Chapter 11: Disaster.

"Zombies ahoy!" a centaur cried, pointing east.

There they were, at last: the zombies standing at the edge of the forest, beyond the milling goblins. The dragon-stomach smoke had obliterated the monstrous mound of goblins at the north wall, but that effect was abating now, and they were surging back from the east and west wings. Either the newly encroaching goblins would be dissolved also, in which case the region wasn't safe for zombies either, or they wouldn't, in which case the zombies couldn't pass there. So how could the Zombie Master get through?

"The Zombie Master must get to the Castle, where he can set up his magical laboratory and work undistracted," Dor said. "Now that we have him in sight, there just has to be a way."

"Yes, I believe at this stage it would tip the balance," King Roogna agreed. "But the problem of transport still seems insuperable. It is difficult enough keeping the monsters outside the Castle; anything beyond the ramparts becomes prohibitive."

"If we believe that, so must they," Dor said. "Maybe we could surprise them. Cedric--would you join me in a dangerous mission?"

"Yes," the centaur said--immediately.

The King glanced at him, mildly surprised at the change in attitude. Evidently Dor had done better with the centaurs than Roogna had expected.

"I want to take the King's flute and lure away the creatures from the vicinity of the zombies, to someplace where we can safely detonate the forget spell. That will stop the goblins from coming back here in time to interfere with the Zombie Master. Could you hold the magic hoop in such a way as to make any airborne attackers pass through it, while outrunning groundborne attacks?"

"I am a centaur!" Cedric said. Answer enough.

"Now really," the King said. "This is a highly risky venture!"

"So is doing nothing," Dor said. "The goblins are still mounding up at the other walls; before the day is out they will be coming over the top, and you have no more dragon juice to melt them down. We've got to have the zombies!"

Magician Murphy had come up again. "You are courting disaster," he said. "I respect your courage, Dor--but I must urge you not to go out so foolishly into the goblin horde."

"Listen, snotwing--" Cedric started.

Dor cut him off. "If you really cared, Magician, you would abate the curse. Is your real objection that you fear this ploy can succeed?"

The enemy Magician was silent.

"You'll need someone to lead the zombies in," Vadne said.

"Well, I thought maybe Jumper--"

"The big spider? You'd better have him with you, protecting your flank," she said. "I will guide the zombies in."

"That is very generous of you," Dor said, gratified. "You can transform any creature that gets through the zombie lines. The Zombie Master himself is the one who must be protected; get as close to him as you can and--"

"I shall. Let's get this mission going before it is too late."

The King and Magician Murphy both shook their heads with resignation, seeming strangely similar. But Roogna fetched the flute and the forget spell. They organized at the main gate. Dor mounted Cedric, Jumper joined him and bound him securely in place with silk, and Vadne mounted another centaur. The remaining centaurs of the north wall disposed themselves along the east wall, bows ready. Then the small party charged out into the melee of goblins and harpies.

There was a withering fire from the wall, as the centaurs shot fire arrows and the goblins, trolls, gnomes, and ghouls withered. It cleared a temporary path through the thickest throng. Cherry bombs and pineapples were still bombarding the allied army. This didn't seem to faze the goblins or their cohorts, but it made Dor extremely nervous. Suppose a pineapple were to land in his vicinity? He would be smithereened! And, considering Murphy's curse--

"Change course!" he screamed.

Startled, Cedric jounced to the side, through a contingent of elves. There was an explosion ahead of them. Shrapnel whizzed by Dor's nose, and the concussion hurt his ears. Eleven bodies sailed outward Cedric veered to avoid the heavily smoking crater.

"Hey!" a centaur bellowed from the wall. "Stay on course! I almost catapulted a pineapple on you!"

Cedric got back on course with alacrity. "Centaurs have sharp eyes and quick reflexes," he remarked. "Otherwise something could have gone wrong."

Murphy's curse had tried, though, almost causing Dor to interfere with the centaur's careful marksmanship. Dor realized that he would do best to stick to his own department.

He put the flute to his lips, thankful that Jumper was there to help him, so that he had his hands and attention free. He blew experimentally into the mouthpiece. The flute played an eerie, lilting, enticing melody, which floated out through the clamor of battle and brought a sudden hush. Then dwarves and gremlins, vampires and harpies, and numberless goblins swarmed after the centaurs, compelled alike by that magic music.

The winged monsters closed in faster, diving in toward Dor. Cedric twisted his human torso in that supple way centaurs had, facing back while still galloping forward. He swung the hoop through the air in an arc, intercepting the dirty birds as they came--and as each passed through the hoop, she vanished. Dor wondered where they went, but he was too busy playing the flute--if his labored blowing could be called playing--and keeping his body low so as not to get snagged by the hoop himself. He could not keep his attention on all the details!

With two of his legs, Jumper held a spear with which he prodded any goblins or similar ilk that got too close. No ilk could match the galloping pace of the centaur, but since they were forging through the whole goblin allied army, many closed in from the sides. Dor saw Vadne converting those goblins that she touched to pancake disks, and her centaur was fending off the aerial creatures with his fists.

Quickly they reached the zombie contingent. "Follow the woman in!" Dor cried. "I'll lead the monsters away! Block off your ears until I'm beyond your hearing!" Yes, that would be a fine Murphy foul-up, to lure the goblins away only to lure the Zombie Master and Millie into the same forget-spell trap! But a problem anticipated was a problem largely prevented.

Then he was off, playing the magic flute again. No matter how grossly he puffed into it, the music emerged clear and sweet and haunting. And the creatures followed.

"Where to?" Cedric inquired as they galloped. Dor had an inspiration. "To the Gap!" he cried. "North!"

The centaur put on some speed. The air whistled by them. Experimentally Dor held the flute into the wind, and sure enough: it played. That saved him some breath. The goblins fell behind, and the elves and dwarves, but the trolls were keeping up. Cedric accelerated again, and now even the vampires lost headway. But Dor kept playing, and the creatures kept following. As they had to.

At centaur speed, the Gap was not long in drawing nigh. They had to wait for the land and air hordes to catch up.

"Now I want to get them close to the brink, then detonate the forget spell," Dor said, dropping the flute to his side for the moment. "With luck, the harpies will fly on across the Gap and get lost, and the goblins will be unable to follow them, so won't be able to fight any more."

"Commendable compassion," Jumper chittered. "But in order to gather a large number here, to obtain maximum effect from the spell, you must remain to play the flute for some time. How will we escape?"

"Oops! I hadn't thought of that! We're trapped by the Gap!" Dor looked down into the awesome reaches of the chasm, and felt heightsick. When would he stop being a careless child? Or was Murphy's curse catching them after all? Dor would have to sacrifice himself, to make the goblins and harpies forget?

