Copyright Information

Copyright © 1995 by Lawrence Watt-Evans. This edition copyright © 2003 by Lawrence Watt-Evans. All rights reserved.

Published by Wildside Press LLC.

www.wildsidebooks.com

Dedication

For Julie—

because they’re all for her.

A Note to the Reader

In the course of this novel, the surprise ending of the animated movie Wizards (1977; directed by Ralph Bakshi) is revealed. If you have not seen the film and think you might want to someday…well, you’ve been warned.

Chapter One

The spaceship shone vivid purple in the unfiltered light, brighter than any jewel, bright as a skateboarder’s gear. Its nose and tail fins were golden; the forward fins were patterned in gold, white, and purple. At first glance, it should have been as gaudy and absurd as a cartoon.

But out there in space, with the glow of Base One’s sun cutting sharp-edged divisions between light and shadow, with the utter black of deep space and the hard, unblinking blaze of a myriad stars behind it, it didn’t look silly at all. It looked impressive, more real than reality itself.

Pel Brown supposed that this was what all those comic-book artists and movie special-effects crews had been trying for, and, limited by the media they used, had been unable to achieve. It took the reality of airlessness, free-fall, and starlight to create such an intense image.

The bright colors were what did it; the bland greys and whites of NASA’s shuttle or most of the movie spaceships just didn’t have the same power.

Pel had never expected to see a real spaceship—not like this, anyway. After all, he was just a freelance marketing consultant from Germantown, Maryland, and until recently the only spaceships he’d ever known existed were the ones built by NASA or the old Soviet space program.

Three months ago he had had no idea that parallel universes were real, and not just science fiction. Three months ago he hadn’t met the velvet-clad thug who called himself Raven, or any of Raven’s motley companions. He hadn’t asked his lawyer to bail a bunch of stranded spacemen out of jail. He hadn’t stepped through a portal in his basement wall into Raven’s world, a universe where magic worked, and something called Shadow was the absolute ruler of the world. He hadn’t escaped from Shadow’s monsters only to wind up in a third universe, the one the spacemen came from, where the Galactic Empire ruled three thousand inhabited planets. He hadn’t spent weeks as a slave working in a mine on a planet called Zeta Leo III.

And three months ago he had had a wife and daughter, and now they were gone, and he had been told that they were both dead, murdered by space pirates.

Space pirates! God, that sounded like something out of the old pulp magazines, or a low-budget movie—only they’d been all too real, and altogether serious. They’d captured Pel, along with Raven and the others, and sold them into slavery.

And they hadn’t gone in for gaudy colors. The ship out there was not their style at all. The colors marked it as part of the Imperial fleet.

This particular combination of colors wasn’t quite the standard set; gold and white were unusual. The purple meant the ship was the property of the Galactic Empire, of course; Pel wondered what the gold represented. He guessed that it probably meant the ship carried some high official.

There were plenty of high officials at Base One already, in Pel’s opinion; he had been harassed by a few of them. A good many of the Galactic Empire’s big shots had been interested in seeing the people from another universe.

Pel watched, vaguely annoyed, as the ship slid smoothly into the huge air lock a quarter-mile farther down Base One’s surface.

That surface was an uneasy blend of raw meteoritic stone and riveted metal—the Imperial military had hollowed out the orbiting rock, and then built outward, as well. Pel’s window looked out from a bulge of asteroidal stone onto a broad vista of sheet steel, pocked and patched as a result of collisions with celestial debris, but untainted by any trace of rust.

Then the infinite depths of space and the long metal walls of the station dimmed to near-invisibility and his own face leapt out at him from the glass; someone had turned on the light in the room behind him.

He blinked, and continued to stare at the glass, at his own features superimposed on the universe, almost blocking it all from sight. His nose, recently broken by the overseers at the mine where he’d worked as slave labor, did not look quite right, and the bruises elsewhere had left dark traces that looked like shadows, but it was still the same face he had always had.

He was in the wrong universe, but he was still in his own body. Reality hadn’t gotten that strange.

“Mr. Brown?” an unfamiliar voice inquired.

* * * *

The clerk looked at the clipboard, then at Amy. “Miss Jewell?” he asked.

Amy dropped the magazine on the table, losing her place. The tentacular monster in the cover picture grinned lewdly up at her, ignoring the screaming girl in its coils.

Losing her place was no great inconvenience; the stories were all pretty bad anyway. Men’s adventure stories weren’t any better written here than back home on Earth, and in general were even more offensively sexist. Not to mention that the line between adventure and science fiction had been hopelessly blurred by the existence of interstellar travel and huge areas of unexplored galaxy—odd, to realize that stories of heroes fighting monsters from other planets didn’t qualify as science fiction here.

The stories still sucked, though. She was very tired of evil mutant masterminds and big blond heroes.

Reading this tripe was better than nothing, but not by much. It generally took her mind off feeling lousy, but nothing more than that. When her bruises healed completely and she got back home to her three acres in Goshen, Maryland, that would probably help a lot more.

Of course, there was presumably still a stranded spaceship in her back yard. The Empire’s first attempt to contact Earth, to arrange an alliance against Shadow, had ended when I.S.S. Ruthless plummeted out of the sky and crash-landed there.

They’d planned on appearing twenty miles from the White House, one the crewmen told Amy later—they didn’t want to just drop right into the middle of the capital.

Twenty miles or so northwest of the White House had put them right over Amy’s yard, and the moment the ship popped out of the space-warp that let it into Earth’s universe the crew had made the unexpected discovery that anti-gravity, the basis for much of the Empire’s machinery, didn’t work in Earth’s universe, and there was therefore nothing holding the ship up.

It had crashed, and it was probably still there, and it was never going to fly again. The laws of physics were apparently very different in each of the three known realities.

They were different enough that something called “magic” worked in the world Shadow and Raven came from, something that had let Amy and the crew of Ruthless step through a basement wall into that world.

And when they’d fled into the Galactic Empire, the monsters that followed them had died for lack of that “magic,” just as Ruthless had fallen for lack of anti-gravity. The three universes were different, all right.

Some things didn’t change, though—people could still be rotten, in any universe. Like her ex-husband Stan. Like that son of a bitch Walter, who had bought her from the pirates and kept her as a slave until the Empire rescued her and brought her to Base One.

At least the Empire made an attempt at being civilized.

Even if, she thought with a final glance at that god-awful collection of violent, sexist, racist, imperialist adventure stories, they weren’t all that good at it.

She forgot the magazine and looked up at the clerk.

“Ah…Miss Jewell? Or is it Mrs.?”

“It’s Ms.,” Amy said, perversely. Her stomach was slightly upset, as it often was lately—the food here was at least as bad as the fiction—and she was in no mood to cooperate with the Empire in its petty oppressions.

“Mrs.?” the clerk asked again.

“Ms. It’s a word we use back on Earth.”

“Oh. Yes, of course.” The clerk noted something, then looked up again and said, “Could you come with me, Miss Jewell?”

“Why? And where?”

The clerk did not answer; instead he said, in a surprisingly definite voice, “I was told to bring you at once.”

Amy sighed, and decided not to argue any more.

* * * *

“Mr. Deranian?”

Ted ignored them, and the two men cast knowing glances at one another.

“You take the right arm,” one of them said. “Be careful, though—the doctor said that besides the head wound, his ribs aren’t completely healed yet.”

The other nodded.

Side by side they advanced, and grabbed Ted by the arms.

“Come on, Mr. Deranian,” one of them said. “Dream’s not over yet.”

* * * *

“Miss N’goyen?”

“Nguyen,” Susan said, without moving from her cot. She was lying facedown; the burns on her back no longer hurt all the time, but lying on them was still not a good idea. Her time as a slave on Zeta Leo III had been very rough on her.

But then, having been a refugee as a child, she’d survived rough times before. She’d thought that she was finally through with all that when she’d made it through law school, passed the bar, and joined the firm of Dutton, Powell, Hough.

Obviously, she’d been wrong.

When Amy Jewell had called on her to provide legal assistance in dealing with the spaceship that had crashed in her back yard, Susan had not expected it to lead her to this.

The messenger tried again, and almost managed to pronounce the name.

“What is it?” Susan asked.

“Could you come with me, please?”

Susan raised her head and looked at the messenger. “Do I have a choice?”

“Not really.”

She sighed, sat up, swung her feet to the floor, and stood.

“Lead the way,” she said.

* * * *

Pel took the seat on the far left, and Amy settled beside him. Pel noticed that she was no longer wearing heavy make-up to hide the bruise on her face; the discolorations had faded to a faint, sickly yellow tinge. Pel knew that his own injuries, too, were no longer obvious.

Ted was led in, unresisting, and seated on the far right; the fresh bandage on his head was smaller than the one Pel had last seen there, and the visible cuts and bruises had healed. There were scars, of course.

Susan, arriving last, took her place between Amy and Ted. A long-sleeved tunic hid the bandages that still covered much of her back and her forearms.

That was all of them, Pel thought, all four of them—the only living Earthpeople in the entire universe, according to the Galactic Empire.

At least, in this entire universe. So far as Pel knew, there were five billion others back on Earth, all blithely unaware that any universe but their own existed. And he secretly harbored hopes, despite his own better judgment, that his wife and daughter might still be alive somewhere. Their deaths had been reported to him, had been confirmed repeatedly, but he hadn’t seen either of them die, hadn’t seen their bodies.

He knew, intellectually, that they were both dead, but accepting it emotionally was another matter.

Nancy and Rachel weren’t here, though, even if by some miracle they weren’t both dead. The four of them, Pel and Amy and Ted and Susan, were the only Earthpeople here at Base One. Pel found something peculiarly amusing in the thought that half of them were lawyers, here because they had been representing the other half.

The Galactic Empire didn’t seem to care about lawyers, though. Ted wasn’t representing him here, and Susan wasn’t representing Amy; they were all here on their own. Pel looked around, wondering why they had been gathered.

This was a new room to them all. It was small and bare, with walls of whitewashed stone—that meant it was within the asteroid itself, rather than in the later additions, where everything was steel. The tiled floor might once have been white, too, but was now a dull gray. The four steel chairs were not particularly comfortable. The purple-painted lectern bore the lion-and-unicorn seal of the Imperial Military—but then, so did any number of objects scattered about Base One.

It looked like a small briefing room. That was, at least, an improvement on the debriefing and interrogation chambers where Pel seemed to have spent most of his waking hours for the past ten days.

The door opened, and a man in the familiar purple uniform of an Imperial officer marched past them, papers in hand, and took his place at the lectern. Pel was beginning to learn the insignia; he placed this character as a major in the political service.

That was mildly unusual; up until now they had mostly been bothered by people in Imperial Intelligence.

“Welcome to Base One,” the major announced, in jovial, booming tones that were almost painful in so small a room. “I’m Major Southern.”

Pel winced, not just at the tone, but at the words. He and the others had been here at Base One for over a week—Pel, without a regular cycle of sunrise and sunset, had lost track of exactly how long it had been, but he knew it was over a week. They didn’t need any more welcoming speeches.

Ted grinned foolishly. “Major Southern,” he said. “I like that. Glad I thought of it. Southern, warm, friendly—a summery sort of name.”

At that, Amy winced.

“Now, you’re all intelligent people,” the major proclaimed, in somewhat more moderate tones. “You all know what the situation is.”

Pel glanced at Ted, who grinned back and winked broadly at him.

“We’re fighting a powerful, mysterious enemy,” Major Southern continued. “A force that has conquered an entire universe, and that now threatens two others.”

Ted nodded, smiling happily. Susan sat in polite and motionless silence. Amy’s lips tightened. Pel could almost hear her thoughts—he could imagine her muttering, “I haven’t seen it threatening Earth.”

“This force called Shadow uses methods we don’t understand, methods that are impossible in our own universe; the people of Shadow’s world call it magic, and that’s as good a name as any. It’s used that magic to send its agents, its spies, and its monsters into our universe. It has attempted to subvert the Galactic Empire, which has brought peace and security to all mankind—at least, in this reality.”

Amy’s lips twitched, and Pel could easily guess the cynical thoughts running through her mind.

All mankind, except where it hadn’t gotten yet, which was far more than the Empire cared to admit—all of the little group had seen more than they wanted of the odd corners where the Empire had no dominion. And the Empire might bring security to mankind, perhaps, but not necessarily women. It also helped if the men were white.

Just how different was the Empire from Shadow, really? Both were imperialist; Shadow just seemed to be a little farther along in its conquests.

Of course, as one point in its favor, the Galactic Empire was run by humans; nobody knew just what Shadow was.

“You know that we have representatives of Shadow’s universe here at Base One,” the major said. “Lord Raven of Stormcrack Keep has taken temporary refuge here, and he and his party have fought against Shadow all their lives.”

“So they say,” Amy muttered, and this time it was not just Pel’s imagination.

He thought this might be carrying cynicism a little far; Raven and his man Stoddard and the two wizards had certainly seemed sincere enough.

The major either didn’t hear her, or chose to ignore her. “They’ve sworn to continue that fight,” he said, “and to join their efforts to ours, rather than to continue operating independently. In just a few days, we’ll be sending Lord Raven and the others through a space-warp, back into their home universe—and with them we’ll be sending a squadron of our best men, and a trained telepath. This combined force will be the first step in taking the battle onto Shadow’s home ground, the first step in overthrowing this unnatural tyranny and freeing the oppressed people of Shadow’s realm.”

And probably bringing them under Imperial domination instead, Pel thought.

