"You're as boring as I am," Dalton said. "Let's go play some golf."
"Oh, God," Thaxton said, with a hopeless look ceilingward.
"Golf?" Melanie said. "There's a course outside?"
"There's a course inside," Dalton corrected. "There's not much outside but a four-hundred-foot drop to a desert."
Thaxton threw down his serviette. "Well, if I must, I must."
Linda said, "Mr. Thaxton, if you hate golf, why do you always give in and play?"
"For the simple reason that I have nothing else better to do."
"But the castle has no end of worlds."
He gave her a wan smile. "Yes, but you see, my dear, I'd be in them."
Linda nodded glumly. "I think I know what you mean."
Dalton thumped Thaxton on the back. "Buck up, old man."
"Oh, I don't want to give the impression that I'm unhappy in Castle Perilous. I think it's perfectly marvelous here."
"Then let's get out on the links."
"Right you are. Very nice to have met you, Melanie."
"Same here. Have a good game."
"Well, we shall certainly try."
All this time, Jeremy had been stuffing himself in silence. When the two golfers left, he leaned back and delivered a tremendous belch.
"Excuse me."
"That was really ignorant," Deena said.
"I said excuse me."
Linda looked down at Melanie's tattered jeans. "Do you want me to whip up an outfit for you, or do you want to keep wearing those clothes?"
Melanie tugged at her sweat shirt, from which the lettering NORTHEASTERNSTATEhad faded. "These? Everybody else is wearing fancy stuff. Maybe I should too."
"Do you want a dress, a gown, or pants?"
"Pants."
"I think you'd look good in shorts over tights. What color tights?"
"Uh, black?"
"You have green eyes. What if I go for a match?"
"Okay."
"Fine. Stand up."
Melanie stood. "What for?"
Linda waved her right hand. "How's that?"
Melanie looked down at herself. Gone were the sweat shirt, jeans, and white athletic shoes turned gray with grime. Instead, she was attired in forest-green tights, brown leather short pants, matching boots, and a thonged jerkin over a green puffed-sleeve blouse. Her old clothes and shoes lay in a pile at her feet.
"How did you do that?"
"Magic. What do you think?"
"I look like Robin Hood."
"Yeah, I ―"
"What's the matter?"
With a sudden look of despair, Melanie slumped to her seat. "I was just thinking, I have a calculus test tomorrow."
"Well, we can always send you right back."
"You can?" Melanie thought about it. She shook her head emphatically. "I don't want to go back. But what will people say about my just vanishing? And my parents ―?"
Linda said, "It used to be that there was no way back from the castle, and people wound up as missing persons or listed as possible murder victims. But Lord Incarnadine reestablished the Earth portal, and now we have almost complete control of it. What we can do now is set up some kind of cover story to explain your absence."
"What would I tell my parents?"
"That you're dropping out of school for a while and staying with friends, which would only be the truth. You could keep in touch with them by letter or phone."
"You can phone from the castle?"
"With the castle's mainframe, we can tap into any communication system in the world."
"You can even fax a letter," Jeremy said.
"Really?" Melanie let out a breath. "I guess I don't have any excuse not to stay."
"No, you don't. Why don't you have a bite, and then we'll introduce you to Lord Incarnadine. Jeremy, have you seen him lately?"
"Last time I saw him he said something about going to his sister's garden party."
"Princess Dorcas? Oh, that's right. Well, that's one party we can't crash. Maybe later. Go ahead and eat, Melanie."
Melanie pulled up the cheese plate and bit into a wedge of Camembert. She was hungry, and everything looked so appetizing. Don't feel guilty about stuffing yourself, she thought. After all, you're eating for…
She froze, a puzzled look on her small freckled face. By dint of some flashing insight, she was aware of what was inside of her, the small bud of flesh that had taken root in her uterus. She knew its structure and its potential, and she knew with a certainty that could only come with seeing with her own eyes. She did see it, somehow.
How? Was this sight of the unseen her talent?
A glowing smile spread slowly across her face.
You're eating for three now.
Three
Keep ― West Wing
"I've got it."
Switching his golf bag from one shoulder to the other, Thaxton asked, "You've got what?" He kept walking down the gloomy corridor.
"A clerihew," Dalton said.
"Give."
"Okay, here goes.
"Sergei Rachmaninoff
Turned his lights on and off.
An old Late Romantic,
He was really quite frantic."
Dalton looked at his golf partner. "Well?"
Thaxton lifted one eyebrow. "Never cared much for Rachmaninoff."
"I'm asking for your opinion of my clerihew, sir."
"Adequate."
They continued down the hallway toward a pool of light. When they reached it they discovered that the illumination came from an archway that led out into the open, affording a pleasant prospect of stately trees, lawns, sunshine, and shrubbery. A formal garden of hedgerows and flower beds was set in the midst of all this, and a party was going on in the middle of everything. Canopies had been set up, tables underneath laid with food and drink. Several dozen people in widely varying costumes were enjoying the affair, many servants attending. Music came from a small orchestra. A game of croquet (or something to do with balls and mallets) was in progress on a greensward beyond.
"What's all this?" Thaxton said, stopping to watch.
"I do believe that's Princess Dorcas's family reunion."
"Oh?"
"A servant told me about it. Most of Incarnadine's family were invited. Cousins, uncles, Prince Trent, the whole crowd. The castle nobility."
"Really. You rarely see them."
"Most of them keep to their worlds. And they don't think much of Guests."
"Ah, yes," Thaxton said. "I suppose we're N.O.C.D. to them."
"_Not our Class, Dear'?"
"Right you are. Are they all related, do you think?"
"Most are, distantly," Dalton said, "from what I understand. They're the remnants of the aristocracy that once ruled the Western Pale and its adjacent kingdoms. Hundreds of years ago, thousands, maybe, when the territory wasn't the wasteland it is today. Over the years they took up residence in Perilous, and most of them live in one aspect or another."
Thaxton hefted his bag. "Well, we're not invited."
"Not hardly."
They walked on.
"Wait a minute," Thaxton said. "I feel one coming on."
"Eh?"
Thaxton cleared his throat, then versified as follows:
"Not bad, actually," Dalton said. "Have you discovered, like I have, that there's no good rhyme for Mozart?"
Thaxton considered the matter. "Goat's fart?"
"Not the most felicitous. Beethoven's hard too, if not impossible."
"We could change category. Or we could ― what's the matter?"
Dalton had stopped to peer into a small alcove to the left. A pair of stockinged legs was sticking out from behind the arch.
"What have we here?" Thaxton said.
They entered the alcove and found a man lying face up. Dark-haired and bearded, he was dressed in a blue fur-lined gown and long-skirted orange doublet. The gown was finely embroidered with gold thread. Everything he wore was very well tailored and looked expensive. Gold and enormous jewels ringed almost every finger.