Abernathy drew back. “You think?”

“Wait a minute!” Ben was out of his chair and between them with as much speed as he could manage, nearly tripping headfirst over a box of gardenias in his effort to prevent bloodshed. He took a deep breath. “Questor.” He waited until the other’s eyes found his. “I thought that kind of magic was beyond you. I thought that when you lost the books of magic, you lost any way of even studying the arts mastered by your predecessors, let alone trying to …”

“Trial and error, High Lord!” the other interrupted quickly. “Trial and error! I simply expanded on what I already knew, taking matters a step further each time, learning a bit more as I went until I had learned it all. It has taken me until now to master the magic, but master it I have!”

“You think,” Ben amended.

“Well …”

“This is a waste of time—as usual!” Abernathy snapped, turned, and would have stalked away except that he was hemmed in by the G’home Gnomes, who had crowded close to hear better. Abernathy wheeled back. “The fact of the matter is, you never get anything right!”

“Rubbish!” Questor cried out suddenly, quieting them all. He straightened. “For ten long months I have worked on this magic—ever since the old books of magic were destroyed with Meeks, ever since then!” His sharp eyes locked on Abernathy. “I know how much this means to you. I have dedicated myself to mastering the magic that would make it possible. I have used the magic on small creatures with complete success. I have proven so far as it is possible to do so that it can be done. It only remains to try it with you.”

No one said anything for a moment. The only sound in the room was the buzz of a solitary bumblebee as it meandered from flower box to flower box. Abernathy frowned at Questor Thews in determined silence. There was disbelief reflected in his eyes, but it couldn’t quite mask the hope.

“I think we should give Questor the opportunity to finish his explanation,” Willow spoke up finally. She stood a pace or two back from the others, watching.

“I agree,” Ben added his approval. “Tell us the rest, Questor.”

Questor looked offended. “Rest? What rest? That is the whole of it, thank you—unless you expect technical details on how the magic works, which I am not going to give you, since you would not understand them anyway. I have developed a means to complete the transformation from dog to man and that is that! If you wish me to use the magic, I will! If not, I will dismiss the matter from my mind!”

“Questor …” Ben began soothingly.

“Well, really, High Lord! I work hard to discover a difficult and elusive magical process and I am greeted with insults, jeers, and accusations! Am I Court Wizard or not, I ask myself? There certainly seems to be some doubt!”

“I simply asked …” Abernathy tried.

“No, no, you need not apologize for the truth of your feelings!” Questor Thews seemed to relish thoroughly the role of martyr. “Throughout history, all great men have been misunderstood. Some have even died for their beliefs.”

“Now, look here!” Ben was growing angry.

“That is not to say that I feel my own life is threatened in any way, you understand,” Questor added hastily. “I was simply making a point. Ahem! It only remains for me to repeat that the process is complete, the magic is found, and we can use it if you wish. Simply say so. You have all the facts.” He stopped suddenly. “Oh. Except one, that is.”

There was a collective groan. “Except one?” Ben repeated.

Questor tugged uncomfortably on one ear and cleared his throat. “There is one small matter, High Lord. The magic requires a catalyst for a transformation of this magnitude. I lack such a catalyst.”

“I knew it …” Abernathy muttered under his breath.

“But there is an alternative,” Questor continued hastily, ignoring the other. He paused and took a deep breath. “We could use the medallion.”

Ben stared at him blankly. “The medallion? What medallion?”

“Your medallion, High Lord.”

“My medallion?”

“But you would have to take it off and give it to Abernathy to wear during the transformation process.”

“My medallion?”

Questor looked as if he were waiting for the ceiling to fall in on him. “It would only be for a few moments, you understand—that would be all. Then you could have your medallion back.”

“I could have it back. Right.”

Ben didn’t know whether to laugh or to cry. “Questor, we spent weeks trying to get the damn thing back when it wasn’t really gone in the first place, and now you want me to take it off for real? I thought I was never supposed to take it off. Isn’t that what you yourself have told me on more than one occasion? Isn’t it?”

“Well, yes …”

“What if something goes wrong and the medallion is damaged or lost? What then?” A dark flush was beginning to creep up Ben’s neck. “What if … what if, for whatever reason, Abernathy can’t give it back? Great balls of fire! This is the most half-baked idea I ever heard, Questor! What are you thinking about, anyway?”

Everyone had sort of shrunk away from him during this explosion, and now Ben found himself alone amid the flower boxes with the wizard. Questor was standing fast, but looking none too comfortable.

“If there were another choice in the matter, High Lord …”

“Well, find one, confound it!” Ben cut him short. He started to elaborate, then stopped, glancing instead at the others. “How much sense does this make to anyone else? Abernathy? Willow?”

Abernathy did not answer.

“I think you have to consider carefully what is at risk, Ben,” Willow said finally.

Ben put his hands on his hips, looked at them each in turn, then gazed out wordlessly into the gardens beyond. So he had to consider what was at risk, did he? Well, what was at risk was the thing that had made him King of Landover and kept him there. It was the medallion that summoned the Paladin, the knight-errant who served as the King’s champion and protector—his champion and protector on more than one occasion already. And it was the medallion that let him pass back and forth between Landover and other worlds, including the one he had come from. That’s what was at risk! Without the medallion, he was in constant danger of winding up as just so much dog meat!

He regretted that last comparison almost immediately. After all, what was also at risk was Abernathy’s permanent future as a canine.

He frowned blackly. What had begun as a fairly uneventful day was turning into a quagmire of unpleasant possibilities. His memory tugged at him. Ten months ago, he had been tricked into conveying the old wizard Meeks back into Landover when he had thought his worst enemy safely exiled. Meeks had then used his considerable magic to steal Ben’s identity and the throne and—most important of all—to convince Ben that he had lost the medallion. It had almost cost Ben his life—not to mention Willow’s—to discover what had been done to him and to defeat the old troublemaker once and for all. Now he was King again, safely ensconced at Sterling Silver, comfortably settled, the reins of kingship firmly in hand, his programs for a better life nicely under way, and here was Questor Thews playing around again with the magic!

Damn!

He stared at the flowers. Gardenias, roses, lilies, hyacinths, daisies, and dozens of variations of other familiar species along with a truckload of ground cover and flowering vines—all spread out before him like a vast patchwork quilt, scented and soft as down. It was so peaceful here. He didn’t get to enjoy the garden room that often. This was his first morning in weeks. Why was he being hounded like this?

Because he was the King, of course, he answered himself. Let’s not be stupid here. This wasn’t a nine-to-five job. This wasn’t why he had left his profession as a successful trial lawyer in Chicago, Illinois, to apply for the position of High Lord of Landover, a kingdom of magic and fairy folk that wasn’t anywhere near Chicago or anywhere else anyone there had ever heard about. This wasn’t why he had chosen to alter his life so completely that he was no longer even recognizable as the person he had been in his old world. He had wanted to change all that; that was why he had come here. He had wanted to escape the purposelessness of being who and what he had become—a bitter and reclusive widower, a disillusioned practitioner of a profession that had lost its character. He had wanted a challenge that would again give meaning to his existence. He had found that here. But the challenge was constant and not circumscribed by time or place, by need or want. It was simply there, always new, always changing; and he understood and relished the fact that he must always be there to meet it.

He sighed. It was just a little difficult sometimes.

He was conscious of the others watching him, waiting to see what he would do. He took a deep breath, inhaled the mix of fragrances that filled the noonday air, and turned to face them. Whatever doubts he’d had were gone. The decision wasn’t really all that hard after all. Sometimes he just had to do what felt right.

He smiled. “Sorry to be so touchy,” he said. “Questor, if you need the medallion to make the magic work, then you’ve got it. As Willow said, I have to consider the risks involved, and any risk is worth helping Abernathy get back to himself.” He looked directly at his scribe. “How about it, Abernathy? Want to take the chance?”

Abernathy seemed undecided. “Well, I don’t know, High Lord.” He paused, thought, looked down briefly at his body, shook his head, and looked up again. Then he nodded. “Yes, High Lord, I do.”

“Splendid!” Questor Thews exclaimed, promptly coming forward. The others murmured, hissed, and chittered their approval. “Now, this won’t take a moment. Abernathy, you stand here, right in the center of the room, and the rest of you stand back a bit behind me.” He adjusted them accordingly, beaming all the while. “Now then High Lord, please give the medallion to Abernathy.”

Ben reached for the medallion where it rested about his neck and hesitated. “You’re certain about this, Questor?”

“Quite certain, High Lord. All will be well.”

“I mean, I can’t even speak or write Landoverian without the medallion!”

Questor brought his hands up quickly in a gesture of reassurance. “Here, now. A simple spell will solve that problem.” He motioned briefly, muttered something, and nodded in satisfaction. “There we are. Go ahead. You can take it off.”

Ben sighed, took off the medallion, and handed it to Abernathy. Abernathy slipped it carefully about his shaggy neck. The medallion lay against his tunic front, sunlight dancing off its polished silver surface, detailing the etching of a knight riding out of an island castle at sunrise—the Paladin riding out of Sterling Silver. Ben sighed again and stepped back. He felt Willow come up beside him and take his hand in hers.

“It will be all right,” she whispered.

Questor breezed back about Abernathy again, adjusting him first this way and then that, telling him all the while that things would take only a moment. Satisfied at last, he moved directly in front of the scribe and took two careful steps right. He tested the air with a wet finger. “Ah!” he declared mysteriously.

He brought his arms high out of the gray robes, flexed his fingers, and opened his mouth. Then he paused, his nose twitching. One hand dropped quickly to rub at it in irritation. “Dratted sunshine tickles,” he muttered. “Pollen does nothing to help, either.”

The G’home Gnomes crowded close again, pressing up against the wizard’s robes, their ferret faces peering out at Abernathy in anxious anticipation.

“Could you move those creatures back?” the dog snapped and even growled a bit.

Questor glanced down. “Oh. Well, yes, of course. Back now, back with you!” He shooed the gnomes away and resumed his stance. His nose twitched again, and he sniffed. “Quiet, please!”

He began a long incantation. Bizarre gestures accompanied words that brought frowns of puzzlement to the faces of his listeners. They edged forward a pace or two to listen: Ben, a lean, fit man of forty standing firm against the advancement of middle age; Willow, a child in a woman’s body, a sylph, half-human, half-fairy; the kobolds Parsnip and Bunion, the first thick and stolid, the second spindle-legged and quick, both with sharp, glittering eyes and teeth that suggested something feral; and the G’home Gnomes Fillip and Sot, furry, unkempt ground creatures that appeared to have just poked their heads up from their earthen dens. They watched and waited and said nothing. Abernathy, the focus of their attention, closed his eyes and prepared for the worst.

Still Questor Thews went on, looking for all the world like some scarecrow escaped from the fields, his recitation seemingly as endless as the complaints of the G’home Gnomes.

Ben was struck suddenly with the incongruity of things. Here he was, until recently a member of a profession that stressed reliance on facts and reason, a modern man, a man from a world where technology governed most aspects of life, a world of space travel, nuclear power, sophisticated telecommunications and a hundred-and-one other marvels—here he was, in a world that was all but devoid of technology, fully expecting a wizard’s magic to transform completely the physiological makeup of a living creature in a way that the sciences of his old world had barely dreamed was possible. He almost smiled at the thought. It was just too bizarre.

Questor Thews’ hands swooped down suddenly and then up again, and the air was filled with a fine silver dust that sparkled and shimmered as if alive. It floated in breezy swirls all about Questor’s hands for a moment, then settled over Abernathy. Abernathy saw none of it, his eyes still tightly closed. Questor continued to murmur, his tone changing, growing sharper, becoming more a chant. The silver dust swirled, the light in the room seemed to brighten, and there was a sudden coldness in the air. Ben felt the G’home Gnomes shrink back behind his legs, muttering guardedly. Willow’s hand closed tighter about his own.

“Ezaratz!” Questor cried out suddenly—or something like it—and there was a brilliant flash of light that ricocheted off Ben’s medallion and caused them all to flinch away.

When they looked back again, there stood Abernathy—unchanged.

No, wait, thought Ben, his hands are gone! He has paws!

“Oh, oh,” Questor said.

Abernathy’s eyes blinked open. “Arf!” he barked. Then, in horror, “Arf, arf, arf!”

“Questor, you’ve turned him completely into a dog!” Ben exclaimed in disbelief. “Do something!”

“Drat!” the wizard muttered. “A moment, a moment!” His hands gestured, and the silver dust flew. He resumed the incantation. Abernathy had discovered paws where his hands had been. His eyes had snapped wide open and his muzzle had begun to quiver.

“Erazaratz!” Questor cried. The light flashed, the medallion flared, and the paws disappeared. Abernathy had his hands back. “Abernathy!” the wizard exulted.

“Wizard, when I get my hands on you … !” the scribe howled. Clearly, he had his voice back as well.

“Stand still!” Questor ordered sharply, but Abernathy was already advancing on him, moving out of the ring of silver dust. Questor moved quickly to stop him, brushing at the dust where it formed a screen between them. The dust darted away from him as if alive and flew suddenly into his face.

“Erazzatza!” Questor Thews sneezed suddenly.

A well of light opened up beneath Abernathy, a cloudy brightness that seemed to fasten about the dog’s legs with tiny feelers. Slowly, the light began to draw Abernathy down.

“Help!” Abernathy cried.

“Questor!” Ben screamed.

He started forward and tripped over the G’home Gnomes, who had somehow edged in front of him.

“I … I have him … High Lord!” Questor Thews gasped between sniffles. His hands tried desperately to regain control of the swirling dust.

Abernathy’s eyes had opened even wider, if that were possible, and he was struggling to climb free of the pooled light, calling out to them frantically. Ben tried to untangle himself from the G’home Gnomes.

“Be … calm!” Questor urged. “Be … ca … ah, ah, ah … ACHOOO!”

He sneezed so hard, he lurched backward into Ben and the others and knocked them all sprawling. The silver dust flew out the windows into the sunlit gardens. Abernathy gave one final cry and was sucked down into the light. The light flared once and disappeared.

Ben pushed himself up on his hands and knees and glared at Questor Thews. “Gesundheit!” he snapped.

Questor Thews turned crimson.

BOTTLE



“Well?” Ben demanded. “Where is he? What’s happened to him?”

Questor Thews didn’t seem to have a ready answer, so Ben diverted his attention from the flustered wizard long enough to help Willow up, then turned quickly back again. He wasn’t angry yet—he was still too shocked—but he was going to be very angry any second. Abernathy had disappeared just as surely as if he had never been—vanished, just like that. And, of course, Ben’s medallion, the medallion that protected the kingship and his life, the medallion Questor had assured him would be perfectly safe, had vanished as well.

He changed his mind. He wasn’t going to be angry after all. He was going to be sick.

“Questor, where is Abernathy?” he repeated.

“Well, I … the fact of the matter is, High Lord, I … I am not entirely certain,” the wizard managed finally.

Ben seized the front of the wizard’s robes. He was going to be angry after all. “Don’t tell me that! You’ve got to get him back, damnit!”

“High Lord.” Questor was pale, but composed. He didn’t try to draw away. He simply straightened himself and took a deep breath. “I am not sure yet exactly what happened. It will take a little time to understand …”

“Well, can’t you guess?” Ben shouted, cutting him short.

The owlish face twisted. “I can guess that the magic misfired, of course. I can guess that the sneeze—that wasn’t my fault, you know, High Lord, it simply happened—that the sneeze confused the magic in some fashion and changed the result of the incantation. Instead of transforming Abernathy from a dog back into a man, it seems to have transported him instead. The two words are quite similar, you see, and the magics likewise are similar. It happens that the results of most incantations are similar where the words are similar …”

“Skip all that!” Ben snapped. He started to say something further, then caught himself. He was losing control of the situation. He was behaving like some B-picture gangster. He released the front of the wizard’s robes, feeling a bit foolish. “Look, you think that the magic sent him somewhere, right? Where do you think it sent him? Just tell me that.”

Questor cleared his throat and thought a moment. “I don’t know,” he decided.

Ben stared at him, then turned away. “I don’t believe this is happening,” he muttered. “I just don’t believe it.”

He glanced momentarily at the others. Willow stood close, her green eyes solemn. The kobolds were picking up a planter that had been knocked over in the struggle. There were dirt and broken flowers scattered in a six-foot circle about them. The G’home Gnomes were whispering together anxiously.

“Perhaps we should …” Willow started to say.

And then there was a bright flash of light from the spot where Abernathy had disappeared, a popping sound as if someone had pulled a cork free, and something materialized from out of nowhere, spun wildly about, and came to rest on the floor.

It was a bottle.

Everyone jumped, then stared. The bottle lay there quietly, an oval-shaped container about the size of a magnum of champagne. It was corked and wired tightly shut and it was painted white with red harlequins dancing on its glass surface, all in varying poses of devilish gaiety, all grinning madly.

“What in the world is that?” Ben muttered and reached down to pick it up. He studied it wordlessly for a moment, hefting it, peering into it. “Doesn’t appear to be anything inside,” he said. “It feels empty.”

“High Lord, I have a thought!” Questor said suddenly. “This bottle and Abernathy may have been exchanged—transposed, one for the other! Transpose sounds like transform and transfer, and I think the magics are close enough that it is possible!”

Ben frowned. “Abernathy was exchanged for this bottle? Why?”

Questor started to reply and stopped. “I don’t know. But I am quite positive that is what happened.”

“Does this help determine where Abernathy is now?” Willow asked.

Questor shook his head. “But it gives me a starting point. If I can trace the source of the bottle, then perhaps …” He trailed off thoughtfully. “Odd. This bottle seems familiar.”

“You’ve seen it somewhere before?” Ben wanted to know immediately.

The wizard frowned. “I am not sure. It seems as if I might have and at the same time it seems I must be mistaken. I do not quite understand it.”

Along with just about everything else, Ben thought rather unkindly. “Well, I don’t give a hoot about this bottle,” he declared, “but I do care about Abernathy and the medallion. So let’s find a way to get them back. Whatever it takes, Questor, you do it and do it quickly. This mess is your responsibility.”

“I realize that, High Lord. You need not remind me. It was not my fault, however, that Abernathy tried to move out of the incantation’s sphere of influence, that the dust flew into my face when I tried to stop him, and that I thereupon sneezed. The magic would have worked as it was intended to work if I had not …”

Ben impatiently brushed the explanation away with a wave of his hand. “Just find him, Questor. Just find him.”

Questor Thews bowed curtly. “Yes, High Lord. I will begin at once!” He turned and started from the room, muttering, “He might still be in Landover; I will begin my search here. The Landsview should help. He should be safe for the moment in any event, I imagine—safe even if we do not reach him immediately. Oh! Not that there is any reason he shouldn’t be safe, High Lord,” he added, turning hastily back. “No, no, we have time.” He started away again. “The sneeze was not my fault, drat it! I had the magic perfectly under my control, and … oh, what is the point of belaboring the matter, I will simply start looking …”

He was almost through the door, when Ben called after him, “Don’t you want this bottle?”

“What?” Questor glanced back, then hastily shook his head. “Later, perhaps. I have no immediate need for it. Odd, how familiar … I wish my memory were a little bit better on these things. Ah, well, it cannot mean much if I cannot summon even a faint recollection …”

He disappeared from view, still muttering—the Don Quixote of Landover, searching for dragons and finding only windmills. Ben watched him go in frustrated silence.



It was difficult to think about anything beyond the lost medallion and the missing Abernathy, but there was nothing to be done about either until Questor reported back. So while Willow went into the gardens to pick fresh flowers for dinner and the kobolds went back to their work about the castle, Ben forced himself to resume consideration of the latest complaint of the G’home Gnomes.

Intriguingly enough, the gnomes were no longer so anxious to pursue the matter.

“Tell me whatever you have left to tell me about the trolls,” Ben ordered, resigned to the worst. He settled himself wearily in his chair and waited.

“Such a beautiful bottle, High Lord,” said Fillip instead.

“Such a pretty thing,” echoed Sot.

“Forget the bottle,” Ben advised, remembering for the first time since Questor had departed that it was still there, sitting where he had put it down on the floor next to him. He glanced at it in irritation. “I’d like to.”

“But we have never seen one like it,” persisted Fillip.

“Never,” agreed Sot.

“Can we touch it, High Lord?” asked Fillip.

