Castle Spellbound

HIGH IN THE AIR

Dying wasn't so bad, once you got over the initial panic. This thought came to Dalton as he fell. At first there had been a numbing terror. Then… nothing. He'd blacked out.

Now? Peace. Great peace. His life was over. It had been a good life, all told. Not that there weren't a few things he regretted. Difficult to avoid all the rough spots. But overall, hc'd enjoyed living. And he was grateful for the castle. Yes, especially for the castle. The privilege of living in Perilous I'm just a few years had been enough to make it all worthwhile.

Marvelous place, even though it killed him in the end. Another thought came to him: he'd been falling for an awfully long time. A bit too long, really. Maybe he was already dead.

He opened his eyes. Sky above. He rolled his head. There was the ground, and he was surely heading toward it. But there was something wrong. His sense of time was distorted.

Was it true, the old saw about your entire life flashing in front of your eyes? Well, he was indeed feeling a bit retrospective. Maybe when you die this compressed time thing happens, and it takes forever to actually kick the old bucket. Good thing dying wasn't all that unpleasant.

He was falling. He could feel and hear the air rush past. But he wasn't falling very fast. What was the formula? Feet per second squared times the gravitational constant g… something like that. He should be plummeting, really dropping. But he wasn't. This was rather peculiar.

He craned his neck to look at the ground again. Yup. Still getting closer, but not as fast as the last time he'd looked. This was damned peculiar. Was he going to die or wasn't he? Here he had gotten used to the idea, had even arrived at the point where he was thinking, well, maybe it isn't such a bad thing after all; in fact, maybe it's the old proverbial consummation devoutly to be wished-and now it seemed there was some doubt about the whole business. Hmph. Well, that didn't wash with him. If you fall off a high parapet, you're damned well supposed to die, and that's all there is to it.

Slowly, he tumbled over until he was dropping face forward, like a skydiver in free fall.

Except that he was doing blessed little diving. This was more like floating, for pete's sake. Floating? What the blue blazes was going on here?

Out of the air, a familiar voice came to him.

Hello, there! This is your lucky day. You've managed to trip one of the castle's safety spells. This one is designed to catch people who have been heroic, clumsy, or just plain dumb enough to fall out of a window or off a battlement. Only you know which case applies! Whichever it is, though, you're quite safe. The levitation spell will lower you safely to the ground. No need to worry. If you've been heroic, you have my thanks. If not… do try to be more careful in the future.

The voice was Incarnadine's.

"Well, I'll be damned," Dalton said.

After a superhuman effort, Thaxton managed to pull himself up.

He spilled over onto the walkway and lay on his back, not really caring that lions might devour him at any moment. He feIt sick with grief, wanting to die himself. He almost would have preferred to fall than watch Dalton do it.

The funny business above the castle was still going on, though he couldn't quite make out the strange smirking face. Bright things flapped in the air above the parapets, among rainbows of unnatural color.

Presently, he thought he might get up. He raised himself a sitting position and looked about him.

No lions.

Well. He got to his feet, an act that took slightly more strength than he seemed to possess. He went to the parapet and looked over the edge.

It was a frightfully long way down. He couldn't see a thing, and he didn't really want to. There was no chance that Dalton had survived, and he had no need to see evidence confirming the fact.

He'd best get back downstairs. It would devolve to him to apprise everybody of the grim event.

Nasty business. Nasty, nasty business. He headed back to the tower.

Like Buck Rogers with his antigravity belt (he still remembered those old serials!), Dalton settled gently to earth, feet first.

He felt a little wobbly, but otherwise fine. He stood in the middle of a high-walled courtyard. An arched gateway lay his right, and he walked to it.

He entered another courtyard. He crossed it, going through another gate.

After traversing a maze of cloisters, courtyards, and barbicans, he finally found what he thought was the exterior wall of the keep. He kept it to his right as he continued to thread his way through the labyrinth.

Finally, he saw a pair of mammoth bronze doors. No knobs or door handles, but strangely enough there was, set into the stone wall beside one door, a button that looked like a doorbell. He pressed it. A deep chime sounded inside.

After a longish moment, he pressed it again. As he was about to do it a third time, a small wicket opened in the right-hand door and a strange-looking Guardsman poked his head out.

"Who is it?"

"Uh, my name's Dalton, and I-"

The Guardsman, who looked like some cartoon character, was annoyed. "Can't you read the sign?"

"I fell off the, uh… What? Oh. That."

Only then did Dalton notice the neatly hand-painted sign on the wall to his right. In archaic script, it read:

DOORBELL OUT OF ORDER-PLEASE KNOCK

"Interesting."

The Guardsman's head withdrew and the tiny door closed.

Dalton knocked. The sound echoed inside.

After a while he knocked again. Just to be sure, he pressed the bell button a few more times.

Finally, there came clanking sounds from inside. The door opened a crack.

Another Guardsman, this one looking quite normal and not like something out of an old movie, peered out and registered recognition. "Mr… Dalton, is it?"

Dalton said, "Yes. This is rather embarrassing, but I fell off the roof of the castle."

"Ye gods! Are you all right, sir?"

"Fine. The safety spell saved me."

"Thank the heavens! Come in, sir, come in." The Guardsman admitted him.

Inside, Dalton looked up at the other side of the immense door. He could see no wicket nor even the suggestion of one.

"Very interesting."

"Sir?"

Dalton grinned at the gatekeeper. "Nothing." He chuckled. "Never a dull moment in this place, is there? Not even a slightly dull moment."

The Guardsman shook his head sadly. "I'm afraid not, sir. I'm afraid not."