"I can solve it." Jumper chittered. "Ballooning over the--"

"No!" Dor cried. "There is a whole hideous host of things that can and will go wrong with that Last time we tried it--"

"Then I can drop us down over the edge, into the chasm, where the goblins cannot follow," Jumper suggested. "We can use the magic ring to protect us from descending harpies."

Dor didn't like the notion of descending into the Gap either, but the harpies and goblins and ilk were arriving in vast numbers, casting about for the missing flute music, and he had to make a quick decision. "All right. Cedric, you gallop out of here; you're too heavy to lower on spider silk."

"That's for sure!" Cedric said. "But where should I go? I don't think I can make it back to the Castle. There are one or two zillion minor monsters charging from there to here, and I'd have to buck the whole tide."

"Go to Celeste," Dor suggested. "Your job is honorably finished, here, and she'll be glad to see you."

"First to the warlock!" Cedric exclaimed, grinning. He made a kind of salute, then galloped off west.

Jumper reattached the dragline to Dor, then scrambled over the cliff edge. This easy walking on a near-vertical face still amazed Dor. However, it was decidedly handy at the moment.

Dor resumed playing the flute, for the goblins were beginning to lose interest That brought them forward with a rush. They closed on him so rapidly that they wedged against each other, blocking themselves off from him. But they were struggling so hard that Dor knew the jam would break at any moment. Yet he kept playing, waiting for Jumper's signal of readiness.

Finally his nerve broke. "Are you ready?" he called. And the goblins, loosed momentarily from their relentless press forward, eased up--and the jam did break. Dor fumbled for his sword, knowing he could never fight off the inimical mass, yet--

But what was he thinking of? It was the magic ring he should use. Cedric had left it with him. He picked it up and held it before him. The first goblin dived right at him. Dor almost dropped the hoop, fearing the creature would smash into him--but as it passed through the ring, it vanished. Right before his face, as if it had struck an invisible wall and been shunted aside. Potent magic!

"Ready!" Jumper chittered from below. Just in time, for three more goblins were charging, and Dor wasn't certain he could get them all neatly through the hoop. More likely they would snag on the rim, and their weight would have carried him back over the cliff. "Jump!"

Dor trusted his friend. He jumped. Backward off the cliff. He sailed out into the abyss, escaping the grasp of the surging goblins, swinging down and side-wise, for Jumper had providently rigged the lines so that Dor would not whomp directly into the wall. The spider always thought of these things before Dor did, anticipating what could go wrong and abating it first. Thus Murphy's curse had little power over him. That was why Jumper had taken so much time just now, despite knowing that Dor was in a desperate strait at the brink of the canyon; he had been making sure that no mistake of his would betray Dor.

And there it was, of course: the answer to the curse. Maturity. Only a careless or thoughtless person could be trapped by the curse, giving it the openings to snare him.

Now the vampires and harpies swarmed down, though the majority of them were fighting with the goblins above. "Snatch! snatch!" they screamed. A perfect characterization.

Dor found himself swinging back. He held the hoop before him, sweeping through the ugly flock--and where the ring passed, no harpies remained. But they clutched at him from the sides--

Then Jumper hauled him in against the wall, so that he could set his back to its protective solidity and hold the hoop before him. Dor saw now that the brink of the chasm was not even; the spider had skillfully utilized projections to anchor the framework of lines, so that Dor had room to swing clear of the wall. A remarkable feat of engineering that no other type of creature could have accomplished in so brief a time.

"Give me the ring!" Jumper chittered. "You play the flute!"

Right. They had to call as many creatures to this spot as possible. Dor yielded the hoop and put the flute to his lips. Jumper maneuvered deftly, using the hoop to protect them both.

Now the harpies dived in with single-minded intent, compelled by the music. They swooped through the hoop; they splatted into the wall around it, knocking themselves out and falling twistily down into the chasm, dirty feathers flying free. The vampires were no better off.

Then the goblins and trolls started dropping down from the ledge above, also summoned by the flute.

Dor broke off. "We're slaughtering them! That wasn't my intent! It's time to set off the forget spell!"

"We would be trapped by it too," Jumper reminded him. "Speak to it."

"Speak to it? Oh." Dor held out the glassy ball. "Spell, how are you detonated?"

"I detonate when a voice commands me to," the ball replied.

"Any voice?"

"That's what I said."

Dor had his answer. He set the sphere in a niche in the cliff. "Count to one thousand, then order yourself to detonate," he told it.

"Say, that's clever!" the spell said. "One, two, three-four-five-"

"Slowly!" Dor said sharply. "One number per second."

"Awww--" But the spell resumed more slowly. "Seven, eight--what a spoilsport you are!--nine, ten, a big fat hen!"

"What?" a nearby harpy screeched, taking it personally. She dived in, but Jumper snagged her with the hoop. Another potential foul-up defused.

"And don't say anything to insult the harpies," Dor told the spell.

"Ah, shucks. Eleven, twelve--"

Jumper scurried away to the side, fastened the other end of a new line he had attached to Dor, and hauled him across. This was not as fast as running on level land, but it was expedient.

They moved steadily westward, away from the spell sphere. Dor continued playing the flute intermittently, to keep the goblins massing at the brink without allowing too many to fall over. He heard the spell's counting fading in the distance, and that lent urgency to his escape. The problem was now one of management; he and Jumper had to get far enough away to be out of the forget range, without luring the goblins and harpies beyond range too. Inevitably a good many monsters would escape, but maybe the ones fazed by the forget detonation would lend sufficient confusion to the array to inhibit the others from returning to the Castle. There seemed to be no clear-cut strategy; he just had to fudge through as best he could, hoping he could profit enough to give Castle Roogna the edge. It had worked well with the Mundane siege of the Zombie Master's castle, after all.

How much nicer if there were simple answers to all life's problems! But the closer Dor approached adulthood, the less satisfying such answers became. Life itself was complex, therefore life's answers were complex. But it took a mature mind to appreciate the convolutions of that complexity.

"One hundred five, one hundred six, pick up a hundred sticks!" the spell was chanting. "One hundred seven, one hundred eight, lay all hundred straight!" Now there was a simple mind!

Dor wondered again how wide a radius the detonation would have. Would the chasm channel it? Then the brunt would come along here, instead of out where the goblins were. Maybe he and Jumper should climb over the rim before the spell went off, and lie low there, hoping to be shielded from the direct effect. But they couldn't come up too close to the goblins, who were milling about near the brink. The harpies were still dive-bombing him, forcing Jumper to jump back with the hoop. Fortunately, the bulk of their attention was taken by the goblins, their primary enemy; Dor and Jumper were merely incidental targets, attacked because they were there. Except when Dor played the flute, as he continued to do intermittently.

"Three hundred forty-seven, three hundred forty-eight, now don't be late," the spell was saying in the fading distance. As long as he could hear it, he had to assume he was within its forget radius.