“Yes, can we?” pleaded Sot.

Ben glared. “I thought we were here to discuss trolls. You seemed anxious enough to do so earlier. You practically cried to do so. Now you don’t care anymore?”

Fillip glanced hastily at Sot. “Oh, we care a great deal, High Lord. The trolls have mistreated us grievously.”

“Then let’s get on …”

“But the trolls are gone for now and cannot be found again immediately in any case, and the bottle is right here, right in front of us, so can we touch it for a moment, Great Lord—just for a moment?”

“Can we, Mighty High Lord?” echoed Sot.

Ben wanted to take the bottle and beat them over the head with it. But instead he simply picked it up and handed it over. It was easier than arguing. “Just be careful,” he cautioned.

There really wasn’t much to worry about on that count, he realized. The bottle was heavy glass and looked as if it could endure a good deal of mistreatment. Actually, it seemed almost something more than glass—almost a metal of some sort. Must be the paint, he thought.

The G’home Gnomes were fondling and caressing the bottle as if it were their most precious treasure. They stroked it and loved it. They cradled it like a child. Their grimy little paws moved across its surface almost sensuously. Ben was disgusted. He glanced out into the gardens at Willow and thought about joining her. Anything would be better than this.

“How about it, fellas,” he said finally. “Let’s finish up with the trolls, okay?”

Fillip and Sot stared at him. He beckoned for them to return the bottle, and they reluctantly handed it back. Ben set it down next to him again. The gnomes hesitated, then resumed their complaint against the trolls. But the effort was halfhearted at best. Their eyes kept straying back to the bottle, and finally they gave up on the trolls altogether.

“High Lord, could we have the bottle?” asked Fillip suddenly.

“Oh, yes, could we?” asked Sot.

Ben stared. “Whatever for?”

“It is a precious thing,” said Fillip.

“It is a treasure,” said Sot.

“So beautiful,” said Fillip.

“Yes, beautiful,” echoed Sot.

Ben closed his eyes and rubbed them wearily, then looked at the gnomes. “I would love to be able to give it to you, believe me,” he said. “I would love to say, ‘Here, take this bottle and don’t let me see it ever again.’ That’s what I would love to do. But I can’t. The bottle has some connection with what happened to Abernathy, and I have to know what.”

The G’home Gnomes shook their heads solemnly.

“The dog never liked us,” muttered Fillip.

“The dog never did,” muttered Sot.

“He growled at us.”

“And even snapped.”

“Nevertheless …” Ben insisted.

“We could keep the bottle for you, High Lord,” interrupted Fillip.

“We would take good care of it, High Lord,” assured Sot.

“Please, please,” they implored.

They were so pathetic that Ben could only shake his head in wonder. They were just like little children in a toy store. “What if there were an evil genie in the bottle?” he asked suddenly, leaning forward with a dark frown. “What if the genie ate gnomes for breakfast?” The gnomes looked at him blankly. Obviously they had never heard of such a thing. “Never mind,” he said. He sighed and sat back again. “You can’t have it, and that’s that.”

“But you said you would love to give it to us,” Fillip pointed out.

“That is what you said,” agreed Sot.

“And we would love to have it.”

“We would.”

“So why not give it to us, High Lord?”

“Yes, why not?”

“Just for a little while, even?”

“Just for a few days?”

Ben lost his temper once again. He snatched up the bottle and brandished it before him. “I wish I had never seen this bottle!” he yelled. “I hate the damn thing! I wish it would disappear! I wish Abernathy and the medallion would reappear! I wish wishes were candy and I could eat them all day long! But they aren’t, and I can’t, and neither can you! So let’s drop the whole subject of the bottle and get back to the trolls before I decide I don’t want to listen to you anymore on anything and send you on your way!”

He put the bottle down again with a thud and sat back. The gnomes glanced at each other meaningfully.

“He hates the bottle,” whispered Fillip.

“He wishes it would disappear,” whispered Sot.

“What did you say?” Ben asked. He couldn’t quite hear them.

“Nothing, Great High Lord,” answered Fillip.

“Nothing, Mighty High Lord,” answered Sot.

They went quickly back to their tale of woe about the trolls, a tale which they wrapped up rather quickly. While they were telling it, they never took their eyes off the bottle.



The remainder of the day slipped by rather more quickly than Ben had expected. The gnomes finished their tale and departed for their quarters. Guests were always invited to spend the night, and Fillip and Sot invariably accepted the invitation because they loved Parsnip’s cooking. That was all right with Ben so long as they stayed out of trouble. Before they were even through the garden room door, Ben was moving to join Willow. Belatedly, he remembered the bottle, still sitting next to his chair amid the flower boxes. He retraced his steps, picked it up, glanced around for a safe place to put it, and decided on a cabinet that displayed a series of ornate flower pots and vases. He slipped the bottle inside, where it blended quite nicely, and hurried out.

He walked the gardens with Willow for a time, reviewed his agenda for the following day—how in the world was he going to get along without Abernathy to remind him of his appointments and to keep his calendar?—stuck his head in the kitchen to see what Parsnip was preparing, and went for a run.

Running was the one exercise he still practiced faithfully. He kept what he could of his boxer’s routine—a holdover from his days as a silver gloves champion and after—but he lacked the sophisticated punching equipment that would let him train as he would in a Chicago gym, so he relied heavily on the running, together with rope work and isometrics. It was enough to keep him fit.

He dressed in his sweats and Nikes, crossed from the island to the mainland in the lake skimmer—his private skiff, a vessel that ran without any power but that of his own thought—climbed the hills beyond, and began to run along the rim of the valley. Fall was in the air, a brief hint of color already beginning to show in the green of the trees. Days were growing short, the nights cold. He ran for almost two hours, trying to work through the day’s frustrations and disappointments; when he was sufficiently tired, he crossed back again.

By now the sun was slipping quickly into the west, already partially masked by a screen of forest trees and distant peaks. He watched the dramatic outline of the castle loom up before him as he sat in the skimmer, thinking how much he loved it here. Sterling Silver was the home he had always searched for—even when he didn’t know he was searching for it. He remembered how forbidding she had seemed that first time, all worn and discolored from the Tarnish, the loss of magic in the land having sickened her. He remembered how huge and empty she had seemed. That was before he had discovered that she was alive and that she was as capable of feeling as he. He remembered the warmth he had felt in her that first night—a warmth that was real and not imagined. Sterling Silver was a singular bit of magic, a creation of stone and mortar and metal that was nevertheless as human as any creature of flesh and blood. She could extend warmth, she could provide food, she could shelter, she could comfort. She was a wondrous magic, and he never ceased to marvel that she could actually be.

He received word from Willow on his return that Questor had surfaced long enough to report that he had determined that Abernathy definitely wasn’t still in Landover. Ben accepted the news stoically. He hadn’t really expected things to be that easy.

Willow came to him and washed him in his bath. Her tiny hands were gentle and loving, and she kissed him often. Her long, green hair swept down about her face as she worked, and it made her seem veiled and mysterious.

“You must not be too angry with Questor,” she said finally as he was toweling himself dry. “He tried to do what he thought best for Abernathy. He wanted desperately to help.”

“I know that,” Ben said.

“He holds himself responsible for Abernathy’s condition, and such responsibility is a terrible burden.” She looked out the window of his bedchamber into the darkening night. “You should understand better than anyone what it can be like to feel responsible for another person.”

He did. He had carried the weight of that responsibility more times than he cared to remember. A few times he had carried it when it was not really his to carry. He thought of Annie, his wife, gone now almost four years. He thought of his old law partner and good friend, Miles Bennett. He thought of the people of Landover, of the black unicorn, of his new friends Willow, Abernathy, Bunion, Parsnip, and, of course, Questor.

“I just wish he could manage to control the magic a little better,” he said softly. Then he stopped in the middle of what he was doing and looked over at the sylph. “I’m scared to death of losing that medallion, Willow. I remember all too well what it was like when I thought I’d lost it last time. I feel so helpless without it.”

Willow came to him and held him. “You will never be helpless, Ben. Not you. And you will never be alone.”

He hugged her close and nodded into her hair. “I know. Not while you’re around. Anyway, I shouldn’t worry. Something will come up.”

Something did come up, but it wasn’t until dinner was nearly over that it did, and it wasn’t what either of them expected. Dinner was a sparsely attended affair. The G’home Gnomes did not show up—an astonishing occurrence—nor did Questor. Bunion dropped by briefly and was off again, and Parsnip stayed in the kitchen. So Ben and Willow sat alone at the great dining hall table, eating dutifully and listening to the silence.

They were just finishing when Questor Thews burst into the room, his owlish face so distraught that Ben was on his feet instantly.

“High Lord!” the wizard gasped. “Where is the bottle?”

“The bottle?” Ben had to think a moment. “In the garden room, in a display case. What’s wrong?”

Questor was trying so hard to catch his breath that Ben and Willow felt obliged to help him to a chair. Willow gave him a glass of wine, which he quickly drained. “I remember now where I saw the bottle, High Lord!” he said finally.

“Then you did see it before! Where?” Ben pressed.

“Here, High Lord! Right here!”

“But you didn’t remember that earlier when you saw it?”

“No, of course not! That was over twenty years ago!”

Ben shook his head. “You’re not making any sense, Questor.”

The wizard lurched to his feet. “I will explain it all to you as soon as we have that bottle safely in hand! I will not feel comfortable until we do! High Lord, that bottle is extremely dangerous!”

Bunion and Parsnip had appeared as well by now, and the bunch of them hastened down the castle halls toward the garden room. Ben tried to find out more as they went, but Questor refused to elaborate. They reached the garden room in moments and pushed through the closed doors in a knot. The room was dark, but a touch of Ben’s hands on the castle walls brought light.

He crossed the room to the display cabinet and peered through its glass doors.

The bottle was gone.

“What, what in … ?” He stared in disbelief at the empty space on which the bottle had rested. Then he knew. “Fillip and Sot!” He spit their names out like loose stones. “Those damn gnomes, they couldn’t leave well enough alone! They must have stayed behind at the door to see where I put it!”

The others pushed forward, racing past him to the cabinet.

“The G’home Gnomes took the bottle?” Questor asked incredulously.

“Bunion, go search for them,” Ben ordered, already fearing the worst. “If they’re still here, bring them—quick!”

The kobold was gone instantly and back again just as quickly. His monkey face grimaced and his teeth showed.

“Gone,” Ben cried in fury.

Questor looked faint. “High Lord, I am afraid that I have some very bad news for you.”

Ben sighed stoically. Somehow, he wasn’t surprised.

GRAUM WYTHE



Abernathy came awake with a start. He didn’t come awake in the ordinary sense because he had never really been asleep, just wishing he was, his eyes squinched closed, his breath held like a swimmer underwater. It seemed as if he came awake, however, because first the light was there, all around him, so intense he could feel its brightness even with his eyes closed, and then all of a sudden it was gone.

He blinked and looked around. A screen of shadows and half-light masked everything. He took a moment to let his vision clear fully. There were bars in front of his face. He blinked again. There were bars all around! Good heavens, he was in a cage!

He tried to scramble up from the sitting position in which he found himself and discovered that his cage would not permit it. His head was right up against the ceiling. He maneuvered one arm—he could barely move that either—to touch the ceiling experimentally, then the bars … Wait, what was this? He touched the bars again. They were set in glass of some sort—and weren’t really bars, but some sort of latticework, very ornate, very intricate. And the cage wasn’t square, it was hexagonal!

Who ever heard of a hexagonal cage?

He glanced down. A pair of delicate-looking vases were squashed between his legs and the glass, looking for all the world as if they would shatter with his next breath.

Nevertheless, he did breathe, mostly from astonishment. He wasn’t in a cage; he was in some sort of display case!

For a moment he was so bewildered that he was at a complete loss as to what to do next. He stared out beyond the case into the shadows and half-light. He was in a massive stone and timber hall filled with cabinets and shelving, cases and pedestals, all displaying various artifacts and art objects. The light was so poor that he could barely make any of it out. A scattering of windows that were small and set high on the walls allowed in what little light there was. Tapestries decorated the walls at various intervals, and a floor of stone flagging was covered with scattered squares of what appeared to be handwoven carpet.

Abernathy scowled. Where in the name of all that was good and decent in the world was he? That confounded Questor Thews! He might still be in Sterling Silver for all he knew, locked away in some half-forgotten room of old art, except … He let the thought trail away unfinished. Except that he wasn’t, he sensed. His scowl deepened. That muddleheaded wizard! What had he done?

A door opened at one end of the room and closed softly. Abernathy squinted through the gloom. Someone was there, but he couldn’t see who. He held his breath and listened. Whoever was there apparently didn’t know about him yet. Whoever was there was strolling idly about the room, moving very slowly, stopping from time to time, looking things over. A visitor, Abernathy decided, come to look at the art. The footsteps grew closer, off to his left now. His display case sat rather far out from the wall, and he could not see clearly behind him without turning his head and shoulders. If he did that he was afraid he might break something in the case. He sighed. Well, maybe he should. After all, he couldn’t just sit there indefinitely, could he?

The footsteps passed behind him, slowed, came around, and stopped. He looked down. A small girl was looking up. She was very young, he decided, no more than maybe twelve, with a tiny body, a round face and curly honey-blond hair cut short. Her eyes were blue and there was a scattering of freckles on her nose. She was apparently trying to decide what he was. He held his breath momentarily, hoping that she might lose interest and go away. She didn’t. He tried to stay perfectly still. Then he blinked in spite of his resolve, and she drew back in surprise.

“Oh, you’re alive!” she exclaimed. “You’re a real puppy!”

Abernathy sighed. This was turning out about the way he had expected it would—about the same as the rest of his day.

The little girl had come forward again, eyes wide. “You poor thing! Locked in that case like that, no food or water or anything! Poor puppy! Who did this to you?”

“An idiot who fancies himself a wizard,” Abernathy replied.

Now her eyes really opened wide. “You can talk!” she whispered in a voice of conspiratorial elation. “Puppy, you can talk!”

Abernathy frowned. “Would you mind not calling me ‘puppy’?”

“No! I mean, no, I wouldn’t mind.” She edged closer. “What’s your name, puppy? Uh, I’m sorry. What’s your name?”

“Abernathy.”

“Mine’s Elizabeth. Not Beth or Lizzy or Liz or Libby or Liza or Betty or anything else, just Elizabeth. I hate those cute abbreviations. Mothers and fathers just stick you with them without asking you what you think about it, and there they are, yours forever. They’re not real names, just half-names. Elizabeth is a real name. Elizabeth was my great-aunt’s name.” She paused. “How did you learn to talk?”

Abernathy frowned some more. “I learned as you did, I imagine. I went to school.”

“You did? They teach dogs how to talk where you’re from?”

Abernathy was finding it hard to stay patient. “Of course not. I wasn’t a dog, then. I was a man.”

Elizabeth was fascinated. “You were?” She hesitated, thinking. “Oh, I see—a wizard did this to you, didn’t he? Just like Beauty and the Beast. Do you know the story? There was this handsome prince and he was changed into an ugly beast by a wicked spell and couldn’t be changed back again until he was truly loved.” She stopped. “Is that what happened to you, Abernathy?”

“Well …”

“Was the wizard a wicked wizard?”

“Well …”

“Why did he change you into a dog? What kind of dog are you, Abernathy?”

Abernathy licked his nose. He was thirsty. “Do you suppose you could open the door to this display case and let me out?” he asked.

Elizabeth hurried forward, curls bouncing. “Oh, sure.” She stopped. “It’s locked, Abernathy. These cases are always locked. Michel keeps them that way to protect his things. He’s very mistrustful.” She paused. “Oh, oh. What’s happened to the bottle that was in there? There was a white bottle painted with dancing clowns and now it’s gone! What’s happened to it? Are you sitting on it, Abernathy? Michel will be furious! Is it under you somewhere, maybe?”

Abernathy rolled his eyes. “I have no idea, Elizabeth. I cannot see anything under me because I cannot move out of the way to look. I will probably never see anything under me again if I do not get out of here!”

“I told you, the door’s locked,” Elizabeth repeated solemnly. “But maybe I can get a key. My father is steward of Graum Wythe. He has keys to everything. He’s gone right now, but let me check his room. I’ll be right back!” She started away. “Don’t worry, Abernathy. Just wait here!”

Then she was gone, out the door like a cat. Abernathy sat quietly in the silence and thought. What bottle was she talking about, who is Michel, where is Graum Wythe? He had known a Michel once. And a Graum Wythe. But that was years ago, and that Michel and that Graum Wythe were best forgotten …

He felt a sudden chill steal up his spine as the almost forgotten memories took shape once more. No, it couldn’t be, he told himself. It was just a coincidence. Probably he heard wrong. Probably Elizabeth said something else and he misunderstood.

The minutes slipped away, and finally she was back. She appeared noiselessly through the door, crossed to the display case, inserted a long iron key into the lock, and twisted. The glass and iron-mesh door opened, and Abernathy was free. Gingerly, he extricated himself.

“Thank you, Elizabeth,” he said.

“You’re welcome, Abernathy,” she replied. She straightened the upended vases, searched about in vain for the missing bottle, and finally gave up. She closed the display case door and locked it once more. “The bottle isn’t there,” she announced solemnly.

Abernathy straightened himself and brushed off his clothing. “I give you my word, I know nothing of its whereabouts,” he advised her.

“Oh, I believe you,” she assured him. “But Michel might not. He isn’t very understanding about such things. He doesn’t even allow people in this room normally unless he invites them in—and then he stays right there with them. I can get in alone only because my father is steward. I like to come here to look at all the neat things. Do you know that there’s a picture on the far wall with people in it that really move? And a music box that will play whatever you ask it to? I don’t know what was in the bottle, but it was something special. Michel never let anyone near it.”

A picture with people that moved and a music box that played requests? Magic, Abernathy thought instantly. “Elizabeth,” he interrupted, “where am I?”

Elizabeth looked at him curiously. “In Graum Wythe, of course. Didn’t I tell you that before?”

“Yes, but … where is Graum Wythe?”

The blue eyes blinked. “In Woodinville.”

“And where is Woodinville?”

“North of Seattle. In Washington State. In the United States of America.” Elizabeth watched the confusion on Abernathy’s face grow. “Doesn’t any of this mean anything to you, Abernathy? Don’t you know any of these places?”

Abernathy shook his head. “These are not places in my world, I am afraid. I do not know where …” Then suddenly he stopped. There was alarm in his voice. “Elizabeth,” he said slowly, “have you ever heard of a place called Chicago?”

Elizabeth smiled. “Sure. Chicago is in Illinois. But that’s a long way from here. Are you from Chicago, Abernathy?”

Abernathy was beside himself. “No, but the High Lord is—or was! This is a nightmare! I’m not in Landover anymore! I have been sent to the High Lord’s world! That fool wizard!” He stopped in horror. “Oh, good heavens—and I have the medallion! The High Lord’s medallion!”

He fumbled desperately at the chain and medal that hung about his neck while Elizabeth cried, “Abernathy, it’s all right, it’s okay, don’t be frightened, please! I’ll take care of you, really I will, I’ll look out for you.” And all the while she petted him soothingly.

“Elizabeth, you do not understand! The medallion is the High Lord’s talisman! It cannot protect him while I have it in this world! He needs it to be with him in Landover! This is no longer his worl … !” Again, he stopped. There was new horror in his eyes. “Oh, for … His world! This is his world, his old world! Elizabeth! You say this place is called Graum Wythe—and that its master is called Michel. What is his full name, Elizabeth? Quickly, tell me!”

“Abernathy, calm down!” Elizabeth kept trying to pet him. “His name is Michel Ard Rhi.”

Abernathy looked as if he were about to have a heart attack. “Michel Ard Rhi!” He breathed the name as if to speak it too loudly would bring on the pending heart attack for sure. He took a deep, calming breath. “Elizabeth, you must hide me!”

“But what’s wrong, Abernathy?”

“It is quite simple, Elizabeth. Michel Ard Rhi is my worst enemy.”

