text: "Now we have arrived," Dor said, taking charge after reluctantly disengaging from Irene. "But we have not accomplished our mission. I believe this is the place King Trent and Queen Iris came to. I think the table told me they were here, just before I passed out from King Oary's drug. But I might have dreamed that; the memory is very foggy. Have we any solid proof?"
  
  "Apart from the henchman who speaks the language of Xanth?" Grundy asked.
  
  "That's circumstantial," Irene said. "It only proves he had contact with the Xanth scout, not that King Trent actually came here. We have to be sure."
  
  "My evidence is rather tenuous," Arnolde offered. "It seems that the stable hands had difficulty thinking of me as a person of intellect, and spoke more freely in my vicinity than they might otherwise have done. I declined to speak to them, in what I confess might be construed as a fit of pique—"
  
  "Chic pique," Smash chuckled.
  
  "And so they did not realize that the magic in your vicinity caused their language to be intelligible to you, or that you had the wit to comprehend it," Dor put in, pleased. " We could not communicate with them without an interpreter, so it was natural for them to assume you couldn't either. That, combined with their tending to think of you as an animal—"
  
  "Precisely. My pique may have been fortuitous. So I found myself overhearing certain things that were perhaps not entirely my affair." He smiled. "In one case, literally. It seems one of the cooks has a continuing liaison with a scullery maid—" He broke off, grimacing. "Right beside my stall! It was instructive; they are lusty folk. At any rate, there was at one point a reference to a certain alien King who, it seems, had claimed to be able to perform magic."
  
  "King Trent!" Dor exclaimed. "My memory was right, then, not a dream! The table did say King Trent was here!"
  
  "I think we always knew it!" Irene agreed, glowering in memory of the betrayal associated with that table.
  
  "The translator knew about the magic of Xanth," Dor continued. "But of course no one could do magic here in Mundania, until we discovered you, Arnolde. King Trent would have said he could do magic in Xanth, and the qualification got dropped in translation."
  
  "Certainly," the centaur agreed. "It seems that King Oary somehow anticipated magic that he thought might greatly enhance his power and was very angry when that magic did not materialize. So he arrested the alien King treacherously and locked him away, hoping to coerce him into performing, or into revealing the secret of his power."
  
  "Where?" Irene demanded. "Where is my father?"
  
  "I regret I did not overhear more than I have told you. The alien King was not named. I do not believe the people of the stables knew his identity, or believe in his power, or know where he may be confined. They merely gossip. The apparent magic of Smash's initial display of strength, and the manner we communicated with King Oary, caused a considerable ripple of interest around the castle, and indeed in the entire Kingdom of Onesti, which accounts for the gossip about similar cases. But already this interest is waning, since both strength and communication appeared to have been illusion. It is very easy to attribute phenomena to illusion or false memory when practical explanations are lacking, and Mundanes do this often." He smiled grimly. "I daresay a new round of speculation has commenced, considering the events of the past hour. Your tangle plant, Irene, was gratifyingly impressive."
  
  "It sure was!" Grundy agreed enthusiastically. "It was grabbing people right and left, and it ripped the stall apart. But when Arnolde left, the tangler sank down dead."
  
  "Magic plants can't function without magic, dummy," Irene said.
  
  "Fortunately," Arnolde agreed. "On occasion it reached for me; then I angled away from it, depriving it of magic, and it desisted. After a time it ceased to bother me."
  
  "Even a tangler isn't totally stupid!" Irene laughed.
  
  "At least we have more to go on," Dor said. "We can be pretty sure King Oary imprisoned King Trent and Queen Iris, and that they remain alive. Oary's experience with us must have enhanced his conviction that anyone from Xanth is hiding magic from him, since we really did have magic, then stopped showing it when he imprisoned us. He probably intended to force us to tell him the secret of magic so he could do it, too, or at least compel the rest of us to perform for him."
  
  "King Oary strikes me as a pretty cunning old rascal," Irene said. "Wrongheaded but cunning."
  
  "Indeed," Arnolde agreed. "From my observation, he runs this Kingdom reasonably well, but unscrupulously. Perhaps that is what is required to maintain the precarious independence from the larger empires on three sides."
  
  "We still need to locate King Trent," Dor said. "Arnolde, did you hear anything else that might remotely connect?"
  
  "I am not sure, Dor. There was a reference to King Omen, Oary's predecessor who disappeared. It seems the common folk liked him and were sorry to lose him."
  
  "He was King?" Dor asked. "I understood he was underage, so Oary was regent, and Omen never actually became King."
  
  "I gather in contrast that he was indeed King, for about a year, before he disappeared," the centaur said. "They called him Good Omen, and believe the Kingdom of Onesti would have prospered under his guidance."
  
  "Surely it would have," Dor agreed. He realized that King Oary might have preferred to minimize King Omen's stature in order to make his own position more secure. If the Kingdom of Onesti was well run, it could have been mostly King Omen's doing. "A trade agreement with Xanth could help both Kingdoms. Maybe King Omen was arranging that, then got deposed before King Trent arrived. King Oary's greed has cost him that chance."
  
  "The peasants suspect that King Omen was illicitly removed," the centaur continued. "Some even choose to believe that he still lives, that King Oary imprisoned him by subterfuge and usurped power. This may of course be mere wish fulfillment—"
  
  "And just may be the truth," Irene put in. "If King Oary deceived and imprisoned us and did the same with my parents, why not also with Good King Omen? It certainly fits his pattern."
  
