“Just what are you after?”
Osmirik folded his hands. “I intend to work a spell with the help of your device. I am somewhat familiar with the capacities of such a machine as yours, though my knowledge is entirely theoretical.”
“Wait a minute,” Jeremy said. “You mean to tell me you’re gonna run a magic spell … through my computer?”
“That is what I mean to say.”
“How? And f’crissakes, why?”
Osmirik was patient. “I do not as yet have an answer to the first question. To the second, I would answer thus: the spell I have in mind involves more variables than is practical to deal with. It requires a magician with a phenomenal memory. I am not such a magician. In fact, my talent is minimal. Thaumaturgical talent is a gift, pure and simple. But with that machine, and some help from an adept such as Lady Linda, we may succeed in locating the young man named Gene.”
Jeremy nodded. “Gotcha. Sounds like fun. But where’s the magic come from? You got fairy dust, or what?”
“No fairy dust, whatever that may be. The source of magic is the castle itself. Let me essay a figure of speech, drawing on the lore of your own world. Think of the castle as an electrical generator, and of the castle’s various talented inhabitants as conduits, drawing off that energy and putting it to use.”
“I get it. All right, sounds better and better.”
“Very good. Now, let us begin. Can this machine process degenerative numerical series?”
“Huh? I can see we’re gonna have problems. You’ll have to translate that better.”
Osmirik took a ballpoint pen from an inside pocket of his long hooded gown. “Allow me to show you.”
A few minutes later, Jeremy looked up from the sheet of yellow paper that Osmirik had filled with curious symbols. “Okay, near as I can figure out, you’re talking about factorials. Like, six factorial would be six times five, times four, times three, times two —”
“Exactly!”
“Yeah, well, that’s no problem. But what’s all this stuff?”
“That is merely its application to the problem of —”
Osmirik suddenly looked up toward one of the galleries.
“Someone is about,” he said. “I saw no one come in.”
He got up and approached a nearby stairwell. Before he got to it, a man appeared at the rail above. He was tall with medium-long dark hair and square-cut features.
“Hello, Osmirik.”
The librarian was astonished. “Your Majesty, I had no idea you had returned!”
“Haven’t told anybody yet. Had some research to do.” The man inclined his head toward Jeremy. “New Guest?”
“Yes, sire. May I present Master Jeremy — er …”
“Hochstader,” Jeremy added. “That’s ‘Mister.’”
“Glad to have you aboard, Mr. Hochstader. Osmirik, has the Earth portal been wandering again?”
“Yes, Majesty. There is trouble afoot.”
“I know. Loads of it, as a matter of fact. Do you have anything on interdimensional field geometry? I’m having a devil of a time finding anything.”
“Yes, sire, we do. One volume, and it is kept in the outsized-folio shelves. A thousand pardons, Majesty. I will fetch it for you immediately.”
Osmirik hurried off.
“That’s a slick-looking machine you have there, young man,” His Majesty said.
“Thanks. Uh, are you the king of this place?”
“That’s me. I’m called Lord Incarnadine. Funny name, but I’ve become rather fond of it.”
“Lord, huh? I thought a lord was lower than a king.”
“Hold on a minute.”
Incarnadine descended the stairwell and came over to the table.
“A lord is lower than a king, but the history of this place goes back a long way. The master of this castle was originally the vassal of some big cheese to the east. But then there was a falling-out, a little difference of opinion, a big war — and zip, bang, my family got into the king business. But the traditional title stuck. So the head man around here is still Lord Protector of the Western Pale — that’s where this castle is situated — but he’s also King of this, that, and the other annexed territory. Clear? Don’t worry, it’s not very. My ‘kingdom’ is mostly a desert, and most of my subjects are scattered across 144,000 worlds.”
“Oh.”
Incarnadine smiled. “May I inspect your gadget?”
“Hm? Oh, sure.”
Jeremy sat amazed as Incarnadine asked him all sorts of technical questions about the computer’s operating system. It was incongruous coming from some guy dressed like something out of a movie about knights and dragons. Jeremy answered all the questions.
“I’d really like to see the guts of this thing,” Incarnadine said.
“No problem.” Jeremy whipped out his wallet and withdrew a set of miniature tools. Working expertly fast, he cracked open the computer’s plastic case and exposed the works to plain view.
Incarnadine bent closer. “Beautiful. Advanced architecture, modular design.”
“You seem to know a lot about computers.”
Incarnadine shook his head. “I try to keep up, but I don’t have the time. I’ve built my own, though.”
“You built a computer?”
“Well, it isn’t much like the ones back on Earth. For one thing, it doesn’t use electricity, because electricity doesn’t work around here.”
“That’s what they tell me. So how come this thing runs?”
“Because it’s using the magical energy that you’re feeding into it.”
Jeremy’s eyes went wide. “Me?”
Incarnadine flipped a hand over. “No other way. Take out the batteries.”
“Huh? But then it wouldn’t —” Giving his shoulders a shrug, Jeremy opened the little door in the back and took out the NiCd batteries, then turned the computer around and punched a few keys. “Hey, it still works!”
“Of course. Everyone who enters Castle Perilous develops a magic skill. You’ve found yours, obviously.”
“No kidding.” Gaze intent on the readout screen, Jeremy let his fingers dance over the keyboard.
Osmirik returned with a quarto volume and handed it to his liege.
“Thanks, Ozzie.”
“May I be of further assistance to His Majesty?”
“Well, I need to do a search of the card catalogue, but I don’t want to take you away from any important research project. What’s up, by the way?”
Osmirik informed Incarnadine of Gene’s disappearance and the plans to devise a locator spell.
“Yeah, that sounds like the way to go,” Incarnadine said. “And the idea about the computer is terrific. Trouble is, I could also use some state-of-the art help with what I’m doing, which is potentially more important.”
“Then by all means, Majesty, you should avail yourself of the machine.”
“Don’t you think we’d better ask the owner? Anyway, I don’t think I’m ready for that yet. Still in the theory stages, and I’m already floundering. Work on finding Gene, I’ll search the catalogue myself.”
“May I ask what problem His Majesty is working on?”
“There seems to be a major disturbance affecting the stresses between the universes. Somewhere, something — or someone — is pumping a lot of energy out of the interdimensional plenum. It could be a natural phenomenon, but I suspect foul play. The disturbance is just barely detectable at this stage, but if it continues, we could be in for a nasty bout of instability here.”
Osmirik nodded gravely. “I see.”
“We have to find out where it’s coming from, and figure out a way to stop it.”
“I am ready to render every assistance.”
“Good. Too bad about Gene, and that only makes it more likely that someone is up to something.”
Osmirik gave an involuntary shudder. “I only hope, sire, that it is not the Hosts of Hell again.”