“But why? What happened to make you enemies?” Elizabeth was full of questions, her blue eyes dancing. “Is he a friend of the wizard who changed you into a dog, Abernathy? Is he a bad …”

“Elizabeth!” Abernathy tried to keep the desperation from his voice. “I will tell you everything, I promise—after you hide me! I cannot be found here—not with the medallion, not with …”

“Okay, okay,” the little girl assured him quickly. “I said I would take care of you, and I will. I always keep my promises.” She thought. “You can hide in my room. You won’t be found there for a while. No one comes there much except for my dad, and he won’t be back for a few days.” She paused. “But we have to find a way to get you there first. That might not be easy, you know, because there’s always someone wandering about the halls. Let me see …”

She studied him critically for a moment, Abernathy wishing he could make himself invisible or something, and then she clapped her hands excitedly.

“I know!” She grinned. “We’ll play dress-up!”



It was the low point of Abernathy’s life, but he did it because Elizabeth assured him it was necessary. He trusted Elizabeth instinctively, the way you will a child, and did not question that she truly intended to help him. He was frantic to get out of the open and into hiding. The worst thing in any world that could happen to him was to be found again by Michel Ard Rhi.

So he let Elizabeth tie a makeshift collar and leash about his neck, he dropped down on all fours still wearing his silks with their silver clasps, and he walked out of that room like a real dog. It was uncomfortable, disgraceful, and humiliating. He felt like a complete fool, but he did it anyway. He even agreed to sniff at things as he walked and wag his stubby tail.

“Whatever you do, don’t talk,” Elizabeth cautioned as they stepped through the door into a hallway beyond. The hallway was as shadowed and closed away as the room filled with art, and Abernathy could feel the cold of the stone on his feet and hands. “If anyone sees us, I’ll just tell them you’re my dog and we’re playing dress-up. I don’t think they will question it much when they see those clothes you’re wearing.”

Charming, thought Abernathy, irritated. And exactly what is wrong with my clothes? But he didn’t say anything.

They passed down a long series of corridors, all rather poorly lit by a combination of tiny windows and lamps, all constructed of stone and timber. Abernathy had seen enough of Graum Wythe by now to know that it was a castle much like Sterling Silver. That suggested that perhaps Michel Ard Rhi was living out his boyhood fantasies, and that in turn made the scribe curious to know more. But he didn’t want to think about Michel just now; he was almost afraid that thinking of him might somehow make the man appear, so he forced the matter from his mind.

Elizabeth had brought him quite some distance through Graum Wythe’s halls without encountering anyone when they rounded a corner and found themselves face to face with a pair of men in black uniforms. Elizabeth stopped. Abernathy immediately edged back behind her legs, finding them entirely too skinny to hide behind. He sniffed the floor dutifully and tried to look like a real dog.

“Afternoon, Elizabeth,” the men greeted.

“Good afternoon,” Elizabeth replied.

“That your dog?” one asked. She nodded. “All dressed up, eh? Bet he doesn’t like it much.”

“Bet he hates it,” the other agreed.

“What’s he got on his nose, glasses? Where’d you find those, Elizabeth?”

“Pretty fancy stuff for a dog,” the other observed. He started to reach down, and Abernathy growled, almost before he realized what he was doing. The man pulled his hand back quickly. “Not very friendly, is he?”

“He’s just frightened,” Elizabeth offered. “He doesn’t know you yet.”

“Yeah, guess I can understand that.” The man started on his way again. “Let’s go, Bert.”

The other hesitated. “Does your father know about this dog, Elizabeth?” he asked. “I thought he told you no pets.”

“Oh. Well, he changed his mind,” Elizabeth said. Abernathy slipped out from behind her, pulling on the leash. “I have to go now. ’Bye.”

“’Bye, Elizabeth,” the man said. He started away, then turned back. “Hey, what kind of dog is that anyway?”

“I don’t know,” Elizabeth called. “Just a mutt.”

It was all Abernathy could do to keep from biting her.



I am not a mutt,” he told her when it was safe to talk again. “I happen to be a soft-coated Wheaten Terrier. My bloodlines are probably better than your own.”

Elizabeth blushed. “Sorry, Abernathy,” she said softly, eyes downcast.

“Oh, well, that’s all right,” he soothed, trying to make up for his gruffness. “I simply wanted you to know that I possess pedigree despite my condition.”

They sat in her room on the edge of her bed, safe for the moment. Her room was bright and sunny in contrast to what they had seen of the rest of the castle, the walls paneled and papered, the floor carpeted, and the furniture soft and feminine with stuffed animals and dolls scattered about. Books lined a case on one wall beside a small writing desk, and pictures of teddy bears and puffins were hung casually about. A poster of something or someone called Bon Jovi was taped to the back of the closed door.

“Tell me about you and Michel,” Elizabeth asked, eyes lifting once more.

Abernathy sat back stiffly. “Michel Ard Rhi is part of the reason that I am a dog,” he said. He thought for a moment. “Elizabeth, I honestly don’t know if I should tell you this or not.”

“Why, Abernathy?”

“Well … because much of it is going to be very hard for you to believe.”

Elizabeth nodded. “Like what you told me about the wizard changing you from a man into a dog? Like you being from another world?” She shook her head and looked very solemn. “I can believe things like that, Abernathy. I can believe there are things most people don’t know anything about. Like magic. Like make-believe places that really aren’t make-believe. My dad tells me all the time that there are all kinds of things people don’t believe just because they don’t understand them.” She paused. “I don’t tell anyone this—except for my best friend Nita—but I think that there are other people living out there somewhere on other worlds. I do.”

Abernathy regarded her with new respect. “You happen to be right,” he said finally. “This is not my world, Elizabeth. It is not Michel Ard Rhi’s world either. We are both from a world called Landover, a kingdom really, not very big, but very far away. It is a crossroads for many worlds besides yours, all leading into the mists where the fairy people live. The mists are the source of all magic. The fairies live entirely in the magic; other worlds and people do not—at least, not for the most part.”

He stopped, trying to think how to proceed. Elizabeth was staring at him with amazement, though not disbelief. He reached up and shoved his glasses further back on his nose.

“What happened to me happened more than twenty years ago. Michel’s father was King of Landover then. He was in the final year of his life. I was his Court Scribe. Michel was about your age—but other than that, he was nothing like you, of course.”

“Was he bad?” Elizabeth wanted to know.

“He was.”

“He’s not very nice now, either.”

“Well, then, he has not changed much from when he was your age.” Abernathy sighed. The memories came flooding back, painful images that lingered and refused to go. “I played with Michel while he was growing up. His father asked me to and so I did. He was not a very pleasant child, especially after Meeks took him under his wing. Meeks was the old Court Wizard, a very bad man. He made friends with Michel and taught him bits of magic. Michel liked that. He was always pretending he could do anything he wanted to do. When I played with him, he always pretended he had a castle called Graum Wythe, a fortress stronghold that could stand against a hundred hostile armies and a dozen wizards. He liked the idea of having so much power at his command.”

Abernathy shook his head. “He played at this and he played at that, and I went along with it. It was not my place to question what was happening to the boy—or what I thought was happening. The old King did not seem to see it as clearly as I did …” He shrugged. “Michel was quite a little monster, I’m afraid.”

“Was he mean to you?” Elizabeth asked.

“He was, but he was much meaner to others. I had some protection because I was Court Scribe. Others were not so fortunate. And Michel was really cruel toward animals. He seemed to take great delight in tormenting them. Particularly cats. He really hated cats for some reason. He was always finding strays and throwing them off the castle walls …”

“That’s horrible!” Elizabeth exclaimed.

Abernathy nodded. “I told him so. Then one day I caught him doing something so unspeakable that even now I cannot bear to talk about it. In any case, that was the end of my patience. I picked up that boy, turned him over my knee, and beat him with a switch until he howled! I did not think about what I was doing, I just did it. When I was finished, he ran screaming from the room, furious at me for what I had done to him.”

“Well, he deserved it,” Elizabeth announced, certain of it even without knowing what it was he had done.

“Nevertheless, it was a terrible mistake on my part,” Abernathy continued. “I should have left well enough alone and simply advised the King on his return. The King was gone, you see, and Michel had been left to the care of Meeks. He went immediately to Meeks, therefore, and demanded that I be punished. He wanted my hand cut off. Meeks, I learned later, laughed and agreed. Meeks never cared much for me, you see. He felt I influenced the old King against him. So Michel summoned his guards and they came looking for me. There was no one to protect me. Meeks was acting regent in the King’s absence. I would most certainly have had my hand removed had they found me.”

“But they didn’t.” Elizabeth was anxious to help the story along.

“No. Questor Thews found me first. Questor was Meeks’s half-brother, a wizard as well, albeit a lesser talent. He was visiting for the week, hoping the old King would find him a position somewhere or other. We were friends, Questor and I. He did not care much for his half-brother or Michel either, and when he heard what was happening he came to warn me. There was no time for me to escape from the castle and no place to hide within it. Michel knew them all. So I allowed Questor Thews to change me into a dog so I would not be harmed. I wasn’t, fortunately, but afterward Questor was unable to change me back again.”

“So it wasn’t a bad wizard who changed you after all,” Elizabeth said.

Abernathy shook his head. “No, Elizabeth—just a poor excuse for one.”

Elizabeth nodded solemnly, her freckled face lined with thought. “And you’ve been a dog all these years? Sorry. A … a soft-coated Wheat Terrier?”

“Soft-coated Wheaten Terrier. Yes. Except for my fingers and my voice and my thinking, which are still the same as they were when I was a man.”

Elizabeth smiled a sort of sad child’s smile. “I wish I could help you, Abernathy. Help change you back, I mean.”

Abernathy sighed. “Someone tried that already. That’s how I ended up here, scrunched up in that display case. Questor Thews again, I’m afraid. He is not any more adept at his art now than he was thirty years ago. He thought he had finally found a way to change me back. Unfortunately, the magic failed him once again, and here I am, trapped in the castle home of my worst enemy.”

They were silent for a moment, staring at each other. Afternoon sunshine spilled through the curtained windows and warmed the room. The speckled blue and violet wildflowers in the vase on the dresser smelled of meadows and hills. From somewhere distant, there came the faint sound of laughter and a scraping of boxes or crates. Abernathy was reminded of home.

Elizabeth was speaking. “My father once told me that Michel could be very mean to animals,” she was saying. “He said that was why I couldn’t have a pet—because something might happen to it. No one at Graum Wythe has a pet. You never see any animals here.”

“I don’t wonder,” Abernathy replied wearily.

She looked at him. “Michel mustn’t be allowed to find you.”

“No, he certainly mustn’t.”

“But the watch will say something about my having a dog, I’ll bet.” She frowned at the thought. “The watch tells him everything. They keep this place guarded just like a prison. Even my father can’t go everywhere—and he is chief steward of Graum Wythe. Michel relies on him completely. He runs everything—well, almost everything. He doesn’t run the watch. They report directly to Michel.”

Abernathy nodded, saying nothing, thinking suddenly of the medallion concealed beneath his tunic, imagining what would happen if he were caught wearing it.

Elizabeth sighed. “I don’t like Michel very much—even though he’s really never done anything to me. He just isn’t very friendly. He always looks so … creepy.”

Abernathy didn’t know what “creepy” meant, but he was sure it was something Michel Ard Rhi could be. “I have to get away from here, Elizabeth. You have to help me.”

“But, Abernathy, where will you go?” she asked immediately.

“It really doesn’t matter so long as it is far away from here,” he advised. He paused, frowning. “I still cannot understand why I am here rather than somewhere else. Here, of all places. How could that happen?” He shook his head.

“I think I should go with you,” Elizabeth said suddenly.

“No! No, you cannot do that!” Abernathy replied at once. “No, no, Elizabeth, I have to go alone.”

“But you don’t even know where you’re going!”

“I can find my way, believe me. There is a way back into Landover if you wear the medallion. The High Lord told me something of it once—a place called Virginia. I can find it.”

“Virginia is at the other end of the country!” Elizabeth exclaimed, horrified. “How will you get there?”

Abernathy stared at her. He had no idea, of course. “There are ways,” he said finally. “But I have to get out of here first. Will you help me?”

Elizabeth sighed. “Of course, I’ll help you.” She stood up, walked over to the window, and looked out. “I have to think of a way to sneak you through one of the gates. They check everyone going out.” She thought. “It’s too late today to do anything. Maybe tomorrow. I have to go to school, but I get home by four. Or maybe I’ll pretend to be sick and stay home. I can’t hide you here for very long.” She looked over. “I still think I should go with you.”

Abernathy nodded. “I know. But you can’t, Elizabeth. You are too young. It would be too dangerous.”

Elizabeth frowned, then turned back to the window. “My dad says that sometimes when I ask to do things.”

“I suppose he does.”

Elizabeth turned back again and looked over with a smile. He saw himself fleetingly in the mirror behind her, saw himself as she saw him, a dog in red and gold silk clothing sitting on her bed, glasses on his furry nose, soulful brown eyes looking back at her. He suddenly thought how ridiculous he must seem to her. He looked away, embarrassed.

But she surprised him. “Are we going to stay good friends, Abernathy,” she asked, “even after you’re gone?”

He would have smiled if it were possible for dogs to do so. “Yes, Elizabeth, we are.”

“Good. I’m really glad that I’m the one who found you, you know.”

“I am, too.”

“I still wish you would let me come with you.”

“I know.”

“Why don’t you think about it.”

“I will.”

“Do you promise?”

Abernathy sighed. “Elizabeth?”

“Yes?”

“I could think much better if I had something to eat. And maybe something to drink?”

She bounced out of the room. Abernathy watched her go. He liked Elizabeth. He had to admit that he didn’t mind so much being a dog around her after all.

DARKLING



“There is something that lives in the bottle,” Questor Thews said.

He sat with Ben, Willow, and the kobolds in the garden room. Night’s shadows cloaked everything in shawls of gray and black, save only where a single dimmed light from a smokeless lamp lent muted shades of color to a small circle of space where four listeners sat hunched over in silence, waiting for the wizard to continue. Questor’s owlish face was gaunt and craggy with worry, his brow furrowed more deeply than usual, his eyes bits of silver glitter. His hands were folded in his lap, gnarled sticks of deadwood that had become inextricably locked together.

“The thing is called a Darkling. It is a kind of demon.”

Like the bottle imp, Ben thought suddenly, remembering the old Robert Louis Stevenson story. Then he remembered what the creature of that story had done to its owners and he experienced a sudden twinge of uneasiness.

“The Darkling is very like the genie of the lamp in the old tales,” Questor continued. Ben felt the uneasiness begin to subside. “It serves the holder of its bottle, appearing when summoned, doing its master’s bidding. It uses various forms of magic to accomplish this.” He sighed. “Unfortunately, the magic it uses is all bad.”

“How bad?” Ben asked quietly. The uneasiness was back.

“That depends, High Lord.” Questor cleared his throat and rocked back in thought. “You have to understand the nature of the magic the Darkling employs. It isn’t a magic that is self-contained; it is a magic that is derivatory.”

“Which means what?”

“Which means that the Darkling draws its strength from the holder of the bottle. Its magic is fed by the strength of character of the one who calls upon it—not by what is good and kind in that character, but by what is bad and hurtful. Anger, selfishness, greed, envy, other emotions that you can name as well as I, destructive emotions that lurk within all of us to some degree—the Darkling draws the power for its magic from these.”

“It feeds on human failing,” Willow observed softly. “I have heard of such creatures, long ago banished from the mists.”

“Well, that is not yet the worst of it,” Questor went on wearily. His mouth had twisted into a scowl that threatened to pull his nose down into his beard. “I mentioned before that the bottle seemed somehow familiar to me. It is—or was—a very long time ago. It has been more than twenty years since I last saw it. It was only just this evening that I was able to remember where.” He cleared his throat nervously. “I last saw it in the hands of my half-brother. The bottle belonged to him.”

“Oh, oh,” Ben groaned.

“But how did it get here?” Willow asked.

The wizard sighed his deepest sigh yet. “To explain that, I have to go back in time.”

“Not too far back, I hope?” Ben pleaded.

“High Lord, I will go no further back than is necessary for the purpose of completing my explanation.” Questor was slightly indignant. “You must appreciate the fact that the amount of time either of us might believe necessary is somewhat subjective when one …”

“Just do it, Questor—please!” Ben urged helplessly.

Questor hesitated, shrugged, nodded, then rocked back once more. He was seated on a bench that offered no back support at all and appeared at every rock to be in danger of going over altogether. He tugged up his legs beneath his robe as a child would, drawing them close to his chest, and his owlish face assumed a faraway look. His brows knitted, and his lips tightened. He appeared to Ben to be a man who had eaten something disagreeable.

Finally, he was ready. “You will remember that my half-brother was Court Wizard to the old King,” he began. They all nodded, the kobolds included. “I was without position at the Court, but I would visit from time to time anyway. The old King often gave me small tasks that took me to other parts of the kingdom—tasks that were of no particular interest to my half-brother. My half-brother had been named tutor to the old King’s young son shortly after the boy’s eighth year, and the whole of my half-brother’s time thereafter was occupied with teaching that boy. Unfortunately, he was teaching the boy all the wrong things. He saw that the old King was weakening, aging more quickly, sick from ailments which could not be cured. He knew that the boy would be King after his father was gone, and he wanted control of the boy. Michel was his name. Michel Ard Rhi.”

He cocked his head. “Michel had never demonstrated much character, even before he began spending all his study time with Meeks. But after my half-brother got his hands on him, he became a thoroughly despicable lad in no time at all. He was cruel and mean-spirited. He took great delight in tormenting everyone and everything. He was obsessed with the magic Meeks employed and he begged after it as would a hungry man for food. Meeks used the magic to win the boy over and then finally to subvert him altogether.”

“Delightful,” Ben observed. “So what has this got to do with the bottle, Questor?”

“Well.” Questor had assumed his best professorial look. “One of the toys that Meeks gave to Michel to use was the bottle. Michel was allowed to summon the Darkling and order him about. The demon was extremely dangerous, you understand, but not if one appreciated his uses. My half-brother understood enough to keep the creature under control, and Michel’s play presented no real threat to him. Michel used the Darkling in quite frightful ways—often in terrible games with animals. It was during one of these uses that Abernathy lost patience with the boy and thrashed him, and I was then forced to change my good friend from a man to a dog in order that he not be harmed.

“It was shortly after that the old King saw what was happening to the boy and ordered all tutoring to stop. Meeks was forbidden to engage in magic thereafter when the boy was about. All the boy’s magic things were ordered destroyed—the bottle, in particular.”

“But that didn’t happen, obviously,” Ben interjected.

Questor shook his head. “The old King was weak, but he was still protected by the Paladin. Meeks was not about to challenge him. My half-brother was content to wait for the old man to die. He was already planning his future with the boy, already planning to abandon Landover for other worlds. Time would eventually give him everything, he believed. On the other hand, he was not about to give up the bottle—certainly not about to let it be destroyed. But he couldn’t simply hide it; the old King might learn of his deception. And even if he did, he couldn’t convey the magic out of Landover when he left, in any case; the natural law of things would not permit it. What was he to do, then?”

Questor paused as if expecting an answer. When he failed to get one, he bent forward conspiratorially and whispered, “What he did was to order the Darkling to convey himself and his bottle out of Landover to a place where both would remain hidden until my half-brother came for them once more. Very ingenious.”

Ben frowned impatiently. “Questor, what does all this have to do with the price of apples and oranges?” Questor looked befuddled. “What about the bottle?” Ben snapped.

Questor grimaced and held up his hands imploringly. “My half-brother promised it to the boy. That bottle was the boy’s favorite possession. My half-brother assured Michel that his bottle would not be destroyed. He said they would recover it later, after the death of the old King, after they had taken up residence in another land and begun selling kingships to Landover. It was to be their secret.” He shrugged. “I would have informed the old King, of course, had I known. But I did not learn of all this until later when the old King was gone. That was when Meeks first chose to tell me about it.”

“He told you about it?” Ben was appalled.

Questor looked mortified. “Yes, High Lord. There was no reason not to. There was nothing I could do about the matter. My half-brother was quite proud of himself, and his pride insisted that he share his satisfaction in his accomplishments with someone. I was always his first choice when it came time to bestow such honors.”

Ben was thinking. Questor glanced at him nervously. “I regret that it took me until now to remember all this, High Lord. I realize I should have remembered sooner. But it has been over twenty years, and the bottle simply didn’t recall itself to my memory until …”

“Wait a minute!” Ben cut him short. “What about the bottle? What happened to it?”