  "We are indulging in a great deal of supposition," Arnolde said warningly. "We could encounter disappointment. Yet if I may extend the rationale—it occurs to me that if King Trent and King Omen both survive, they may be confined together. We have already seen that the dungeons of Castle Onesti are not extensive. If there is another castle, and we find one confined there—"
  
  "We find the other!" Irene finished. "And if we rescued them both, Good Omen would be King of Onesti again and all would be well. I'd sure like to depose hoary King Oary!"
  
  "That was the extrapolation of my conjectures," Arnolde agreed. "Yet I reiterate, it is highly speculative."
  
  "It's worth a try," Dor said. "Now let's plan our strategy. Probably only King Oary knows where King Trent and/or King Omen are incarcerated, and he won't tell. I could question the stones of the castle, but probably the Kings aren't here at all, and the stones wouldn't know anything about other places. If the local servants don't know anything about it, it probably isn't known. So the question is, how can we get him to tell?"
  
  "He ought to have a guilty conscience," Irene said. "Maybe we could play on that."
  
  "I distrust this," Dor said. "I encountered some bad people and creatures in another adventure, and I don't think their consciences troubled them, because they simply didn't believe they were doing anything wrong. Goblins and harpies—"
  
  "Of course they don't have consciences," Irene snapped. "But Oary is a person."
  
  "Human beings can be worst of all, especially Mundanes," Dor said. "Many of them have ravaged Xanth over the centuries, and King Oary may contemplate something similar. I just don't have much confidence in any appeal to his conscience."
  
  "I perceive your point," Arnolde said. "But I think 'appeal' is not the appropriate term. A guilty conscience more typically manifests in the perception of nocturnal specters—"
  
  "Not many specters running around this far from Xanth," Grundy pointed out.
  
  "We could scare him into giving it away!" Irene exclaimed.
  
  "Tonight," Dor decided. "We must rest and feed ourselves first—and hide from King Oary's troops."
  
  They had no trouble avoiding the troops. It took Oary's forces some time to organize, after the devastation Smash had caused during the breakout, and only now, after the long discussion, was any real activity manifesting at the castle. Irene made vines grow, bristling with thorns; in their natural state these had been a nuisance, but now they were a menace. When the magic moved away, the vines died, for they had been extended far beyond their natural limits—but the tangle of thorns remained as a formidable barrier. That, coupled with the Mundanes' knowledge that the ogre lurked in the forest, kept the guards close to the castle even after they emerged. They were not eager for contact with the creature who had bashed all those holes in the massive walls.
  
  At night, rested, Dor's party made its play. Grundy had scouted the castle, so they knew which tower contained the royal suite. King Oary was married, but slept alone; his wife couldn't stand him. He ate well and consumed much alcoholic beverage; this facilitated his sleep.
  
  They had fashioned a platform that Smash carried to the base of the outer wall nearest the royal tower, which happened to be on the forest side. Arnolde mounted this, bringing his magic aisle within range of the King.
  
  Irene had scouted for useful Mundane seeds and had assembled a small collection. Now she planted several climbing vines, and in the ambience of magic they assumed somewhat magical properties. They mounted wall and platform vigorously, sending their little anchor-tendrils into any solid substance they found, quickly binding the platform firmly in place. Arnolde had to keep moving his legs to avoid tendrils that swiped at his feet, until the growing stage passed that level. The plants ascended to the embrasure that marked the King's residence, then halted; the magic aisle extended more inward than upward.
  
  Grundy used the sturdy vines to mount to that embrasure. He scrambled over, found himself a shrouded corner, and called quietly down: "I can see inside some, but I don't dare get close enough to cover the whole room."
  
  "Talk to the plant," Irene said in her don't-be-dumb tone. She no longer used that on Dor, mute recognition of their changed situation, but obviously she retained the expertise.
  
  "Say, yes," the golem agreed. "There's a vine that reaches inside." He paused, talking to the plant. "It says Oary's not alone. He's got a doxy in his bed."
  
  "He would," Irene grumped. "Men like that will do anything."
  
  It occurred to Dor that this could be the reason the translator had persisted in addressing Irene as "slut" and "strumpet." This was the type of woman King Oary normally associated with. But Dor decided not to mention this to Irene; she already had reason enough to hate Oary.
  
  Dor climbed the vines, finding a lodging against the wall just beneath the embrasure. "Describe the room," he murmured to Grundy. "I've got to know exactly what's in it, and where."
  
  The golem consulted with the plant. "There is this big feather bed to the right, two of your paces in from this wall. A wooden bench straight in from the embrasure, six paces, with her dress strewn on it. A wooden table to its left, one pace—and there's your sword on it, and Arnolde's bag of spells."
  
  "Ha!" Dor exclaimed quietly. "I need that sword. Too bad it's not the variety that wields itself; I could call it right to me."
  
  The golem continued describing the room, until Dor was satisfied he had the details properly fixed in his mind. He was able to picture it now— everything just so. "I hope my mind doesn't go blank," he called down.
  
  "Don't you dare!" Irene snapped. "Save your fouling up for some other time. Do I have to come up there and prompt you?"
  
  "That might help," Dor confessed. "You see, I can't make things say specific things. They only answer questions, or talk in response to my words. Usually. And the inanimate is not too bright, and sometimes perverse. So I may indeed foul it up."
  
  "For pity's sake!" Irene took hold of the vines and began climbing. "And don't look up my skirt!" she said to Arnolde.
  