“I’m here today to invite the four of you to join that combined force,” Major Southern said. “As natives of a universe different from both ours and Shadow’s, you have a different viewpoint, you have knowledge and techniques that might be just what’s needed to defeat this…this inter-universal horror.”

“Fuck off,” Pel said, unable to resist any longer. Did this beribboned idiot think they didn’t know what the Empire wanted? They knew, and they weren’t interested. They had all made that clear enough. “Just send us home,” he said.

“It’s not our fight,” Amy added.

Ted giggled.

Susan’s lips were a tight line; she said nothing.

“I’d been told that some of you felt that way,” Major Southern said, frowning. “You’re civilians, and subjects of another nation—one we don’t recognize, of course, but still, we realize you aren’t soldiers we can order into battle. Further, you probably wouldn’t be of much use if we sent you out there involuntarily. We don’t seem to be getting anywhere by appealing to your patriotism and common decency—you’ve all turned us down. Revenge doesn’t seem to have been enough, either.”

“We don’t know it was Shadow that sold us into slavery,” Amy said. “We only have your word for that.”

“Why would we lie?” The major spread his hands in a gesture of bewilderment.

“You might have staged the whole thing to get us on your side,” Amy suggested. “If it was Shadow that captured us, why would it sell us? If it’s after us, why weren’t we killed?”

“We don’t know,” Southern admitted, “and that’s something we’d like to find out, but we can’t.” He hesitated, but Amy had said her piece; no one interrupted further, and he returned to his speech.

“You won’t go voluntarily, as I said,” he told them, “so we’re offering you a choice. Lord Raven and the rest will be sent into Shadow’s universe three days from now, whether any of you four are with them or not. Those of you who don’t go—well, we can’t keep you here forever, living on the largesse of the Empire. You’re free to join the Imperial military; we can always use bright people like yourselves. If you’re not interested, though, I’m afraid you can’t stay at Base One, which is, after all, a military installation. Instead, we’ll send you to any nearby planet you choose; we’ll land you where you ask, and from then on, of course, you’re on your own.”

“Send us home, damn it!” Pel shouted.

The major pretended to ignore him and continued, “Of course, we can’t create an inter-universal space-warp just for the convenience of a handful of uncooperative civilians, but I suppose we can arrange grants of citizenship and provide the necessary papers to keep you out of jail. For brave volunteers, once the crisis is past and Shadow defeated, no reasonable reward would be refused, and opening a space-warp would be considered; but for civilians who’ve turned down a chance to serve the Empire? Not likely.”

The four Earthpeople stared at him—or at any rate, three of them did.

Ted Deranian shrugged and said, “I’ll go with Raven if you like; it’s all the same to me. Might make a better story that way, if I don’t wake up before I get that far.”

Amy let out a low moan of disgust at Ted’s insistence on his delusion. Pel glanced at her, but said nothing; he understood her reaction.

Ever since the party had stepped through the magical portal from Earth to Shadow’s world, Ted had been convinced the entire thing was a dream. Beatings, torture, wounds, and the passage of days and even weeks had failed to dislodge this conviction. Almost two months had now passed since the May evening when they had passed through Pel’s basement wall, but Ted persisted.

The man’s exact mood varied; sometimes he seemed to be struggling to maintain his belief, sometimes he sank into near-catatonia. Right now he was treating it all as a joke that had gone on a little too long, a story that was slow in reaching the point.

It got on everyone’s nerves, and Pel and Amy both feared that Ted had slipped irretrievably into insanity weeks ago. Pel suspected the head wound he had acquired resisting the pirates aboard Emerald Princess, or the beatings he had received on Zeta Leo III, might have caused brain damage, as well.

“What about the rest of you, then?” Major Southern asked, smiling.

“You’re a sadistic bastard, you know that?” Pel answered calmly.

“Now, now, Mr. Brown,” the major said, feigning shock. “That’s no way to talk!”

No one replied. He looked them over, then stepped out from behind the lectern.

“I’ve said my piece,” he told them. “From here on, it’s all up to you.”

“Sure it is,” Amy said. “We get our choice of two universes—but neither one of them’s ours.”

The major smiled and patted Amy on the shoulder. “That’s right,” he said. “I’ll let you think about it.” He looked around the room, gave everyone a cheerful grin that was only slightly patronizing, and strolled out.

Amy glared after him, and muttered, “Where’d they find that stupid prick?”

Pel shrugged. “Same place as all the others, I suppose,” he said. “Wherever that is.”

Susan suddenly spoke, for the first time since entering the room.

“I’m going with Raven,” she said. “And I’d advise you both to consider joining us. I don’t have any power over you, Mr. Brown, but as your attorney, Amy, I strongly recommend you take my advice.”

The other three all turned to stare at her.

“Susan, are you…what are you talking about?” Amy demanded.

“Amy, just think it over.”

She turned and marched out.

Baffled, Pel and Amy and Ted watched her go.

Chapter Two

We’ve no need of them,” Raven repeated.

“We don’t need them here, either,” General Hart replied, “and they might be useful to you. Our telepaths tell us they have the most amazing assortment of odd information tucked away in their heads; this Earth of theirs seems to make a fetish of spreading information every which way, whether it’s needed or not.”

“And what know they of my world?” Raven protested. “Not so much as a newborn babe at the nurse’s breast!”

Hart shrugged. “So? My men aren’t much better.”

“Soldiers?” Raven waved that away, the natural gesture stiff because of the bandaged fingers of his left hand. “A soldier’s a soldier, man—an they know their jobs, we’ll find use for them in Stormcrack and in Shadow’s lands. But the Earth-folk…”

“Are you bothered because two of them are women?”

Raven, pacing by the wall-map, glanced at the general. “Aye,” he said, “there’s that, and I admit it freely. ’Tis no place for a woman, in the midst of battle.”

“One of your own party’s a woman,” Hart pointed out.

“Elani? Nay, she’s a wizard; ’tis another matter entire.”

“Looks like a woman to me,” Hart said.

Two rooms away a telepath listened in on the conversation, and on the thoughts of the participants. Proserpine Thorpe had been reading the minds of those around her, sometimes whether she wanted to or not, since her earliest childhood; she was rarely surprised by the lies and deceptions of non-telepaths dealing with one another. Even so, the cynicism underlying this particular discussion was more than she would have expected.

General Hart really didn’t care about any plans to destroy Shadow, had no interest at all in the people the mysterious evil had harmed or killed; he just wanted to get rid of all the extra-universal troublemakers before some idiot politician or ambitious underling found some way to exploit them and make him look stupid or ineffective. He didn’t really completely believe in other universes, or that this Shadow thing posed a serious threat; this whole business had happened because nobody kept a close enough eye on that overzealous geek Copley, who should never have made Major, and that pompous civilian fraud Bascombe, the so-called Under-Secretary for Interdimensional Affairs—a post in the Department of Science that existed only because Bascombe had invented it and pulled sufficient strings to get it for himself.

But Copley was out of the way now, thanks to a burst appendix, and Bascombe would be harmless enough by himself once these foreigners were disposed of. If Hart had a chance to send along a couple of his own unwanted subordinates as well, that would be just fine, even if it meant losing a couple of dozen men from his command. The Empire had plenty of soldiers, after all; sending a few on a ridiculous mission was no great loss.

And he seemed quite certain that whoever was sent would be lost.

For his part, Raven cared about almost nothing except destroying Shadow—not so much because of what it had done to thousands of innocents, though to give him credit he did feel a certain regret and anger at such needless cruelty, but because Shadow had harmed him, his family, and his honor. Had Shadow never touched Stormcrack Keep, Raven would still have opposed it, but only from a safe distance.

That was hardly a shock; after all, Raven was, as Prossie had known for weeks, a barbarian.

As it was, though, with his younger brother ruling Stormcrack Keep as Shadow’s puppet, Raven was willing to sacrifice anyone and anything, including Stormcrack itself, to defeat Shadow and avenge himself. He did not care in the least that Amy and Susan might be in danger if they ventured back into his native reality; he cared, rather, that they would be useless, and that their presence might be an inconvenience him, and increase the risks of the party as a whole.

However, he would, in the end, agree to anything General Hart proposed, because it was General Hart who controlled access to the gate between universes—at least for the moment. Once back in his own land Raven would be free to ignore any plans and promises made at Base One—and he intended to do just that. He thought General Hart’s plan for a small, fast-moving strike force that would penetrate Shadow’s fortress and assassinate Shadow to be utter nonsense. Shadow, he knew, was a magical being, and if confronted directly must be fought with magic—though its creatures could be slain with sword or spear, certainly, he doubted that Shadow itself would be bothered by anything so mundane.

Raven’s own plan was to gather whatever magic he could and fling it against Shadow until something got through.

To Raven, as the telepath had seen before, “magic” included not just the magic of his own universe, but any force that he did not comprehend, including Imperial science and Earthly technology.

If he took this proposed Imperial raiding party in, and brought back a few survivors who would attest to the need for other weapons against Shadow, then perhaps the Empire would provide those other weapons. Perhaps, if their “science” could do nothing, they would at least provide the men and swords to dispose of Shadow’s creatures.

So he was agreeing to Hart’s plan, even while he knew it was absurd, in order to draw the Empire into more direct conflict with Shadow.

Prossie knew that according to the rules the Empire set for telepaths, which required the immediate reporting of any sort of treason, or deception of government officials, or other anti-Imperial thought that a telepath might accidentally uncover, she should tell General Hart—but the general already assumed that the whole thing was a suicide mission. He misjudged Raven’s motives for agreeing, thought the man was acting out of some silly romantic notions of courage, honor, and chivalry, but Hart knew that the proposed attack was insane and impossible.

He was deliberately trying to get Raven and the others killed, to get them out of the way. He liked the idea of keeping Shadow there as the Empire’s enemy; it made the military more important if there was a serious foe out there somewhere, rather than just occasional rebels and outlaws to be suppressed.

So he intended to send Raven and his companions, and the Earthpeople, and a few of his own less-desirable underlings off to get killed.

And he intended to send Prossie along. Like most Imperials, he didn’t mind at all if telepaths got killed. Almost everyone hated telepaths; that was a fact that Prossie had lived with all her life. Hart was no exception.

It was only reasonable to want to send a telepath, for communication and espionage reasons, and Hart thought that Prossie, after her previous visit to Earth, might be tainted with dangerous notions.

General Hart wanted her dead.

And as far as Prossie was concerned, that meant that he didn’t deserve to be warned of Raven’s plans.

Besides, even if Hart knew the lordling’s true motives, his own plans wouldn’t change.

Likewise, even if Raven knew Hart’s own intentions, he wouldn’t change his own mind; cooperation was the only way to get home to his own world.

Maybe some of the others should be warned, Prossie thought, but not these two. Aside from the uselessness of such a warning, nobody really wanted to have telepaths telling them what to do, telling them what they had misread or misunderstood or forgotten.

And for that matter, Prossie was not supposed to be listening in in the first place. She had heard her own name mentioned earlier, and had, almost inadvertently, begun eavesdropping. That was a violation of the rules; the Empire had strict penalties for telepaths who spied on innocent citizens, and even worse for those who spied on government officials. If she warned General Hart, or if she warned Raven and he let it slip to an Imperial officer, she could wind up at the whipping post, or on the operating table for a lobotomy, or even hanged.

General Hart was far more likely to order a flogging than to thank her.

Let them go on with it, then.

As for the others—well, that remained to be seen.

Prossie liked the Earthpeople, or at least three of them—Pel and Amy and Susan had such interesting, complicated minds, and so little real hatred or hostility in them. Ted’s poor tangled thoughts she avoided now, but the others she enjoyed, even when Amy was feeling sick and sorry for herself. Raven’s liegeman Stoddard was a good person, the wizards Elani and Valadrakul were no worse than average—Elani had a noble streak under her motherly warmth that was intriguing. Prossie didn’t want to see any of them killed, and she certainly didn’t want to get killed herself.

But although Prossie wished the Earthpeople no ill, getting off Base One and into Shadow’s realm was probably the best thing that could happen to them.

She would not say a word to General Hart.

* * * *

Roughly an hour after the briefing, if that was the name for it, had broken up, while he rambled along one of the endless metal-lined corridors that laced Base One, Pel encountered Susan Nguyen and fell in beside her.

He would not admit, even to himself, that he had been deliberately tracking her down. It was just good luck, he told himself, that he had happened upon her.

Just good luck—but he did have a question or two he very much wanted her to answer.

After mumbled greetings and a few paces of polite silence, he cleared his throat. She glanced up.

“Susan, are you really going to go with Raven’s party into Shadow’s universe?” he asked. “You saw what sort of monsters Shadow controls—you really think this stupid attack squad is going to get anywhere? It seems to me that it’s practically suicide!”

He waited for an answer and was on the verge of concluding that he wasn’t going to get one when Susan suddenly said, “You’ve noticed that the Empire’s technology is different from ours, haven’t you, Mr. Brown? They’ve got anti-gravity and telepathy, but we haven’t seen any sign of computers or electronics, or even radios or telephones. All the same, do you think they might know how to make bugs of some kind, Mr. Brown?”

“Bugs?” Pel blinked.

He hadn’t thought about that. He chewed his lower lip for a moment, glancing along the drab gray walls.

“I suppose they might,” he admitted, “but it doesn’t…”

“Just keep walking,” Susan suggested.

Pel obeyed; together, the two of them strode down the corridor.

“A telepath could hear us, anyway,” Pel muttered.

“But a telepath would have to be listening,” Susan pointed out, “and they really have very few telepaths.”

