Castle Dreams (17 page)

“Which is?"

“The tunnel leading out to the plain."

“The one they use as a loading dock? We don't know if it really exists."

“It must. It's the only way to get anything big into the mine."

“But why wouldn't they be guarding that, too?"

“Because it's a hidden entrance and the inner door is probably huge and impregnable. But we can blast through it from this side."

“With the nukes? Jeez. Okay, I'm game. But which level?"

“We'll have to try them all. But my instincts say down."

“Right."

They reversed direction, increasing their pace a bit, trying to keep the stairway from vibrating with their footsteps. The walls of the shaft were of striated rock, smoothly bored. Gene wondered what high-tech marvel had sliced through solid rock like so much cheese. Lasers, probably, but maybe something better. Particle beams. Gamma-wave lasers?

Another landing below. Gene descended the last few steps and approached the door cautiously. He put his ear to it.

Sativa stood behind him and waited.

He took his time. At last he straightened up and looked at her.

“I'm going to risk a peek."

He grasped the handle, pressed the thumb tab, and pulled. He eased the door out of its jamb until a crack of darkness appeared. A draught of cooler air flowed to his face.

He listened. Then he widened the crack a hair and peeked.

The tunnel was empty except for more crates of armaments. He heard nothing. After waiting at least a quarter-minute, he opened the door and stepped out. He raised his weapon.

“Are you sure you can use that thing?” she asked.

“Are you sure you're a good teacher? I pushed all the right buttons."

“But the safety's on."

He glanced down. “Oh.” He flipped the tiny lever the other way. “Thanks."

“Think nothing of it. Which way, do you think?"

“My sense of direction is fairly good. I'd say the other side of the mountain is to the left."

“Check."

Gene shut the door carefully, and darkness, except for Saliva's greenish glow, returned.

She touched something on her suit and the light cut out. They stood in complete darkness for a time, listening.

Silence.

Before long the strips along the front of her suit began glowing again.

“There is a proper light on this thing,” she said. “But I've been reluctant to use it."

An intense beam shot from the region of her right shoulder and made a tight circle on the wall. She fiddled with a control until the circle widened.

“Little photon-shooter. I shouldn't be doing this, though.” She shut it off. “Their sensors can pick up the tiniest bit of trace radiation."

The intensity had hurt Gene's eyes, and now the light's absence blinded him. But his heightened sensitivity returned quickly and soon he was navigating quite well by the weak halo of the strips.

More war materiel. These crates were bigger and there seemed to be more of them.

They walked on, carefully checking all directions at each intersection. Gene imagined himself having a sixth sense, sending out feelers into the darkness. It wasn't magic—he hadn't a magic spell for that—but he hoped there were enough remnants of the facilitation spell to give his imaginings some force. Nothing tickled his feelers yet, but he was getting a tingly feeling from them.

He stopped.

“Did you hear something?” He looked back.

“Um, no. Did you?"

“I thought."

They waited briefly, ears cocked.

“Must have kicked a pebble or something,” he said.

They moved on.

Saliva pulled him close and whispered, “We'd better keep our voices down."

“Right, sorry."

Their footsteps were oddly muffled in the silence. Porous rock absorbing sound? Perhaps it was the kind of absolute silence that is overwhelmed by the body's own interior noise: heartbeat, the rush of blood, the creak of bone. The same way that the mine's utter darkness revealed spectral shapes and flashes—the random, stray firing of light-receptor cells in the retina.

It was not long before they heard a rumbling sound nearby, as of huge doors rolling back.

Sativa grabbed his arm and squeezed.

They retreated from the sound of the freight elevator, retracing their steps. They reached the door of the escape shaft. Gene opened it.

There came sounds of voices below. From high above, the unmistakable vibrating thud of heavy boots on the stairs.

“We're stuck, unless we find another shaft,” he said. “Looks like we're going to be making that desperate last stand you mentioned."

They ran off into the darkness, made a few turns, and raced down a tunnel.

Another dead end. They skidded to a stop.

“You can give yourself up,” Sativa said.