  "I wouldn't think of it," the centaur said equably. "I prefer to view equine limbs, and never did see the merit in pink panties."
  
  "They're not pink!" she said.
  
  "They're not? I must be colorblind. Let me see—"
  
  "Forget it!" She joined Dor, gave him a quick kiss, wrapped her skirt closely about her legs, and settled in for the duration. Dor had worried about the strength of the vines, with all this weight on them, but realized she would have a better notion than he how much they could hold.
  
  "Well, start," she whispered.
  
  "But if I talk loud enough for the things to hear me, so will King Oary."
  
  She sighed. "You are a dumbell at times, dear. You don't have to talk aloud to objects; just direct your attention to them. That's the way your magic works. As for King Oary—if that snippet with him knows her trade, he won't be paying any attention to what's outside the castle."
  
  She was right Dor concentrated, but still couldn't quite get it together. He was used to speaking aloud to objects. "Are they really not pink?" he asked irrelevantly.
  
  "What?"
  
  "Your—you-knows."
  
  She laughed. "My panties? You mean you never looked?"
  
  Dor, embarrassed, admitted that he had not.
  
  "You're entitled now, you know."
  
  "But I wasn't, back when I had a chance to see."
  
  She released her grip on the vine with one hand and reached over to tweak his cheek, in much the manner the Gorgon had. "You're something sort of rare and special, Dor. Well, you get this job done right, and I'll show you."
  
  "Will you get on with it?" Grundy demanded from above.
  
  "But she says not till after this job's done," Dor said.
  
  "I was referring to the job!" the golem snapped. "I'll tell you what color her—"
  
  "I will wring your rag body into a tight little knot!" Irene threatened, and the golem was silent.
  
  Prompted by this, Dor concentrated on the magic sword on the King's table. Groan, he ordered it mentally.
  
  Obediently, the sword groaned. Naturally it hammed it up. "Groooaan!" it singsonged in an awful key.
  
  "The doxy just sat up straight," Grundy reported gleefully as the vine rustled the news to him. "Oh, she shouldn't have done that. She's stark, bare, nude naked!"
  
  "Skip the pornography, you little voyeur!" Irene snapped. "It's the King we want to rouse." She nudged Dor. "You know the script we worked out. 'Let me free, let me free.'"
  
  Dor concentrated again. Sword, I have a game for you. If you play your part well, you can scare the pants off bad King Oary.
  
  "Hey, great!" the sword exclaimed. "Only they're already off him. Boy, is he fat!"
  
  No. Don't talk to me! Talk to the King. Groan again and say, "Let me free, let me free!" The idea is you 're the ghost of Good King Omen, coming back to haunt him. Can you handle that, or are you too stupid?
  
  "I'll show you!" the sword exclaimed. It groaned again, with hideous feeling. It was definitely a ham.
  
  "There's someone here!" the doxy screamed.
  
  "There can't be," the King muttered. "The guards prevent anyone from getting through. They know I don't want to be disturbed when I'm conducting affairs of state."
  
  "Affairs of state!" Irene hissed furiously.
  
  "Affair, anyway," Dor said, trying to calm her.
  
  "Let me free, let me free," the sword groaned enthusiastically.
  
  "Then who's that?" the doxy demanded, hiding under the feathers.
  
  "I am the ghooost of Goood King Ooomen," the sword answered. Dor no longer needed to prompt it.
  
  The doxy emitted a half-stifled squeak and disappeared entirely into the feathers, according to Grundy's gleeful play-by-play report. The King clutched a feather quilt about him, causing part of the doxy to reappear, to her dismay.
  
  "You can't be!" Oary retorted shakily, trying to see where the voice came from. The lone candle illuminating the room cast many wavering shadows, the plant reported, making such detection difficult.
  
  "Coming back from the graaave to haaunt you!" the sword continued, really getting into it.
  
  "Impossible!" But the King looked nervous, Grundy reported.
  
  "He's a tough one," Irene murmured. "He should be terrified, and he's only worried. We're only scaring the doxy, who doesn't matter. Girls can be such foolish creatures!" Then she reconsidered. "When they want to be."
  
  Dor nodded, worried himself. If this ruse didn't work—
  
  "Yooou killed me," the sword said.
  
  "I did not!" Oary shouted. "I only locked you up until I figured out what to do with you. I never killed you."
  
  The doxy's face reappeared, replacing the rounder portion of her that had showed before. "You locked up Good Omen?" she asked, surprised.
  
  "I had to, or I never would have gotten the throne," the King said absently. "I thought he would foul up as King, but he didn't, so there was no way to remove him legitimately." As he talked, he hoisted his porcine torso from the bed, wrapped the quilt about it, and stalked the voice he heard. "But I didn't kill him. I am too cautious for that. It is too hard to undo a killing, if anything goes wrong. So this can't be his ghost."
  
  "Then whose ghost is it?" the doxy demanded.
  
  "No ghost at all," the King said. "There's no one there." He picked up the sword. "Just this sword I took from the Xanth Prince. I thought it was magic, but it isn't. I tried it out, and there's nothing remarkable about it except a fine edge."
  
  "That's not true!" the sword cried. "Unhand me, valet!"
  
  Unnerved at last, the King hurled it out the embrasure. "The thing talks!" he cried.
  
  "Well, that's one way to recover my weapon," Dor murmured.
  