“For all we know, they have spy-rays or something,” Pel pointed out.

Susan just nodded.

A moment later, as they turned a corner, she said, “You know, all of them are going back to their own universe, not just Raven. Elani’s going.”

Pel glanced at Susan, then turned his gaze resolutely ahead. “I know that,” he said.

He was puzzled by the reference. He was sure Susan had some good reason for mentioning Elani, and not any of Raven’s other companions. Susan and Elani weren’t particularly close; in fact, Pel couldn’t remember ever seeing the two of them together for more than a few seconds at a stretch, or speaking to each other at all beyond common courtesies.

Elani was one of the two wizards in Raven’s band, and the only surviving female; did either of those facts signify anything important?

“You know, I’d rather go back home to Earth, instead of Shadow,” Susan remarked. “It’s a shame we can’t go back the way we came.”

Pel started to reply, but just then Susan turned, adding, “And here’s my door. It’s been a pleasure seeing you, Mr. Brown.”

She stepped into her room, and left Pel standing in the passageway, staring stupidly at the blank closed door.

Back the way they came?

They had arrived at Base One by spaceship. They could hardly use an ordinary spaceship to get back to Earth; spaceships couldn’t travel between universes. In all the Galactic Empire, so far as they knew, there was only one space-warp generator, and it was a huge thing here at Base One, not something that could be mounted on a spaceship.

Before that spaceship they had been on another one, Pel remembered, and another before that—but before that, they had arrived on a worthless desert planet called Psi Cassiopeia II through a magical portal from Shadow’s realm.

Pel blinked.

They had come through a magical portal.

A magical portal that Elani had created.

And they had gotten to Shadow’s realm by stepping through another, similar portal from Pel’s own basement.

Pel suddenly felt very stupid.

They didn’t need the Empire’s gigantic space-warp machine to send them to Earth. All they needed was Elani.

Of course, the laws of nature differed drastically from one universe to the next, so none of Elani’s magic worked here in the Galactic Empire, any more than his long-lost digital watch had, any more than anti-gravity worked on Earth. Elani couldn’t send them back home from Base One.

But if they went with her into Shadow’s realm, she could certainly send them home from there.

Now why, Pel wondered, hadn’t he thought of that himself, and much sooner?

He shook his head. He’d been too busy with other thoughts to look at the situation logically, he decided. He twisted his mouth into a wry smile as he started back toward his own assigned room.

It appeared he’d be volunteering to join Raven’s strike team after all.

In the next corridor, Prossie Thorpe smiled to herself. The telepath hadn’t had to so much as drop a hint; Susan Nguyen had figured it out for herself, and she would let the others know. The mission would go on as planned—but not necessarily as General Hart expected.

Chapter Three

Pel eyed the gathered group with some dismay.

All four of the Earthpeople had eventually gotten the idea and realized that the road home led through Shadow’s world; now they all stood in a little bunch to one side of the staging area. They wore hand-me-downs and cast-offs; their own clothes were lost or ruined, leaving them in borrowed slacks and surplus T-shirts and old boots. Susan Nguyen had managed to hang onto her big black handbag through all their adventures, but everything else they wore came from the charity of the Galactic Empire, and in consequence they looked mismatched and scruffy.

In the center of the assembly room stood Raven of Stormcrack Keep, dramatically clad in his customary black velvet, calling and waving for order. Three fingers of his left hand were bandaged together, and his movements still had a certain stiffness to them; his arms were raised, but did not move as smoothly and freely as they ought.

It was a mystery to Pel just where Raven had gotten his clothes; when he had been taken aboard Emperor Edward VII for the flight to Base One he had worn only a tattered green silk bathrobe. Perhaps the Empire had been generous with him in return for his enthusiastic opposition to Shadow—or perhaps his own garments had somehow been recovered and repaired.

Beside Raven on his right stood Stoddard—none of the Earthpeople knew any other name for him, or even whether Stoddard was a family name or his given name—in a borrowed purple uniform with the insignia removed, since his own leathers had been lost or ruined somewhere along the way.

On Raven’s left stood the wizard Valadrakul of Warricken, and a step behind him was Elani, also a wizard. Some of their original garments, like Susan’s purse, had been recovered, somewhat the worse for wear, so that Elani wore her dark red wool robe, now heavily stained and with a few tears in the fabric hastily sewn shut. Valadrakul’s calf-length embroidered vest incongruously covered most of a borrowed Imperial uniform. He had worn braids and long hair before his arrival in the Galactic Empire, and had lost one braid and some skin on Zeta Leo III; now his hair was cut short and trimmed in the bristly Imperial military style. Where Imperial soldiers were always clean-shaven, however, Valadrakul wore a full beard, which made for an odd combination.

These four, Pel knew, were all that remained of Raven’s cell of the organized resistance against Shadow’s rule in Stormcrack Keep’s demesne; all the other members of Raven’s little group were dead or lost, their remains scattered across two universes.

Of course, Raven claimed that there were other resistance groups, dozens of them, and that they formed a network that had even placed spies in the Galactic Empire and sent envoys to the Imperial Court. Pel had no way of knowing how much of that was true, but in any case, Raven’s party had been cut off, and no longer knew how to contact the others.

At least, so they said.

Facing Raven was a stocky, balding man in a purple uniform, his insignia proclaiming him a full colonel. He had given his name as Carson. Behind him was arrayed his squad, some fifteen men—all of them white, of course, and most of them blond. The Galactic Empire did not believe in mixing races; Pel had learned that much during his time here. The Delta Scorpius system, where Base One orbited, was entirely reserved for whites. Pel had been told that planets and bases existed where there were blacks and Orientals and other non-whites, either alone or in combination, but he had never seen any. The only non-white at Base One was Susan; even Raven, with his Mediterranean complexion, was dark enough to sometimes draw curious and uneasy looks.

So here were fifteen of the Empire’s finest, which meant Aryans, in full uniform, hair cut short, tall polished boots gleaming, helmets hung on their Sam Browne belts. The fancy belts apparently indicated that they were a special elite force of some sort; the crew of I.S.S. Ruthless hadn’t been so equipped.

If the uniforms had been black or gray, instead of purple, Pel thought they’d have looked like fine little Nazis.

And why a group that small was under the command of a colonel, rather than a lieutenant or even just a non-com, Pel didn’t know. Maybe Carson’s rank was intended to impress someone. It did not, however, impress Pel.

Standing off to the side was one more person in an Imperial uniform, this one with an ordinary belt, dull-finished half-boots, and the black and gold patch of a Special on her shoulder, a rather plain young woman Pel knew from his previous adventures. She had no helmet in sight, and no sidearm. Pel knew her as Registered Master Telepath Proserpine Thorpe—Prossie, to her friends.

Hers was the only familiar face in the Imperial contingent. Pel had hoped that the surviving members of the former crew of Ruthless would all be included—he had gotten to know them somewhat, and to respect them. Especially, Pel thought, in comparison with most of the Imperial military personnel he had encountered at Base One, many of whom seemed virtual parodies of dim-witted pomposity.

The military didn’t have to be like that, Pel knew; back on Earth, in the U.S., even the Marines generally weren’t as absurd as the bunch at Base One.

He looked for a familiar face in Carson’s squad, and didn’t find it. Captain Cahn was not there, nor Smith, Mervyn, Soorn, or Lieutenant Drummond.

Lampert was not there because he was still missing, last seen on Zeta Leo III. Cahn himself was probably still in a hospital somewhere, getting his bones reassembled—he had been thrown off a rooftop on Zeta Leo III.

And Cartwright, Peabody, and Lieutenant Godwin were dead, of course. Like Squire Donald a’ Benton, and little Grummetty, and Alella, all of them dead, somewhere in the Galactic Empire.

And like Pel’s wife Nancy, and their daughter Rachel.

So there were eight survivors from the other two universes here, and even counting Prossie as an ally, that left them a minority of the group. Carson’s fifteen men—fifteen strangers—were the majority.

Pel was of the opinion that that was likely to cause trouble. Raven was certain to consider himself the leader of the entire enterprise, and from the look of it, Colonel Carson did not care to yield the point.

Colonel Carson might also have some pretty serious reservations about allowing the Earthpeople to go home. Pel thought that he and Amy could probably have convinced Captain Cahn to let them go—after all, the Earthpeople had gotten Cahn and his crew out of the Rockville jail; shouldn’t he return the favor?

But Carson was a complete stranger, and his presence could be a real problem.

Still, once they were in Shadow’s universe, the Imperials would no longer have their whole empire backing them up, and their blasters would not work.

Did they know that? Had they picked that up from Cahn’s reports?

Pel remembered the battle that had sent the earlier group fleeing through the magical opening from Shadow’s universe into the Empire’s reality. Shadow had sent hordes of monsters against them, and the Imperials’ blasters might as well have been harmless toys for all the good they did. Valadrakul’s spells had worked, and Susan’s pistol…

Susan’s pistol.

Pel blinked, and looked at Susan.

Yes, she had her purse. The big black handbag hung from one shoulder. Despite everything, she still had it.

Carson and Raven were arguing about something, and everyone else was watching the dispute, or else busy with their own affairs. Pel leaned over and whispered to Susan, “You armed?”

She threw him a quick warning glance, then answered, not looking at him, “Yes.”

He took his cue from her, and did not look at her as he asked, “Loaded?”

She lowered her head slightly, in a barely-perceptible nod.

A moment later, as some minor official was herding the entire party of twenty-five into the ship that would carry them through the space-warp, Susan managed to step away from Ted and closer to Pel.

“.38 Police Special,” she whispered. “Six-shot revolver, but I only have four rounds left. Why?”

“Just wanted to know what’s available, in case we have any disagreements on the other side.” He threw a meaningful glance in Colonel Carson’s direction.

She nodded.

Just behind them, Amy asked, “What are you two talking about?”

Pel glanced at Ted, and at the Imperials, and said, “Tell you later.”

Amy, annoyed, decided not to press the issue on the spot.

“You’d better,” she said.

Pel smiled. He glanced about.

His gaze fell on Prossie Thorpe, and his smile vanished. If she read what he was thinking, the whole game might be up right there.

Or it might not; he wasn’t sure just what side Prossie would take.

To be safe, though, he decided it would be best not to think about any of that stuff. Not about the pistol, or using Elani’s magic to get back to Earth, or anything the Empire might not like. But of course, trying not to think about it was almost impossible.

If he thought about something else instead, maybe he could distract himself.

Well, here was something—just how were they going to go through the space-warp? He had seen the machinery the Imperials used to generate their opening between universes, and it was absolutely gigantic—Hoover Dam would make one of the support brackets, and the Washington Monument an insulator. The resulting field was a couple of hundred yards across—and a few hundred yards away from the machinery, out in the vacuum of open space. They would need some sort of transport to reach it.

Captain Cahn’s expedition to Earth had flown through the warp aboard I.S.S. Ruthless, and had immediately discovered, on the other side, that anti-gravity didn’t work in Earth’s universe.

Their blasters hadn’t worked on Earth, either.

And their blasters hadn’t worked in Shadow’s realm.

Pel suspected that meant that anti-gravity wouldn’t work in Shadow’s realm, either.

So how would the whole group get there?

Was the Empire going to throw away another ship, and count on Raven’s wizards to send everyone back? Had they come up with some other approach?

A glider might work. The space-warp generator operated in the hard vacuum of space, but an anti-gravity craft with wings could use its engines on the Imperial side and its wings on the Shadow side.

“All right, folks—everybody, your attention, please!”

Pel realized he was staring at the dull gray asteroidal stone of the floor; he looked up, startled. Colonel Carson was speaking.

“We’re all here, and I think we’re all ready. We’ve got our team equipment loaded already, and if you’ll all bring your personal belongings, I think it’s time to board the ship and get this show on the road!” He smiled—Pel supposed the smile was intended to be encouraging and friendly, but it came out rather stiff and stupid.

Pel had very little in the way of personal belongings; unlike Susan, he had been unable to retrieve anything after his stint working the mines of Zeta Leo III.

Not that he’d had much of anything, in any case. He hadn’t carried a purse; when he’d stepped through the magical portal in his basement, planning a five-minute visit to Stormcrack Keep and a quick return home, all he’d had was the clothes he wore and the contents of his pockets. A shirt, a belt, pants, socks, and shoes; his wallet, with credit cards and a few dollars in currency that wouldn’t pass anywhere in this universe; the key to his car; and that was about it.

And even those items were all lost.

Nancy had had her purse, but she was dead and her purse was gone.

Rachel was dead, too.

So all Pel had to carry were the pair of pants he had been given at the mine, and somebody’s cast-off Imperial uniforms.

With a sigh, he picked up the little bundle and marched in the direction Carson had indicated.

* * * *

The Empire, it seemed, had decided to throw away another ship.

This one, I.S.S. Christopher, was a small short-range personnel transport, smaller than Ruthless, perhaps seventy feet from nose to tail—certainly no more than that. It was purple and pink, but not particularly elaborate in its design or decoration—at least, not by Imperial standards. To Amy, with its fins and curves and two-tone paint job, it still looked like something out of a comic book or a campy movie.

She shivered slightly; the air of the flight deck felt thin and chilly. She knew that had to be an illusion, though; the door they had entered through had been wide open to the rest of Base One, so the air would have equalized. It was just the knowledge that the flight deck itself was an air lock that was bothering her, she was sure—that, and the general stress and uneasiness she had been living with since arriving at Base One. She glanced up at the immense outer door; that mass of steel girders and panels was all that stood between them and outer space, and in a few minutes it would be opened.