“What happened to it?” Questor repeated.

“Yes. That was the question. What happened to it?”

Questor looked as if he wanted to disappear into himself. “My half-brother retrieved it and gave it back to Michel.”

“Gave it back …” Ben stopped, horrified.

“Well, there was no reason not to give it back, you see,” Questor tried to explain. “My half-brother had made the boy a promise, you remember. There was little danger in keeping it. They were in a new world, and the magic of the bottle was considerably diminished by the fact that not much of anyone in that world believed in or practiced magic. It was relatively harmless there, and …”

“Wait a minute!” Ben interrupted. “We’re talking about my world!”

“Your old world, yes …”

“My world! The bottle was in my world! You said … ! That means … !” Ben was beside himself. He took a quick breath. “Your errant magic worked an exchange, didn’t it? That was what you said, wasn’t it? And if the magic brought the bottle here, it must have sent Abernathy there! What in the hell have you done, Questor? You’ve sent Abernathy to my world! Worse, you’ve sent him to this nut Michel, haven’t you?”

Questor nodded dismally.

“Along with my medallion, damnit, so that now I can’t even get back into my world to help him!”

Questor cringed. “Yes, High Lord.”

Ben sat back without a word, glanced at Willow, then glanced at the kobolds. No one said anything. The room was still, the sounds of the night distant whispers. Ben wondered why these things always seemed to happen to him.

“We have to get the bottle back,” he said finally. He looked at Questor. “And when we do, you had better find a way to exchange it back again for Abernathy!”

The wizard’s face screwed into a knot. “I will do my best, High Lord.”

Ben shook his head hopelessly. “Whatever.” He stood up. “Well, we can’t do much until sunrise. It’s too dark out there to try to track down those confounded gnomes now. Even Bunion would have trouble. Hardly any light at all—clouded over, no moon. Damn the luck!” He strode to the windows and back again. “At least Fillip and Sot don’t know what they’ve taken. They think of the bottle as a pretty possession. Maybe they won’t open it before we find them. Maybe they’ll just sit there and look at it.”

“Perhaps.” Questor looked doubtful.

“But perhaps not?” Ben finished.

“There is a problem.”

“Another problem, Questor?”

“Yes, High Lord, I am afraid so.” The wizard swallowed. “The Darkling is a very unpredictable creature.”

“Meaning?”

“Sometimes it comes out of the bottle on its own.”



Not a dozen miles from where Ben Holiday was staring in horror at Questor Thews, Fillip and Sot lay huddled together in the concealing blackness of the night. They had scooped out an abandoned badger den and backed their way in, two chubby, furry bodies disappearing inch by inch into the earth until nothing remained but pointed snouts and glittering eyes. They crouched within their makeshift warren, listening to the sounds that rose about them, as still as the leaves hanging limp from the surrounding trees in the windless, peaceful air.

“Shall we take it out one more time?” asked Sot finally.

“I think we should keep it hidden,” replied Fillip.

“But we need only take it out for a moment,” argued Sot.

“That might be one moment too long,” insisted Fillip.

“But there is no light,” persisted Sot.

“Some need no light,” declared Fillip.

Then they were quiet again, eyes blinking, noses sniffing. Somewhere distant, a bird cried out sharply.

“Do you think the High Lord will miss it?” asked Sot.

“He said he wished he had never seen it,” answered Fillip. “He said he wished it would disappear.”

“But he still might miss it,” said Sot.

“He has many other bottles and vases and pretty things,” said Fillip.

“I think we should take it out one more time.”

“I think we should leave it where it is.”

“Just to look at the dancing clowns.”

“Just to give someone else a chance to steal it.”

Sot hunched down irritably, squirming in a way that would leave no doubt in his brother’s mind as to how he felt about the matter. Fillip ignored him. Sot squirmed some more, then sighed and stared out again into the night. He was thinking of the tasty meal and the warm bed he had left behind at the castle.

“We should have stayed with the High Lord until morning,” he said.

“It was necessary that we leave at once with the bottle,” replied Fillip, a tad weary now of the other’s talk. His nose wrinkled. “The High Lord was disturbed by the presence of the bottle. It gave him great pain even to look upon it. It reminded him of the dog. The dog was his friend—although I admit I will never understand how anyone can be friends with a dog. Dogs are good to eat, but have no other purpose.”

“We should have told him we were taking the bottle,” argued Sot.

“That would only have caused him more pain,” rebutted Fillip.

“He will be angry with us.”

“He will be pleased.”

“I think we should look at the bottle again.”

“Will you stop … ?”

“Just to be certain that it is still all right.”

“… asking that same … ?”

“Just to be sure.”

Fillip sighed a deep, wheezy sigh that sent dust flying from their burrow entrance. Sot sneezed. Fillip glanced at him and blinked. Sot blinked back.

“Perhaps just for a very, very brief moment,” said Fillip finally.

“Yes, just for a moment,” agreed Sot.

Their wrinkled, grimy fingers pawed at the cluster of sticks and leaves that concealed a narrow hole they had dug in the earth directly before them. When the clutter was pushed aside, they reached in together and gingerly extracted a cloth-bound bundle. Holding it close, they loosened the wrappings and pulled out the bottle.

Carefully, they set it on the ground in front of their noses, its painted white surface gleaming faintly, its red harlequins at their dance. Two pairs of gnome eyes glittered with excitement.

“Such a pretty thing,” whispered Fillip.

“Such a beautiful treasure,” echoed Sot.

They stared at it some more. The allotted moment stretched into several and then into many. Still they stared, transfixed.

“I wonder if there is anything inside,” mused Fillip.

“I wonder,” mused Sot.

Fillip reached out and shook the bottle gently. The harlequins seemed to dance faster. “It seems empty,” he said.

Sot shook it as well. “It does,” he agreed.

“But it is difficult to tell without looking,” said Fillip.

“Yes, difficult,” said Sot.

“We might be mistaken,” said Fillip.

“We might,” said Sot.

They sniffed it and pawed it and studied it in silence for long moments, turning it this way and that, moving it about, trying to learn something more of its contents. Finally Sot began poking at the stopper. Fillip moved the bottle quickly away.

“We agreed to open it later,” he pointed out.

“Later is too long,” countered Sot.

“We agreed to open it when we were safely home.”

“Home is too far away. Besides, we are quite safe right here.”

“We agreed.”

“We could re-agree.”

Fillip felt his resolve begin to slip. He was as anxious as Sot to discover what, if anything, was concealed within their precious bottle. They could open it—just for a moment—then close it again. They could look down its neck, take just a quick peek …

But what if whatever was within the bottle spilled out in the dark and was lost?

“No,” said Fillip firmly. “We agreed. We will open the bottle when we are home again and not before.”

Sot glowered at him, then sighed his defeat. “When we are home and not before,” he echoed with measurable dejection.

They lay without talking for a time, staring at the bottle. They blinked their eyes weakly, trying to keep it in focus, their sight so poor that they could barely do so. G’home Gnomes relied almost entirely on their other senses to tell them what was happening about them. Their eyes were practically useless.

The bottle sat there, a vaguely luminescent oval against the dark. When the stopper wiggled experimentally in its seating, they missed it completely.

“I suppose we should put it away,” said Fillip finally.

“I suppose,” sighed Sot.

They reached for the bottle.

“Hsssstt!”

Fillip looked at Sot. Sot looked at Fillip. Neither had spoken.

“Hsssstt!”

It was the bottle. The hissing sound was coming from the bottle.

“Hsssstt! Set me free, masters!”

Fillip and Sot froze, ferretlike faces twisted into masks of terror. The bottle was talking!

“Masters, open the bottle! Let me come out!”

Fillip and Sot jerked their extended hands back as one and scrunched down into their burrow until nothing showed but the tips of their noses. Had they been able to get further down into the earth, they would have done so gladly.

The voice from the bottle began to whine. “Please, please, masters, let me out? I won’t hurt you. I am your friend. I can show you things, masters. Set me free. I can show you wonderful things.”

“What sort of wonderful things?” ventured Fillip from his refuge, a disembodied voice in the black. Sot didn’t say a word.

“Things of bright magic!” the bottle said. There was a long moment of silence. “I won’t hurt you,” the bottle repeated.

“What are you?” asked Fillip.

“Why can you talk?” asked Sot.

“Bottles don’t talk.”

“Bottles never talk.”

The bottle said, “It isn’t the bottle speaking to you, masters. It is I!”

“Who’s I?” asked Fillip.

“Yes, who?” echoed Sot.

There was a moment’s hesitation from the bottle. “I don’t have a name,” was the answer.

Fillip inched out of the burrow. “Everyone has a name,” he said.

Sot inched out with him. “Yes, everyone,” he agreed.

“Not I,” the bottle said mournfully. Then it became brighter. “But perhaps you can give me a name. Yes, a name you find fitting for me. Why don’t you let me out so you can name me?”

Fillip and Sot hesitated, but their fear was already giving way to curiosity. Their marvelous treasure was not just a pretty thing; it was a talking thing as well!

“If we let you out, will you be good?” asked Fillip.

“Will you promise not to hurt us?” asked Sot.

“Hurt you? Oh, no!” The bottle was shocked. “You are the masters! I must never hurt the masters of the bottle. I must do as they bid me. I must do as I am told.”

Fillip and Sot hesitated further. Then Fillip reached out his hand tentatively and touched the bottle. It felt warm. Sot did the same. They looked at each other and blinked.

“I can show you wonderful things,” the bottle promised. “I can show you things of bright magic!”

Fillip looked at Sot. “Should we open the bottle?” he asked in a whisper.

Sot looked back at him. “I don’t know,” he replied.

“I can give you pretty things,” the bottle promised. “I can give you treasures!”

That was good enough for the G’home Gnomes. Fillip and Sot reached for the bottle as one, fastened their hands about its neck, and pulled the stopper free. There was a puff of reddish smoke that glittered with bits of green light, then a popping sound, and something small, black, and hairy crawled out of the bottle. Fillip and Sot jerked their hands back at once. The thing crawling from the bottle looked like an oversized spider.

“Ahhhh!” The thing on the lip of the bottle sighed contentedly. It perched there and looked down at them. It was barely a foot tall. Red eyes blinked like those of a cat. It looked less like a spider now. It had four limbs, all seemingly the same, a rat’s tail that switched and jerked, an arched back with a spine of bristling black hair, whitish hands and fingers like those of a sickly child, and a face that was thick with hair and blunted—as if it had been pushed in once and never came back again to its original shape. Pointed ears pricked up and listened to the night sounds. A mouth crooked with teeth and wrinkled skin smiled in something close to a grimace.

“Masters!” the creature soothed. The fingers of one limb picked at its body as if there were something irritating hidden in all that black hair.

“What are you?” asked Fillip in a whisper. Sot just stared.

“I am what I am!” the creature said. The grimace broadened. “A wondrous child of magic and wizardry! A being far better than those who gave me life!”

“A demon!” whispered Sot suddenly in terror.

The creature winced. “A Darkling, masters—a poor unfortunate made prisoner to this repulsive body by … chance. But keeper of the bottle, too, masters—keeper of all its wonders and delights!”

Fillip and Sot were barely allowing themselves to breathe. “What … what wonders do you keep in the bottle?” Fillip ventured finally, unable nevertheless to keep his voice from shaking.

“Ahhhh!” the Darkling breathed.

“Why … are they kept there?” asked Sot. “Why not in your pocket?”

“Ahhhh!” the Darkling said again.

“Why do you live in the bottle?” asked Fillip.

“Yes, why?” echoed Sot.

The spiderlike body arched and turned on the lip of the bottle like some feeding insect. “Because … I am bound!” The Darkling’s voice was an excited hiss. “Because it is my need! Would you like it to be yours, too, perhaps? Would you like to feel its touch? Little masters, would you dare? Would you dare to see how it shapes and molds and reworks life?”

Fillip and Sot were inching further back down into their burrow with every word, trying to make themselves disappear altogether. They were wishing they had kept the bottle closed as they had agreed they would. They were wishing they had never opened it up.

“Ohhhhh! Are you frightened?” the Darkling asked suddenly, whining the words, teasing with them. “Are you frightened of me? Oh, no, you mustn’t be frightened. You are the masters; I am but your servant. Command me, masters! Ask for something and let me show you what I can do!”

Fillip and Sot just stared at him wordlessly.

“A word, masters!” the Darkling pleaded. “Command me!”

Fillip swallowed the dryness in his throat. “Show us something pretty,” he ventured tentatively.

“Something bright,” added Sot.

“But that is such a simple task!” the Darkling pouted. “Ah, well. Something pretty, masters, something bright. Here, then!”

It rose from a half-crouch and seemed to swell slightly in size. Fingers flicked this way and that, and tiny bits of green light sparked. All about it flying insects caught fire, turning into brilliant bits of rainbow color. The insects darted madly as the flames consumed them, tiny trailers of brightness as they swept past the astonished gnomes to form intricate patterns against the night.

“Ohhhh!” breathed Fillip and Sot as one, transfixed by the kaleidoscope of color, only vaguely disturbed after the first insect or two by a sense of repulsion.

The Darkling smiled a crooked smile and laughed gleefully. “Here, masters! More colors for you!”

Skeletal white fingers flicked the night air once more, and the bits of green light flew higher this time, exploding with showers of brightness that flared and rainbowed out. A night bird had been set aflame, its cry quick and final as it perished. Others joined it, flaming rainbows of wondrous, terrible color in the dark, stars falling from the heavens. The gnomes watched, their delight growing strangely more demanding as the birds died, their sense of what was being lost gradually becoming submerged in some distant, darkened place within them.

When the birds had been consumed as well, the Darkling turned back to Fillip and Sot. Its eyes glittered a smoky red. That same light was reflected now—just a touch—in the eyes of the gnomes.

“You can see many such things, masters,” the Darkling whispered, its voice a low hiss of promise. “The magic of the bottle can give you all you wish—all the delights and wonders of your imagination and beyond! Do you wish these, masters? Do you wish to enjoy them?”

“Yes!” breathed Fillip rapturously.

“Yes!” sighed Sot.

The Darkling hunched over, black hair bristling out, a thing of perverse shape and fawning gestures. “Such good masters,” it whispered. “Why don’t you touch me?”

Fillip and Sot nodded obediently. Already they were reaching out their hands.

The Darkling’s eyes closed in satisfaction.

SPELLBOUND



Ben Holiday slept poorly that night, troubled by dreams of the bottle and the demon that lived within it. He dreamed that the demon came out of the bottle on its own—just as Questor had warned it might—a huge, gargoyle monster that could swallow men whole. It did that with Fillip and Sot, did it with half a dozen others, and was in close pursuit of Ben when he mercifully came awake.

The day was gray and rainy, not an auspicious omen. They had delayed their search for the missing G’home Gnomes until morning to assure favorable tracking conditions and had merely ended up swapping darkness for rain. Ben glanced out the windows as he dressed, watching the rain fall in sheets. The ground was puddled and glistening; it must have been raining for some time. Ben sighed heavily. It would be difficult finding any trail at all in this weather.

Nevertheless, Bunion, whose job it was to track the gnomes, seemed unperturbed by the situation. Ben came downstairs to the dining hall to have breakfast with the others before leaving and found the kobold engaged in earnest conversation with Questor Thews on just that subject. Ben was able to follow most of the conversation, having spent enough time with the kobold to pick up a good deal of his difficult, guttural language, and Bunion was indicating that despite the rain he felt he would have no difficulty. Ben nodded in satisfaction and ate more of the breakfast than he thought he would.

When the meal was finished, he adjourned with Questor and Bunion to the front court. Willow was already there, supervising the selection of the horses they would ride and overseeing the loading of the pack animals. Ben was always surprised at how organized the sylph was, taking on duties that weren’t necessarily hers, wanting to make certain of the thoroughness of the work. She smiled and kissed him, the rain trailing off her hooded cloak onto her nose and mouth. Ben hadn’t particularly wanted her to accompany him, always worried for her safety, but she had insisted. Now he was glad she was doing so. He kissed her back and gave her a reassuring hug.

They ferried the animals across to the mainland, and by midmorning they were under way. Ben rode Jurisdiction, his favorite mount, a bay gelding, Questor sat atop an elderly gray with one white sock, and Willow had chosen a blue roan. The kobolds, as usual, walked, having little use for horses and vice versa. Ben liked to joke that wherever he went on horseback, he always had Jurisdiction. He said it again this morning, but it sounded flat. Everyone was bundled up in their rain gear, heads lowered against the wet and the wind, bodies hunched up against the morning chill, and they were not particularly interested in jokes. They were mostly interested in trying to ignore their discomfort.

Bunion went quickly on ahead, leaving the others to follow at a slower pace. There wasn’t much question in Ben’s mind where the G’home Gnomes would go; they were fairly predictable creatures. With a treasure of the sort that they believed the bottle to be, they would head directly for the safety of their burrow home. That meant they would travel north out of the forestlands of Sterling Silver through the western borders of the Greensward and finally to the hill country beyond to their gnome community. They would not travel fast; they were slow creatures under the best of circumstances and they were preoccupied with the bottle. Ben was half-convinced that the little guys really didn’t view what they were doing as theft in any event and would not be concerned with anyone following. That meant they would not be running, and Bunion might find them—rain or no rain—before the day was out.

So they meandered north, picking their way through the raindrops and puddles, waiting patiently for Bunion to return with the news that he had found them. Bunion would find them, of course. Nothing could escape a kobold once he made up his mind to track it. The kobolds were fairy creatures who could move from place to place almost swifter than the eye could follow. Bunion would catch up to the gnomes in nothing flat once he came across their trail, and Bunion had seemed certain he would do so quickly. Ben hoped so. He was worried about this demon.

A Darkling, Questor had called it. Ben tried to envision it as he rode and failed to find a satisfactory image. Questor had not seen the creature for better than twenty years, and his memory as usual was a bit hazy. Sometimes it was little and sometimes it was big, Questor had said. Ben shook his head, remembering the wizard’s confusion. Big help. What mattered most, in any case, was the magic the Darkling wielded—magic that was always bad news for whoever came up against it. But maybe Fillip and Sot had not yet opened the bottle and let the Darkling free. Maybe they could manage to stifle their curiosity long enough for him to catch them before they gave in to it.

He sighed, shifting uncomfortably atop Jurisdiction as the rain blew into his face on a sudden gust of wind. Maybe the sun would come out if he clapped his hands, too.

“I think it might be clearing a bit, High Lord,” Questor called out suddenly from just behind him.

Ben nodded wordlessly, never believing it for a moment. It was probably going to rain like this for forty days and forty nights, and they ought to be out building an ark instead of chasing around the countryside after those pin-headed gnomes. It had been almost a full day now since Abernathy had disappeared into the light with his medallion, and he was beginning to despair. How was Abernathy going to take care of himself in Ben’s world? Even if he did somehow manage to elude Michel Ard Rhi, where could he go? He didn’t know anyone. He didn’t know the first thing about the geography of Ben’s world. And the minute he opened his mouth to ask someone …

Ben quickly blocked the rest of that scenario from his mind. There was no point in dwelling on Abernathy or the medallion. He had to concentrate his energy on getting the bottle back from Fillip and Sot. Even without the services of the Paladin, he felt confident he could do that. Bunion and Parsnip were more than a match for the gnomes, Darkling or no, and Questor Thews ought to be able to use his own magic to counteract that of the demon if it should become necessary to do so. If they were quick enough, they would get the bottle back again before Fillip and Sot even knew what had happened.

Still, it would have been nice to be able to rely on the Paladin, he thought—as frightening as his alter ego was to him. Ben could still remember the times he had been transformed into the knight-errant—armor closing him about, straps and buckles clinking into place, the smell of fighting and the memories of battle filling his senses. It was both terrifying and exhilarating, and he was repelled and drawn to it at the same time. He breathed the wet, cold air and pictured it again in his mind. Sometimes, when he let himself consider the possibility, he was afraid that, with enough exposure, the experience of becoming the Paladin could become an addiction …

He shrugged the thought away. Such thoughts didn’t matter just now. Without the medallion, there could be no transformation. Without the medallion, the Paladin was just a dream.