  "Try for my bag of seeds," Irene suggested. "I can do a lot with genuine magic plants."
  
  Grundy had located the seeds, carelessly thrown in a corner; no doubt Oary had been disappointed when he discovered the bag did not contain treasure, though he should have been satisfied with the gold and diamonds Dor had carried. Greed knew no restraint! "You can't get rid of me that way," the seedbag said as Dor mentally prompted it. "My ghost will haunt you forever."
  
  "I tell you, I didn't kill you!" Oary said, looking for the new voice that sounded seedy. "You're just making that up."
  
  "Well, I might as well be dead," the seedbag said. "Locked up here alone—it's awful."
  
  "What do you mean, alone?" Oary demanded. "The Xanth King is in the next cell, and the sharp-tongued Xanth Queen in the third. They wanted to know what had happened to you, and wouldn't deal with me, so now they know."
  
  Irene's free hand clutched Dor's shoulder. "Confirmation!" she whispered, thrilled.
  
  Dor was equally gratified. The talking objects had hardly terrorized Oary, but they had evoked his confession nevertheless. Dor continued to concentrate. But you 're way out in nowhere, he thought to the bag.
  
  "But we're way out in nowhere," the bag dutifully repeated. Dor was getting better at this as he went. He had never before used his talent in quite this way; it was a new aspect.
  
  "Nowhere?" The King pounced on the bag and shook it. "You're in the Ocna dungeon! The second biggest castle of the Kingdom! Plenty of company there! I'd be proud to be in that dungeon myself! Out, you ungrateful bag!" And he hurled it out the embrasure.
  
  "What?" the doxy demanded. She had evidently heard only the last few words.
  
  "Out, you ungrateful bag," the table repeated helpfully. "That's what he said."
  
  "Well, I never!" the doxy said, flushing wrathfully.
  
  "Don't tell me you never!" the feather quilt she had retained said. "I was right here when you—"
  
  The doxy slapped the quilt, silencing it, then wrapped it about her and stalked out. "Help!" the quilt cried. "I'm being kidnapped by a monster!" Then it was beyond the magic aisle and said no more.
  
  "Guards!" the King bellowed. "Search the premises! Report anything remarkable."
  
  There was a scream from the hall, and the sound of someone being slapped. "He said premises, not mistresses!" the doxy's voice cried.
  
  There was a guttural laugh. "But we do have something remarkable to report."
  
  "He's seen it before!" she retorted. Her footfalls moved on away.
  
  Guards charged into the room. Quickly they ascertained that no one except the King was in the tower. Then they spied the tip of the vine that had grown into the embrasure. They investigated it—while Dor and Irene scrambled down the wall. Grundy leaped from above them, dropping to the centaur's back. "Take off!" he cried.
  
  Arnolde in turn launched himself from the platform, landing with heavy impact on the dark ground and galloping off. The platform was shoved violently by the back thrust of his hooves, so that the vines holding it in place were wrenched from the wall. Suddenly Irene was falling, her support gone, while Dor dangled tenuously from his vine, his grip slipping.
  
  But Smash the Ogre was there below. He snatched Irene out of the air and whirled her around, absorbing the shock of her fall. Her skirt flew out and up—and now at last Dor saw her panties. They were green. Then Smash deposited her gently on the ground while Dor slid down as quickly as he could, weak with relief. "I'm glad you were there!" Dor gasped.
  
  "Me glad centaur was still near," Smash said. "He out of range now."
  
  Which meant that the ogre's magic strength was gone again. Irene had fallen in those few seconds that the rear extension of the aisle remained. Now Smash's nonrhyming showed that the Mundane environment had closed in.
  
  "Someone's out there!" King Oary cried from the embrasure. "After him!" But the guards had no good light for the purpose, and seemed loath to pursue a magic enemy in the moonlight.
  
  "You sword," Smash said, pressing it into Dor's hand. "You seeds," he said to Irene, giving her the bag he had rescued.
  
  "Thanks oodles, Smash," she said. "Now let's get away from here."
  
  But as they moved out, a small gate opened in the castle wall and troops poured forth bearing torches. "Oary must have caught on that it was our magic," Dor said as they scrambled away.
  
  Soon they caught up to the centaur, who had stopped as soon as he realized what was happening. Dor felt no different as they re-entered the magic aisle, but Smash's panting alleviated; his strength had returned.
  
  Quickly Dor summarized their situation. "We're together; we have our magic things, except for Arnolde's spells, and we know King Trent, Queen Iris, and King Omen are alive in Castle Ocna. Oary's troops are on our trail. We had better hurry on to rescue the three, before the troops catch us. But we don't know the way."
  
  "Every plant and rock must know the way to Ocna" Grundy said. "We can ask as we go along."
  
  The guards were spreading out and combing through the forest. Whatever virtues King Oary lacked, he evidently compelled obedience when he really wanted it. Dor's party had to retreat before them. But there were two problems: this section of forest was small, so that they could not remain concealed long; and they were being herded the wrong way. For it turned out that Ocna was half a day's walk northwest of Onesti, while this forest was southeast. They were actually moving toward the village settlement, where the peasants who served the castle dwelt. That village would, in the course of centuries, expand into the town of Onesti, whose designation on the map had given them the hint where to find King Trent. They didn't want to interfere with that!
  
  "We've got to get on a path," Irene said. "We'll never make it to Ocna tonight traveling cross-country. But the soldiers will be patrolling the paths."
  