She quickly looked away, back at Christopher.

The entire party trooped inside and found seats in the main cabin, which was starkly utilitarian—gray steel ribs overhead, gray steel plates underfoot, and eight rows of four seats apiece, gray steel seats upholstered in worn maroon leatherette, arranged in pairs on either side of a central aisle, like some military imitation of an airliner. Three bare lightbulbs, in a line down the center of the curving ceiling, provided light.

Amy thought that Ruthless, from what little she had seen of it, had been far more luxurious. But then, Ruthless was a long-range craft, Captain Cahn had told her, and had been on a diplomatic mission.

Furthermore, they hadn’t known they were throwing it away. This time they presumably did, so naturally they’d picked a less valuable ship.

There were no seat belts—Amy had noticed long ago that the Galactic Empire wasn’t much on safety equipment. Personal belongings were stowed under the seats; anything large or awkward was taken to the back of the cabin, where one of Colonel Carson’s men heaved it through a door and onto a shelf in the storage area astern, where the soldiers’ packs and various other supplies were already stowed. The soldiers retained their helmets and sidearms, but not much else; the Earthpeople generally kept whatever they had.

Two more of Colonel Carson’s men split off from the main group and trooped forward, into the cockpit; Carson himself stayed until everyone else was sorted out and seated, and then he, too, vanished through the forward door.

There were half a dozen portholes, small ones with opaque covers dogged down over them; Amy found herself seated beside one, and immediately set about uncovering it.

Susan, seated beside her, watched with interest.

As Amy had suspected, the ship was already off the deck and moving slowly toward the air lock door. Anti-gravity was quick and silent, and the Empire, once it finally started something, didn’t waste time.

The space-warp machine was out on the surface of Base One, halfway around the asteroid. They would be out in empty space for a few minutes. Amy had traveled through space before, on Emerald Princess and Emperor Edward VII, but those were big, comfortable ships, and appeared far safer than Christopher. She felt a twinge of uneasiness.

They stopped moving; there was no change in sensation, any more than there had been when they lifted off, but Amy could see that the flight deck wall was no longer sliding past. For a long moment they hung suspended as air was pumped out of the chamber, the ship no longer moving forward, but swaying gently in the air currents. The process began with a distant boom that was audible even through the thick steel of the ship, and then a dull roaring that gradually faded as the air thinned.

At last silence fell; the ship was floating in vacuum, with nothing to carry vibration. Then, finally, the outer door swung open before them—Amy had to press her face against the after edge of the porthole to see it clearly, but she managed it. There was no sound, of course; the immense steel barrier moved in utter silence, swinging slowly aside and revealing the white blaze of stars beyond.

The ship began moving forward again—as always with anti-gravity, there was no sensation of motion, but Amy could see the air lock walls sliding by again.

Then they turned about. Amy’s inner ear still registered nothing, but she saw the universe wheel vertiginously past the porthole. The open door of the air lock was replaced by an infinity of stars and blackness; then the gray steel of Base One’s artificial walls appeared along one side, followed by a rough, dark stretch of the original asteroid, then by more steel.

She had hoped to have a good look at the space-warp generator, but she realized quickly she was on the wrong side of the ship to see it clearly. Still, by repeating her edge-of-the-port maneuver, she was able to see it ahead.

It was ablaze with light. The gargantuan ring of equipment was glowing violet-white, so bright Amy found she couldn’t look at it directly even when she found the right angle. Everything else vanished into the blackness of space in contrast.

The airless void gave the whole scene an impossible sharpness, a clarity that perversely made it seem dreamlike and unreal. The waking world as Amy knew it was never so stark and clean-edged.

Then the ship surged forward—still with no sensation of acceleration—and that intense light surrounded the vessel, spilling in through the port so intensely that Amy turned away, momentarily blinded. Others exclaimed in pain and surprise at the unexpected brilliance as she groped for the porthole cover and slammed it shut.

Her eyesight was almost back to normal when, abruptly, there was a feeling of motion.

The ship was falling. Amy could feel it. Her stomach surged uncomfortably; she clutched at her seat, wondering why the hell the Empire didn’t use seat belts and shoulder harnesses.

Everyone else felt it, as well; Elani screamed, Prossie Thorpe shrieked something that might have been, “Here we go again!,” and several of Carson’s men swore.

To add to the confusion, the cabin lights went out, plunging them into utter darkness.

They struck something, hard; the ship rocked wildly, and Amy heard crunching and snapping. They fell again, and then, again, struck something and broke through it.

Then, with a sudden hard bump, they were down. Amy’s head rocked back and forth, but she kept her seat and was undamaged. Judging by the sounds she heard in the stygian gloom not everyone was equally fortunate.

She waited for a few seconds, to be sure the ship was not going to move again; she realized that it lay at a slight angle, the artificial gravity that made it always seem level gone. It wasn’t much of an angle; she didn’t hear anything rolling or sliding down the slope after the first second or two.

At first it felt as if they had bounced, as if the ship were now rising, but then Amy realized that was just higher gravity. Base One had artificial gravity set at one Imperial gee—which was less than Earth’s gravity. Earth, she had been told, had a gravitational field approximating 1.15 gees, by Imperial measurements.

And Shadow’s conquered world was 1.3, which, she was sure, was what they were now experiencing. That heavy feeling, as if they were in an ascending elevator, was not going to go away.

Once she was convinced they weren’t going anywhere, she groped her way up the wall and found the porthole. Carefully, she lifted the porthole cover slightly; light spilled in. This was not the incredible eye-scorching glare of the space-warp, however; the light that now shone around the rim seemed quite manageable. In fact, it looked like ordinary daylight—perhaps a bit thin and watery, but daylight.

Amy swung the cover aside and looked out at Shadow’s world.

She couldn’t see much. The trunk of a huge tree, standing no more than two yards away, blocked most of her view. Turning slightly, she could see that broken branches and foliage were scattered across the ship’s fin, a few feet aft of the port. The fin itself was bent and battered, its pink paint scratched and scraped, revealing black primer and shining steel. Yellow sunlight slanted down, glittering coolly on the pink paint and green spring leaves—the sun here in Shadow’s realm, in what she and some of the others had taken to calling Faerie, was paler than Earth’s, its light not the warmer hue Amy would have expected back home.

Although she had no reason to think she could tell the difference, the light seemed to her like morning light, rather than afternoon.

“What the hell happened?” an unfamiliar male voice demanded of no one in particular.

Amy turned away from the port and peered into the gray gloom of the main cabin.

“We landed,” she said. “Hit a few trees on the way down.”

“Trees?” a timid voice asked.

“Big plants,” a more confident voice replied. “Some of them get to be a hundred feet tall, or more. They’re what wood comes from.”

“We know what trees are, idiot!” a new voice snapped.

“Not all of us, we don’t,” another retorted. “Or at any rate I’ve never seen any!”

“Well, you’ll see plenty of them here,” Amy called, while wondering how anyone could have grown to adulthood without seeing a tree.

Then she remembered what she had seen of the Galactic Empire—the backwater world Psi Cassiopeia II, which was mostly lifeless desert and entirely treeless; the rebel colony on Zeta Leo III, where she had been held captive on an immense corn farm where the only trees were a handful of six-foot shrubs near the house, obviously just recently planted; and the hollowed-out asteroid called Base One. She might have seen a tree or two somewhere besides that farm, but there certainly hadn’t been very many. She had to remember that these people weren’t from Earth; most of them weren’t even from the equivalent homeworld of the Empire, Terra.

Maybe trees had never evolved anywhere in the Galactic Empire’s universe except Terra. Even so, she would have expected the Imperials to have exported them to all their colonies.

Well, she had expected a lot of things that didn’t seem to have happened.

“Your pardon, milady,” Raven said from very near behind her, startling Amy. “Might I trouble you to allow me a look?”

“Of course,” Amy said, getting out of her seat and allowing Raven to lean over and peer out the port. “I’m afraid you won’t be able to see much.”

“Indeed,” Raven agreed wryly, as he took in the sight of the immense tree-trunk. “’Tis scarcely the broad panorama that one might have hoped for.”

“Any idea where we are?”

Raven shook his head. “Marry, milady, though ’tis a grand oak, ’tis hardly one I recognize—for that, how to tell one from the next, an you see but the bole, with no mark upon it save those put there by our craft’s descent? The Empire’s telepaths were consulted in the devising of yon opening ’tween worlds, and our goal was to arrive far enow from Shadow’s demesne for safety, yet close enough to approach it in time, and perchance that’s done, but that scarce names a single spot. Grand oaks such as this might be found in any number of suitable places.”

Emboldened by Raven’s presence, several of the others were now gathering around the port, trying to see out; poor Susan, in the seat beside Amy’s, was being crowded quite rudely, and was twisted almost into fetal position trying to avoid pressure on her burns.

A rush of anger swept through Amy at the sight of that. It was bad enough that the lot of them had been sent off on this stupid journey before their injuries were fully healed, but all those big, strong, healthy men crowding around poor wounded Susan…

“There are other ports you people could open,” Amy pointed out sharply.

Before anyone could reply, the door to the cockpit swung open and Colonel Carson appeared.

“Lord Raven,” he called, “we could use you up front.”

“Your pardon, milady,” Raven said, managing an approximation of a bow despite having his head and shoulders wedged into the narrow space between the back of Amy’s seat and a curving steel rib. He withdrew, made his way past the press of bodies, and strode up the aisle to the cockpit.

Without waiting for an invitation, Stoddard rose and followed his master.

* * * *

Pel took his time unclogging the porthole. After all, the ship wasn’t going anywhere—not unless the Empire had some utterly uncharacteristic surprise up its collective sleeve, some way to get the thing moving in a universe where anti-gravity didn’t work.

And he didn’t really care all that much about Shadow’s universe, except as a step back to Earth.

Ted Deranian was sitting beside him, watching as Pel uncovered the port. Ted was smiling foolishly. Looking at him, it was hard for Pel to believe the man had ever gotten through law school; he looked more like a village idiot than like an attorney.

Still, there was something he had said that tickled at the back of Pel’s mind. It didn’t really make sense unless you accepted Ted’s theory that both Shadow’s universe and the Empire’s universe were all an elaborate dream, but Pel wanted to believe it.

It had been said back at Base One, when Ted had found Pel sitting alone, on the verge of tears as he thought about Nancy and Rachel.

“Don’t worry, Pel,” Ted had told him. “They woke up, that’s all—they’re back on Earth. When you get back there they’ll be waiting for you.”

Then he had caught himself and asked, “But why am I talking to you? You’re not really here.”

He had wandered off, leaving Pel furious at his insensitivity, but the idea that Nancy and Rachel were alive back on Earth had stayed, no matter how hard Pel tried to suppress it.

Maybe they were.

He knew that this wasn’t all just a dream, all these strange things they had been through; he knew that Ted had it wrong, and the Empire and Shadow were real. They weren’t a dream in the usual sense.

But on the other hand, this was an alien universe; Nancy and Rachel did not belong here. The Empire’s universe was equally alien. Had they really, fully crossed over into these alternate realities?

What if they were all really doing some sort of astral travel? Wouldn’t Nancy and Rachel snap back into their own world when their astral selves were destroyed?

Or even if the physical bodies made the transition, was time the same here?

Pel had read plenty of science fiction and fantasy as a kid; he had seen hundreds of movies over the years. Wasn’t there always something somehow unstable about someone who had been removed from his or her proper place? What if that wasn’t just a literary convention, but a deep subconscious understanding of some fundamental fact about reality?

Mightn’t there be some way to change the past, to make Nancy and Rachel have never left Earth?

He and the others were in another dimension, a parallel world, an alternate reality; they were, as Amy put it, in Faerie. The very existence of such a place went against all common sense and previous experience; it threw Pel and Amy and Susan and Ted into the realm of legend, of myth, of fantasy. How could they know any more what the rules were? Back home, dead was dead, and nobody came back—but here? Who knew? Death might be different.

Hadn’t someone written a story about a land like that? “Death Is Different,” that was it—by Lisa Goldstein, perhaps? About a small country somewhere where death wasn’t permanent, where the dead could be seen strolling about.

What if that author had somehow known a truth about this place where Shadow ruled? After all, the worlds of Empire and Shadow so resembled the settings for any number of stories that Pel found it hard to believe it a coincidence; it made more sense to credit it to some sort of psychic leakage between universes, images from one realm finding their way into the subconscious minds of writers in another.

And if that were so, what about all those stories where people rose from the dead, where the protagonist awoke at the end home safe in his own bed, everything restored to what it was before? Were those based on truth?

What if death was different?

On one level he knew that was nonsense. He knew this was all hard fact; Nancy and Rachel were dead. Cartwright and Godwin and Peabody, Grummetty and Alella and Squire Donald, they were all equally real, and all equally dead, and all really dead. He had seen Grummetty’s corpse himself. He had seen Cartwright bleeding as the monsters overwhelmed him. They were all dead, and would stay dead until Judgment Day.

But somewhere, in the back of his mind, where he wanted so much to believe Nancy and Rachel were alive that he could believe anything at all, he still hoped.

He swung open the porthole cover and stared out at the green and gold and deep gray of the forests of Faerie.