"Can we go faster?" Dor asked nervously. He had thought they were traveling well, but the numbers had jumped with seeming suddenness from the neighborhood of one hundred to the neighborhood of three hundred. Unless the spell was cheating, skipping numbers--no, the inanimate did not have the wit to cheat Dor had just been preoccupied with his own efforts and gloomy thoughts.

"Not safely, friend," Jumper chittered.

"Let me take back the hoop," Dor suggested to the spider. "Then you can string your lines faster."

Jumper agreed, and passed back the hoop.

Another harpy made a screaming dive. Dor scooped her into the hoop, and she was gone without recall or recoil. What happened to the creatures who passed through it? Harpies could fly, goblins could climb; why couldn't either get out? Was it an inferno on the other side, killing them instantly? He didn't like that.

Jumper was ahead, setting the anchor for the next swing. Dor had a private moment. He poked a finger into the center of the hoop, from the far side, watching it disappear from his side. He saw his finger in cross section, as if severed with a sharp sword: the skin, the little blood vessels, the tendons, the bone. But there was no pain; his finger felt cool, not cold; no inferno there, and no freezing weather either. He withdrew it, and found it whole, to his relief. He poked it from the near side, and got the same effect, except that this time he could not see the cross section. It seemed that either side of the ring led to wherever it led. A different world?

Jumper tugged, and Dor swung across, feeling guilty for his surreptitious experimentation. He could have lost a finger that way. Well, maybe not; he had seen the King's fingers disappear and reappear unharmed. "Let's check and see if the goblins are clear," Dor said. He had not played the flute for a while.

The spider scurried up the wall to peek over with two or three eyes, keeping the rest of his body low. "They are there in masses," he chittered. "I believe they are pacing the harpies--who are pacing us."

"Oh, no! Murphy strikes again! We can't get clear of the Gap, if they follow us!"

"We should be clear of the forget radius now," Jumper chittered consolingly.

"Then so are the goblins and harpies! That's no good!" Dor heard himself getting hysterical.

"Our effort should have distracted a great number of the warring creatures," Jumper pointed out reasonably. "Our purpose was to distract them so that the Zombie Master could penetrate to Castle Roogna. If he succeeded, we have succeeded."

"I suppose so," Dor agreed, calming. "So it doesn't really matter if the harpies and goblins don't get forget-spelled. Still, how are we ever going to get out of here? It is too late to turn off the spell."

"Perseverance should pay. If we continue until night--" Jumper cocked his body, lifting his two front legs so as to hear better. "What is that?"

Dor tried to fathom what direction the spider was orienting, and could not. Damn those ubiquitous eyes! "What's what?"

Then he heard it. "Nine hundred eighty-three, nine hundred eighty-four, close to the hundredth door; nine hundred eighty-five--"

A harpy was carrying the spell toward them--and it was about to detonate! "Oh, Murphy!" Dor wailed. "You really nabbed us now!"

"What's the big secret about this talking ball?" the harpy screeched.

"Nine hundred ninety-two, buckle the bag's shoe," the spell said.

"Stop counting!" Dor yelled at the spell.

"Countdown can't be stopped once initiated," the spell replied smugly.

"Quick," Jumper chittered. "I will fasten the draglines so we can return. We must escape through the magic hoop."

"Oh, no!" Dor cried.

"It should be safe; I saw you testing it."

"Nine hundred ninety-seven, nine hundred ninety-eight," the spell continued inexorably. "Now don't be late!"

Jumper scrambled through the hoop. Dor hesitated, appalled. Could they return? But if he remained here--

"One thousand!" the spell cried gleefully. "Now at last I can say it!"

Dor dived through the hoop. The last thing he heard was "Deto--"

He arrived in darkness. It was pleasant, neutral. His body seemed to be suspended without feeling. There was a timelessness about him, a perpetual security. All he had to do was sleep.

You are not like the others, a thought said at him.

"Of course not," Dor thought back. Whatever he was suspended in did not permit physical talking, because there was no motion. "I am from another time. So is my friend Jumper the spider. Who are you?"

I am the Brain Coral, keeper of the source of magic.

"The Brain Coral! I know you! You're supposed to be animating my body!"

"When?"

"Eight hundred years from now. Don't you remember?"

I am not in a position to know about that, being as yet a creature of my own time.

"Well, in my time you--uh, it gets complicated. But I think Jumper and I had better get out of here as soon as the forget spell dissipates."

You detonated a forget spell?

"Yes, a major one, inside the Gap. To make the goblins and harpies and cohorts and ilk stop fighting. They--"

Forget spells are permanent, until counterspelled.

"I suppose so, for the ones affected. But--"

You have just rendered the Gap itself forgotten.

"The Gap? But it's not alive! The spell only affects living things, things that remember."

Therefore all living things will forget the Gap. Stunned, Dor realized it was true. He had caused the Gap to be forgotten by all but those people whose forgetting would be paradoxical. Such as those living adjacent to it, who would otherwise fall in and die. Their deaths would be inexplicable to their friends and relatives, leading to endless complications that would quickly neutralize the spell. Paradox was a powerful natural counterspell! But any people who had no immediate need-to-know would simply not remember the Gap. This was true in his own day--and now he knew how it had come about. He had done it, with his bumbling.

Yet if what he did here had no permanence, how could...? He couldn't take time to ponder that now. "We have to get back to Castle Roogna. Or at least, we can't stay here. There would be paradox when we caught up to our own time."

So it would seem. I shall release you from my preservative fluid. The primary radiation of the spell should not affect you; the secondary may. You will not forget your personal identities and mission, but you may forget the Gap once you leave its vicinity.

"I'm pretty much immune to that anyway," Dor said. "I'm one of the near-Gap residents. Just so long as I don't forget the rest."

One question, before I release you. Through what aperture have you and all these other creatures entered my realm? I had thought the last large ring was destroyed fifty years ago.

"Oh, we have a two-inch ring that we expanded to two-foot diameter. We can change it back when we're done with it."

That will be appreciated. Perhaps we shall meet again--in eight hundred years, the Coral thought at him.

Then Dor popped out of the hoop and dangled by his dragline. Jumper followed.

"I had not anticipated immobility," the spider chittered ruefully.

"That's all right. We can't all think of everything, all the time."

Jumper was not affronted. "True."

The harpies were visible in the distance, but they paid no further attention to Dor and Jumper. They were milling about in air, trying to remember what they were doing there. Which was exactly what Dor had wanted to happen. The goblins, however, were in sadder state. They too seemed to be milling about--but they had forgotten that sharp dropoffs were hazardous to health, and were falling into the chasm at a great rate. Dor's action had decimated the goblin horde.

"It can not be helped," Jumper chittered, recognizing his disgust. "We can not anticipate or control all ramifications of any given course."