Morning stretched into midday, and they paused long enough to consume a cold lunch within the shelter of a stand of crimson maple. There was still no sign of Bunion. No one spoke of the matter, but all were concerned. Time was quickly slipping away. They rode out again after a short rest, edging now into the Greensward. Long, grassy stretches of flatland spread away before them east and north. The rain had begun to diminish, fulfilling Questor’s expectations, and the air warmed slightly. Daylight was gray and hazy through a vast blanket of gauzy, rumpled clouds.

A short time later, Bunion appeared. He appeared not from the north as expected, but from directly west. He came up to them so swiftly that he was almost on top of them before they saw him, his wiry body skittering and dancing through the damp. His eyes were bright, and he was grinning like a delighted child, all his sharp teeth in evidence. He had found Fillip and Sot. The G’home Gnomes were not on their way north after all. As a matter of fact, they did not appear to be on their way to much of anywhere. They were scarcely two miles distant, engrossed in watching raindrops fall from trees and turn into brightly colored gemstones.

“What?” Ben exclaimed in disbelief, certain he had heard wrong.

Questor hastily said something to Bunion, listened to the kobold’s reply, and turned back to Ben. “They have opened the bottle, High Lord. They have set the Darkling free.”

“And the Darkling is turning raindrops into gems?”

“Yes, High Lord.” Questor looked decidedly uneasy. “Apparently it amuses the gnomes.”

“I’ll bet it does, those little ferret-faced bozos!” Ben scowled. Why wasn’t anything ever easy? “Well, so much for getting the bottle back unopened. Now what, Questor? Will the Darkling try to stop us from putting it back in the bottle?”

Questor shook his head doubtfully. “That depends on Fillip and Sot, High Lord. Whoever holds the bottle controls the demon.”

“So the real question is, will Fillip and Sot refuse to give the bottle back to us?”

“The magic is a powerful lure, High Lord.”

Ben nodded. “Then we need a plan.”

The plan he came up with was fairly simple. They would ride over to a place just out of sight of the gnomes. Parsnip would remain with the horses while the others went forward afoot. Ben, Questor, and Willow would approach from the front, openly. Bunion would sneak around behind. If Ben was unable to persuade the gnomes to return the bottle willingly, Bunion would snatch it away before they could do anything to stop him.

“Remember, Bunion, if you see me rub my chin with my hand, that’s your signal,” Ben finished. “You get in there as fast as you can and you get that bottle!”

The kobold grinned wolfishly.

They turned west, Bunion showing the way, Parsnip trailing with the pack animals, and rode the short distance to where the G’home Gnomes were at play with their treasure. They pulled into a stand of fir behind a low ridge while still hidden from view, dismounted, gave the horses over to Parsnip, sent Bunion on ahead to get into place, and began walking up the ridge. When they reached its crest, they stopped short.

Fillip and Sot sat beneath a massive old willow, legs tucked up underneath, hands outstretched, laughing gleefully. The old willow’s boughs were heavy with rain, and as the droplets slipped free they became sparkling gemstones. The gnomes tried to catch those that fell close, but most tumbled earthward out of reach and collected in shimmering piles. There were gemstones everywhere, heaps of them, flashing rainbow colors through the afternoon gray and damp, a seeming mirage come to life.

The bottle sat upon the ground between the G’home Gnomes, forgotten. An ugly, spiderlike creature danced upon the bottle’s rim where the stopper had been pulled and flicked bits of green fire at the raindrops. Each bit of fire changed another droplet into a gemstone.

It was the weirdest scene Ben Holiday had ever witnessed. Fillip and Sot looked as if they had gone nuts.

“All right! That’s enough!” he yelled sharply.

The G’home Gnomes froze, shrinking down against the earth like wilted flowers. The Darkling crouched catlike on the lip of the bottle, eyes glittering. Ben waited a moment to be certain that he had their attention, then started down the slope of the ridge, Questor and Willow in tow. When he reached the outer curtain of the willow’s broad canopy—not more than a dozen yards from the gnomes—he stopped.

“What do you think you’re doing, guys?” he asked quietly.

Fillip and Sot looked terrified. “Leave us alone!” they cried. “Let us be!” The words all jumbled together as they spoke them, and Ben couldn’t tell who was saying what.

“There is a small problem that needs solving first,” he said evenly. “You have something that belongs to me.”

“No, no,” whined Fillip.

“Nothing,” whined Sot.

“How about the bottle?” he asked.

The moment he said the word “bottle” the gnomes had their hands on it, snatching it back away from him. The Darkling stayed perched on the open lip, clinging to the glass as if it had suction cups on its fingers. Ben had a clear view of the creature now; it was an ugly little thing. The red eyes glittered hatefully, and Ben looked quickly away.

“Fillip. Sot.” He tried to keep his voice calm. “You have to give the bottle back. It doesn’t belong to you. You took it without permission.”

“You said you wished you had never seen it!” insisted Fillip.

“You said you wished it would disappear!” added Sot.

“You put it away!”

“You didn’t want it!”

“Great High Lord!”

“Mighty High Lord!”

Ben held up his hands quickly to silence them. “You have to give it back, fellas. That’s all there is to it. Close it up and hand it over—right now.”

The gnomes pulled the bottle closer still. Their eyes narrowed, and something of the look he had seen in the Darkling’s eyes reflected suddenly in their own. Fillip’s muzzle was drawing back to show teeth. Sot was stroking the demon’s arched spine.

“The bottle belongs to us!” snapped Fillip.

“The bottle is ours!” grated Sot.

The terror was still evident in their eyes, but Ben had mistaken completely its source. He had thought them frightened of him; in truth, they were frightened, not of him, but of losing the bottle.

“Nuts!” he muttered and looked at Questor.

The wizard stepped forward. His scarecrow form straightened. “Fillip and Sot, you are hereby charged with theft of royal property and flight to avoid return of same!” He cleared his throat officiously. “Return the property now—the bottle, that is—and all charges will be dropped. Otherwise, you will be arrested and placed in the castle dungeons.” He paused hopefully. “You don’t want that, do you?”

The G’home Gnomes cringed. Then suddenly they leaned down to the bottle as the Darkling whispered something up to them. When they looked back again, the defiance was evident.

“You lie to us!” declared Fillip.

“You wish to hurt us!” declared Sot.

“You want the bottle for yourselves!”

“You want its treasures for your own use!”

“You try to trick us!”

“You play hateful games!”

They were on their feet now, holding the bottle between them, backing slowly toward the base of the tree. Ben was appalled. He had never seen the gnomes like this; they were actually ready to fight!

“What’s happening here?” he whispered urgently.

“It is the demon, High Lord!” Questor whispered back. “It poisons everyone it touches!”

Ben was already regretting that he had even bothered trying to talk the gnomes out of the bottle. It would have been smarter just to send Bunion in to steal the damn thing and be done with it.

Willow appeared suddenly at his other side. “Fillip!” she called out. “Sot! Please, do not do this to the High Lord! Remember how he came to you when no one else would? Remember how he helped you?” Her voice softened. “He has always helped you when you needed it; you owe him much. Return the bottle to him. He needs the bottle to help find Abernathy and bring him safely back. Do not obstruct him like this. Listen to what is inside of you. Give him back the bottle.”

For just a moment, Ben thought they would. They seemed to respond better to Willow; they looked sheepish and guilty. They started forward a step or two, tenuous shufflings, muttering something unintelligible, appearing themselves once more. Then the Darkling darted from the bottle onto first Fillip’s shoulder and then Sot’s, hissing wickedly, then dropped back again, dancing as if maddened. Fillip and Sot stopped abruptly and began retreating once more. The look of fear and defiance returned.

That was enough for Ben. It was time to call on Bunion. He brought his hand up to his chin and rubbed it as if thinking matters over.

Bunion shot out of nowhere, a blur of darkness against the gray haze of the rain. Fillip and Sot never saw him. He was on them before they realized what was happening. But, by then, the attempt to regain possession of the bottle had already failed. One instant Bunion seemed to have his hands on the bottle; in the next he was flung back, thrown by an invisible force. Incredibly, the Darkling had taken matters into its own hands. The demon hissed, spit like a cat, and threw a massive bolt of green fire at the kobold. Bunion was picked up again and hurtled backward through the air to disappear completely from view.

Ben was already rushing forward, but he was not nearly quick enough. The G’home Gnomes screamed in warning, and the Darkling was quick to respond. It whirled on Ben, fingers flicking at the air. Raindrops turned to knives and whistled toward the High Lord in a lethal barrage. Ben had no chance to dodge them.

Fortunately, he didn’t have to. For once, Questor Thews got the magic to work right the first time, and the knives were turned aside at the last possible moment. Ben blinked, shied away out of reflex, came around again when he realized he wasn’t a pincushion after all, and yelled for Questor and Willow to run. Already the Darkling was lashing out again, this time with a bewildering array of rocks and loose stone, thrown from the earth as if scooped by some giant’s hand. Questor’s shield held firm, however, and the three friends backed quickly away, crouching down against the strange assault as it hammered toward them.

Then the stones were obscured in a gust of hailstones and winter sleet that suddenly took shape out of the falling rain and came at them with frightening purpose. Questor cried out sharply, threw out his hands, and a flash of blinding light obscured everything. But the protective shield was beginning to give and the hailstones to break through. They struck with stinging, painful blows, and Ben staggered back, trying to protect Willow as they edged toward the summit of the ridge.

“Get down, High Lord!” he heard Questor yell frantically.

Pulling Willow close, he stumbled over the summit and down the far slope. Questor’s shield gave way completely. Hail and sleet were all about, a blinding flurry of white, striking at them. Ben fell to the ground and rolled, Willow going down with him, tumbling wildly through scrub and bare earth.

Then, miraculously, the sleet and hail were gone. Rain fell softly once more, the day gray and empty and still. Ben let his eyes slip open, met Willow’s as they lifted to find him, then caught a glimpse of Questor over her shoulder as he struggled up woodenly and brushed himself off.

There was no sign of the gnomes or the demon.

Ben was shaking. He was frightened and angry and grateful to be alive. The Darkling had very nearly killed them. He reached over impulsively and hugged Willow close.



They found Bunion snarled in some brush several hundred yards off, bruised and battered, but conscious. He should have been dead, considering the beating he had taken, but kobolds were very tough creatures. Willow worked over him carefully for a time, using the healing powers common to the once-upon-a-time fairy people of the lake country, touching him gently, taking away the worst of the hurt. After less than half an hour, Bunion was back on his feet, stiff and sore, but grinning wickedly. The kobold hissed a few words of unmistakable meaning at Questor. He wanted another crack at the demon.

But the Darkling had disappeared along with the bottle and Fillip and Sot, and there was no trace of where they might have gone. Ben and company searched for a time, scouring the surrounding countryside for a trail. They found nothing. Apparently the demon had used his magic to conceal their tracks.

“Or maybe they simply flew out of here, High Lord,” Questor advised solemnly. “The Darkling has such power.”

“Are there any limits to what this thing can do?” Ben asked.

“The only limits imposed on it are those imposed by the character of the holder of the bottle. The worse the character, the stronger the demon.” Questor sighed. “Fillip and Sot are not really bad creatures. The strength the Darkling can draw from them should exhaust itself quickly.”

“I feel sorry for them, Ben,” Willow said quietly. “For Fillip and Sot.”

He looked at her in surprise, then nodded wearily. “I suppose I do, too. I don’t imagine they even know what’s happened to them.” He turned. “Parsnip, bring the horses!”

The kobold hurried away. Ben glanced skyward momentarily, thinking. The rain was ending, the day edging quickly toward dusk. There wasn’t enough time left to accomplish much of anything before nightfall.

“What do we do now, High Lord?” Questor asked him. The others crowded close.

Ben’s jaw tightened. “I’ll tell you what we do, Questor. We wait until morning. Then we go after Fillip and Sot. We hunt for them until we find them, and when we find them we get the bottle back and shut the Darkling away once and for all!”

He glanced over at a grinning Bunion. “And next time we’ll be ready for the little monster!”

MICHEL ARD RHI



Abernathy spent his first full day in Ben’s world shut away in Elizabeth’s room, discovering how much trouble he was really in. Elizabeth had considered the possibility of staying home sick from school in order to be with him, but had discarded the idea when she realized being sick would bring the housekeeper on a determined crusade of mercy and Abernathy would likely be discovered in the process. Besides, she hadn’t come up with a plan to sneak him out of Graum Wythe yet, so she needed the day to think the matter over.

So off she went to school while Abernathy stayed hidden in her room, reading old magazines and newspapers. He asked her for the reading material, and she brought it to him from her father’s study before she left. Abernathy was Court Historian as well as Court Scribe in Landover and he knew something of the histories of other worlds as well as his own. He had made it a point to study the history of Ben’s world when Meeks moved over there and began recruiting men willing to pay for Landover’s throne. It had been pretty frightening stuff. Most of what Abernathy remembered had to do with machines and sciences and any number of wars. Since he was wearing the medallion, he could read and speak the language of any world he was in, so learning what Ben’s world was like wouldn’t be difficult. But it would be necessary if he was to find a way back to his own.

So he picked through the stack of magazines and newspapers, propped up on Elizabeth’s bed amid stuffed animals and dolls, a scattering of pillows at his back, and tried to figure out how things worked. Most of his reading was superfluous. There were an abnormally large number of stories about wars and killing, most the result of politics and economics, many having no rational purpose. There were a number of stories having to do with investigations of one sort or another as well. Abernathy read a few and gave up, concluding that he was trapped in a world full of crooks and thieves. Some of the magazines offered stories of romance and adventure, but Abernathy skipped those. He read more closely the advertisements—that’s what they were called, he discovered—and learned most of what was useful from them.

The advertisements told him what was for sale in the way of goods and services, and that let him discover several things. It let him discover that no one traveled by horse or carriage; everyone rode or even flew in machines developed by the world’s sciences. It let him discover that in order to use these machines, he had to pay for the privilege with money or something called credit, and he, of course, had neither. Finally, it let him discover—forgetting for the moment the fact that he was a talking dog—that no one dressed anything like the way he did, talked anything like the way he did, or shared much of anything else in the way of a common social, economic, or cultural background. Once beyond the walls of Graum Wythe, he would stand out from everyone else as clearly as day from night.

One of the magazines included a map of the United States, which he quickly realized was Ben’s country. He found the state of Washington, where he was, and the state of Virginia, where he had to go. The topography of the country between was clearly delineated on the map. A legend advised him of the distance he would have to travel. Elizabeth had been right—it was a long, long way from here to there. He might walk it, but it looked as if the walk could take him forever.

After a time, he put down the newspapers and the magazines, got off the bed, walked over to the twin latticework windows that opened to the south, and looked out. The countryside immediately surrounding the castle was planted with vineyards. There were a few small patches of open space, a tiny stream that meandered about, and several distant houses that dotted the landscape, but not much of anything else. The houses intrigued Abernathy. He had seen pictures of such houses in the magazines, and neither those nor these were anything at all like the houses in Landover. Graum Wythe seemed sorely out of place amid such structures, as if it had been picked up and plunked down without thought to whether it belonged or not. Abernathy assumed it was here solely because it was the prideful recreation of Michel Ard Rhi’s imaginary fortress from his childhood—the place he had occupied in his mind most of his life. There was a moat about it, guardhouses at either end of the drawbridge leading over, a low stone wall farther out with wire and sharp barbs atop it, and a gate. Abernathy shook his head. Michel hadn’t changed.

Elizabeth had prepared a sandwich and something called potato chips for Abernathy’s lunch, and he ate them at midday before settling back down to read further from the magazines and newspapers. He hadn’t been at it for more than a few minutes when he heard footsteps come up to the bedroom door, saw the door handle turn, and watched in horror as it swung open.

There wasn’t time to hide. There wasn’t time to do anything but drop down amid the newspapers and magazines and play dead. So that was what Abernathy did.

A woman came into the room carrying an armful of what appeared to be cleaning supplies. Abernathy could see this through slitted eyes. She was humming to herself, unaware yet that there was anyone else in the room. Abernathy had curled himself into a ball, trying hard to blend in with the stuffed animals. Was this the dreaded housekeeper Elizabeth had thought to avoid by going on to school instead of playing sick? Why hadn’t Elizabeth warned him that she might come into the room to clean anyway? He tried hard not to breathe. Maybe she wouldn’t notice him. Maybe she would leave if he just …

She turned around and looked right at him. She stiffened in surprise and put her hands on her hips. “Well, what’s this? What are you doing here? There’s not supposed to be any dogs in here! That Elizabeth!”

She smiled then and laughed—a private joke of some sort, Abernathy decided. There was nothing for him to do now but to play along. He lay there and thumped his stubby tail as best he could, trying to appear like a normal dog.

“Well, well, well! You are a cute thing! All dressed up like a little doll!” The cleaning lady came right up to him, reached down, and gave him a suffocating hug. She was rather stout to begin with, and Abernathy felt the breath leave his body in a rush. “Now what am I supposed to do with you?” she went on, stepping back, giving him an appraising look. “I’ll bet no one else knows you’re here, do they?”

Abernathy kept thumping his tail, trying to appear cute.

“You’ve sure made a mess of this room—look at these magazines and newspapers!” The woman bustled about, picking up, straightening up. “Did you eat this sandwich, too? Where’d you get that? I tell you, that Elizabeth!” She laughed some more.

Abernathy lay patiently waiting as she finished moving about, then looked up expectantly as she came back to give him a pat on the head. “None of my business,” she muttered and patted him some more. “Tell you what,” she said conspiratorially. “You stay right here, don’t move. I’ll clean the room like I’m supposed to and be on my way. It’s not up to me to worry about you. I’ll leave you to Elizabeth. Okay?”

Abernathy thumped his tail some more, wishing it were longer. The cleaning lady put a cord in the wall and ran a rather noisy machine about the floor and rugs for a time, ran a cloth over the furniture, picked and straightened up some more, and was done.

She came back over. “Now you be good,” she admonished, ruffling his ears. “Don’t let anyone know you’re here. I’ll keep your secret if you will, okay? Now give me a kiss. Right here.” She bent down, offering her cheek. “C’mon, just a little kiss.”

Abernathy licked her dutifully on the cheek.

“Good dog!” She patted him on the head and rubbed his muzzle. Then she picked up her cleaning gear and headed out the door. “’Bye, old boy,” she called back.

The door closed softly and the footsteps moved away.

Abernathy wished he had something to wash out his mouth.



Elizabeth returned around mid-afternoon, unremittingly cheerful. “Hi, Abernathy!” she greeted, pushing through the door and closing it tightly behind her. “How was your day?”

“It would have been better,” Abernathy replied archly, “if you had thought to warn me that the housekeeper might clean!”

“Oh, that’s right, it’s Monday!” Elizabeth groaned and dropped her books on the writing desk with a thud. “Sorry about that. Did she see you?”

“She did. But she thought I was a pet and said I was your responsibility and not hers. I don’t think she plans to tell anyone.”

Elizabeth nodded solemnly. “Mrs. Allen is my friend. When she gives her word, she keeps it. Not like some I know.” She frowned menacingly. “Nita Coles used to be my friend, but she isn’t anymore. Know why? Because she told everyone I like Tommy Samuelson. I don’t know why she did that. He isn’t even my boyfriend or anything, I just said I sort of liked him. He is cute. Anyway, she told Donna Helms, and Donna tells everyone everything, so the first thing you know, the whole school is talking about me and Tommy Samuelson, and I am embarrassed beyond tears! I bet even Mr. Mack, my teacher, knows! I told Eva Richards, my other friend, that if Nita doesn’t take it all back and right now, I won’t …”

“Elizabeth!” Abernathy cut her short with something very much like a bark. “Elizabeth,” he said her name again, this time more gently. She stared at him. “Have you come up with a way to get me out of here?”

“Sure.” She said it matter-of-factly, as if there had never been any question about it. She dropped herself down on the bed next to him. “A real good way, Abernathy.”

“How, Elizabeth?”

She grinned. “We’ll send you out with the laundry!” The look on Abernathy’s face sent the grin scurrying for cover. “Look, it’s simple, really. A truck from the cleaners picks up the laundry every Tuesday. That’s tomorrow. Several big canvas hampers go out, full of sheets and stuff. You can hide in one. The guards never check the laundry. You ride out in the back of the truck and when it stops to unload, out you jump. By then, you’ll be miles away.” She grinned again. “What do you think?”