Chapter Four

Raven of Stormcrack Keep had seen many strange things in the hard, sad days since his brother had betrayed the clan and yielded the Keep and its lands to Shadow. He had fled through haunted forests by night, and had seen creatures there whose nature he still did not know, things he dared not contemplate too closely. He had lived for a time among the little people of Hrumph, the people his grandfather had called gnomes, before they were driven into exile; he had dwelt like a giant among them, and had been amazed by their ways and customs. He had fallen in with a handful of the few remaining wizards, had seen them in their own strongholds, where they lived unhampered by the dictates of the nobility and used whatsoever magic they might please. One of those wizards, Elani, had opened for him portals into the Galactic Empire, and into the world of Earth, where he had seen wonders that even the mightiest magic could not equal. He had been slave and supplicant in those other worlds; he had been beaten and abused, and still bore scars and wounds not yet healed from those encounters. He had thought that nothing could faze him any more. But now, as he stared at the men who had piloted the Imperial vessel, he discovered that he had not lost his capacity for surprise.

It was not any new marvel of science or magic that astounded him, but the depths of idiocy to which allegedly intelligent men could sink.

“Colonel,” he said, “what might those two be about?” He pointed at the two men crouched beside an open panel, poking at the tangle of wires and baubles inside.

“They’re trying to fix the engines, of course,” Carson replied edgily.

“Be your engines broken?”

“Well, of course they are!” Carson snapped. “Why else would we have crashed?”

Raven considered this question for a moment, admiring its magnificent ineptitude. “Prithee,” he asked eventually, “has none told you the nature of this realm?”

Carson glared at him. “What do you mean?”

Raven hesitated, then waved the matter away. Perhaps it would be best if he were to leave the man’s ignorance intact for the moment; an opportunity might arise to exploit it at some other time. “Mayhap later,” he said. “Erst, you sought my favor in some matter?”

“Yeah,” Carson said, looking distastefully at the broad forward viewport. “I want to know where the heck we are. I’d figured on reconnoitering from the air, taking a look around—but then the drive quit on us. In fact, nothing seems to be working; must be a break in the power system somewhere.”

“I fear, sir, that I know not where we be,” Raven said. “Did they not tell you where the great portal would be?”

“They told me we’d come out around two hundred miles from this Shadow thing,” Carson said. “I didn’t listen to all the damn details; I figured we could straighten that out from the air once we came through.”

Raven nodded. “And I’ve no more than that.”

“You know this country, don’t you?”

“Aye, for the main, an I’ve landmarks…”

“Well, then, take a look, damn it!” Carson waved at the viewport.

Raven looked.

The view here was a good deal more extensive than that from the porthole by Amy Jewell’s seat, but it still revealed little more than that they were in a mature forest somewhere. Broken branches and scattered leaves were everywhere, signs of the ship’s fall strewn in a web of sunlight and shadow; oaks towered overhead, while moss and fungus flourished below. The light was the clean sweet white of home, not the hot glare of Earth’s sun, or the harsh blaze of the lights of Base One. He judged from its angle that the day was just short of mid-morning.

“’Tis a forest,” Raven said, “and I and mine drew best we could a map for you ere we left, and thereon we indicated those forests we knew—and some would put us your two hundred miles from Shadow’s stronghold. How to tell one forest from another, who can say? Saw you aught before we fell—a keep, a mount, any such as that?”

Carson turned and glared at one of the pilots.

“No, sir,” the man replied. “We didn’t have time to see much of anything. Just trees.”

“There might have been mountains off that way,” the co-pilot offered, pointing to the left.

Raven considered that, studying the angle of the sun and the patterns of the moss on the trees. “Then, an those were the Further Corydians, we might be in the West Sunderland,” he said at last, “but I’ve no certainty.”

“All right,” Carson said. “If we’re in Sunderland, where do we go, and how will we know if we’ve got it wrong?”

Raven bit back a retort; he took a second to calm his voice, then replied, “An we’re in the Low Forest of West Sunderland, we need but make way to the west, and in due time we should either strike the Palanquin Road, or reach the edge of the forest and the Starlinshire Downs. If it be the road, turning south will bring us in time to the River Vert; if it be the Downs, we should find landmarks enow.”

Carson nodded. “And then what?” he demanded.

“And then? Why, then we strike out westward for Shadow’s keep, should our plans be made and the omens favorable, and if they be otherwise, then seek we shelter with those who yet serve the cause of the Light.” Raven’s own plans were already made, and consisted mostly of the latter choice, locating a surviving part of the resistance to Shadow’s rule; he had no intention of flinging himself against Shadow’s keep in some pointless, suicidal raid.

However, throwing Carson and his men into such a raid might be the best way to rid himself of a nuisance, and to provide the evidence needed to convince the Empire to devise a serious attack. And who could say that they might not learn something from such an assault? To Raven’s best knowledge, no one had been foolish enough to attempt anything of the sort in centuries.

“You can contact these others?” Carson snapped.

“Certes, I can,” Raven replied, meeting his eye. He had developed the knack of lying straight-faced as a child, and had never lost it, but in this case he spoke very nearly the truth. Contact could be made, though it would best be done by a wizard, rather than by himself.

“And they can contact the Empire?”

Raven hesitated. “Aye,” he said, “that’s within their powers.” That was beyond question; the hesitation was due to uncertainty as to the wisdom of letting Carson know it.

He didn’t mention that in plain truth, either Elani or Valadrakul could doubtless make contact with others in the anti-Shadow network at any time, now that they were once again in their native realm, where good magic worked as it should. In truth, Elani could most likely make contact with agents in the Galactic Empire at any time, and they could, in their turn, carry messages to the Imperial authorities.

Of course, that would most probably put an end to their usefulness as spies. Furthermore, Raven did not trust the Empire. He would communicate with it only on his own terms, not at the urging of this arrogant oaf of a commoner.

He had not yet fully settled upon his own preferred course of action to be followed once he had found a new place in the resistance. That the Empire had some fool notion of using him as native guide in their assault on Shadow’s keep he knew; that he had assented to the Empire’s instructions, however, did not mean he would actually obey them. He had agreed because such an agreement was his only way to leave Base One and return to his own world.

Here, though, he was in command. Colonel Carson might not have realized that yet, but Raven knew who was master here, in the natural world, away from the topsy-turvy Empire. He was the heir to Stormcrack Keep, and as such he need take no heed of such as Carson.

* * * *

Carson glared at the damned foppish barbarian who called himself Raven, trying to decide whether or not he could be trusted.

He didn’t really trust any foreigner—none of them could think straight, they all had minds as twisty as their infernal streets in those little outworld colonies or the Azean backwaters on Terra. He had been told to cooperate with this Raven, though; the savage was supposed to be sworn to fight Shadow, and it was Shadow that really scared those pissant politicians back home, especially that twit Bascombe in the Department of Science, with his fancy title that he’d made up and got his father-in-law to make official.

And, Carson admitted to himself, the people who gave him his orders might actually know what they were doing this time—though he wouldn’t bet his pension on it.

They’d told him that the space warp would put him in a whole new universe, where space itself was different; he’d had his doubts, and for that matter he still wasn’t entirely convinced that this planet wasn’t just someplace off in an odd corner of the galaxy, that the space warp wasn’t just a shortcut from here to there, but it did seem to operate as advertised.

They’d told him to expect equipment failures, that some of the machinery wouldn’t operate in the space here, maybe most of it, and sure enough, the damn ship had fallen like a rock, the AG drive working about as well as a popped rubber. He still suspected a break in the power feed somewhere, but he couldn’t prove it.

So maybe they knew what they were doing when they told him to trust this fancy-talking twit.

“We can breathe the air here?” he demanded.

“Most assuredly,” Raven replied gravely.

“All right,” Carson growled. “Let’s get out and take a look around, then, and maybe find these friends of yours.”

* * * *

Amy scuffed one half-booted foot through the dead leaves, enjoying the rustle that made.

It wasn’t quite the same sound she’d have gotten doing the same thing back on Earth, in, say, Vermont; the air was slightly thicker here, and the higher gravity made the leaves pack down more tightly. That made it an effort to just stand and breathe, really; the tired irritability that had hounded her ever since her rescue from Walter and Beth, back on Zeta Leo III, was still with her as well.

Still, it was good to be outdoors again after all the weeks at Base One. They had been lucky enough to arrive on a beautiful day—warm in the sun, cool in the shade—and the contrasts were delightful after the stuffy boredom of the hollowed-out asteroid. And it was good to see trees and leaves; she hadn’t realized it, but she had missed them, not seeing a proper forest, or even a decent grove, since she had first arrived in the Galactic Empire.

The rich smells of black earth, rotting leaves, and growing things were absolutely wonderful after weeks of steel walls and stale air.

The forest seemed awfully quiet, though. She heard no birds, no squirrels or other animals; perhaps the spaceship’s crash had frightened them away. The heavy, still air wasn’t stirring anything overhead, either; the only sounds came from the stranded humans.

She looked up as the Imperial soldiers, in response to a brisk order from Colonel Carson, formed up in a line alongside the ruined spaceship, facing into a small clearing. At the sight of them, all together in their neat uniforms and silly purple helmets, it occurred to Amy that they had all been lucky that the ship had not smashed directly into one of the huge trees.

But then, the trees weren’t all that close together, for the most part; a few giants had crowded out most of the lesser competition.

Even so, it appeared to Amy that they had been fortunate in falling into one of the larger gaps. Trees crowded close around the ship’s nose and one side, but farther back the vessel lay in a relatively open space—open enough, at any rate, for Carson to stand there and order his men about, while the rest of the party stayed in sight but out of the way.

She saw Raven and Valadrakul exchange a derisive glance at seeing the soldiers standing in their tidy row, chests out and shoulders back.

“Popinjays,” Elani muttered. “Gaudy purple popinjays, ready to have the stuffing knocked from them.”

Stoddard didn’t say anything; he crossed his arms on his chest and watched. Pel and Susan were still helping Ted down from the ship, and not paying any attention to the rest.

Amy turned and whispered to Elani, “You don’t think much of them?”

“Pah!” Elani said. “Soldiers such as these perished in their thousands in the wars against Shadow. The others, Captain Cahn and his men, at least showed small signs of wit; this lot, ha!”

“You haven’t had a chance to get to know them,” Amy protested.

Elani made a noise of disgust. “I need not,” she said.

Amy remarked, “Raven seemed eager to have them along.”

Elani muttered, “My lord Raven is a wise man at times, but he can be a fool, as well. Look you now, and see what he thinks of these.”

Amy looked at Raven, who was making no attempt to hide his disdain for Carson and company.

Well, that was fine. It might serve as a distraction.

“Elani,” she said, “now that we’re here, is your magic working again?”

The wizard turned to look at her. She waved a hand, and something flickered briefly in the air, and then vanished.

“Aye,” she said. “The craft’s with me again.”

Amy smiled. “Then we have a favor to ask—Pel and Susan and I.”

Elani quirked one side of her mouth upward in a crooked smile of her own. “It seems to me that I might guess whereof you speak,” she said. “In truth, I’d wondered when you might speak of it.”

“Then you’ll do it?”

The wizard shook her head. “In time, aye,” she said, “for we’d have none with us who’d not be there freely, and indeed, what would we with such as your man Deranian? And yourself, a dealer in knickknacks and drapery, what have you to do with deeds of high courage and state? So aye, I’ll see you home—in time, in good time. But this is no place suitable, nor have we time enow, and ’twould be impolitic to attempt this ere I have spoken to Raven.”

Amy pursed her lips and reluctantly nodded. “I can see that,” she said.

“And it might have risks, as well,” Elani added. “There’s reason to believe that the opening of the gates between worlds is what drew Shadow’s eye before, when erst you came to our land. An that be so…well, you’ll be safe in your own realm, but those of us who remain behind…” She shook her head.

“I hadn’t thought of that,” Amy admitted.

“I had,” Elani replied. “But naught of it, i’truth, for I’ll have the risk, an you’re quick. We’d the gate to Earth a time or two ere ever Shadow caught us at it, and all I ask is that we have at the ready a way to make good our flight when the portal again closes. For that, ’twould seem wise to know better where we stand.”

Amy hesitated. “You mean you want to wait until we know where we are?”

“Certes, you have it.”

Amy would greatly have preferred it if Elani had opened the portal immediately, but that evidently wasn’t going to happen. She frowned, but in the heavy gravity and thick air, with her stomach uneasy, she found that she didn’t have the energy to argue.

“All right,” she said. “We’ll wait.”

* * * *

Pel watched with interest as the black-garbed nobleman and the purple-uniformed colonel stood almost nose-to-nose, glaring at each other.

“Colonel,” Raven said patiently, “imprimis, you know naught of this land. Would not it be wise, then, to heed the counsel of those who do? Secundus, is’t not but common sense to dissemble, when in the enemy’s lands?”

Carson glowered at Raven.

“I don’t like it,” he said. “I want my men in uniform. We aren’t a bunch of spies.”

“Are we not?” Raven demanded sarcastically. “What are we, then?”

“We are a fighting squad sent to destroy this Shadow of yours, Mr. Raven, or whatever your name is.”

“And you think, then, that such a motley party as this can best a power that has laid waste twice a dozen kingdoms, and brought all this world ’neath its sway?”

“I think, sir, that one properly-disciplined squad of Imperial soldiers can do a better job of damn near anything than any bunch of foreign barbarians!”

Raven threw up his hands in anger and disgust. He turned away, and spotted Prossie Thorpe.

“Mistress Thorpe,” he called, “come hither, lend me your counsel!”

Several sets of eyes swiveled toward the telepath, who had been leaning against an immense oak and picking idly at the bark.

Prossie started and looked up, dropping flakes of bark. “Me?” she asked.

“Aye,” Raven said, beckoning. “You.”