  "Maybe there's a magic seed for this," Grundy suggested.
  
  "Maybe," Irene agreed. "Another tangler would do—except I don't have one. I do have a cherry seed—"
  
  "The kind that grows cherry bombs? That would do it!"
  
  "No," Arnolde said.
  
  "What's the matter, horsetail?" the golem demanded nastily. "You'd rather get your rump riddled with arrows than throw a few cherries at the enemy?"
  
  "Setting aside the ethical and aesthetic considerations—which process I find objectionable—there remain practical ones," the centaur said. "First, we don't want a pitched battle; we do want to elude these people, if possible, leaving them here in a fruitless search while we proceed unchallenged to Ocna. If we fight them, we shall be tied down indefinitely, until their superior numbers overwhelm us."
  
  "There is that," Dor agreed. Centaurs did have fine minds.
  
  "Second, we must keep moving if we are to reach Ocna before dawn. A half-day's march for seasoned travelers by day, familiar with the route, will be twice that for us at night. A cherry tree can't travel; it must be rooted in soil. And since it is magic—"
  
  "We'd have to stay with it," Irene finished. "It'd die the moment we left. Anything magic will be no good away from the magic aisle."
  
  "However," the centaur said after a moment, "it might be possible to grow a plant that would distract them, even if it were dead. Especially if it were dead."
  
  "Cherry bombs won't work," Grundy said. "They don't exist in Mundania. They wouldn't explode outside the aisle."
  
  "Oh, I don't know," Irene said defensively. "Once they are mature and ready to detonate, it seems to me they should be able to explode anywhere. I'd be willing to try them, certainly,"
  
  "Possibly so," the centaur said. "However, I was thinking of resurrection fern, whose impact would extend beyond the demise of the plant itself."
  
  "I do have some," Irene said. "But I don't see how it can stop soldiers."
  
  "Primitives tend to be superstitious," the centaur explained. "Especially, I understand, Mundanes, who profess not to belive in ghosts."
  
  "That's ridiculous!" Dor protested. "Only a fool would not believe in ghosts. Some of my best friends are—"
  
  "I'm not certain all Mundanes are fools," Arnolde said in his cautious way. "But these particular ones may be. So if they encountered resurrection fern—"
  
  "It could be quite something, for people who didn't know about it," Irene agreed.
  
  "And surely these Mundanes don't," Arnolde said. "I admit it is a bit of a dastardly deed, but our situation is desperate."
  
  "Dastardly deed," Dor said. "Are you sure that counterspell we used with the salve worked?"
  
  The centaur smiled. "Certainly I'm sure! We do not have to do such a deed, but we certainly can if we choose to."
  
  Irene dug out the seed. "I can grow it, but you'll have to coordinate it. The wrong suggestion can ruin it."
  
  "These primitives are bound to have suffered lost relatives," the centaur said. "They will have repressed urgings. All we shall have to do is establish pseudo-identities."
  
  "I never talked with resurrection fern," Grundy complained. "What's so special about it? What's this business about lost relatives?"
  
  "Let's find a place on a road," Arnolde said. "We want to intercept the Mundanes, but have easy travel to Ocna. They will pursue us when they penetrate the deception."
  
  "Right," Irene agreed. "I'll need time to get the fern established so it can include all of us."
  
  "Include us all in what?" the golem demanded.
  
  "Resurrection fern has the peculiar property of—" the centaur began.
  
  "Near here!" Smash called, pointing. Ogres had excellent night vision.
  
  Sure enough, they had found a path, a rut worn by the tread of peasants' feet and horses' hooves.
  
  "Do you go to Ocna?" Dor asked the path.
  
  "No. I merely show the way," it answered.
  
  "Which way is it?"
  
  "That way," the section of path to their west said. "But you'll have trouble traveling there tonight."
  
  "Why?"
  
  "Because there is something wrong with me. I feel numb, everywhere but here. Maybe there's been a bad storm that washed me out."
  
  "Could the path be aware of itself beyond the region of magic?" Irene asked Dor.
  
  "I'm not sure. I don't think so—but then, it does know it goes to Ocna, so maybe it does have some awareness. I'm not used to dealing with things that straddle magic and nonmagic; I don't know all the rules."
  
  "I believe it is reasonably safe to assume the path is animate only within the aisle," Arnolde said. "In any event, this is probably as good a place for our purpose as any. The soldiers are surely using this path, and will circle around here. It is better to meet them in a manner of our choosing than to risk an accidental encounter. Let us begin our preparations."
  
  "Right," Irene said. "Now the fern will grow in the dark, but needs light to activate its magic. The soldiers will have torches, so it should be all right."
  
  "I have the sunstone," Dor reminded her. "That can trigger the fern, if necessary. Or we could clear out some trees to let the moonlight in."
  
  "Good enough," she agreed. She planted several seeds. "Grow."
  
  "But what does it do?" Grundy asked plaintively.
  
  "Well, it relates to the psychology of the ignorant spectator," Arnolde explained. "Anyone who comprehends its properties soon penetrates the illusion. That is why I feel it will be more effective against Mundanes than against citizens of Xanth. Thus we should be able to deceive them and nullify the pursuit without violence, a distinct advantage. All we have to do is respond appropriately to the their overtures, keeping our own expectations out of it."
  
  "What expectations?" the golem demanded, frustrated.
  
  Dor took a hand. "You see, resurrection fern makes figures seem like—"
  
  "Refrain!" Smash whispered thunderingly. "Mundane!" Ogres' hearing was also excellent.
  