Abernathy thought. “I think it might work. But what about when they load me in the truck? Won’t they think the laundry is a bit heavy?”

Elizabeth shook her head firmly. “No way. The towels and stuff go out wet all the time. They weigh a ton. I’ve heard Mr. Abbott say so. He’s the driver. He won’t think anything about it when he puts you in the truck. He’ll just think you’re a load of wet towels or something.”

“I see.” Abernathy was undecided.

“Believe me, it’ll work,” Elizabeth assured him. “All you have to do is sneak down to the laundry early in the morning. I’ll go with you. If we go early enough, we won’t run into anyone. I can set my alarm. On the clock,” she added, pointing.

Abernathy looked at the time-telling device doubtfully, then back at the little girl. He sighed. “Can you give me a good map of the country to take with me, Elizabeth—something that will help me find my way to Virginia?”

Elizabeth immediately shook her head no. “I have an idea about that, too, Abernathy. You can’t go trekking across the country on foot all the way to Virginia. It’s just too far. There are mountains between here and there, and it’s almost winter. You might freeze!”

She reached over and put her hand on his head. “I’ve got some money saved. I want to give it to you. I’ll have to make up something for Dad, but I can do it. I’ll give you the money, and here’s what you do. You wrap yourself all up in bandages so no one can see what you look like. They’ll think you’re all burned or something. Then you go to the airport and buy a standby ticket to Virginia. They’re real cheap—I’ll show you how to do it. You can fly back in a couple of hours. You’ll still have to walk a bit when you get there, but not nearly so far as from here—maybe a hundred miles or so. And it will still be warm there; you won’t freeze.”

Abernathy didn’t know what to say. He just stared at her for a moment. “Elizabeth, I cannot take your money …”

“Shhhh, shhhh!” She cut him short with a hiss. “Don’t say that. Of course you can. You have to. I can’t sleep thinking about you out there wandering across the country. I have to know that you’re all right. Really, I should go with you. But since you won’t let me, you at least have to take the money.” She paused. “You can pay me back later, if you want—sometime.”

Abernathy was overwhelmed. “Thank you, Elizabeth,” he said quietly.

Elizabeth reached over and gave him a big hug. It was a much better hug than the one he had received from Mrs. Allen.



Abernathy stayed in Elizabeth’s room when she went down to eat dinner, waiting patiently for her to bring something edible back for him. He passed the time reading idly through something called TV Guide, which he didn’t understand. He expected Elizabeth to return in short order, just as she had the previous night, but the minutes slipped by and she failed to show. He began listening at the door for her and even risked a quick look down the empty hall. No Elizabeth.

When she finally appeared, she was ghost white and visibly distressed.

“Abernathy!” she exclaimed with a hiss, closing the door quickly behind her. “You’ve got to get out of here immediately! Michel knows about you!”

Abernathy went cold. “How did he find out?”

Elizabeth shook her head in anguish, tears starting down her cheeks. “It was all my fault, Abernathy,” she sobbed. “I told him! I had to!”

“Now, now,” he soothed, kneeling down in front of her, paws coming up to rest on her shoulders reassuringly. He wanted nothing so much as to run from that room as quickly as he could, but first he needed to know what he was up against. “Just tell me what happened,” he said, trying to sound calm.

Elizabeth sniffed back her tears and sobs and faced him. “The watch told Michel about you, just as I was afraid they would. They came up to us just after dinner to make their report and happened to mention it to him. They remembered it because they saw me standing there, and one of them asked if I still had the dog. He mentioned the odd clothes you were wearing and the way your paws didn’t quite look like paws. He described you. Michel got this funny look on his face and started asking me questions. He asked me where I found you, and I … Well, I couldn’t lie to him, Abernathy, I couldn’t! He has this way of looking at you, kind of mean, like he can see everything …”

She broke into sobs again, and Abernathy quickly hugged her against him, holding her until the tears began to subside. “Go on,” he urged.

“Well, I told him I found you near the art room. I didn’t tell him you were in it or anything, but it didn’t matter. He went right to the art room, telling me to stay where I was, and when he came back he was furious! He wanted to know what had happened to his bottle. I said I didn’t know. He wanted to know what had happened to you! I said I didn’t know that, either. I started crying, telling him I just wanted someone to play dress-up with and that when I found you, you were wandering about in these old clothes, so I just put you on a leash and took you for a walk, and … Then he wanted to know if you said anything to me! He seemed to know you could talk, Abernathy!”

Abernathy felt as if the walls were closing in on him. “Hurry up, Elizabeth,” he urged. “Tell me the rest as quick as you can!”

She took a deep, steadying breath. “Well, as I told you, I couldn’t lie—not completely, not to him. So I said, ‘Yeah, he did!’—as if I was real surprised he knew. I said that was why I sent you away, because I was afraid of you. I just turned you loose and you ran off. I said I hadn’t seen you since. I said I hadn’t said anything to anyone because I was afraid they wouldn’t believe me. I said I was waiting to tell my father when he came back Wednesday.” She took hold of him with her hands. “He believed me, I think. He just told me to go to my room and wait there for him. He ordered the watch to start a search. But he was yelling at them like he was crazy, Abernathy! You have to get out of here!”

Abernathy nodded wearily. “How do I do that, Elizabeth?”

The little girl’s hands tightened on his arms. “Just the way I said you would—except that you have to go down to the laundry room right now!”

“Elizabeth, you just said they were searching for me!”

“No, no, Abernathy—listen!” Her roundish face bent close, brow furrowed with determination. Her nose freckles seemed to dance. “They’ve already searched the laundry room. That’s where they started. I told them that was where I let you go. So no one’s there anymore. They’re looking around everywhere else. The laundry room is down the hall, around the corner to the right, on the ground floor—not far. If you go out the window … listen to me … if you go out the window and down the vines, you can slip around the corner and through the window!”

“Elizabeth, I can’t climb down …”

“The catch is off, Abernathy! I took it off over the weekend when I was playing hide-and-seek with Mrs. Allen! You can slip right through the window into one of the hampers and wait! If not, just wait in the bushes; I’ll come down and open it as soon as I can! Oh, I’m so sorry, Abernathy! This is all my fault! But you have to go! You have to hurry! If they find you here, they’ll know I lied, that I helped you …”

There was the sound of voices and footsteps in the hall beyond, rapidly approaching.

“Abernathy!” Elizabeth whispered fearfully.

Abernathy was already moving for the windows. He released the catch, pushed open the twin latticework frames, and peered down. It was dark, but he could just make out a thick tangle of trailing vines. They appeared strong enough to hold him.

He turned back to Elizabeth. “Good-bye, Elizabeth,” he whispered. “Thank you for your help.”

“It’s the fifth window around the corner!” she whispered back. Then she put her hands to her mouth in horror. “Abernathy, I haven’t given you the money for the airplane ticket!”

“Never mind that,” he said, already swinging carefully out the window, testing his weight on the vines. His fingered paws gripped poorly. He would be lucky if he didn’t break his neck.

“No, you have to have the money!” she insisted, practically beside herself. “I know! Meet me tomorrow at noon at the school—Franklin Elementary! I’ll have it then!”

There was a knock at the door. “Elizabeth? Open the door.”

Abernathy recognized the voice immediately. “Good-bye, Elizabeth!” he whispered again.

“Good-bye!” she whispered back.

The latticework windows swung silently shut above him, and he was left hanging in the dark.



It seemed to Abernathy that it took him an impossible amount of time to get down. He was terrified of being caught out there, but he was equally terrified of falling. He compromised his fears by making his way at something of a snail’s pace, taking time to find each handgrip and foothold as he inched downward through the vines, pressed as close as he could get to the stone block. Lights had come on in the courtyard below, electric lamps—he had read about them—and the darkness was no longer quite so concealing. He felt like a fly waiting for the swat that would end its purposeless life.

But the swat didn’t come, and he finally felt the reassuring firmness of the ground touch his feet. He crouched down instantly, eyes sweeping the yard, searching for movement. There was none. Quickly, he made his way along the wall, staying close against its dark shadow, out of the illumination of the lamps. A door opened from somewhere behind, and he heard voices. He scurried along faster, reaching the bend in the wall that would take him to the promised laundry window. It was darker here, the wall turning back into a deep, shadowed alcove. He slipped along silently, counting windows as he went. The fifth window, Elizabeth had said. One, two …

Behind him, a beam of light shot across the dark, sweeping the courtyard to the low outer wall and the moat and back again. A flashlight, Abernathy thought. He had read about those, too. A flashlight meant that someone was out there on foot, searching the grounds. He practically ran now, counting three, four … five!

He skidded to a stop, almost passing by number five without seeing it because it was partially concealed in a clump of bushes. He looked at it. It was smaller than the previous four—smaller, too, than the ones that followed. Was this the right window? Or was he not supposed to count this one? There was light inside, but there was light in the next one as well. He began to panic. He bent close and listened. Did he hear voices in there? He glanced back frantically. The flashlight was coming closer in the dark, the sound of voices back there as well.

He looked forlornly at the window. There was nothing to do but chance it, he decided. If he stayed where he was, he was certain to be found. He reached down to the window and pushed carefully inward. The window gave easily at his touch. He caught a glimpse of linens in a basket. Relief flooded through him. He knelt down quickly and started to crawl in.

Several pairs of hands reached up to help him.



We found him sneaking in through the laundry room window,” said a guard, one of three from the watch that had captured Abernathy. They held him firmly by the arms. “It was lucky we went back or we would have missed him. We’d searched there first and hadn’t found a thing. But Jeff here says he thinks maybe one of the windows was left unlatched, that we ought to check it. We did, and that’s when we found him, crawling in.”

They stood in a study, a room filled with books and files, desks and cabinets—Abernathy and his captors and Michel Ard Rhi.

The guard speaking paused and glanced uncertainly at Abernathy. “Exactly what sort of creature is he, Mr. Ard Rhi?”

Michel Ard Rhi ignored him, the whole of his attention centered on Abernathy. He was a tall, rawboned man with a shock of black hair and a narrow, pinched face that suggested he had just eaten something sour. He looked older than he was, his brow lined, his skin sallow. He had dark, unfriendly eyes that registered immediate disapproval with everything in view. He stood ramrod straight, affecting an air of complete superiority.

“Abernathy,” he whispered almost soundlessly, as if in answer to the guard’s question.

He took a moment longer to study his captive, then said to the guards without bothering to look at them, “Wait outside.”

The guards left, closing the study door softly behind them. Michel Ard Rhi left Abernathy standing where he was and moved over to sit behind a huge, polished oak desk littered with paperwork. “Abernathy,” he said again, as if not yet convinced of it. “What are you doing here?”

Abernathy was no longer shaking. When the guards had captured him he had been so terrified that he could barely stand. Now he accepted his situation with the weary resignation of the condemned, and his acceptance gave him a small dose of renewed strength. He tried to keep his voice calm. “Questor Thews sent me here by mistake. He was trying something with the magic.”

“Oh?” Michel seemed interested. “What was the old fool trying this time?”

Abernathy showed nothing. “He was trying to change me back into a man.”

Michel Ard Rhi looked at him appraisingly and then laughed. “Remember how he changed you into a dog in the first place, Abernathy? Remember how he botched it? I’m surprised you let him come near you.” He shook his head hopelessly. “Questor Thews never could manage to do anything right, could he?”

He made it a statement of fact, not a question. Abernathy said nothing. He was thinking of the High Lord’s medallion, still concealed beneath his tunic. He was thinking that whatever else happened, Michel Ard Rhi must not be allowed to discover he wore it.

Michel seemed to know what he was thinking. “Well,” he mused, drawing the word out. “Here you are, you say, delivered to me by your inept protector. Such irony. But you know what, Abernathy? Something isn’t right about all this. No one human—or dog—crosses through the fairy mists without the medallion. Do they, Abernathy?”

He waited. Abernathy shook his head carefully. “The magic …”

“The magic?” Michel interrupted at once. “The magic of Questor Thews? You want me to believe that the magic was the cause of your passage out of Landover into this world? How … incredible!” He thought a moment and smiled unpleasantly. “I don’t believe it. Why don’t you prove it to me? Why don’t you satisfy my curiosity? Open your tunic.”

Abernathy went cold. “I have told you …”

“Your tunic. Open your tunic.”

Abernathy gave it up. Slowly he unclasped the tunic front. Michel leaned forward as the silver medallion came into view. “So,” he said, his voice a slow hiss. “It was the medallion.”

He got up and walked out from behind the desk, coming to a stop directly in front of Abernathy. He was still smiling, a smile without warmth. “Where is my bottle?” he asked softly.

Abernathy held his ground, fighting down the urge to step back. “What bottle are you talking about, Michel?”

“The bottle in the case, Abernathy—where is it? You know where it is and you’re going to tell me. I don’t believe for a moment that you just happened to appear in my castle. I don’t believe that this is all just the result of errant magic. What sort of fool do you think I am? The medallion brought you here from Landover. You came to Graum Wythe to steal the bottle, and that’s what you’ve done. It only remains for me to discover where you have hidden it.” He paused thoughtfully. “Maybe it’s in Elizabeth’s room. Is that where it is, Abernathy? Is Elizabeth your accomplice in all this?”

Abernathy tried to keep any trace of fear for Elizabeth from his voice. “The little girl? She just happened to stumble on me, and I had to pretend with her for a bit. If you want, search her room, Michel.” He tried to sound disinterested.

Michel watched him like a hawk. He leaned forward a bit. “Do you know what I am going to do with you?”

Abernathy stiffened slightly. “I am sure you will tell me,” he replied.

“I am going to put you in a cage, Abernathy. I am going to put you in a cage just as I would with any stray animal. You’ll be given dog food and water and a pad to sleep on. And that is where you will stay, Abernathy.” The smile was gone completely now. “Until you tell me where the bottle is. And …” He paused. “Until you take off the medallion and give it to me.”

He bent closer still, his breath strong in Abernathy’s nostrils. “I know the law of the medallion. I cannot take it from you; you must give it to me. It must be given freely, or the magic is useless. You will do that, Abernathy. You will give me the medallion of your own choice. I grow tired of this world. I think perhaps I might return to Landover for a time. I think I might like being King now.”

He stared into Abernathy’s eyes for a moment, searching for the fear concealed there, found it, and stepped back again in satisfaction. “If you don’t give me the bottle and the medallion, Abernathy, you will be left in that cage until you rot.” He paused. “And that could take a very long time.”

Abernathy didn’t say a word. He simply stood there, paralyzed.

“Guard!” Michel Ard Rhi called. The men without reappeared. “Take him down to the cellar and put him in a cage. Give him water and dog food twice a day and nothing else. Don’t let anyone near him.”

Abernathy was dragged roughly through the door. Behind him, he heard Michel call out in a singsong, taunting voice, “You should never have come here, Abernathy!”

Abernathy was inclined to agree.

SLIGHT MISCALCULATION



Fillip and Sot fled north with the bottle, intent on putting as much distance between themselves and the High Lord as was possible. They had escaped in the first place because the Darkling had transported them from the site of battle to a point some miles north, enveloping them in a shroud of smoke and brightly colored lights and whisking them off with all the ease that true magic allows. They had no idea what had become of the High Lord and his companions and they frankly didn’t want to know. They didn’t even want to think about it.

They ended up thinking about it anyway, of course. All the while they fled north, they thought about it, even without speaking to each other about it, even without acknowledging by covert glances or gestures what they were doing. They couldn’t help it. They had committed the most unpardonable, treasonable act imaginable—they had defied their beloved High Lord. Worse, they had actually attacked him! Not directly, of course, since it was the Darkling who had done the attacking, but it was all at their behest and that was the same thing as if they had struck the blows. They couldn’t imagine why they had done such a thing. They couldn’t conceive of how they had allowed it to happen. They had never even dreamed of challenging the wishes of the High Lord before. Such a thing was unthinkable!

Nevertheless, it had happened, and there was no turning back from it now. They were fleeing because they didn’t know what else to do. They knew the High Lord would come after them. He would be furious at what they had done and he would hunt them down and punish them. Their only hope, they sensed, was in flight and, eventually, in hiding.

But where to run and where to hide?

They hadn’t resolved the dilemma by the time nightfall and exhaustion made further flight impossible, and they were forced to stop. They wormed their way down into an abandoned badger nest and lay there in the dark listening to the pounding of their hearts and the whisper of their consciences. The bottle was open before them, the Darkling perched on its rim, playing with a pair of frantic moths it had captured and secured with long strands of gossamer webbing. Moon and stars were hidden behind a bank of low-hanging clouds, and night sounds were strangely muted and distant.

Fillip and Sot held hands and waited for the fear to go away. It refused to budge.

“I wish we were home!” Sot whined over and over to Fillip, and Fillip nodded each time without speaking.

They huddled close, too frightened even to think of eating, though they were hungry, or sleeping, though they were tired. They could do nothing but crouch there and think on the misfortune that had befallen them. They watched the Darkling cavort about the bottle, flying the moths like tiny kites, turning them this way and that as the mood struck. They watched, but it was different from what it had been the night before. They no longer found the demon or the bottle so wonderful a treasure.

“I think we did a terrible thing,” ventured Fillip finally, his voice a cautious, frightened whisper.

Sot looked at him. “I think so, too.”

“I think we made a very bad mistake,” Fillip went on.

“I think so, too,” said Sot again.

“I think we should never have taken the bottle,” finished Fillip.

Sot just nodded this time.

They glanced over at the Darkling, who had stopped playing with the moths and was looking intently at them.

“It might not be too late to give the bottle back to the High Lord,” suggested Fillip tentatively.

“No, it might not,” agreed Sot.

The Darkling’s eyes flared bright red in the dark, blinked once, and fixed on them.

“The High Lord might forgive us if we return the bottle,” said Fillip.

“The High Lord might be grateful,” said Sot.

“We could explain that we did not understand what we were doing,” said Fillip.

“We could tell him how sorry we were,” said Sot.

They were both sniffling a bit, wiping at their eyes and noses. The Darkling pointed once at the moths and turned them to bits of blue fire that flared and were gone.

“I do not want the High Lord to hate us,” said Fillip softly.

“Nor I,” said Sot.

“He is our friend,” said Fillip.

“Our friend,” echoed Sot.

The Darkling spun suddenly about the lip of the bottle, throwing bits of colored light all about the darkness, the light sparking and exploding in brilliant streamers. Strange images formed and faded and formed again. The G’home Gnomes watched, intrigued anew. The demon laughed and danced, and there were jewels raining down about them as flying moths crystalized and tumbled from flight.

“The bottle is so pretty,” said Fillip in awe.

“The magic is so wondrous,” sighed Sot.

“Perhaps we could keep the bottle just a bit longer,” ventured Fillip.

“Perhaps for just a day or two,” agreed Sot.

“What could it hurt?”

“What harm could there be?”

“Perhaps …”

“Maybe …”

They began and stopped talking at the same moment, turning suddenly to each other, seeing the red glare of the demon’s bright eyes reflected in their own and recoiling from it. They tightened their clasped hands and blinked with dazed incomprehension.

“I’m frightened,” said Sot, tears in his eyes.

Fillip’s voice was a wary hiss. “I don’t like the bottle anymore,” he said. “I don’t like how it makes me feel!”

Sot nodded voicelessly. The Darkling was watching them, the lights and colors and images gone back into the night. The demon hunched down on the lip of the bottle and its red eyes were slits.

“Let’s put it back in the bottle,” suggested Fillip quietly.

“Let’s,” agreed Sot.

The demon curled down into a ball and spit suddenly.

“Go away!” said Fillip bravely, making shooing motions with one hand.

“Yes, go away!” echoed Sot.

The demon hissed sharply. “Where would you have me go, masters?” it asked, a bit of a whine in its voice.

“Back into the bottle!” answered Fillip.

“Yes, into the bottle!” agreed Sot.

The demon studied them a moment longer, and then the strange spiderlike body skittered back into the bottle and was gone. Fillip and Sot reached up as one, grabbed the bottle almost frantically, and jammed the stopper back into place.

Their hands were shaking.

After a moment, they set the bottle back down again, just in front of them, hidden in leaves and twigs at the forefront of their little den. They watched it silently for a time, and then their eyes began to droop, and sleep began to steal through them.

“Tomorrow we will return the bottle to the High Lord,” murmured Fillip.