Prossie had not expected anyone to notice her presence; she had no idea that she would be dragged into an argument between Raven and Colonel Carson, and had hardly even been listening. She sometimes had trouble paying attention to people whose minds were closed to her, and telepathy did not work in this universe—in what Amy called “Faerie.” Prossie had picked the name up in passing, and rather liked it.

She still found it somewhat odd, being so out of touch with the thoughts of those around her. In fact, after the crowding at Base One, and the constant buzzing of thoughts on all sides, it was rather restful.

And it wasn’t the same horrible cut-off loneliness she had felt in her cell on Earth, because here she was in constant contact with her cousin Carrie. That was the communications line between this party and the people back at Base One; it was also a natural and comfortable link between the two women. The two of them could chatter away while Prossie took in the physical sensations of this strange new world.

She had been in Shadow’s world once before, but weeks ago, and in a different place. The trees here were taller, older, more imposing, the atmosphere more restful—if warmer, perhaps uncomfortably so.

It was rather intriguing to look at things, to touch things, to smell them, without having any preconceptions impinging from other minds about what the things should look like, should feel like. Prossie had really been too concerned with other, more urgent matters to take an interest in that before.

So instead of listening to the others she was picking at the bark of a gigantic oak when Raven called to her, picking at it and enjoying the feel of it.

She started and looked back at the others.

“Thorpe,” Carson said, “get over here.”

Reluctantly, Prossie left the oak and obeyed. Her stride was brisk and military; her expression was not.

“Mistress Thorpe,” Raven said, “you can look into the minds of others, is’t not so?”

“Well, ordinarily, I can,” Prossie admitted hesitantly, “but not here, or on Earth. Only in normal…I mean, Imperial space.”

“Then you cannot see what I am thinking, nor what Colonel Carson believes?”

“No, sir.”

“Is that right?” Carson demanded angrily.

“Yes, sir,” Prossie said.

“Well, then, what the hell did they send you for,” Carson shouted, “if you can’t read minds here?”

“I can maintain telepathic contact with my cousin Carrie, sir—Registered Master Telepath Carolyn Hall, that is, back at Base One,” Prossie explained. “I can still handle communications with General Hart and the High Command.” She did not add that he had been told all this previously; she knew perfectly well that Colonel Carson had ignored most of his briefing, assuming, as he always did, that he knew better than all the pantywaist experts and fat-bottomed generals.

Carson glared at her, and Raven took the opportunity to ask, “But ere we left Base One, you could see into the minds about you?”

“Yes, sir,” Prossie admitted warily. Although it was an interesting novelty, she was never entirely comfortable when her telepathic ability was blocked off, and any sort of talking to other people without it was unpleasant. This questioning, about matters she preferred not to discuss, was much worse than ordinary conversation. She had no way of knowing whether Raven suspected that she had illicitly eavesdropped on him earlier. He hadn’t suspected anything at the time, but the idea could easily have come to him after the ship passed through the warp.

“And your cousin Carolyn Hall,” Raven continued, “she can still see into the minds of others about her?”

“Yes, sir,” Prossie admitted, “but there are strict rules to protect privacy.”

Carson rumbled, muttering something that might have been a remark about it being a damn good thing. One good thing about having her head blocked off, Prossie thought, was that she could ignore the distrust and hatred everyone felt toward telepaths.

Raven nodded. “Assuredly,” he said. “But then, perhaps you could answer a question of mine, as it regards the thoughts of General Hart and the others above you.”

Prossie hesitated. “Maybe,” she said.

“Perhaps you can tell me, Mistress Thorpe,” Raven said, “why these men should have chosen to saddle me with a blockhead such as Colonel Carson.”

Prossie’s mouth opened, and then closed again. Someone snickered.

Had the time come to admit what she had done, and tell them all the truth?

“I didn’t snoop…” Prossie began uncertainly. Then she stopped. Her expression wavered for a moment; Raven, who had started to turn away from her to argue further with Carson, saw the colonel’s expression and turned back.

She had been nervous as Raven and Carson questioned her, but Carrie, who was listening in, had thought the whole affair was thoroughly amusing. Prossie could sense her mental giggling. Carrie could afford to giggle; she was safe at home, not out here in an alien forest.

But then Raven asked why he had been saddled with Colonel Carson, and Carrie, at first amused by the question, had read what Prossie knew.

And suddenly she wasn’t giggling, mentally or otherwise. Her amusement had vanished. She sent a feeler out to General Hart, and then to others…

By now everyone, from all three universes, was staring at the telepath, though several of them were not sure why. Pel, watching, felt a growing tension; for his own part, he had a sense of impending doom.

But then, he had felt a sense of impending doom for much of the time since Nancy’s death.

Prossie’s face went oddly blank as Carrie, panicking, pulled her briefly into a full linkage; then her expression returned more or less to normal.

“What troubles you, lady?” Raven asked.

Prossie hesitated, trying to think over what she had read herself, and what Carrie had relayed. Trying to decide what to say, when she couldn’t read her listeners’ reactions, was very difficult.

“It’s a mistake,” she said at last. “General Hart…there’s been a lot of factional fighting about Shadow…there were several plans, and they got confused, what with Major Copley being ill. It should have been Captain Haggerty in command, not Colonel Carson…”

It was actually worse than that, but Prossie had had a lifetime of not telling everything she knew. She didn’t relay what Carrie had just told her.

General Hart’s choice of personnel, and entire attitude toward the mission, had been subtly affected by undeservingly trusted subordinates. Prossie had known that Hart had intended to send an officer he wanted to get rid of, but it had actually gone beyond that.

Colonel Carson had been selected by agents of Shadow as absolutely the worst possible officer for the job.

“Bull!” Carson shouted.

For a moment, Prossie thought Carson was replying to her unspoken thought, but then she realized he was simply denying that his appointment was a mistake.

Prossie felt lost without her mind reading. She knew what everyone wanted; the Earthpeople wanted Elani to send them home, Elani wanted to send them. Raven wanted to take command of the rest and take them to join the underground. Elani and Valadrakul and Stoddard trusted Raven and would support him in whatever he had planned against Shadow.

Most of the fifteen troopers just wanted to finish whatever the job was and go home; they had no idea of what they had gotten into.

And Carson wanted to prove that he was a great leader and a true man among men, but since he was not, in fact, either one, he had no idea at all how to accomplish that.

She knew what they all had wanted, up to the moment they hit the space-warp—but what they intended to do about it, she had no idea. Why hadn’t the Earthpeople taken Elani aside? Amy had been talking to her, but nothing had come of it, so far as Prossie could see.

Why wasn’t Raven playing along with Carson, as he had with Hart? Didn’t he see that the man was an arrogant fool who could be coaxed into doing anything, so long as he thought it was his own idea? If Raven didn’t see it, what about Valadrakul or Elani?

Prossie wished she could take Raven aside for a few moments, or Elani, or almost any of them, but instead here she was, trapped between Raven and Carson in the most public manner possible. She regretted, now, that she had taken time to look around and admire the trees.

“It’s bull, I said,” Carson repeated, and Prossie realized that everyone was looking at her. She stared back at Carson. Even without her telepathy, Prossie could almost feel the hate Carson felt for her.

“Maybe I misunderstood something,” she said.

“Nay, lady,” Raven protested, “’twould explain much, if this man was sent in error. ’Tis plain he’s no master of subtlety, and ill-fitted for our task here. What, then, shall I, as a rightful lord, take the charge? What say you all?”

“I say it’s bloody treason, you barbaric fop!” Carson bellowed. He reached for his sidearm.

Raven stepped back and reached for his sword-hilt—but he had no sword. The weapon was lost long since, somewhere back in the Galactic Empire. “Valadrakul!” he called.

Carson’s blaster was out and pointed, and Prossie stared at it in horror.

Didn’t they know it wouldn’t work here?

Carson pulled the trigger as Valadrakul raised his hands; the wizard’s fingers twisted strangely as he spoke a word.

For a moment, Prossie thought the blaster had worked after all, as something flashed, pale and quick as heat lightning, between Carson and Valadrakul. Then she realized that the weapon was pointed at Raven, that the shimmering flare had traveled from the wizard’s upraised hands to Carson’s body.

For an instant the colonel stood motionless, an expression of astonishment spreading slowly across his features; then it turned to a rictus of pain, and he crumpled to the ground, still holding tight to the useless blaster.

The sound of his fall into the dead leaves seemed impossibly loud and prolonged. Accustomed to a constant telepathic echo behind every voice, the eternal hum of other minds drowning out the ordinary noises of the inanimate universe, Prossie rarely heard mere sound so clearly, but here, in this telepathically dead environment, there were no distractions. She thought she could almost hear each individual leaf crumbling, each separate impact as first one knee, then the other, then a hand and the blaster and the other hand struck, his belly and finally his face landing in the rustling detritus.

And when the sound of the impact had faded, she heard a strange arrhythmic chorus of faint clickings. At first she took it for leaves settling, but then she realized it came from the wrong direction.

She turned, and saw a dozen blasters, drawn and aimed, triggers clicking uselessly against copper contacts. Carson’s men were avenging their fallen commander—or trying to.

“Men of the Empire!” Raven called, his hands upraised in an orator’s gesture. “Yon usurping fool is dead; drop your arms, an you’d not taste the same!”

“The hell you say,” someone called.

“Raven,” a quiet voice said—a woman’s voice, speaking from the side, not from the line of men by the ship.

Startled, Raven turned, and found Susan Nguyen standing straight, legs braced, her pistol held out before her, gripped firmly in both hands. Her black handbag, whence the revolver had come, lay open at her feet.

The barrel of the little gun was pointed directly at Valadrakul’s head, from a distance of perhaps four feet away. The wizard was utterly motionless, his hands hanging stiffly at his sides.

“This gun works here,” Susan said, speaking calmly but emphatically. “You’ve seen it.”

“Aye, mistress, I do so recall,” Raven replied warily.

“You are not going to hurt anyone else. Neither is Valadrakul. If anyone else is harmed, your wizard dies. Clear enough?”

Raven flicked his gaze to Elani; Prossie’s own eyes turned to follow, and she found that Pel and Amy stood one on each side of the female wizard, each gently restraining one of Elani’s arms.

“Now,” Susan said, “we are all going to sit down quietly, and talk this out, and settle what we’re going to do, and we’re going to do it without any sort of violence, because the first person to use violence is going to get a bullet in his gut. Is that clear?”

“Aye, mistress,” Raven said, “’tis plain as the day. And it pleases me well—I’d no wish for strife. Yon fool drew ’gainst me, and I’ve no blade; am I to perish undefended by the hands of such as he?”

“You know perfectly well that blasters don’t work here.”

“Ah, but mistress,” Raven protested, “in the heat of the moment I misremembered.”

Susan did not reply to that.

She didn’t lower the gun, either.

For a moment, no one spoke; then Ted Deranian burst out giggling.

“What an anti-climax!” he shouted. “No gunfight, no wizard war! My subconscious is wimping out on me.”

“Shut up, Ted,” Pel said.

Ted ignored him, and turned to Susan.

“Lady, if you’re a real person and I didn’t just dream you up,” he said, “I sure hope you don’t try this sort of thing in the courtroom!”

Chapter Five

“But I tell you, I am your rightful lord!” Raven shouted.

The Imperial soldiers shuffled their feet and cast uneasy, mocking glances at one another.

“The hell you say,” one man muttered.

“Mr. Raven,” the lieutenant explained patiently, “leaving aside that you killed the colonel, or at least your man did, and while it may have been self-defense, I’m not saying it wasn’t, still, that ain’t the approved procedure for promotion, and as I was saying, even leaving that aside, you aren’t in the chain of command.”

“And I have the word of General Hart that I am,” Raven insisted.

“You got the paperwork, the signed orders, you let us see ’em,” the lieutenant answered. “Otherwise—you don’t have the uniform, you don’t have the rank, you don’t have anything. You’re a civilian.”

“I am a nobleman born!”

“That don’t mean shit to us, sir. Our oath is to the emperor, nobody else. You could be the bloody King of the Franks himself, and we’d still have to tell you to call your Dad and get the papers.”

Pel, watching and listening from a few yards away, could see that a couple of the soldiers were not happy with that particular claim; he wondered who the King of the Franks was. He supposed it might be a title given to the heir to the throne, like the rank of “Prince of Wales” in Britain. It seemed a very odd thing to him that there would be such archaic titles in an interstellar empire.

“Listen, man,” Raven argued, “your master is dead, and you are in the enemy’s lands, lands that you know naught of, and where I am all that you have to guide you. Your lord, the General Hart, sent you hither to aid me—me, and none other. Then is’t not madness and folly to deny that command is fallen to me, that Colonel Carson is no more?”

“Mr. Raven,” the lieutenant explained wearily, “you are not in the chain of command. I am. I was the colonel’s second-in-command, and with him gone, I am in command. You are a civilian, and as long as you are, you can’t possibly assume command. That doesn’t mean we can’t cooperate.”

“Permission to speak, Lieutenant?” one of the men called.

Startled, Raven and the lieutenant turned.

The man who had spoken—Pel didn’t know any of the soldiers’ names yet—was leaning comfortably against a tree; now he straightened, and pointed to Prossie. “We’ve got a mu… I mean, a telepath with us, Lieutenant,” he said. “Why not ask her? Check with Base?”

“Aw, come on,” someone called. “She’s the one who started this and got the colonel killed!”

“No, that was the guy over there in the funny clothes,” another voice protested.

“I don’t mean she killed him,” the first replied, “but she was the one who said things were screwed up!”