"Yeah, I guess," Dor agreed, still bothered by the slaughter he had wrought. Would he get hardened to this sort of carnage as he matured? He hoped not.

They climbed to the brim and stood on land again. The goblins ignored them, not remembering them. The forget detonation had evidently been devastating near its origin, wiping out all memories of everything.

Dor spied a glassy fragment lying on the ground. He went to pick it up. It was a shatter from the forget-spell globe. "You really did it, didn't you!" he said to it.

"That was some blast!" the fragment agreed happily. "Or was it? I forget!"

Dor dropped it and went on. "I hope Cedric got clear in time. That spell was more powerful than I expected."

"He surely did."

They hurried back toward the Castle, ignoring the wandering hordes.

The battle was not over at Castle Roogna, but it was evident that the tide had turned. As the distance from the forget-spell ground zero lengthened, the effects diminished, until here at the Castle there was little confusion--except that there were only about a third as many goblins and harpies as before, and the ramparts were manned by zombies. The Zombie Master had gotten through!

The defenders spied them, and laid down a barrage of cherry bombs to clear a path to the Castle. Even so, it was necessary to employ sword and hoop to get through, for the goblins and harpies resented strangers getting into their battle. So Dor was forced to slay again. War was hell, he thought.

King Roogna himself welcomed them at the gate. "Marvelous!" he cried. "You piped half the monsters off the field and made them forget. Vadne led the Zombie Master in while the goblins were distracted by the flute, and he has been generating new zombies from the battlefield casualties ever since. The only problem is fetching them in."

"Then there's work for me to do," Dor said shortly. He found he didn't really want to accept congratulations for doing a job of mass murder.

The King, the soul of graciousness, made no objection, "Your dedication does you credit."

Jumper helped, of course. Covered by centaur archers on the ramparts, they went out, located the best bodies, looped them with silk, and dashed back under cover. Then they hauled the corpses in on the lines. They were really old hands at this. When they had a dozen or so, they ferried them in to the Zombie Master's laboratory.

Millie was there, wan and disheveled, but she looked up with a smile when Dor entered. "Oh, you're safe, Dor! I was so worried!"

"Worry for your fiancé," he said shortly. "He's doing the work."

"He certainly is," Vadne said. She was moving the bodies into position for him by converting them to great balls that were easily rolled, then returning them to their regular shapes. As a result, he was evidently manufacturing zombies at triple the rate he had at his own castle. Time was consumed mainly in the processing, not the actual conversion. "He's making an army to defend this Castle!"

"Dor's doing a lot too!" Millie said stoutly. Flattered despite himself, Dor realized that Millie still had feeling for him, and still might--But he had to suppress that. It was not only that his time in this world was limited, and that if he interfered with this particular aspect of history and it stayed put, he would paradoxically negate his whole original mission. It was that Millie was now betrothed to another man, and Dor had no right to--to do what he wished he could.

"We're all doing what we can, for the good of the Land of Xanth," he said, somewhat insecurely, considering his thought. How much better it would be for him, if he could find some girl more nearly his own age and status, and--

"I wish I had full Magician-caliber talent like yours," Vadne said to the Zombie Master as she shape-changed another corpse. Dor saw that she was able to handle living things, and once-living things, and inanimate things like the magic ring: a fair breadth of talent, really.

"You do have it," the Zombie Master said, surprised.

"No, I am only a neo-Sorceress."

"I would term your topological talent as Magician-caliber magic," he said, rendering the corpse into a zombie.

She almost glowed at the compliment, which carried even more impact because it was evident that he had made it matter-of-factly, unconscious of its effect. She looked at the Zombie Master with a new appraisal, What potency in a compliment, Dor thought, and filed the information in the back of his mind for future reference.

Dor went out to fetch more bodies. Jumper helped, as always. They kept working until daylight waned, and slowly the goblin and harpy forces dwindled while the zombie forces increased. Harpy zombies were now waging the defense in the air--greatly easing that situation.

Yet this left Dor unsatisfied. He had entered the tapestry for one mission, the acquisition of the elixir to restore a zombie to full life. But by the time he had that, he had been enmeshed in another mission, the conversion of the Zombie Master to King Roogna's cause. Now he had accomplished that also--and was casting about for yet another quest. What was it?

Ah, he had it now. This foolish war between the goblins and harpies--was it possible to do something about it, instead of preserving Castle Roogna by wiping out both sides? Why not simply abate the problems that had caused the war?

He had gone over this before, in his mind, and had no answer. But then time Had been too much of a factor. Now the Castle was prevailing, now there was time, and he knew more about the magic available. The magic hoop, for example, leading into the Brain Coral's somber storage lake--

'That's it!" he exclaimed.

Jumper cocked four or five eyes at him. "There is something I missed?"

"Anchor me, so I can't fall in. I have to go through the hoop to talk with the Brain Coral."

The spider did not argue or question. He fastened a stout dragline to Dor. Dor propped the magic hoop against a wall and poked his head through.

"Brain Coral!" he thought, again rending it impossible to breathe or speak in the preservative fluid. This stuff was not mere water; it had stasis magic. "This is Dor of eight hundred years from now, again."

What is your concern? the Coral inquired patiently.

"Have you a male harpy in storage?"

Yes. An immature one, exiled three hundred years ago by a rival for the harpy throne.

"A royal male?" Dor thought, startled.

By harpy law a royal person cannot be executed like a commoner. So he was put safely away, and the access ring destroyed thereafter.

"Will you release him now? It would make a big difference to our present situation."

I will release him. Bear in mind you owe me a favor.

“Yes. I will talk to you again in eight hundred years." Dor removed his head from the Coral's realm. His head had been in stasis, but the rest of his body was responsive.

In a moment a bird-shape popped out of the hoop. "Greetings, Prince," Dor said formally.

The figure spread his wings, orienting on him. "And what ilk be ye, man-thing?"

"I am Magician Dor. I have freed you from storage."

The harpy glanced an imperial glance at him. "Show your power."

Dor picked up a fallen harpy feather. "What is the age of the Prince?" he inquired. "Exclusive of storage time."

"The Prince is twelve years old," the feather answered.

"Why, that's my age!" Dor exclaimed.

"You'll sure be a giant when you get your full growth!" the feather said.

The Prince cut in. "Very well. I accept your status, and will deal with ye. I am Prince Harold. What is it ye crave of me?"

"You are the only male harpy alive today," Dor said. "You must go forth and claim your crown, to preserve your species. I charge you with two things only: do not cohabit with any but your own kind, and give to me the counterspell to the curse your people put on the goblins."

The Prince drew himself up with hauteur. "One favor ye did me, yet ye presume to impose on me for two favors! I need no stricture of cohabitation for when I come of age--not when I have the entire world of harpies to build my harem from. As to this spell, I know naught of it."