“Give it back to the High Lord,” yawned Sot.

They were asleep in moments, reassured that all would be well. Soon, their snores grew steady and their breathing deep.

Immediately, a dull red glare began to emanate from the bottle.



Sot dreamed of brightly shining jewels. He dreamed that they were falling all about him like raindrops, shimmering as they tumbled down from clouds of rainbow-lined fleece and skies of depthless blue. He sat upon a hill of fragrant grasses and wildflowers and watched them gather all about him in mounds. Sunshine shone from somewhere, warming him, and there was a sense of endless peace.

Beside him sat the bottle—his precious, wondrous bottle. It was the bottle and the Darkling locked within that made the jewels fall.

“Set me free, little master!” the Darkling pleaded suddenly, a small, frightened voice. “Please, master!”

Sot stirred within his dream, and he knew somehow that if he did as the demon had asked that the jewels that fell about him would increase in number and beauty beyond anything he could imagine. He knew that if he obeyed, the demon would give him precious things beyond all comprehension.

It all seemed so easy and right.

He reached over, still asleep, still in his dream, it seemed, and he pulled the stopper free …



It was raining when Fillip and Sot came awake again, the skies leaden and clouded over. The rain fell in great, heavy drops that splattered noisily as they struck the earth. Puddles and streams were already forming, mirrors of silver and trickles of gray. It was barely dawn, and everything in the haze of damp and new light was a shimmer of vague images and phantoms.

Coarse, gnarled hands wrenched Fillip and Sot from their slumber and dragged them roughly to their feet. The G’home Gnomes stood shivering with the cold, their weak eyes blinking in bewilderment. Bulky, dark shapes encircled them, a ring of grotesque shadows that lacked clear definition. Fillip and Sot squirmed and wriggled, trying to break free, but the hands held them fast.

One of the shapes detached itself from the ring. It bent close, a body consisting of heavy limbs, bent spine, and matted, dark hair, with a face that was almost featureless under a covering of skin like rough hide.

“Good morning, little gnomes,” the troll greeted in his rough, guttural language.

Fillip and Sot shrank back, and trolls all about them laughed with delight.

“Can’t you talk?” the speaker asked, feigning sadness.

“Let us go!” pleaded the gnomes in unison.

“But we just found you!” the other said, aggrieved now. “Must you run off so quickly? Have you somewhere to go?” A meaningful pause. “Might you be running from someone, perhaps?”

Fillip and Sot both shook their heads vigorously.

“From someone looking for this?” the troll asked slyly.

He held forth one massive hand. In that hand was their precious bottle, unstoppered once more, the Darkling dancing along its rim, withered child’s hands clapping merrily.

“The bottle is ours!” cried Fillip angrily.

“Give it back to us!” wailed Sot.

“Give it back?” the troll said in disbelief. “A thing as wonderful as this? Oh, I think not!”

Fillip and Sot kicked and fought like trapped animals, but the trolls holding them just tightened their grip. The speaker was bigger than the others and obviously in charge. He reached out suddenly with his free hand and thumped them hard on their heads to quiet them down. The force of the blows knocked them to their knees.

“It appears to me that you’ve been thieving again,” the troll continued thoughtfully. “Stealing what doesn’t belong to you.” The gnomes managed to shake their heads once more in denial, but the troll ignored them. “I think this bottle cannot belong to you. I think it must belong to someone else, and whoever that someone is, he has clearly suffered a great misfortune because of you.” He brightened. “Still, another’s misfortune need not necessarily be passed on. One man’s loss is another man’s gain, as the old saying goes. We cannot be certain whom the bottle formerly belonged to. So it seems best that it now belong to me!”

Fillip and Sot looked at each other. These trolls were scavengers, common thieves! They looked quickly to the Darkling where it danced along the neck of their precious bottle.

“Don’t let them do this!” pleaded Fillip desperately.

“Make them give you back to us!” begged Sot.

“Stop them, stop them!” they cried together.

The demon did handstands and backflips and watched them through slitted eyes that glittered redly in the haze. A bit of multicolored fire spurted to life at the end of the fingers of one hand, and it blew the fire toward them in a shower of sparks that flared, died, and turned to ashes that caused them to choke and cough and go silent again.

The troll who held the bottle looked down at the Darkling. “Do you belong to these gnomes, tiny fellow?” he asked solicitously.

The Darkling went still. “No, master. I belong only to the holder of the bottle. I belong only to you!”

“No, no!” wailed Fillip and Sot. “You belong to us!”

The other trolls laughed with glee, the sound as chill as the rain that fell all about them.

The speaker bent close. “Nothing belongs to a G’home Gnome, foolish ones! Nothing ever has and nothing ever will! You haven’t learned how to keep your possessions safe! How do you think we found you? Who do you think brought us here? Why, gnomes, it was this very creature you now call upon for help! It showered the skies with its brightly colored fire! It asked that we take it from you! It asked that it not be left your prisoner!”

The G’home Gnomes stared wordlessly, their last shred of hope gone. The Darkling—their friend, their maker of wondrous magic—had deliberately betrayed them. It had given them over to their worst enemies.

“Ho, hum,” the speaker said with a yawn. “Time to dispose of you, I think.”

The other trolls growled their assent and stamped their feet impatiently. They were growing bored with this game. Fillip and Sot struggled anew.

“What shall we do with them?” the speaker mused. He glanced about at the others. “Cut their throats and spike their heads? Pull off their fingers and toes? Bury them alive?”

Roars of approval sounded from all about, and the G’home Gnomes cringed down into small puddles of despair.

The troll leader shook his head. “No, no, I think we can do better than that!” He looked down at the cavorting demon. “Little fellow, what do you say should be done with these gnomes?”

The Darkling danced and balanced on fingers and toes, a wicked spiderlike shape clinging to the bottle’s slick surface. “They might make good feeding for the animals of the forest,” it teased.

“Ah!” the troll leader exclaimed. The others joined in a chorus of raucous approval, and the early morning stillness was filled with the sound.

So it was that Fillip and Sot were thrown to the ground, bound hand and foot with cord, hoisted feet first from a line slung over a low branch of a nearby hickory, and left to dangle with their down-turned heads some four feet above the ground.

“Not so close as to drown you in a rain wash and not so far as to prevent the scavengers from reaching you,” the speaker advised as the trolls turned away north. “Farewell, little gnomes. Keep your chins up!”

The pack laughed and shoved playfully at one another as they departed. The Darkling sat upon the speaker’s broad shoulder and looked back, eyes a blood-red glitter of satisfaction.

In moments, Fillip and Sot were left alone, hanging upside down from the hickory. They swayed gently in the wind and rain and cried.

ONE-WAY TICKET



It was raining and blowing on Ben Holiday as well as he began his day some twenty miles south of where the G’home Gnomes had been strung up by their heels. He unwrapped himself from the warmth of Willow and his sleeping gear and shivered with the early morning chill as he dressed. They were encamped within a sheltering stand of giant fir that sat back against a rocky bluff, but the damp seemed to penetrate even there. The kobolds were already up and moving about, Bunion making ready to begin scouting ahead for the fleeing gnomes. Questor staggered about sleepily, attempted to make breakfast with his magic, and succeeded in producing five live chickens that flapped about madly and a cow that scattered Parsnip’s cooking gear. Within minutes, wizard and kobold were yelling at each other irritably, and Ben was wishing he were back at Sterling Silver in the comfort and seclusion of his own bedchamber.

But there wasn’t much point in wishing for what he couldn’t have, so he consumed a stalk of Bonnie Blue and a little water, mounted Jurisdiction and set off with the others in tow. Bunion quickly went on ahead, disappearing into the shadows and half-light like some aberrant wraith. The others rode after in a line, Ben leading, Willow and Questor following, Parsnip bringing up the rear on foot with the pack animals.

They traveled in silence. It was cold, rainy, and dark, and no one felt much like talking. It was the kind of day that you wished on your enemies or, at the very worst, on yourself when you knew you were going to be comfortably settled indoors before a warm fire. It was not the kind of day in which you traveled. Ben sat atop Jurisdiction and wondered why things had to be like this. He was thoroughly discomforted within minutes of setting out. The rain gear kept the water off his body, but the damp and the chill permeated everything. His toes were numb through his boots, his fingers through his gloves. What good thoughts he might have started out with trickled away with the speed of the puddles and streams that passed underfoot.

He began brooding about his life.

Oh, sure, he liked his life well enough. He liked being King of Landover, High Lord of a fantasy realm in which mythical creatures were real and magic was a fact of existence. He liked the challenge of what he did, the diversity of its demands, the constant ebb and flow of the feelings it generated. He liked his friends, even at their worst. They were good and loyal, and they genuinely cared for one another and for him. He liked the world in which he had placed himself and would not have traded it back again for the world he had left, even in the darkest of times.

What disturbed him was how little he felt like what he was supposed to be—a King.

Jurisdiction snorted and shook his head lazily, and a shower of water flew into Ben’s face. Ben brushed it away and kicked the horse reproachfully with his boots. Jurisdiction ignored him, plodding ahead at his own pace, blinking against the rain.

Ben sighed. He just didn’t feel as if he really was a King, he told himself gloomily, picking up his train of thought. He felt that he was just playing at it, that he was filling in for the real King, someone who had been called away unexpectedly, but who would return and prove infinitely more capable than he. It wasn’t that he didn’t try to do the job right; he did. It wasn’t that he couldn’t understand its demands; he could. It was more a question of not ever being quite in control. He seemed to spend all his time trying to extract himself from situations he should have avoided in the first place. After all, look at this latest mess—Abernathy dispatched to God-knew-where, his medallion gone the same way, and now the G’home Gnomes run off with the bottle. What sort of King allowed these things to happen? He could excuse matters by arguing that events beyond his control were responsible for everything that had happened, but wasn’t it a bit ridiculous for him to try to blame everything on a sneeze?

He sighed again. Well, it most certainly was. He had to accept whatever responsibility needed accepting; that was what Kings were for, after all. But the minute he did that, he was confronted once again with that nagging sense of inadequacy—that sense that he really didn’t have a handle on things and never would.

Willow saved him from further self-degradation by riding up next to him and offering a quick smile. “You seem so alone up here,” she said.

“Alone with my thoughts.” He smiled back. “This day is depressing me.”

“You mustn’t let it,” she said. “You must keep its unpleasantness from you and make it serve your own needs. Think of how good the sunshine will feel after the rain has gone away. Think of how much better its warmth will seem.”

He rocked back slightly in his saddle, stretching. “I know. I just wish some of that sunshine and warmth would hurry up and appear.”

She looked away for a moment, then back again. “Are you worried about the gnomes and the bottle?”

He nodded. “That, Abernathy, the medallion, and a dozen other things—mostly the fact that I don’t feel like I’m doing much of a job as King. I can’t seem to get it right, Willow. I just sort of muddle around, trying things out, trying to get out of trouble I shouldn’t have gotten into in the first place.”

“Did you think it would be different from this?” Her face was shadowed and distant beneath her riding hood.

He shrugged. “I don’t know what I thought. No, that’s not so. I knew what it would be like—at least, I knew once I was here. That’s not the problem. The problem is that things keep happening that I don’t seem to have any control over. If I were a real King, an honest-to-God true King, that wouldn’t be the case, would it? Wouldn’t I be able to anticipate and prevent a few of these things from happening? Wouldn’t I be better at this?”

“Ben.” She said his name quietly and for a moment didn’t say anything more, simply riding there next to him, looking over. Then she said, “How long do you think Questor Thews has been trying to get the magic right?”

He stared at her. “What do you mean?”

“I mean that you have been a King for a much shorter time than Questor has been a wizard. Should you expect so much of yourself when you see how hard it still is for him? The truths of what we undertake in our lives are never quickly mastered. No one is born with those truths; they must always be learned.” She reached over and touched him briefly on the cheek. “Besides, was there ever a time in your life when events you could neither anticipate nor control did not intrude on your plans and disrupt them? Why should it be different now?”

He felt suddenly foolish. “It shouldn’t, I suppose. And I shouldn’t be moping about like this, I know. But it just seems that I’m not really what everyone thinks I am. I’m just … me.”

She smiled again. “That is what we all are, Ben. But it doesn’t stop others from expecting us to be more.”

He smiled back. “People should be more considerate.”

They rode on in silence, and he consigned his brooding to the back burner, concentrating instead on formulating a plan for getting the bottle back from Fillip and Sot. Morning passed steadily away, and it was nearing midday when Bunion reappeared from out of the mist.

“He has found the gnomes, High Lord,” Questor advised hurriedly after a brief conference with the tracker. “It appears that they are in some sort of trouble!”

They spurred their horses ahead and rode at a fast canter through the gloom, the rain and wind blowing into their faces as they sought to keep the elusive Bunion in sight. They passed along a ridge line and down a wash to a grassy hillock beyond. Bunion stopped them at its base and pointed.

There, halfway up, suspended head downward from an aging hickory, were Fillip and Sot. The G’home Gnomes dangled in the wind like a pair of rather bizarre pods.

“What the heck’s going on here?” demanded Ben.

He urged Jurisdiction forward, slowly, cautiously, the others following. When he was several dozen yards away, he dismounted and looked guardedly about.

“Bunion says they are alone,” Questor offered over one shoulder, his owlish face poking out of his rain cloak’s hood. “The bottle and the Darkling appear to be gone.”

“Great High Lord!” called out Fillip weakly.

“Mighty High Lord!” echoed Sot.

They sounded as if they were just about all done in, their voices a faint gurgle of rainwater and exhaustion. They were sodden and muddied and presented the most pathetic spectacle Ben had ever witnessed.

“I should just leave them there,” he muttered half to himself, thinking of the missing bottle.

It was as if they had heard him. “Don’t leave us, High Lord, please don’t leave us!” they implored as one, whining like beaten pups.

Ben was disgusted. He shook his head hopelessly, then looked at Bunion. “All right, Bunion. Cut them down.”

The kobold skittered forward, climbed the hickory, and cut the ropes suspending the gnomes. Fillip and Sot dropped headfirst into the muck. Serves them right, Ben thought darkly.

Willow hastened forward, rolled them out of the mud and water, and cut the bonds that secured their hands and feet. Gently, she helped them sit up, rubbing their wrists and ankles to help restore the circulation. The gnomes were crying like babies.

“We are so sorry, Great High Lord,” whimpered Fillip.

“We meant no harm, Mighty High Lord,” whimpered Sot.

“It was the bottle—it was so beautiful.”

“It was the creature—it could do wondrous magic things!”

“But it heard us say we would return it.”

“It made us free it in our sleep!”

“Then it brought the trolls, High Lord!”

“It used magic lights to guide them!”

“And they captured us!”

“And tied us like dogs!”

“And hung … !”

“And left … !”

Ben put his hands up quickly. “Whoa, stop! I can’t follow any of this! Just tell me what happened, all right—but slowly, please. Just tell me where the bottle is now!”

The G’home Gnomes told him everything. They dissolved into tears of repentance numerous times, but they finally got through it. Ben listened patiently, glancing once or twice at Questor and Willow, wondering for what must have been the hundredth time in the past few days why these things always seemed to happen to him.

When the gnomes were finished and lapsing once more into tears, Questor said something to Bunion, who moved away for a few moments and then returned. He spoke with the wizard, who turned to Ben.

“The trolls left several hours ago, it seems. But it is unclear where they have gone. Their tracks appear to lead off in several different directions.” Questor paused uneasily. “Apparently, the Darkling knows we are following and is using its magic to confuse us.”

Ben nodded. Hardly a surprise, he thought. Murphy’s Law was kicking into high gear. He asked Willow to do what she could to help the shaken gnomes recover, then stood up and walked away to look out into the gloom and think.

What to do?

He felt a sudden resurgence of the insecurities that had plagued him earlier. Damn! He was just not getting anywhere! The longer he spent traipsing around the countryside in search of the bottle, the farther away it seemed to get! Not to mention Abernathy and the medallion, he reminded himself bitterly. God only knew what had happened to them by this time, sent into a world where animals were simply pets and magic medallions were scorned as tools of the devil. How long could they last before something happened to them, something for which he would have to hold himself forever accountable?

He breathed the chill air to clear his thoughts and lifted his face to let the rain cool it. It was no use berating himself. It was pointless to stand there and wish that things were different, that he were more a King, or that he had a better sense of what to do about things. Just shove the insecurities and doubts back into their cubicles and keep them there, he admonished himself. Just decide what to do and do it!

“High Lord?” Questor inquired anxiously from somewhere behind him.

“In a minute,” Ben answered.

He had already decided that he was going about matters in the wrong way, that he had reversed his priorities. It was more important that he retrieve Abernathy and his medallion than it was that he retrieve the stolen bottle. It was going to take time to track down that demon and force it back into the bottle, and Abernathy simply didn’t have that kind of time. Besides, it was going to take either luck or magic to subdue the Darkling, and Ben didn’t feel he could rely on the former. He needed his medallion back.

So the problem then became, how did he get Abernathy and the medallion back without being able to switch the bottle for them?

“Questor,” he called suddenly, turning to where the others huddled in a knot beneath the hickory. He saw that Willow had gotten Fillip and Sot back to their feet and had stopped their crying. She was talking to them in a low, quiet voice, her eyes straying momentarily to find him as she heard him call.

Questor Thews shambled over quickly, tall form stooped against the wind, rainwater dripping off his hooked nose. “High Lord?”

Ben looked at him critically. “Have you sufficient magic to send me back after Abernathy? Could you employ something of the same sort of magic you used on him to send me back to wherever he is now? Or do we have to have the medallion? Is the medallion the only way?”

“High Lord …”

“Is the medallion necessary, Questor? Yes or no.”

Questor shook his head. “No. The medallion was needed only for the purpose of interacting with the magic to separate out the animal from the man in Abernathy. That was the difficult part of the incantation. Simply sending one somewhere is a relatively easy magic.”

Ben grimaced. “Please don’t say that. It always worries me when you say something involving the magic is easy. Just tell me that you can send me back after Abernathy, okay? Can you do that? No sneezing, no mistakes—just send me back in one piece, right to where he is?”

The wizard hesitated. “High Lord, I do not think this a good …”

“No editorials, Questor,” Ben interrupted quickly. “No arguments. Just answer the question.”

Questor rubbed his rain-drenched beard, tugged his ear, and sighed. “The answer is yes, High Lord.”

“Good. That’s what I wanted to hear.”

“But …”

“But?”

“But I can only send you there; I cannot bring you back again.” Questor shrugged helplessly. “That is all I have been able to learn of that particular magic. After all, if I knew more, I could simply bring Abernathy and the medallion back myself, couldn’t I?”

True enough, Ben thought dismally. Well, you take your chances in this world, just like you do in any other.

“High Lord, I really wish you would think this …”

Ben brought his finger up quickly and made a hushing sound. “Just give me a moment to consider this, Questor. Please?”

He glanced away into the gloom once more. If he did this thing, it meant that he couldn’t come back again unless he regained the medallion. He would have to stay in his old world, whatever happened, until he could locate it. This all presumed, of course, that Questor could get the magic right this time and actually send him where he was supposed to go and not to some other place and point in time.

He looked back at the wizard, studying the owlish face. Questor Thews. Wizard at large. He would have to leave Questor in control of Landover’s affairs. That was a pretty scary proposition all by itself. He had allowed Questor to act in his place once before when he had been forced to return to his old world, but he had only been gone three days. He was likely to be gone much longer this time out. Maybe forever.

On the other hand, who else could he trust to assume the duties of the throne? Not Kallendbor or any of the other Lords of the Greensward. Not the River Master and his lake country fairies. Certainly not Nightshade, the witch of the Deep Fell. Willow, perhaps? He thought about that a moment. Willow would defer to Questor, he decided. Besides, Questor’s confidence in himself would be shattered if he were not named ruler in Ben’s absence. The Court Wizard was supposed to be the second most powerful figure in the monarchical structure.

Supposed to be. Those were the operative words, of course, Ben thought wryly. The truth of the matter might be something else altogether.

Well, Questor Thews had been a friend to him when he had no others. Questor had stood by him when it seemed foolish for anyone to do so. Questor had done everything asked of him and more. Maybe it was time to repay his loyalty with a little trust.