“So they can thank me and then kill me?"

“There's the chance they'd let you go."

“Back to my magic kingdom? Yeah, they'd believe that, all right."

“If it's real,” she said, “you could prove it."

“I don't want them in my world. Besides, it doesn't work like that. I could show them the portal, and they might not even be able to perceive it, let alone go through it. That's the way it works. That's what keeps my world safe from wholesale invasion. Most of the time, anyway. We do get retail now and then."

“In any event, it doesn't matter.” She let out a breath. “I might as well tell you. I've been dropping nuclear grenades, a few dozen of them."

“Oh? Charming. Time-fused, I suppose, to go off ... When, exactly?"

She checked a digital readout on the left sleeve of the suit.

“We have very little time."

Twenty One

 

 

 

 

ALECTO WHARF

 

She was a little schooner, two-masted, patched sails and all, bulky and awkward as the worst of them. She didn't sail well to windward, he was told. Best to wait for a beam or following wind; but the wind didn't ordinarily oblige in the environs of Port of Dreams. He wouldn't wait, being too eager to get under way. He'd take her out on the tide.

The sky was dark, as it always was. But in the “morning hours” there was sometimes a sense that the dark roof had lifted. This was such a morning. The first morning of his eternity.

He stood astride the foredeck. He was the skipper. He even had a crew, four deckhands to pull the jib sheets and lash the boom and do the complete nautical thing.

“Do the complete nautical thing,” he commanded.

“Aye, aye, sir.” The one in front saluted with two fingers and turned to the crew.

“You heard ‘im!"

They fanned out to do their various appointed tasks. They busied themselves with jib tack, mainsail lashing, shrouds and gaff jaws; with jib hanks and jib halyard and mainsail halyard; with burgee, peak, sail battens and pockets; with leech boom mainsheet and lifting rudder; tiller, extension, fairlead, and jib sheets; daggerboard, thwart, gooseneck, and tack; kicking strap, luff, mooring cleats, and pushpit.

“Bend on the sails!"

“Clip jib hanks on the forestay!"

“Attach the halyards!"

“Hoist the mainsail!"

“Tighten the boom vang!"

“The boomerang?"

“No, you pinhead. The boom vang!"

“Oh."

He watched appreciatively. They were a good crew. They were his, crew. They were charging him a mint.

But they were worth it (they had told him). Boom vangs aside, they knew their mooring cleats from their cockpits, their foresail winches from their backstays, their steering compasses from their halyard winch and cleats. And, boy, did they know from tack downhaul, kicking strap, mainsheet, clew outhaul, topping lift, boom, tack, reefing points, leech, spreader, foresail hanks, shrouds, inner forestay, stanchion, toe rail, and fin keel!
¹
These guys, like,
knew
all that stuff....

[
^1.
The author has obviously skimmed a few books on nautical lore and just as obviously does not know what any of these terms mean.]

 

A wind was rising, and the rivers flowed....

(There was more than one river emptying into the Bay of Desires; in fact, the Bay was the confluence of no less than six rivers, making it the biggest fresh-water estuary in the afterworld. Rather, in this particular afterworld.)

The waters of the bay churned and boiled. The land fell away behind them. The roof of the sky lifted to a milky crepuscular darkness. Choppy waves thumped against the hull, and freshwater spray blessed their faces. They sailed on a close reach to the wind.

“We're under way, sir!"

“I noticed. Course, due west. Into the sun. Which there isn't."

“I noticed, sir."

“I'll brook no impertinence!"

“Sorry, sir."

“Or it's the crow's nest for you, swab."

“Sir, we have no crow's nest. This is a yacht, more or less."

“Well, see that you keep a respectful tongue in your head, or I'll clap you in irons and throw you in the brig."

“We have no brig, sir."

“Oh, shut up. Get below and brew me some coffee."

The shipyards boasted all manner of sailing craft. Many were of ancient design. There were barks and barges, galleys and longboats; but he had preferred a classic vessel from the zenith of the epoch of sail—humble as she was an example.