"It happened after your exile. You can discover its nature from your subjects."

"I shall do so," the harpy said. "An I discover it, I shall provide the counter as your recompense."

Dor conducted the Prince to King Roogna, who did a polite double take as he observed the harpy's gender. "Rare magic indeed!" he murmured.

"We must release Prince Harold Harpy to his kind without mishap," Dor told the King. “The harpies will have no need to fight, once they have him."

"I see," the King said. He glanced obliquely at Magician Murphy, standing beside him. "We shall declare an absolute cease-fire until he is free, I shall walk the ramparts myself, to be sure that nothing goes wrong."

"You may manage to free the harpy," Murphy said grimly. "But my curse will have its impact elsewhere. You have not prevailed." But he looked tired; his talent was evidently under severe strain. No single Magician, however gifted, could stand forever against the power of three. Dor was almost sorry for him.

"But we're getting there," Roogna said. He escorted the Prince to the wall, cautioning the centaurs not to fire at the harpy. Prince Harold spread his pinions and launched into the sky.

There was a screech of sheerest amazement from the nearest female. Then the harpies swarmed to the Prince. For an awful moment Dor feared they had mistaken him, and would tear him to pieces; but they had instantly recognized his nature. They lost all interest in the goblin war. In moments the entire swarm had flapped away, leaving the goblins nothing to fight except a few tired vampires.

Then a lone female harpy winged back from the flock. A centaur whistled. "Helen!" Dor cried, recognizing her.

"By order of Prince Harold," Helen said. "The counterspell." She deposited a pebble in his hand. She winked. "Too bad you didn't take your opportunity when you had it, handsome man; you will never have another. I used the ring you gave me to wish for the finest possible match, and now I am to be first concubine to the Prince." She tapped her ringed claw.

Things evidently happened fast among the harpies; it had been only a few minutes since the Prince mounted the sky. "Good for you," Dor said.

"I knew I could do it," the ring replied, thinking Dor had addressed it. "I can do anything!"

She glanced down at it "Oh, so you're talking again!"

"It will be silent hereafter," Dor said. "Thank you for the counterspell."

"It's the least I could do for you," she said, inhaling. The centaurs goggled.

Then Heavenly Helen spread her pretty wings and was away, with all males on the parapet staring after her, and even a few of the healthier zombies were admiring her form. There were covert glances at Dor, as people wondered what he had done to attract the attention of so remarkable a creature.

Dor was satisfied. Helen had, in true harpy fashion, snatched her opportunity. And who could tell: maybe the wish ring really had had something to do with it.

Dor turned his attention to the pebble spell. "How are you invoked?" he asked it.

"I am not invoked; I am revoked," it replied. "I am not a counterspell, I am the original spell. When I am revoked, the enchantment abates."

"How are you revoked, then?"

"You just heat me to fire temperature, and my magic pours out invisibly until it is all gone."

Dor handed the pebble to the King. "That should abate the goblin complaint. With no further reason to fight, the goblins should go home. Then Murphy's curse can't make the battle continue here."

"You are phenomenal, Magician!" King Roogna said. "You have used your mind instead of your body, in a truly regal manner." He hurried away with the pebble spell.

The King cooked the goblin spell according to the directive, but no change in the goblin horde was apparent. Yet he was not dismayed. "The original spell was subtle," he explained. "It caused the goblin females to be negatively selective. The damage has been done to the goblins over the course of many generations. It will take many more generations to reverse. The females are not here on the battlefield, so the males do not even know of the change yet. So we do not see its effect immediately, or benefit from it ourselves, but still the job is worth doing. We are not trying merely to preserve Castle Roogna; we are building a better Land of Xanth." He waved a hand cheerfully. "Evening is upon us; we must go to our repast and sleep, while the zombies keep watch. I believe victory is at last coming into sight."

It did look that way. Magician Murphy looked glum indeed. Dor, suddenly tired, ate perfunctorily, fell on the bed provided in the completed section of the Castle, and slept soundly. In the morning he woke to discover the Zombie Master on an adjacent bed, and Magician Murphy on another. Everyone was tired, and there was as yet very little space within the Castle.

The goblins had largely dispersed in the night, leaving their copious dead in the field. The zombies remained on guard. The centaurs had resumed their building labors, no longer needed for the defense of the Castle. Now it did seem likely that Castle Roogna would be completed on schedule.

A buffet breakfast was being served in the dining hall, amid the clods of earth, stray pieces of zombies, and discarded weapons. King Roogna was there, and Magician Murphy, and Vadne and Jumper and Dor. Murphy had little appetite; he seemed almost as gaunt as the Zombie Master.

"Frankly I think we have it in hand," the King said. "Will you not relinquish with grace, Murphy?"

"There remains yet one aspect of the curse," Murphy said. "Should it fail, then I am done, and will retire. But I must hold on until it manifests."

"Fair enough," Roogna said. "I hung on when it seemed your curse had prevailed. Indeed, had not young Dor arrived with his friend--"

"Surely nothing I did really affected the outcome," Dor said uneasily. For there, ultimately, could be Murphy's victory.

"You still feel that what you do is invalid?" the King inquired. "We can readily have the verification of that. I have a magic mirror somewhere--"

"No, I--" But the King in his gratitude was already on his way to locate the mirror.

"Perhaps it is time we verified this," Murphy said. "Your involvement, Dor, has become so pervasive and intricate that it becomes difficult to see how it can be undone. I may have been mistaken in my conjecture. Was my curse opposing you also?"

"I believe it was," Dor said. "Things kept going wrong--"

"Then you must have validity, for otherwise my curse would not care. In fact, if your efforts lacked validity, my curse might even have promoted them, so that they played a larger part in the false success. If the King depended on you instead of on his own--"

"But how can I change my own--" Dor glanced at Vadne, then shrugged. He could not remember whether she knew about him now or did not. What did it matter, so long as Millie remained innocent? "My own past?"

"I do not know," Murphy said. "I had thought that would be a paradox, therefore invalid. Yet there are aspects of magic no man can fathom. I may have made a grievous error, and thereby cost myself the victory. Is the Gap forgotten in your day?"

"Yes."

They mulled that over for a while, chewing on waffles from the royal waffle tree. Then Murphy said: "It could be that spots of history can be rechanneled, so long as the end result is the same. If King Roogna is fated to win, it may not matter how he does it, or what agencies assist. So your own involvement may be valid, yet changes nothing. You are merely filling a role that some other party filled in your absence."

"Could be," Dor agreed. He glanced about. The others seemed interested in the discussion, except for Vadne, who was withdrawn. Something about that bothered him, but he couldn't place it.

"At any rate, we shall soon know. My power has been stretched to its limit," Murphy continued. "If I do not achieve the victory this day, I shall be helpless. I do not know exactly what form my curse will take, but it is in operation now, and I think will prove devastating. The issue remains in doubt."