  They waited by the growing fern. In a moment three Onesti soldiers came into view, their torches flashing between the trees, casting monstrous shadows. They were peering to either side, alert for their quarry.
  
  Then the three spied the five. The soldiers halted, staring just within the magic aisle. "Grandfather!" one exclaimed, aghast, staring at Smash.
  
  The ogre knew what to do. He roared and made a threatening gesture with one hamfist. The soldier dropped his torch and fled in terror.
  
  One of the remaining soldiers was looking at Irene. "You live!" he gasped. "The fever spared you after all!"
  
  Irene shook her head sadly. "No, friend. I died."
  
  "But I see you!" the man cried, in an agony of doubtful hope. "I hear you! Now we can marry—"
  
  "I am dead, love," she said with mournful firmness. "I return only to warn you not to support the usurper."
  
  "But you never cared for politics," the soldier said, bewildered. "You did not even like my profession—"
  
  "I still don't," Irene said. "But at least you worked for Good King Omen. Death has given me pause for thought. Now you work for his betrayer. I will never respect you, even from the grave, if you work for the bad King who seeks to send Good King Omen to his grave."
  
  "I'll renounce King Oary!" the soldier cried eagerly. "I don't like him anyway. I thought Good Omen dead!"
  
  "He lives," Irene said. "He is in the dungeon at Castle Ocna."
  
  "I'll tell everyone! Only return to me!"
  
  "I can not return, love," she said. "I am resurrected only for this moment, only to tell you why I can not rest in peace. I am dead; King Omen lives. Go help the living." She moved back to hide behind the centaur, disappearing from the soldier's view.
  
  "Beautiful," Arnolde whispered.
  
  "I feel unclean," she muttered.
  
  The third man focused on Grundy. "My baby son—returned from the Khazars!" he exclaimed. "I knew they could not hold you long!"
  
  The golem had finally caught on to the nature of resurrection fern: it resurrected the memories of important figures in the viewers' lives. "Only my spirit escaped," he said. "I had to warn you. The Khazars are coming! They will besiege Onesti, slay the men, rape the women, and carry the children away into bondage, as they did me. Warn the King! Fetch all troops into the castle! Barricade the access roads! Don't let more families be ravaged. Don't let my sacrifice be in vain! Fight to the last—"
  
  Dor nudged the golem with his foot. "Don't overdo it," he murmured. "Mundanes are ignorant; they aren't necessarily stupid."
  
  "Let's move out," Irene whispered. "This should hold them for a while."
  
  They moved out cautiously. The two soldiers remained by the fern, absorbed by their thoughts. Before rounding a curve in the path, Dor glanced back—and saw a giant, pretty spider, of the kind that ranged about rather than forming a web. The decorations on its body resembled a greenish face, and it had eight eyes of different sizes.
  
  "Jumper!" he exclaimed—then stifled himself. Jumper had died of old age years ago. He had been Dor's closest friend, when the two had seemed to be the same size within the historical tapestry of Castle Roogna, but their worlds were different. The spider's descendants remained by the tapestry, and Dor could talk to them if he arranged for translation, but it wasn't the same. They seemed like interlopers, taking the place of his marvelous friend. Now he saw Jumper himself.
  
  But of course it was only a resurrection, not the real friend. As Dor reminded himself of that, the image reduced to the standing soldier. How Dor wished it could have been genuine! This new separation, albeit from a phantom, was painfully poignant.
  
  "So the fern resurrects precious memories," Grundy said as they got clear. "The person looking sees what is deepest-etched in his experience. He really should know better."
  
  "Oh, what do you know about it?" Irene said irritably. "It's an awful thing to do to a person, even a Mundane."
  
  "You looked back, too?" Dor asked.
  
  "I saw my father. I know he isn't dead, but I saw him." She sounded choked. "What a torment it would have been if that were all I would ever see of him."
  
  "We'll soon find him," Dor said encouragingly. This, too, he found he liked about her—her human feeling and loyalty to her father, who had always been a large figure in Dor's own life.
  
  She flashed him a grateful smile in the moonlight. Dor understood her mood; his vision of his long-gone friend had wrenched his emotion. How much worse had it been for the Mundanes, who lacked knowledge of the mechanism? It was indeed a dastardly thing they had done; perhaps the violence of ogre and sword would have been gentler.
  
  Soon, however, they heard the commotion of pursuit. The resurrection fern had perished, or at least had become inactive after the magic aisle left it; there would be no more visions there. The stories of the three affected soldiers would spread alarm, but there would also be many who still followed their orders to capture Dor's party.
  
  They stepped from the path, hiding in the brush—and the troops rushed on past. A snatch of their dialogue flung out: ". . . Khazars coming . . ." It seemed the golem's information had been taken to heart!
  
  "I think they've forgotten us," Irene said as they stepped back on the path. "The resurrections gave them other things to think about. Now they aren't even looking for us. So maybe we can travel to Ocna safely."
  
  "It was a good move we made, strategically," Dor said. "A dirty one, perhaps, and I wouldn't want to do it again, but effective."
  
  "First we must pass Castle Onesti," Arnolde reminded them.
  
  They got past Onesti by following the directions the path gave. There was a detour around that castle, for peasants had fields to attend to, wood to fetch, and hunting to do well beyond the castle, and the immediate environs were forbidding.
  