“Gods! I need a name for this ship."

He'd quite forgotten.

“The
Perilous
will be her name,” he announced to the crew.

He had no idea why he'd chosen it.

“Good name, sir. Uh ... though not exactly felicitous. Sailors are a suspicious lot. Could be trouble with the crew."

“Screw ‘em if they can't take a joke."

“Aye, sir. Sir, did you get up on the wrong side of the hammock this morning?"

“Something's wrong with this whole deal. It's wearing thin."

“What's wearing thin, sir?"

“This afterlife. It's silly. For another thing, I don't belong here."

“You don't, sir? Where do you belong?"

“In another universe. This one ... well, it—"

“It sucks, sir. Yes, many of the departed say that."

“You agree?"

“Well, sir, it's just a job to me. I'm not mortal, so I really don't know what death is. I should think it'd be a bit of nasty business, sir. Not pleasant, I assume."

“It could suck a bowling ball through fifty feet of garden hose."

“Striking image, sir."

“Thank you. But something tells me that I just don't belong in this cosmos. Something's wrong. Something's out of whack."

“Couldn't help you, sir."

“No, I guess you couldn't. Where's that coffee, by the way?"

“Steward's coming with it, sir."

“I smell salt!"

“There she lies, sir, dead ahead. The open sea."

“The Sea of Oblivion!"

The skipper took deep gulps of salt air. Above, a lone gull circled.

Or was it an albatross?

“What's out there?"

“We'll soon find out, sir."

“I cannot rest from travel; I will drink life to the lees."

“This isn't life, sir."

“Be quiet for a minute. All times I have enjoyed greatly, have suffered greatly, both with those that loved me, and alone; on shore, and when through scudding drifts the rainy Hyades vexed the dim sea."

“Nicely put, sir."

“Thanks. I read it in a fortune cookie."

“Do tell."

“Where's that damned coffee, Telemachus?"

“Here it is, sir!"

The steward gave him a steaming cup. He took it and drank. It burned his tongue gratifyingly.

“And may there be no moaning of the bar when I put out to sea."
²

[
^2.
From a poem by Geraldo Rivera. The quotation preceding is from a poem by Burt Reynolds.]

Clouds gathered, blotting out the lightening sky. Darkness hovered. They sailed past the last spit of sand that stood between the estuary and the sea. The great foaming waters wailed against it in the darkness.

“So much for the no-moaning thing."

“Don't take too much stock in omens, sir."

“Right."

The
Perilous
sailed on into deepest night.

 

 

 

 

MALNOVIA

 

The sign above the door was in strange script but he knew it read:

 

UNITED BROTHERHOOD OF MAGICIANS  
LOCAL 218

 

There was no handle on the door. No knocker either. The door was starkly imposing, painted a shiny black.

Trent ran his hand over the surface. Smooth, very smooth. And vibrating. The tension was incredible.

He backed away from the entrance and surveyed the front of the building. It was undistinguished, slate-roofed and sheathed in rough stone. A cozy little building of three stories and a garret. Quaint dormers with peaked gables. Very sedate.

He approached the door again and knocked once. There came the suggestion of a vast, echoing interior.

“Okay,” Trent said.

He stepped back again, looked the place up and down a second time.

Then, suddenly, he spun once around, cape billowing, arms raised, and went into a dramatic stance, a configuration of power that conducted energy down from the ether, through his arms and into his hands. Power flowed out the ends of his fingers and shot straight at the shiny black barrier of the door.

The door flew open with a bang.

“Right."

Trent noticed that several people had stopped along the street to stare. He smiled, waved. They all hurried away.

He shrugged, then turned to regard the interior. It was dim. He walked to the door and looked in. A narrow corridor went off to the left an oddly long distance before it made an L. There was only the left turn, one way to go. He glanced outside and compared the dimensions of the building to the apparent length of the corridor. There was a disorienting mismatch.

“Neat trick."

He entered and began walking along the dark corridor toward the corner. He had gone only a half-dozen steps before the door slammed violently, shutting out all light and sound from the outside world.