The King returned with his mirror. "Let me see--how shall I phrase this?" he said to himself. "Mirror queries have to rhyme. That was built into them by the Magician who made this type of glass. Ah." He set it on the floor. "Mirror, mirror, on the floor--can we trust ourselves to Dor?"

"Corny," Murphy muttered.

The forepart of a handsome centaur appeared in the mirror. "That signifies affirmative," Roogna said. "The hind part is the negative."

"But many centaurs are far handsomer in the hind part," Dor pointed out.

"Why not simply ask it which side will prevail?" Murphy suggested wryly.

"I doubt that will work," the King said. "Because if its answer affects our actions, that would be paradox. And since we have been dealing with very strong magic, it could be beyond the mirror's limited power of resolution."

"Oh, let's discover the answer for ourselves," Murphy said. "We have fought it through this far, we might as well finish it properly."

"Agreed," Roogna said.

They ate more waffles, pouring on maple syrup from a rare maple tree. Unlike other magic beverage trees, the maple issued its syrup only a drop at a time, and it was dilute, so that a lot of the water had to be boiled off to make it thick enough for use. This made the syrup a special delicacy. In fact, maple trees no longer existed in Xanth in Dor's day. Maybe they had been overlapped, and thus this most magical species had ironically gone the way of most mundane trees.

The Zombie Master came in. Vadne perked up. "Come sit by me," she invited.

But he was not being sociable. "Where is Millie the maid, my fiancée?"

The others exchanged perplexed glances. "I assumed she was with you," Dor said.

"No. I worked late last night, and it would not be meet for such as she to keep my company unchaperoned. I sent her to bed."

"You didn't do that at your own castle," Dor pointed out.

"We were not then engaged. After the betrothal, we kept company only in company."

Dor thought of asking about the journey from the zombie castle to Castle Roogna, which had had at least one night on the road. But he refrained; it seemed the Zombie Master had conservative notions about propriety, and honored them rigidly.

"She has not been to breakfast," the King said. "She must be sleeping late."

"I called at her door, but she did not answer," the Zombie Master said.

"Maybe she's sick," Dor suggested, and immediately regretted his directness, for the Zombie Master jumped as if stung.

The King interceded smoothly. "Vadne, check Millie's room."

The neo-Sorceress departed. Soon she was back. "Her room is empty."

Now the Zombie Master was really upset. "What has happened to her?"

"Do not be concerned," Vadne said consolingly. "Perhaps she became weary of Castle life and returned to her stockade. I will be happy to assist you during her absence."

But he would not be consoled. "She is my fiancée I must find her!"

"Here, let me query the mirror," the King said. "What's a rhyme for Maid?"

"Shade," Murphy said.

"Thank you, Magician," the King said. He propped the mirror in a niche in the wall where it was in shadow. "Mirror, mirror, in the shade, tell us what happened to--"

Dor's chair thunked on the floor as he craned forward to see the picture about to form. The mirror slipped from its perch and fell. It cracked in two, and was useless.

The Zombie Master stared at it. "Murphy's curse!" he exclaimed. "Why should it prevent us from locating the maid?" He turned angrily on Murphy.

Magician Murphy spread his hands. "I do not know, sir. I assure you I have no onus against your fiancée. She strikes me as a most appealing young woman."

"She strikes everyone that way," Vadne said. "Her talent is--"

"Do not denigrate her to me!" the Zombie Master shouted. "It was only in gratitude to her that I agreed to soil my hands with politics! If anything happens to her--"

He broke off, and there was a pregnant silence. Suddenly the nature of the final curse was coming clear to them all. Without Millie, the Zombie Master had no reason to support the King, and Castle Roogna would then lose its major defensive force. Anything could happen to further interrupt its construction--and would. Murphy would win.

Yet the harpies and goblins were gone, Dor thought Did anything remain that could really threaten the Castle? And he realized with horror that one thing did: the zombies themselves. They now controlled Castle Roogna. If they turned against the King--

"It seems your curse has struck with extreme precision," King Roogna said, evidently recognizing the implication. The issue was indeed in doubt! "We must find Millie quickly, and I fear that will not be easy."

"It was my chair that jolted the mirror," Dor said, stricken. "It's my fault!"

"Do not blame yourself," Murphy said. "The curse strikes in the readiest manner, much as water seeks the lowest channel. You have simply been used."

"Well, then, I'll find her!" Dor cried. "I'm a Magician, same as you are." He looked about. "Wall, where is she?"

"Don't ask me," the wall said. "She hasn't been here in the dining hall since last night."

Dor marched out into the hall, the others trailing after him. "Floor, when was she last here?"

"Last night after supper," the floor said. Neither wall nor floor elected to be difficult about details; they knew whom Dor meant, and recognized his mood, and gave him no trouble.

Dor traced Millie's whereabouts randomly, pacing the halls. A problem became apparent: Millie, like the others, had moved about considerably during the evening, and the walls, floors and limited furnishings were not able to distinguish all the comings and goings. It was a trail that crossed and recrossed itself, so that the point of exit could not be determined. Millie had been here at the time the Zombie Master sent her to bed--and not thereafter. She had not arrived at her own room. Where had she gone?

"The front gate--see whether she left the Castle," the King suggested.

Dor doubted Millie would depart like that--not voluntarily. But he queried the front gate. She had not exited there. He checked the ramparts. She had not gone there. In fact she had gone nowhere. It was as if she had vanished from the middle of the hall.

"Could somebody have conjured her out?" Dor wondered aloud.

"Conjuring is not a common talent," King Roogna said. "I know of no conjurers today who could accomplish this."

"The magic hoop!" Jumper chittered.

Oh, no! They fetched the hoop, still at its two-foot diameter. "Did Millie the maid pass through you last night?" Dor demanded of it.

"She did not," the hoop said acerbically. "No on has been through me since you stuck your fool head through and brought out the harpy Prince. When are you going to have me changed back to my normal size? I'm uncomfortable, stretched out like this."

"Later," Dor told it, experiencing relief. Then his relief reversed. If Millie had gone through there, at least she would be alive and safe and possibly recoverable. As it was, the mystery remained, growing more critical every moment.

"Query the flute," Jumper suggested. "If someone played it and lured her somewhere--"

Dor queried the pied-piper flute. It, too, denied any involvement. "Could it be lying?" Vadne asked.

"No," Dor answered shortly.

They crossed the Castle again, but gained nothing on their original information: Millie had left the Zombie Master in the evening, going toward her room--and never gotten there. Nothing untoward had been seen by anyone or anything.

Then Jumper had another notion. "If she is the victim of malodorous entertainment--"

"What?" Dor asked.

"Foul play," the web said, rechecking its translation, "Can't expect me to get the idiom right every time."