He brought his hands up to the narrow shoulders and gripped them firmly. “I’ve decided,” he said quietly. “I want you to do it, Questor. I want you to send me back.”

He kept the other’s gaze locked onto his own, waiting. Questor Thews hesitated once more, then nodded. “Yes, High Lord. If you wish.”

Ben walked him back to where the others waited and gathered them about. Fillip and Sot started to sob again, but he quickly quieted them with assurances that all was forgiven. Bunion and Parsnip hunched down against the trunk of the old hickory, their gnarled bodies glistening wetly. Willow stood apart, an uneasy look to her. She had seen something she didn’t like in Ben’s eyes.

“I have asked Questor to use the magic to send me after Abernathy,” Ben announced brusquely. “He has agreed to do so.” He avoided Willow’s startled eyes. “I have to do what I can to help Abernathy and to regain possession of the medallion. When I have done that, I’ll come back to you.”

“Oh, Great High Lord!” cried Fillip dismally.

“Mighty High Lord!” sobbed Sot.

“We are so sorry, High Lord!”

“Oh, yes, we are!”

Ben patted them on the head. “Questor will assume the duties of the throne in my absence. I want you all to do your best to help him.” He paused and looked directly at his Court Wizard. “Questor, I want you to continue to try to find a way to get the Darkling back into the bottle. That little monster is too dangerous to be allowed to remain loose. See if Kallendbor or the River Master will agree to help you. But be careful.”

Questor nodded wordlessly. The others continued to stare at him, waiting.

“I guess that’s all I have to say,” he finished.

Willow came right up to him then, the determination in her face unmistakable. “I am going with you, Ben.”

“Oh, no.” Ben shook his head quickly. “That would be much too dangerous. I could be trapped over there, Willow. I might never get back. If you were with me, you would be trapped there as well.”

“Which is why I must go with you, Ben. I cannot risk that you might be separated from me forever. What happens to you happens to me as well. We are one person, Ben. It was foretold by the weaving of the flowers in the garden where I was conceived. Even the Earth Mother knows of it.” She took his hand in her own. “Do you remember her admonishment to you? Do you remember what she said?” She waited until he nodded yes. He had forgotten about the Earth Mother—that strange elemental who aided them in their search for the black unicorn. Willow’s hand tightened suddenly. “You are to be my protector; that was what she said. But, Ben, I must be your protector as well. I must be because if I am not, then my love for you is meaningless. There is no argument that you can offer that will dissuade me. I am going with you.”

He stared at her, so in love with her in that instant that he could scarcely believe it. She was so much a part of him. It had happened almost without his realizing it, a gradual strengthening of ties, a binding of feelings and emotions, a joining of their lives. He recognized the truth of it and marveled in his recognition that such a thing could be.

“Willow, I …”

“No, Ben.” She put a finger to his lips, and her beautiful, flawless face lifted to kiss his own. “It is decided.”

Ben kissed her back and held her. He guessed it was.



He decided that they would depart at once.

He had Questor use the magic to outfit them both in jogging suits and Nikes, giving Willow a sweatband to hold back her long hair and sunglasses to help mask her startling eyes. There was nothing he could do about her green complexion; he wouldn’t risk allowing Questor to try anything with magic. They would simply have to make something up if there were questions. He had the wizard conjure up some folding money so he could pay whatever expenses he might incur while trying to find Abernathy. He hoped there wouldn’t be any, of course. He hoped he would find his missing scribe and the medallion right off the bat. But he doubted that he would be that lucky. He hadn’t been very lucky so far in trying to straighten out this mess.

Questor did a superior job of suiting them up in the sweats and running shoes, right down to the appropriate logos. He did yeoman work on the money as well; it felt like the real thing. It was fortunate, Ben thought, that he had shown the wizard some samples on earlier occasions. He gave the money a hasty glance and shoved it down into his pocket.

“And, Questor, you’d better spell Willow to speak English when we get there,” he added.

Willow came over to stand next to him, her slim arms wrapping about his waist to hold him. He wanted to ask her once more if she was still certain about going with him, but he didn’t. Such a question was pointless now.

“Ready, Questor,” he announced. He glanced doubtfully at the gloom and damp that surrounded them, a gray and misty haze. He looked down through the wash to the grasslands beyond, to the hills and forests. He wished he could see it all in a better light, in sunshine, in bright color. He wanted to remember it all. He was afraid he would never see it again.

Questor Thews moved the others behind him, back against the trunk of the hickory. The kobolds were grinning fiercely, the gnomes whining as if they were about to be strung up again. Questor shoved back the sleeves of his robes and lifted his hands.

“Be careful,” Ben said quietly, his arms tightening about Willow.

The wizard nodded. “Good luck to you, High Lord.”

He began the incantation, the magic words spilling out in a steady stream of meaningless rhetoric. Then came the gestures, the appearance of the silver dust, and the coming of the light. Rain and gloom faded, taking with them the kobolds and the gnomes, then Questor Thews as well. Ben and Willow were alone, holding each other close.

“I love you, Ben,” he heard the sylph say.

Then everything disappeared in a flash of light, and they closed their eyes tight against its brilliance.



They drifted for a time, a long, slow drifting that lacked direction or focus, the sort of drifting one sometimes experiences when sleep grows into gradual wakening. Then the light grew less intense, the drifting stopped, and the world about them grew distinct again.

They were standing on a street corner in a city, the air filled with the sounds of cars and people. Willow clung to Ben, burying her face in his shoulder, clearly frightened. Ben looked quickly about, shaken himself by the sudden rush of noise.

Good heavens, it was hot! It was as if it were the middle of summer instead of fall! But that couldn’t be …

“Holy mackerel!” he breathed.

He knew exactly where he was. He would have known whatever the circumstances of his being there.

He was right in the middle of the Las Vegas strip.

CASTLES AND CAGES



Questor Thews stared thoughtfully at the empty space that had been occupied by Ben Holiday and Willow only seconds before, then rubbed his hands together in satisfaction and said, “Well, I believe they are safely on their way.”

Bunion and Parsnip came forward, peered at the emptiness, and hissed their agreement. Their teeth showed and their yellow eyes blinked like signal lamps.

“Great High Lord,” whimpered Fillip from somewhere in the shadows behind them.

“Mighty High Lord,” whimpered Sot.

“Come, come! The High Lord is safe and sound,” Questor assured them, wondering briefly if he had remembered correctly all the words and gestures to the part of the incantation having to do with the place to which he had sent them. Yes, he was certain that he had. Reasonably certain, at any rate.

“Got to concentrate on dealing with matters here,” he announced, mostly to himself. “Hmmmmmm. Let me see.”

He straightened himself beneath his robes, tugged on his beard, and peered out into the gloom. It was still raining heavily, the drops spattering into ever-widening puddles and streams that interlocked across the whole of the landscape as far as he could see. Clouds hung low against the horizon, and the day seemed to be growing darker. The haze of mist that had shrouded the valley since dawn was thickening.

Questor frowned. It would be a perfectly reasonable decision to return to Sterling Silver here and now and forget about chasing after that confounded demon.

On the other hand, there was nothing waiting at Sterling Silver that wouldn’t keep a few days more—and he had promised the High Lord that he would do his best to retrieve the bottle. Although he didn’t care to dwell on it, he knew he was at least partially responsible for the bottle being in Landover in the first place; therefore, he should do his best to set matters right again—especially since the High Lord had placed such great trust in him.

“I think, perhaps, that we should continue our hunt,” he declared. “Bunion? Parsnip? Shall we keep after the Darkling a little while longer?”

The kobolds glanced at each other and hissed their approval.

“Excellent!” Questor turned to the G’home Gnomes. “I should be less charitable with you than was the High Lord, Fillip and Sot, if the choice were mine. Still, all was forgiven, so you are free to go.”

Fillip and Sot stopped whimpering and shivering long enough to glance about at the gray, empty landscape and then at each other. Their eyes were wide and frightened.

“Good and kind Questor Thews!” said Fillip.

“Wondrous wizard!” declared Sot.

“We will stay with you!”

“We will give you our help!”

“Please let us stay?”

“Please?”

Questor Thews looked down at them with undisguised suspicion. The gnomes were asking to stay only because they were afraid of being left alone come nightfall with the Darkling still on the loose. He hesitated, then shrugged. Well, after all, what could you expect of G’home Gnomes?

“Just be sure you stay out of the way if we come across the trolls and that bottle,” he admonished sternly.

The gnomes could not agree quickly enough, falling all over each other in their efforts to assure him that such would be the case. Questor had to smile in spite of himself. He was quite certain they were telling the truth on this occasion.

So they struck out north through the weather, Bunion sweeping the land ahead in an effort to pick up some true sign of the trolls’ passing, Questor and the others trailing after at a slower pace. Questor rode his old gray, letting Parsnip and the gnomes follow afoot, with Parsnip leading Jurisdiction, Willow’s mount, and the pack animals. The rain continued to fall steadily, its gray haze mingling with the mist to wrap the land in ribbons of shadow. Daylight faded as nightfall approached, and still there was no sign of the trolls.

Bunion returned at sunset, and the company made camp within a gathering of rain-drenched cyprus along a river whose swollen waters churned by in sluggish, monotonous cadence. It was relatively dry beneath the great, hanging limbs, and Questor was able to produce a small, cheerful fire by using his magic. Parsnip cooked a delightful dinner which was quickly consumed. Then, buoyed by his earlier success, Questor employed the magic once more to produce blankets and pillows. He would have done better to let well enough alone, but he decided to try one last incantation, a spell that would have produced an enclosed, heated, waterproof shelter complete with bath. The effort failed abysmally. One of the trees actually toppled over on the spot, allowing the rain to douse the fire and leaving the entire company exposed to the weather. They were forced to move their camp farther back within the remaining trees, salvaging what they could of the now-dampened blankets and pillows, and that was that.

Questor apologized profusely, but the damage was nevertheless done and couldn’t be undone. It was most embarrassing. While the others slept, Questor Thews lay awake within his blankets and thought long and hard about the vicissitudes of a wizard’s life. Teaching oneself reliable use of the magic was not an easy task, he lamented. Nevertheless, he must do so. After all, he stood now in the shoes of the High Lord and he was responsible for the well-being of all Landover.

Daybreak brought more rain. The dawn was iron gray and thick with mist stirred by sluggish winds and a mix of cool air and warm earth. The little company ate breakfast and struck out once more across the grasslands of the Greensward. Bunion roamed ahead, still searching for some sign of the trolls, while the rest followed at a slower pace. Everyone was soaked through and thoroughly discomforted. Questor thought briefly to dry them off with the magic, then decided against it. He had resolved during the night not to employ the magic again except when he could be certain of its results or in time of desperate need. He would conserve himself; he would focus his concentration on specific and limited conjuring. That way, he felt, he would be at his best.

Midday came and went. They were well into the grasslands by now, far north and east of Sterling Silver, deep in the country of the Lords of the Greensward. Plowed fields decorated the landscape in checkerboard fashion, most of the crops taken from them now, the earth black and hard looking. Farm buildings and cottages were scattered about, brightened by gardens and hedgerows blooming with flowers of all colors and shapes, rainbow streaks across the rain-swept, gray land.

Questor’s eyes surveyed the misted countryside. Less than a dozen miles distant was Rhyndweir, the fortress castle of Kallendbor, the most powerful of the Lords of the Greensward. The wizard permitted himself a small sigh of expectation. Tonight, he promised himself, they would sleep beneath a dry roof, in dry beds, with steaming baths to remove all memory of the damp and the chill.

It was nearing midafternoon when Bunion abruptly appeared from out of the haze, his hard, dark body glistening with the wet. He approached at something very close to a run—unusual for him—and spoke hurriedly to Questor, his breath hissing from between his sharp teeth, his eyes narrowed and furtive.

The wizard caught his breath. Bunion had found the trolls—but not as any of them had imagined.

The company pressed at a quicker pace, Questor saying nothing to the others yet, still stunned by what Bunion had told him. They passed across a series of fields and a small, quick-flowing stream into a stretch of timber.

The trolls lay in a clearing, amid a close gathering of pine, dead to a man. They were sprawled on the rain-drenched earth in grotesque positions, throats cut, bodies stabbed, tangled together in an orgy of death. The G’home Gnomes took one look and shrank back behind the pack animals, whining in fear. Even Parsnip shied away. Questor went forward with Bunion because it was expected. Bunion whispered again what he had whispered earlier. This tragedy had not been caused by some third party. The trolls had evidently set upon themselves. They had killed one another.

Questor listened patiently and said nothing, but he knew what had happened. He had seen the Darkling’s work before. The chill of the day worked into him more deeply. He was suddenly very frightened.

Bunion pointed ahead into the gloom. One of the trolls had escaped the massacre. One had survived, wounded, and staggered ahead into the woods. That one had taken the bottle.

“Oh, dear,” Questor Thews murmured.

The wounded troll was heading directly for Rhyndweir.



Abernathy!”

The scribe lifted his head from the straw matting on which he lay to peer into the near-blackness beyond. “Elizabeth?”

She appeared out of the shadows of an alcove set into the far wall, slipping through a break in the stone that he could have sworn hadn’t been there a moment before. She crossed the dungeon passageway on tiptoe and put her face up against the bars of his cage. Abernathy, unable to stand erect in the small enclosure, crawled over on all fours to greet her. He could just make out the roundish face with its scattering of nose freckles.

“Sorry I couldn’t come sooner,” she whispered, glancing left and right cautiously. “I couldn’t chance trying. I couldn’t let my dad or Michel know I cared about what happened to you or they might have been suspicious. I think Michel already is.”

Abernathy nodded, grateful that she had come at all. “How did you get in here, Elizabeth?”

“Through a secret passage!” She grinned. “Right there!” She pointed behind her to the break in the wall, a seam of light still faintly visible against the black. “I found it months ago when I was exploring. I doubt anyone else even knows that it’s there. It leads all up and down the south wall.” She hesitated. “I didn’t know how to get to you at first. I didn’t even know where you’d be. I just found out this afternoon.”

“This afternoon? Is it night, then?” Abernathy asked. He had lost all track of time.

“Yep. Almost bedtime, so I have to hurry. Here, I brought you something to eat.”

He saw then that she was carrying a paper bag. She reached into it and produced several sandwiches, some raw vegetables, fresh fruit, a bag of potato chips, and a small container of cold milk.

“Elizabeth!” he breathed gratefully.

She passed the items through, and he tucked them into the straw to hide them—all but the first sandwich, which he began to devour hungrily. He hadn’t been given anything to eat but stale dog food and a little water in almost three days now, the time that he had been imprisoned there. He had been shut away in the bowels of Graum Wythe, ignored except for periodic visits from his uncommunicative jailers, who either came to make certain he was still there or to give him his rations. He hadn’t seen sunlight the entire time. He hadn’t seen Michel Ard Rhi, either.

“How are you, Abernathy?” Elizabeth asked as he ate. “Are you all right? They didn’t hurt you, did they?”

He shook his head and continued to chew. Ham and cheese—one of his favorites.

“I talked to my father about you a little bit,” she ventured after a moment. Then she added hastily, “I didn’t tell him about you and me, though. I just told him that I had found you wandering about and Michel didn’t seem to like you and I was worried about you. I told him I thought it was wrong. He agreed, but he said he couldn’t do anything. He said I knew better than to get involved with strays in the first place, that I knew how Michel was. I said sometimes you had to get involved.”

She hunched down thoughtfully. “I know you aren’t being given any food. I found out from one of the guards, a sort of friend.” She bit her lip. “Why is Michel doing this to you, Abernathy? Why is he being so mean? Does he still hate you so much?”

Abernathy stopped chewing, swallowed, and lowered what remained of the sandwich. He couldn’t have eaten it at all if he hadn’t been so hungry. His cage smelled of sick animals and excrement, and the walls were dark with mold.

“It’s simple, really—he wants something from me.” He decided it couldn’t hurt to tell her the truth now. “He wants this medallion I am wearing. But he cannot take it from me. I have to give it to him. So he has locked me away down here until I agree to give it up.” He brushed some straw from his muzzle with one paw. “But the medallion isn’t his; it isn’t even mine. It was just loaned to me, and I have to return it to its owner.”

He thought, for the first time in quite a while now, about the High Lord and the problems he faced in Landover without the medallion to protect him. Then he sighed and began eating again.

Elizabeth looked at him a moment, then nodded slowly. “I talked to Nita Coles about you today. We’re friends again, see. She explained all about Tommy Samuelson and said she was sorry. Anyway, I told her about you, ’cause we tell each other everything. But we keep it all secret. Most of the time, anyway. This was a sworn, double-locked finger secret, so neither of us can tell anyone or we’ll have seven years bad luck and Tad Russell for a husband for life! She says you can’t be real, of course, but I told her you were and that you needed us to help. So she said she would think about it, and I said I’d think about it, too.”

She paused. “We’ve got to get you out of here, Abernathy.”

Abernathy pushed the last of the sandwich into his mouth and shook his head vehemently. “No, no, Elizabeth, it’s gotten much too dangerous for you to try to help me anymore. If Michel finds out …”

“I know, I know,” she interrupted. “But I can’t keep sneaking food down to you like this. Michel is going to figure out that you’re not starving or anything, that someone’s feeding you. And how will you get out of here if I don’t help you?”

Abernathy sighed. “I’ll find a way,” he insisted stubbornly.

“No, you won’t,” Elizabeth declared, just as stubborn. “You’ll just be down here in this cage forever!”

There was a sudden barking from somewhere down the hallway through a closed door. Abernathy and Elizabeth both turned to look, freezing into motionless statues. The barking lasted only a few seconds and died away.

“Real dogs,” Abernathy whispered after a moment. “Michel keeps them locked away down here, poor things. I don’t even want to speculate why. I hear them cry out sometimes, calling. I can understand something of what they are saying …”

He trailed off, distracted. Then he looked quickly back at the girl. “You have to stay out of this, Elizabeth,” he insisted. “Michel Ard Rhi is very dangerous. He would hurt you if he knew what you were doing—even if he suspected! It wouldn’t make any difference to him that you were a little girl. He would hurt you anyway—maybe your father, too, for that matter.”

There was immediate concern reflected in her eyes when he mentioned the danger to her father. He felt bad about suggesting such a thing, but he had to make certain that she did not take any further chances on his account. He knew what Michel Ard Rhi could be like.

Elizabeth was studying him intently. “Why do you try to scare me like that, Abernathy?” she asked suddenly, almost as if she could read his mind. “You are trying to scare me, aren’t you?”

She made it a statement of fact. “Yes, of course I am, Elizabeth,” he answered immediately. “And you should be scared. This isn’t a game for children!”

“Just for dogs and wizards, I suppose!” she snapped back angrily.

“Elizabeth …”

“Don’t try to make up to me!” There was hurt now in her eyes. “I am not a child, Abernathy! You shouldn’t call me one!”

“I was just trying to make a point. I think you would …”

“How are you going to get out of here without me?” she demanded again, cutting him short.

“There are certainly ways that …”

“There are? How? Name one. Just one. Tell me how you’re going to get out. Go on, tell me!”

He took a deep breath, his strength deserting him. “I don’t know,” he admitted wearily.

She nodded in satisfaction. “Do you still like me, Abernathy?”

“Yes, of course I do, Elizabeth.”

“And would you help me if I needed helping, no matter what?”

“Yes, of course.”

She bent forward against the bars of the cage until her nose was only inches from his. “Well, that’s how I feel about you, too! That’s why I can’t just leave you here!”

The dogs began barking again, more insistent this time, and someone yelled at them to shut up. Elizabeth began backing away toward the alcove.

“Finish your food so you’ll stay strong, Abernathy!” she whispered hurriedly. “Shhh, shhhh!” she cautioned when he tried to speak. “Just be patient! I’ll find a way to get you out!”

She paused halfway through the break in the wall, a slight shadow in the half-light. “Don’t worry, Abernathy! It’ll be all right!”

Then she was gone, the break disappearing once more into blackness.

The barking down the hall was punctuated by several sharp yelps and then faded slowly into silence. Abernathy listened for a time, then pulled out the medallion from beneath his tunic, and studied it silently.

He was scared to death for Elizabeth. He wished he knew what to do about her. He wished he could find some way to protect her.

After a time, he put the medallion back in place again. Then he uncovered the rest of his food and slowly began to eat.