  This path angled down below the clifflike western face of the peak the castle stood on, wending its way curvaceously through pastures and forest and slope. Several parties of soldiers passed them, but were easily avoided. It seemed these people took the Khazars seriously!
  
  Beyond the castle the way grew more difficult. This was truly mountainous country, and there was a high pass between the two redoubts. Dor and the others were not yet fully rested from their arduous climb to Onesti of a day or so ago; now the stiffness of muscles was aggravated. But the path assured them there was no better route. Perhaps that was its conceit— but they had no ready alternative. So they hauled themselves up and up, until near midnight they came to the highest pass. It was a narrow gap between jags.
  
  It was guarded by a select detachment of soldiers. They could not conveniently circle around it, and knew the soldiers would not let them through unchallenged.
  
  "What now?" Irene asked, too tired even to be properly irritable.
  
  "Maybe I can distract them," Dor said. "If I succeed, the rest of you hurry through the pass."
  
  They worked their way as close to the pass as they could without being discovered. Arnolde oriented himself so that the magic aisle was where they needed it. Then Dor concentrated, causing the objects to break into speech.
  
  "Ready, Khazar?" an outcropping of rock cried.
  
  "Ready!" came a chorused response from several loose rocks.
  
  "Sneak up close before firing your arrows," the outcropping directed. "We want to get them all on the first volley."
  
  "Save some for our boulder!" the upper face of the cleft called. "We have a perfect drop here!"
  
  The Onesti soldiers, at first uneasy, abruptly vacated the cleft, glancing nervously up at the crags. It seemed impossible for anyone to have a boulder up there, but the voice had certainly been convincing. They charged the rocks, swords drawn. "Move out!" Dor cried.
  
  Arnolde and Grundy charged for the pass. Smash and Irene hesitated. "Go on!" Dor snapped. "Get through before the magic ends!"
  
  "But what about you?" Irene asked.
  
  Dor concentrated. "Retreat, men!" the outcropping cried. "They're on to us!" There was the sound of scrambling from the rocks.
  
  "I'm not going without you!" Irene said.
  
  "I've got to keep them distracted until the rest of you safely clear the pass!" Dor cried, exasperated.
  
  "You can't keep on after—"
  
  Then the voices stopped. The magic aisle had passed.
  
  "After Arnolde gets out of range," she finished lamely. The soldiers, baffled by the disappearance of the enemy, were turning about. In a moment they would spy the two; the moonlight remained too bright for effective concealment in the open.
  
  "I grew a pineapple while we waited," Irene said. "I hate to use it on people, even Mundanes, but they'll kill us if—"
  
  "How can a magic pineapple operate outside the aisle?" he demanded, knowing this argument was foolish, but afraid if they moved that the soldiers would spy them.
  
  She looked chagrined. "For once you're right! If cherry bombs are uncertain, so is this!"
  
  Smash was standing in the cleft. "Run!" he cried.
  
  But the soldiers were closing in. Dor knew they couldn't make it through in time. He drew his sword. Without its magic, it felt heavy and clumsy, but it was the best weapon he had. He would be overwhelmed, of course, but he would die fighting. It wasn't the end he would have chosen, had he a reasonable choice, but it was better than nothing. "Run to Smash," he said. "I'll block them off."
  
  "You come, too!" she insisted. "I love you!"
  
  "Now she tells me," he muttered, watching the soldiers close in.
  
  Irene threw the pineapple at them. "Maybe it'll scare them," she said.
  
  "It can't. They don't know what—"
  
  The pineapple exploded, sending yellow juice everywhere. "It detonated!" Dor exclaimed, amazed.
  
  "Come on!" Arnolde called, appearing behind the ogre. Suddenly it made sense; the centaur had turned about and come back when they hadn't followed. That had returned the magic to the vicinity, just in time.
  
  They ran to the cleft. The Mundanes were pawing at their eyes, blinded by pineapple juice. There was no trouble.
  
  "You were so busy trying to be heroes, you forgot common sense," Arnolde reproved them. "All you needed to do was follow me while the Mundanes' backs were turned. They would never have known of our passage."
  
  "I never was strong on common sense," Dor admitted.
  
  "That's for sure," Irene agreed. "That juice won't hold them forever. We'll have to move far and fast."
  
  They did just that, their fatigue dissipated by the excitement. Now the path led downhill, facilitating progress somewhat. But it was treacherous in the darkness at this speed, for the mountain crags and trees shadowed it, and it curved and dropped without fair warning. Soon the soldiers were in pursuit.
  
  But Dor used his talent, making the path call out warnings of hazards, so that they could proceed more rapidly than other strangers might. His midnight sunstone helped, too, casting just enough light to make pitfalls almost visible. But he knew they couldn't remain on the path long, because the soldiers were more familiar with it, and had their torches, and would surely catch up. They would have to pull off and hide—and that might not be enough, this time. There was too little room for concealment, and the soldiers would be too wary.
  
  Then disaster loomed. "The bridge is out!" the path warned.
  
  "What bridge?" Dor panted.
  
  "The wooden bridge across the cut, dummy!"
  
  "What happened to it?"
  
  "The Onesti soldiers destroyed it when they heard the Khazars were coming."
  
  So Dor's party had brought this mischief on itself! "Can we cross the cut some other way?"
  
  "See for yourself. Here it is."
  
  They halted hastily. There, shrouded by darkness and fog, was a gap in the mountain—a fissure four times the full reach of a man, extending from the clifflike face of the peak above down to the deep valley below, shrouded in nocturnal fog. Here the moonlight blazed down, as if eager to show the full extent of the hazard.
  