Dor smiled momentarily. "Continue."

Jumper chittered again. "...victim of smelly games, then some other person is most likely responsible. We must ascertain the whereabouts of each other living person at the time of her disappearance."

"You have an uncommonly apt perception," King Roogna told the spider. "You approach things from new directions."

"It comes from having eyes in the back of one's head," Jumper said matter-of-factly.

They checked for the others. The centaurs had remained on the ramparts, backing up the zombies. Dor and Jumper and King Roogna had slept. The Zombie Master had worked till the wee hours, then gone to the male room and thence to his sleeping cot. Magician Murphy had taken an innocent tour of the premises, also stopped at the male room, and slept. Neo-Sorceress Vadne had assisted the Zombie Master, but gone to the female room shortly before Millie was dismissed. She had returned to work late with the Zombie Master, then gone to her own room to sleep. Nothing there.

"What occurs in the female room?" Jumper inquired.

"Uh, females have functions too," Dor said.

"Excretion. I comprehend. Did Millie go there?"

"Often. Young females have great affinity for such places."

"Did she emerge on the final occasion?"

The men stared. "We never checked there!" Dor cried.

"Now don't you men go snooping into a place like that!" Vadne protested. "It's indecent!"

"We will merely ask straightforward questions," the King assured her. "No voyeurism."

Vadne looked unsatisfied, but did not protest further. They repaired to the female room, where Dor inquired somewhat diffidently of the door: "Did Millie the maid enter here late last night?"

"She did. But I won't tell you what her business was," the door replied primly.

"Did she depart thereafter?"

"Come to think of it, she never did," the door said, surprised. "That must have been some business!"

Dor looked up to find one of Jumper's green eyes bearing on him. They had located Millie! Almost.

They entered. The female room was clean, with several basins and potties and a big drainage sump for disposal of wastes. In one corner was a dumbwaiter for shipment of laundry and sundry items upstairs. Nothing else.

"She's not here," Dor said, disappointed.

"Then this is her point of departure," the King said. "Question every artifact here, if you have to, until we discover the exact mode of her demise. I mean, departure," he amended quickly, conscious of the presence of the somber Zombie Master.

Dor questioned. Millie had come in, approached a basin, looked at her pretty but tired face in a mundane mirror--and Vadne had entered the room. Vadne had doused the Magic Lantern. In the darkness Millie had screamed with surprise and dismay, and there had been a swish as of hair flinging about, and a tattoo on the floor as of feet kicking. That was all.

Vadne had departed the room alone. The light had remained doused until morning--when there was no sign of Millie.

Vadne was edging toward the door. Jumper threw a noose and snared her, preventing her escape. "So you were the one!" the Zombie Master cried. His gaunt face was twisted with incredulous rage, his eyes gleaming whitely from their sockets.

"I only did it for you," she said, bluffing it out. "She didn't love you anyway; she loved Dor. And she's just a garden-variety maid, not a Magician-caliber talent. You need a--"

"She is my betrothed!" the Zombie Master cried, his aspect wild. Dor echoed the man's passion within himself. The Zombie Master did love her--as Dor did. "What did you do with her, wretch?"

"I put her where you will never find her!" Vadne flared.

"This is murder," King Roogna said grimly.

"No it isn't!" Vadne cried. "I didn't kill her. I just--changed her."

Dor saw the strategy in that. The Zombie Master could have reanimated her dead body as a zombie; as it was, he could do nothing.

Jumper peered down the drainage sump with his largest eye. "Is it possible?" he inquired.

"We'll rip out the whole sump to find her!" the King cried.

"And if you do," Vadne said, "what will you do then? Without me you can't change her back to her stupid sex-appeal form."

"Neo-Sorceress," King Roogna said grimly. "We are mindful of your considerable assistance in the recent campaign. We do not relish showing you disfavor."

"Oh, pooh!" she said. "I only helped you because Murphy wouldn't have me, and I wanted to marry a Magician."

"You have chosen unwisely. If you do not change the maid back, we shall have to execute you."

She was taken aback, but remained defiant. "Then you'll never get her changed, because talents never repeat."

"But they do overlap," Roogna said.

"In the course of decades or centuries! The only way you can save her is to deal on my terms."

"What are your terms?" the King asked, his eyes narrow.

"Let Dor marry Millie. She likes him better anyway, the stupid slut. I'll take the Zombie Master."

"Never!" the Zombie Master cried, his hands clenching.

Vadne faced him. "Why force on her a marriage with a man she doesn't love?" she demanded.

That shook him. "In time she would--"

"How much time? Twenty years, when she's no longer so sweet and young? Two hundred? I love you now?'

The Zombie Master looked at Dor. His face was tight with emotional pain, but his voice was steady. "Sir, there is some truth in what she says. I was always aware that Millie--if you had--" He choked off, then forced himself to continue. "I would prefer to see Millie married to you, than locked in some hideous transformation. If you--"

Dor realized that Millie was being offered to him again. All he had to do was take her, and she would be restored and Castle Roogna would be safe. He could by his simple acquiescence nullify the last desperate aspect of Murphy's curse.

He was tempted. But he realized that this transformation was the fate that had awaited her throughout. If he took Millie now, he could offer her...nothing. He was soon to return to his own time. Vadne evidently didn't believe that, but it was true. If he eschewed Millie, she would remain enchanted, a ghost for eight hundred years. A dread but fated destiny.

If he interfered now, he really would change history. There was no question of that, for this was personal, his immediate knowledge. He would fashion a paradox, the forbidden type of magic--and by the devious logic of the situation, Murphy would win. The curse had at last forced Dor to nullify himself by changing too much.

Yet if he turned down Vadne's terms, King Roogna would lose anyway, as the Zombie Master turned against him. Either way, Magician Murphy prevailed.

What was he, Dor, to do? Since either choice meant disaster, he might as well do what he believed to be right, however much it hurt.

"No," Dor said, knowing he was forcing Millie to undergo the full throes of ghosthood. Eight centuries long--and what reward awaited her there? Nursemaid to a little boy! Association with a zombie! "She goes to her betrothed--or to no one."

"But I am her betrothed!" the Zombie Master cried. "I love her--and because I love her, I yield her to you! I would do anything rather than permit her to suffer!"

"True love," King Roogna said. "It becomes you, sir."

"I'm sorry," Dor said. He understood now that his love for Millie was less, because he chose to let her suffer. He was knowingly inflicting terrible grief upon them all. Yet the alternative was the sacrifice of what they had all fought to save, deviously but certainly. He had no choice. "What's right is right, and what's wrong is wrong. I--" He spread his hands, unable to formulate his thought.

The Zombie Master gazed somberly at him. "I believe I understand." Then, surprisingly, he offered his hand.

Dor accepted it. Suddenly he felt like a man.