“So maybe they were screwed up!”

The lieutenant looked over his men, chewing his lip as he did so, then turned to look consideringly at Prossie.

“All right, Thorpe,” he said. “You call home and tell us what we’re supposed to do.”

“’Tis a waste…” Raven began.

The lieutenant thrust out a warning hand.

Susan Nguyen cleared her throat warningly.

Raven fell silent, and two score eyes focused on the telepath.

* * * *

When Colonel Carson fell, Prossie had not waited for orders; she had immediately relayed the news to Carrie and told her to tell someone in authority.

Carrie had done so—she had left her cubicle and gone running for the Office of Interdimensional Affairs. Her orders were to report anything received from other universes to the Under-Secretary, and that included messages from Prossie, as well as contacts with the handful of psychics on Earth, or with Shadow’s creatures.

The Under-Secretary was not in.

“It’s urgent,” Carrie told the receptionist.

“I’m sure it is,” the receptionist replied. “Have a seat, and the Under-Secretary will be back momentarily.”

Carrie hesitated, and glanced toward the door—she made it look as if she were seeing if there were any sign of the Under-Secretary’s approach, but in fact she was turning away so as not to stare while she read the receptionist’s mind in hopes of finding out just where the Under-Secretary was.

The receptionist was not thinking about Under-Secretary John Bascombe; she was thinking about an idealized, muscular, blond and handsome male figure. This was the man she felt she deserved to have married, and she was convinced that she had not found him because telepaths, with their sneaking and spying, had stolen him away. There were hundreds of the dirty mutants out there, far more than anyone knew, but they kept themselves secret, only a few admitted what they were in order to get into the government where they could spy on everything better, and steal all the good men away from deserving ordinary women.

It took Carrie several seconds to dig down past this depressingly familiar paranoid fantasy and locate recent memories.

“Why don’t you sit down?” the receptionist asked, mentally adding, “Mutant bitch.”

Carrie realized she had been staring foolishly out the door of the office. The receptionist, despite her belief in a conspiracy of evil, lawless telepaths, didn’t yet realize that her thoughts had been illicitly spied on, but the idea might occur to her at any second.

“No, that’s all right,” Carrie said. “I’ll try again later.” She turned and headed back out into the corridor.

The Under-Secretary had been taking a long lunch, and was lingering over his final cup of tea; Carrie hurried to the cafeteria, to catch him before he left.

He looked up in surprise as she entered.

“Telepath,” he said, “what are you doing here? This room’s off-limits for you!”

“Yes, sir,” Carrie said, “but I think this is an emergency.”

He put down his cup.

“Colonel Carson has been killed, sir,” Carrie told him, coming to attention.

“By Shadow?”

“No, sir. By one of the wizards in his own party.”

Bascombe let out a long, deep sigh. “Are you sure?”

“Yes, sir.”

“Well, get out of here, anyway—no telepaths are allowed in here. I’ll be out in a moment.”

“Yes, sir.” Carrie turned and trotted out to the hall.

She waited, and a moment later the Under-Secretary emerged, walking quickly. “Come along,” he ordered.

She followed, but to her surprise he did not return to his own office; instead he led her down to Level Six, to General Hart’s office.

Five minutes later the three of them, Hart and Bascombe and Carrie, were seated in Hart’s office with the door closed.

“Now,” Hart said, “tell us all about it.”

* * * *

“They’re still arguing,” Prossie told the others.

“Who is?” Lieutenant Dibbs demanded.

“General Hart and the Under-Secretary for Interdimensional Affairs,” Prossie replied.

“Just what are they arguing about?” Amy asked.

That was not easy for Prossie to answer. Carrie was relaying not just the two men’s words, but some of their thoughts, as well. While the spoken debate purported to be a discussion of the best way to ensure the survival of the rest of the expeditionary force, the actual subject, as both men knew, was the fact that General Hart had deliberately tried to screw up the Under-Secretary’s project and had been caught at it. Both Hart and Bascombe knew, however, that Bascombe could not come out and say that openly—if the mission failed he would take at least part of the blame, and trying to shift it to Hart would just make him look worse.

He could, however, take Hart down with him, in a variety of ways, since Hart’s sabotage had shown up so quickly. If the party had been wiped out by Shadow’s forces, both men would have been able to get out cleanly—under-estimating the enemy was a mistake, but an understandable and forgivable one, relatively minor, nothing at all like deliberately sending people to be killed.

So each man was now looking for a way out that would leave him blameless. Branding Raven as a dangerous lunatic or treacherous foreign outlaw was one possibility—in that case, Lieutenant Dibbs should be put in command and Raven arrested or killed. Denouncing Carson posthumously as a renegade was also a possibility, but if he had surviving family or friends that might be risky. And in either case, what should the survivors do next? Should they continue their mission and attempt to penetrate Shadow’s stronghold, or should they abandon the enterprise, take shelter, and wait for rescue?

That latter possibility assumed that rescue was possible. General Hart was not at all clear on how travel between universes worked; the Under-Secretary had a better grasp of the subject, but did not care to enlighten a man who was, when all was said and done, his political adversary. And even knowing what he did, the Under-Secretary was thinking in terms of reopening the space warp and lowering a line; the possibility of using wizards’ magic had not yet occurred to him.

“Whether to continue the mission,” Prossie said.

* * * *

Amy was seated cross-legged on dry, dead leaves, forearms resting on her knees, watching as Raven and the Imperials argued, and feeling sweat moisten the back of her T-shirt; it wasn’t really very hot, and she hadn’t been doing anything very active, but the thicker air seemed to make perspiration come more easily. She felt a vague discomfort in the general vicinity of her stomach, as well, and wasn’t sure whether or not that could be attributed to the climate and atmosphere.

Beside her stood Elani; Amy was staying close to the wizard, who was, after all, her ticket home to Earth, to peace and sanity and her own home.

As far as Amy was concerned, it made no difference at all who was in charge of the group, so long as Raven agreed to let Elani send the Earthpeople home.

Still, she could see that it mattered very much indeed to some people—with a shudder, she stole a glance at Colonel Carson’s body, lying undisturbed on its bed of fallen leaves.

More death. That was not anything she wanted to see. She had managed to live forty years on Earth without seeing more than half a dozen corpses, and those were mostly at funerals; she had never seen anyone die until she had stupidly agreed to step through Pel’s basement wall and take a quick look at Raven’s world.

But then there had been Cartwright, killed by Shadow’s monsters—though he might have still been alive, Amy told herself, when she escaped through the portal into the Empire. There had been Peabody, killed by the pirates aboard Emerald Princess. And others. She hadn’t seen them all die, but Pel’s wife Nancy was dead, and their daughter Rachel, and Raven’s friend Squire Donald, and Lieutenant Godwin, and the two little people, Grummetty and Alella. People aboard the Princess—she didn’t know all the names. People killed in the fighting when the Empire’s Task Force Umber came to the rescue.

And the two on Zeta Leo III who had held her prisoner, Walter and Beth—they had both been hanged by the Empire. She hadn’t seen that, it had happened after she was aboard Emperor Edward VII on her way to Base One, but it had happened, and the two of them were dead, and it was partly her fault.

It was partly their own damn fault, of course, for keeping slaves, and abusing her, and killing that other woman, whatsername, Sheila. Walter was a murderer, and Beth was his accomplice—but if Amy had kept her mouth shut, probably no one would have known that, and the two of them would still be alive in an Imperial prison camp somewhere.

If anyone asked her now, she wouldn’t testify—she was over the need for vengeance, and had had her fill of death. She looked at Carson’s body and swallowed hard, feeling suddenly queasy.

Elani looked down at her, eyes bright.

“Is aught amiss, lady?” the wizard asked.

“I don’t know,” Amy replied. She felt no need to explain her misgivings. “I just don’t feel very good.”

“Ah, certes, you’d be home, I’ll wager. Well, methinks this parley is near its end, and we’ll soon be sending you hence.” Elani’s motherly smile suddenly dimmed. “Or be it more? Have you the Sight, lady? Is danger at hand?” She raised her head and lifted a hand.

Amy started to protest, then stopped.

If Elani wanted to check for danger, it might not be necessary, but it couldn’t hurt.

* * * *

“An they summon you home,” Raven said, “’twould be simple courtesy that I call for volunteers ’mongst your men.”

“My men are under my orders,” Lieutenant Dibbs insisted loudly.

“Ah, but you’ll see that you might soon be under my orders, an your superiors so state—true?”

“Yes, sir,” Dibbs agreed, “but until I get orders to that effect, I’ll just do as I think best. And if we’re ordered home, we go home. Thorpe, any word yet?”

Prossie shook her head. “They’re still talking,” she said. “I think they’re planning to go on, but they haven’t settled the details.”

“They’ve said naught of who’s to command?” Raven asked.

“No.”

“Have you inquired?”

Prossie hesitated.

“Lord Raven,” she said, “I’ve told Carrie that we need to know who’s in charge, but she can’t just interrupt a general and an undersecretary, she can’t make them listen to her. They’ve got what they consider more important matters to settle first. If it’s any help, the Under-Secretary wants to put you in charge, but General Hart says you should be in an advisory capacity, since you’re not only not in the military, you aren’t even an Imperial subject.”

“Ah…” Raven turned away angrily, spat on the ground, then turned back. “You’ve no doubt of that, lady? That lying scoundrel Hart would have me play the native guide, and no more, and his promises that I’d command are no more than devil’s smoke?”

“I’m afraid so,” Prossie said.

“In my own land, he’d have me a mere servant to this ill-born stripling?” Raven gestured toward Dibbs with the three bandaged fingers of his left hand.

Prossie nodded.

“I’ll not have it,” Raven shouted. “I will not and I shall not!”

“So what are you going to do about it, then?” Dibbs demanded.

The rightful lord of Stormcrack Keep turned his attention from raging at the treetops to defending his right. “Silence, fool,” Raven commanded. “Hast forgotten that thy Under-Secretary would place me above thee? Durst address thus one who shall perhaps shortly hold thee in thrall?”

“I’m a freeborn Imperial citizen, sir, and I’ll speak as I please,” Dibbs retorted.

Raven grabbed at his swordless belt in frustration, and cast a glance at Susan. The revolver was no longer aimed directly at Valadrakul’s head, but it was still held securely in the lawyer’s hands.

“’Tis all…” he began.

“Raven!” Elani cried, interrupting him. “Shadow!”

Pel, who had been sitting nearby and listening to the debate, started; he looked about wildly, but saw only the downed spaceship, the cluster of people, the surrounding trees and underbrush.

“Damn!” Raven said. He, for one, clearly did not doubt Elani for a moment. “Valadrakul, wards!” he called. “Elani, where away?”

Elani pointed upward and to one side, past the spaceship’s nose.

“We’re under attack?” Susan asked, turning the gun away from Valadrakul.

“It’s a trick, lady,” one of the soldiers called. “He’s just trying to get the gun!”

Susan started, and her grip on the pistol tightened, but none of the natives of “Faerie” were paying any attention. Raven was looking about for cover, glancing every so often at the sky; Stoddard was shading his eyes and looking up at the treetops; Elani and Valadrakul were both muttering and gesturing, preparing spells.

Pel got slowly to his feet, not sure just why, or what he hoped to do; he was unarmed, and had no way to fight if Shadow’s creatures really were approaching.

“Aye,” Elani called, in a pause between mumbles, “Shadow’s creatures draw nigh. Hellbeasts, carried by another, one that flies—they approach, yonder—a score, perhaps, aboard the flyer!”

The Earthpeople and the Imperials stood, baffled, or milled about in confusion; the natives were more alert. “Shelter in the ship?” Stoddard asked, nodding toward Christopher.

“Nay,” Raven replied, “an we might be trapped within and besieged, or the vessel crushed and us thereby.”

Stoddard nodded an acknowledgment; Pel, who had been heading for the door of the ship without realizing it, stopped dead in his tracks.

A better means of escape occurred to him. “Elani,” he called, “can you get us out of here? Open a portal?”

Amy had gotten to her feet, as well, and was standing close beside the little wizard; she added her own voice, saying, “Please, Elani?”

The sorceress shook her head. “We’ve not the time,” she said.

“Look!” one of the soldiers called, pointing upward.

Something big and black was moving, up above the trees, blocking the sunlight and plunging them into shadow. Pel, watching it, thought it resembled a blimp passing overhead. Did Shadow use airships?

“All right, men,” Lieutenant Dibbs called, “form up, two lines, helmets on, weapons ready.”

“No,” Raven shouted, “flee! Take shelter, wherever you may!”

“These are my men…” Dibbs began.

“Sir,” a soldier said, cutting him off, “our blasters don’t work here.”

Dibbs froze for a second, then said, “Damn. All right, then, we’ll take cover—but in proper order. We aren’t running away. Shelby, you take that end, and the rest of you form up, we’ll move over there, under the starboard vane.”

“Lieutenant…” another man began.

“Move!”

For a moment, no one spoke; leaves rustled, boots stamped, as everyone did what he or she thought best to prepare for an assault. A faint humming that reminded Pel of distant insects came from somewhere overhead, and he realized it came from that dark shape.

Pel remembered his previous visit to Shadow’s realm, and the horrific fight near the forester’s hut on Stormcrack lands, the fight where Spaceman First Class Cartwright had died; there, Shadow’s creatures had burst up through the ground and come showering out of the trees from every direction. There was no safe place. The only chance to survive was flight.

He considered turning to run now, dashing off into the forest at random, but that, he realized, might just take him into the jaws of some slimy black monstrosity.