  "A young, vigorous centaur could hurdle that," Arnolde said. "It is out of the question for me."
  
  "If we had the rope—" Irene said. But of course Chet had that, wherever he was now.
  
  Ascent of the peak seemed virtually impossible, and there was no telling what lay beneath the fog. The bridge had been the only practical crossing— and only fragments of that remained. This had become a formidable natural barrier—surely one reason the Khazars had been unable to conquer this tiny Kingdom. Any bridge the enemy built could readily be hacked out or fired.
  
  But now the torches of the garrison of the upper pass were approaching. That was the other pincer of this trap. A few men could guard that pass, preventing retreat. The slope was steep here, offering little haven above or below the path. If the soldiers didn't get them, nature would.
  
  "The salve," Irene said. "See the fog—we've got to use the salve!"
  
  "But the curse—we've lost the counterspell!" Dor protested. "We'll have to do some dastardly deed!"
  
  "Those soldiers will do some dastardly deed to us if we don't get away from here fast," she pointed out.
  
  Dor looked at her, standing in the moonlight, wearing his jacket, her fine-formed legs braced against the mountain. He thought of the soldiers doing a dastardly deed to her, as they had started to do in the dungeon. "We'll use the salve," he decided.
  
  They scrambled down the steep slope to reach the level of the mist. They had to cling to trees and saplings, lest they slide into the cleft involuntarily.
  
  Dor felt in his pocket for the jar—and found the dime he had obtained from Ichabod in Modern Mundania. He had forgotten that; it must have slipped into another crevice of his pocket and been overlooked. It was of course of no use now. He fumbled farther and found the jar.
  
  Quickly they applied the salve to their feet. The supply was getting low; this was just about the last time they would be able to use it. Then they stepped cautiously out onto the fog.
  
  "Stay close to Arnolde," Dor warned. "And in line. Anyone who goes outside the magic aisle will fall through."
  
  Now the soldiers reached the cut. They were furious when they discovered no victims there. But almost immediately they spied the fugitives. "Cnvm adknv!" one cried. "Sgdx'qd nm sgd bkntc." Then he did a double take.
  
  For a moment the soldiers stared. "Sgdx can't do that!" one protested as the rear of the magic aisle swung around to intersect him.
  
  But their leader found the answer. "They're sorcerers! Spies sent by the Khazars. Shoot them down!"
  
  Numbly responsive to orders, the soldiers nocked arrows to their bowstrings. "Run!" Dor cried. "But stay with Arnolde!"
  
  "This time I'll bring up the rear, just to be sure," the centaur said. "Lead the way, the rest of you."
  
  It made sense. The main part of the magic aisle was ahead of the centaur, and this way Arnolde could angle his body to keep them all within it. Dor and Irene and Smash charged forward as the first volley of arrows came at them. Grundy rode the centaur; it was the best way to keep him out from underfoot. They crossed the fog-filled cut, coming to the dense forest at the far side.
  
  "Aaahh!" Arnolde screamed.
  
  Dor paused to look back. An arrow had struck the centaur in the rump. Arnolde was crippled, trying to move forward on three legs.
  
  Smash was leading the way. He reached out to grab the branch of a tree that projected through the fog. He ripped that branch out of its trunk and hurled it uphill and across the cut toward the soldiers. His aim was good; the soldiers screamed and flung themselves flat as the heavy branch landed on them, and one almost fell into the chasm.
  
  Then Smash charged back across the cloud. He ducked down, grabbed the centaur by one foreleg and one hindleg, and hefted him to shoulder height. "Oh, I say!" Arnolde exclaimed, amazed despite his pain.
  
  But within the ambience of magic, there was no strength to match that of the ogre. Smash carried Arnolde to the slope and set him down carefully where the ground rose out of the fog. This place was sheltered from the view of the soldiers; there would be no more shooting.
  
  "But the arrow," the centaur said bravely. "We must get it out!"
  
  Smash grabbed the protruding shaft and yanked. Arnolde screamed again—but suddenly the arrow was out. It had not been deeply embedded, or the head would have broken off.
  
  "Yes, that was the appropriate way to do it," the centaur said—and fainted.
  
  Irene was already sprouting a seed. They had lost their healing elixir with Arnolde's bag of spells, but some plants had curative properties. She grew a balm plant and used its substance on the wound. "This won't cure it all the way," she said. "But it will deaden the pain and start the healing process. He should be able to walk."
  
  Smash paced nervously. "Yet—Chet," he said. "Mundane, the pain—"
  
  Dor caught on to the ogre's concern. "We don't know that a Mundane wound will always become infected the way Chet's did. That was probably Chet's bad luck. Also, he was bitten by a wyvern, so there might have been poison, while Arnolde was struck by an arrow. This is a different situation—I think." Still, the coincidence of a second centaur getting wounded bothered Dor. Could it be part of the salve's curse? The centaurs had had to use twice as much salve, since they had four feet, and perhaps that made them more susceptible to the curse.
  
  Arnolde soon woke and agreed that the agony of the wound was much abated. That was a relief, for at least two reasons. Nevertheless, Dor decided to camp there for the remainder of the night. Their chance of approaching Castle Ocna secretly was gone anyway, and the recovery of their friend was more important. After all, the centaur's aisle of magic was essential to their welfare in Mundania.