"If you will not restore her," the King said angrily to Vadne, "you shall be passed through the hoop."

"You're bluffing," Vadne said. "You won't throw away your Kingdom just to get at me."

But the King was not bluffing. He gave her one more chance, then had the hoop brought.

"I'll change it back to its original size," she threatened. "Then you won't be able to use it."

"You are very likely to go through it anyway," the King said, and there was something in his expression that cowed her. She stepped through the hoop and was gone.

The King turned to the Zombie Master. "It is a matter of principle," he explained. "I cannot allow any subject to commit such a crime with impunity. We shall ransack this Castle to locate Millie in whatever form she may be, and shall search out every avenue of magic that might restore her. Perhaps periodically we can recall Vadne from storage to see if she is ready to restore the maid. In time--"

"Time..." the Zombie Master repeated brokenly. They all knew the project could take a lifetime.

"Meanwhile, I apologize to you most abjectly for what has occurred, and will facilitate your return to your castle in whatever manner I can. I hope some year we will meet again in better circumstances."

"No, we shall not meet again."

Dor did not like the sound of that, but kept quiet.

"I understand," King Roogna said, "Again, I apologize. I would not have asked you to bring your zombies here, had I known what form the curse would take. I am sorry to see them go."

"They are not going," the Zombie Master said.

Dor felt gathering dread. What was the Zombie Master about to do, in his betrayal and grief? He could destroy everything, and there was no way to stop him except by killing him. Dor held his arms rigid, refusing to touch his sword.

"But nothing holds you here now," King Roogna said.

"I did not buy Millie with my aid, I did not bargain for her hand!" the Zombie Master cried. "I came here because I realized it would please her, and I would not wish to displease her even in death by changing that. My zombies will remain here as long as they are needed, to see Castle Roogna through this crisis and any others that arise. They are yours for eternity, if you want them."

Dor's mouth dropped open.

"Oh, I want them!" the King agreed. "I will set aside a fine graveyard for them, to rest in comfort between crises. I will name them the honored guardians of Castle Roogna. Yet--"

"Enough," the Zombie Master said, and turned to Dor. But he did not speak. He gave Dor one enigmatic glance, then walked slowly out of the room.

"Then I have lost," Murphy said. "My curse worked, but has been overwhelmed by the Zombie Master's loyalty. I cannot overcome the zombies." He, too, walked away.

That left Dor, Jumper, and the King. "This is a sad victory," Roogna said.

Dor could only agree. "We'll stay to help you clean up the premises, Your Majesty. Then Jumper and I must return to our own land,"

They made their desolate way to the dining room, but no one cared to finish breakfast. They went to work on the cleanup chore, burying unzombied bodies outside, removing refuse from inside, putting away fallen books in the library. The main palace had not yet been built, but the library stood as it would be eight hundred years hence, apart from details of decor. One large tome had somehow strayed to the dumbwaiter; Dor held the volume for a moment, struck by a nagging emotion, then filed it on the shelf in the library.

In the afternoon they found the Zombie Master hanging from a rafter. He had committed suicide. Somehow Dor had known--or should have known--that it could come to this. The man's love had been too sudden, his loss too unfair. The Zombie Master had known Millie would die, known what he would do. This was what he had meant when he told the King they would not meet again.

Yet when they cut him down, the most amazing and macabre aspect of this disaster manifested: the Zombie Master was not precisely dead. He had somehow converted himself into a zombie.

The zombie shuffled aimlessly out of the Castle, and was seen no more. Yet Dor was sure it was suffering--and would suffer eternally, for zombies never died. What awful punishment the Zombie Master had wreaked upon himself in his bereavement!

"In a way, it is fitting," King Roogna murmured. "He has become one of his own."

The lesser personnel of the Castle, whom the King had sent away for the crisis, were now returning. The maids and the cooks, the steeds and dragons. Activity resumed, yet to Dor the halls seemed empty. What a victory they had won! A victory of grief and regret and hopelessness.

Finally Dor and Jumper prepared to depart, knowing the spell that placed them here in the tapestry world would soon bring them home. They wanted to be away from Castle Roogna when it happened. "Rule well, King Roogna," Dor said as he shook the monarch's hand for the last time.

"I shall do my best, Magician Dor," Roogna replied. "I wish you every success and happiness in your own land, and I know that when your time comes to rule--"

Dor made a deprecating gesture. He had learned a lot, here--more than he cared to. He didn't want to think about being King.

"I have a present for you," Jumper said, presenting the King with a box. "It is the puzzle-tapestry the Zombie Master gave to me. I am not able to take it with me. I ask you to assemble it at your leisure and hang it from the wall of whatever room you deem fit. It should provide you with many hours of pleasure."

"It shall have a place of honor, always," the King said, accepting it.

Then Dor thought of something. "I, too, have an important object I can't take with me. But I can recover it, after eight hundred years, if you will be so kind as to spell it into the tapestry."

"No problem at all," King Roogna said. Dor gave him the vial of zombie-restorative elixir. "I shall cause it to respond to the words "Savior of Xanth.'"

"Uh, thanks," Dor said, embarrassed.

He went up to the ramparts to bid farewell to the remaining centaurs. Cedric was not there, of course, having returned home. But Egor Ogre was present, and Dor shook his huge bony hand, cautiously.

That was it. Dor was no more adept at partings than at greetings. They walked away from the Castle, across the deserted, blasted battlefield--and into a vicious patch of saw grass at the edge. Jumper, more alert than Dor, drew him back from the swipe of the nearest saw just barely in time.

They were back in the jungle. The visible, tangible wilderness, where there was little subtlety about evil. Somehow it seemed like home.

Yet as they sloughed methodically through the forest, avoiding traps, skirting perils, and nullifying hazards in dull routine fashion, Dor found himself disturbed by more than human-related grief. He mulled it over, and finally had it.

"It is you, Jumper," he said. "We are about to return home. But there I am a boy, and you are a tiny spider. We'll never see each other again! And--" He felt the boyish tears emerging. "Oh, Jumper, you're my best friend, you've been by my side through the greatest and awfulest adventure of my life, and--and--"

"I thank you for your concern," the spider chittered. "But we need not separate completely. My home is by the tapestry. There are many fat lazy bugs trying to eat into the fabric, and now I have special reason to keep them from it. Look for me there, and you will surely find me."

"But--but in three months I'll only be an older boy--and you'll be dead!"

"It is my natural span," Jumper assured him. "I will live as much in that time as you do in the next thirty years. I will tell my offspring about you. I am thankful that chance has given me this opportunity to learn about your frame of reference. I would never otherwise have realized that the giant species have intelligence and feelings too. It has been a great and satisfying education for me."

"And for me!" Dor exclaimed. Then, spontaneously, he offered his hand.

The spider solemnly lifted a forefoot and shook Dor's hand.