Besides, if he died, perhaps he would be reunited with Nancy and Rachel. If he died bravely, went down fighting, didn’t he deserve to join them, wherever they were? Maybe if he died here he would wake up safely back home on Earth, in his own bed, alive and well.

But there was no point in being stupid, in making it easy for Shadow. He headed for Valadrakul and Susan; Valadrakul had his spells, Susan her revolver.

“’Tisn’t seeking us,” Elani said abruptly, breaking the silence.

“Is’t not?” Raven asked, startled. Pel saw that the nobleman had found a broken limb among the debris that the ship had brought down, and was holding it in his right hand like a club. His bandaged left hand was empty.

“Nay. ’Tis come to study the portal that brought us hither.”

Pel started to relax, then realized what that could mean. “It’ll find us soon enough, then,” he said.

“An it flies not on through, into Empire, aye,” Elani agreed.

“Mistress Thorpe,” Raven called, “can you send word, warn those who remain at Base One?”

“Of course, sir,” Prossie replied. “But I can’t promise they’ll pay any attention.”

Raven muttered a word Pel didn’t catch. It sounded like an archaic obscenity.

“The flying creature is at yon portal,” Elani announced, pointing upward.

“Goes it through?” Raven called.

Pel looked about, and saw that the party had collected into three groups—and one individual.

One group consisted of Elani, Amy, and Ted, clustered at the base of a large tree of undistinguished species; another was composed of himself, Susan, Valadrakul, Stoddard, and Prossie Thorpe, standing by the side of the downed ship; and the third was made up of Lieutenant Dibbs and his fourteen men, gathered under the ship’s stubby wing, farther astern. Raven stood alone, on an upthrust root of a gigantic oak, swinging his makeshift club stiffly and watching the leaves overhead.

And Colonel Carson’s body lay in the open part of the little clearing between the ship and the trees, near the center of the uneven quadrilateral formed by the survivors. Pel turned away, and found himself looking at the dead officer’s troops.

Dibbs had his men arranged in two rows of seven, one line facing forward, the other aft, with himself at the outer end; all of them were crouching, as the fin provided slightly less than six feet of headroom. Some, Pel saw, were clutching their blasters by the barrels; others were searching the ground for sticks or rocks.

“Are there any other weapons aboard the ship?” Pel called to the lieutenant, shifting back to the rear of his own cluster.

Dibbs shook his head.

“Nay,” Elani cried. “It turns away! It senses us!”

A dozen faces turned upward.

And a moment later, a dozen assorted black-winged horrors plunged down through the green leaves, claws outstretched, fanged mouths agape.

Chapter Six

Valadrakul gestured, and the foremost hellbeast exploded in golden fire. Pel ducked instinctively as football-sized gobbets of black slime spattered across the ground and the side of the ship. Another flash he guessed to be Elani’s doing.

The other hellbeasts came on without slowing, and before Pel could raise his head one of them struck him on the shoulders and spun him around, slamming him against the hull. Dazed, he could see nothing but purple paint on smooth metal as sharp claws or teeth—he couldn’t tell which—chewed at the back of his head.

Then there came a brilliant yellow flash, and Pel could feel things sliding down his back, across his buttocks and down the back of his legs.

People were screaming, he could hear them, and there were other noises, gnashings and scratchings and gurglings. He heard a loud popping, and realized that it was the sound of a gunshot—Susan had fired her pistol. Another flash sent spots dancing before his eyes.

He remembered the other fight against Shadow’s creatures. That had been different; they had come up from beneath the ground, rather than down from the sky, and then hundreds more had come in from all sides, from the surrounding forest. There had been no warning at all, and the group there had been somewhat different—Cahn and his crew were there instead of Dibbs and his squad, the little people had still been alive, Nancy and Rachel were there. There had been no ship, but a woodshed with a magical portal in it, and the party, hopelessly outnumbered and outmatched, had fled through the portal.

This time, there was no portal—unless one of the wizards could open one, and that seemed unlikely, in the midst of battle, without any previous preparation. Pel knew nothing about how the portals worked, but he remembered that Elani had needed several minutes to open one.

If they faced those limitless hordes again, the hundreds of horrible things that had come leaping out of the forest, they were surely all as good as dead. A few might escape into the surrounding forest, but what would become of them then? They would be lost, to starve or be picked off one by one by Shadow’s creatures.

Maybe, Pel thought, it was almost over. Maybe, in a few minutes, he would be joining Nancy and Rachel—either in death, or waking up again safely back home on Earth.

Unsteadily, shielding his face with one arm and bracing himself against the ship with the other, Pel turned.

Twisted fragments of monster were strewn everywhere, horribly out of place in the bright midday sun—some like the remains of a gigantic burst black balloon, some like black jelly, some like charred driftwood or burned roasts, all dark and harsh against the gentler colors of the forest. Valadrakul stood amid the debris, systematically targeting the survivors—a fifth exploded as it gnawed on someone, one of the group that had stood to the side, Amy and Ted and Elani. All three of them were down, lying on the ground with hellbeasts atop them. As Pel watched, something in that heap flashed white, but the monsters continued their assault. Whatever magic Elani had attempted had not worked.

Pel’s own group, by the ship, was also under attack—there were creatures assaulting Prossie Thorpe and Stoddard, and one lay dead at Susan’s feet, the back of its head blown apart. Pel judged that Susan had thrust the .38 into its mouth before pulling the trigger.

A single monster had gone after Raven, who had warded it off with his club; the antagonists were now facing off, a few feet apart. It seemed to Pel that there was something unnatural about Raven’s position, and for a second that puzzled him. Then he realized what it was; the natural pose for a man with a club would be to hold the weapon in both hands, or to keep his free hand up, ready to grab. Instead, Raven’s bandaged left hand hung uselessly at his side.

None of the beasts had attacked the Imperial soldiers; hiding under the ship’s wing had apparently been a successful ploy. Pel found himself irrationally resenting that.

And there was no second wave, no throng of monsters spilling out of the trees and underbrush. In fact, this time the humans seemed to be getting the better of the fight.

Stoddard had his attacker, a thing like a greyhound with bat-wings and elongated, tentacular forelegs, by the throat, and was squeezing; the monster was trying to wrap its own snakelike limbs around the big man’s neck in return, but its head was twisted back so that it could not see its foe, and Stoddard jerked it from side to side, so that it was having trouble finding its target.

Prossie’s opponent was smaller, and resembled a flying spider, or perhaps a winged monkey; at first glance it didn’t look big enough to be seriously dangerous, but Pel could see blood on Prossie’s hair and uniform as she rolled on the ground struggling with it.

“Lieutenant!” Pel shouted. “Do something!”

Valadrakul flung out a hand, and the thing attacking Prossie exploded.

One hellbeast had landed atop Colonel Carson’s corpse; realizing at last that its prey was already dead, it turned toward the ship and slithered forward, wings dragging behind. Pel was not sure who it was aiming for, Valadrakul or Prossie or himself.

Stoddard began slamming his antagonist against the side of Christopher, a steady dull thudding.

“Come on, men!” Dibbs called; he came charging out of his shelter brandishing a thick chunk of tree-limb. Several soldiers followed; Pel, startled, saw that three or four did not, but remained where they were, huddled under the guidance vane.

Half a dozen men landed atop the slithering creature, arms rising and falling as they pounded at it with rocks and clubs; other men flung themselves at the two monsters that were still atop Elani’s group.

A sharp crack sounded, and Stoddard’s creature went limp. Thin liquid oozed down the side of the ship.

Valadrakul worked his magic once more, and Raven’s opponent burst into ruin without ever striking a blow.

In seconds, the remaining creatures were dead, and the humans were brushing themselves off, gingerly testing wounds, assessing the damage.

Pel had superficial scratches on his head and back, and the T-shirt he wore had been shredded, but he was not seriously injured. None of the soldiers had received anything worse than a few scratches on their hands and arms. Valadrakul and Raven were untouched; Stoddard had bruises on one forearm and a red abrasion on the side of his neck.

Prossie had received dozens of shallow slashes from the razor-edged feet of the thing she had fought, and had lost enough blood to make her dizzy. She sat against the base of a tree, resting, while the others gathered.

Elani, Amy, and Ted were in a pile, under several dead monsters; it took the others a few moments to dig them out.

Ted was on the bottom, and had had the wind knocked out of him, but was otherwise not visibly damaged any further than he had been before. The bandage on his head had been torn off, but the wound beneath appeared no worse.

Amy had three long gashes on one forearm, but had fended off all other attacks; she was pulled upright, dazed and panting.

Elani was dead; she had thrown herself atop the other two, and one of the monsters had torn open the back of her neck, as well as slashing at her head and elsewhere. Her hair and clothing appeared singed, though none of the creatures had used fire in their attacks. Pel wondered if some sort of acid or venom might have been responsible.

“I thought she was supposed to be a wizard,” one of the Imperials muttered.

“She was,” Prossie said.

“Then why didn’t she defend herself, the way whatsisname did?”

“She defended Ted, instead,” Amy explained dully, staring down at the dead sorceress. “She saw he wasn’t moving, so she destroyed the one that went for him, instead of the one that was after her.”

“I saw a flash,” Pel said, “but it didn’t seem to do any good.”

“That was the last time,” Amy said. “I’m not sure…”

“’Twas her death,” Valadrakul said, interrupting. “At a wizard’s death the web of energies that’s been woven about her through all her life comes unraveled all in an instant, and betimes there’s a flash, or a display of one sort or another.” He stared at Elani’s remains with an expression Pel couldn’t interpret—it might have been grief, or anger, or almost anything.

“Well, we…” Dibbs began. He cut off short and looked up, startled, as a deep shadow suddenly fell over the party, blotting out the patchy sunlight.

“What’s that?” a soldier asked.

“The big one,” Valadrakul said, looking up, his face suddenly intent. “’Tis the hellbeast that carried the others hither.” He raised his arms and began a spell.

“Is it attacking, too?”

No one answered, but from overhead came a sudden snapping and crunching—tree-branches were being smashed aside as the thing tried to fight its way to the ground. Leaves and twigs showered down.

Pel looked up, puzzled, trying to locate the descending creature. The trees and shadows made it difficult to see just what was happening.

“Why doesn’t it just come through the hole the ship left?” he asked no one in particular.

Valadrakul was too busy with his magic to answer, and no one else had a ready reply, but then Pel managed to figure out what he was looking at, and realized why. The thing was coming through the hole the ship had left. It still had to break off limbs.

Otherwise, it couldn’t fit.

* * * *

Prossie stared up at the hellbeast in weak and horrified fascination. Behind her, someone screamed, but she didn’t bother to turn and look.

She had heard stories about animals of incredible size that were found on various obscure planets on the outskirts of the Empire—or even worlds that were closer in, but off the main routes. She had generally assumed that such tales were exaggerated; she knew that non-telepaths had a tendency to distort things. Telepaths had something of a self-correcting mechanism, since their memories would automatically be compared with those of the other telepaths, and even so, some events grew in the retelling, so it was no wonder that non-telepaths might blow things all out of proportion.

On the other hand, it was a big universe, and the Empire was full of marvels, so she had never completely dismissed stories of beasts the size of spaceships.

But now that she was actually looking straight up at one, she found it impossible to believe. That thing up there could not be real, she told herself.

A heavy tree-limb plummeted down and smashed ringingly against the grounded spaceship’s metal hull, leaving the opening in the treetops a little larger, giving her a better look at the thing. She stared up, ignoring the leaves, bark, and branches that fell around her.

The hellbeast was roughly bat-shaped, but with a huge, bloated body, a body the length of Christopher but easily twice as thick. The head was raw nightmare, with saw-edged ears the size of sails, man-sized compound eyes where each facet was a slit-pupiled green disk, a mouth that could swallow an aircar; the clustered fangs were like swords, and the dangling purple tongue, thick as a man’s thigh, writhed like a wounded squid’s tentacle.

The wings were still tangled in the surrounding trees, tearing their way through; Prossie glimpsed at least four sets of claws, rather than the two that an ordinary bat would have. And the monster’s shadow covered Christopher, the narrow clearing where the ship had fallen, and a broad stretch of forest to either side.

There was simply no way such a creature could exist in any sane universe.

But then Prossie reminded herself that she was not in a sane universe—she was in Shadow’s realm, in Faerie, where magic ruled and science was powerless.

Regardless of what universe it was, there was still only one sensible reaction to such a monster, and that was to run. The thing might be able to smash its way through the forest, but judging by how slowly it was making its way down to the ship it would not be able to do it with any speed; she ought, she thought, to be able to escape it easily, even in her weak, wounded condition.

She forced herself up onto her feet, bracing herself against the tree she had sat beneath, and was about to flee when Carrie’s mental voice called to her.

“Prossie, they want you to continue the mission, to go on to Shadow’s fortress.”

Prossie stumbled, and looked up at the monster overhead.

She hadn’t been transmitting, there was no way that Carrie could have known what was going on here, but still, the message seemed so irrelevant as to be ridiculous. A dozen dead monstrosities were scattered across the landscape, she was bleeding from a dozen cuts, Elani had been killed, and a nightmare with a quarter-mile wingspan was fighting its way down through the forest, trying to get at them—who cared what a couple of pompous idiots back at Base One wanted? She turned to run.

As she turned, she glimpsed Valadrakul as he flung his spell at the gigantic creature; eldritch energy flashed upward from his raised hands, and sparks flickered across the monster’s belly—but that was all. Nothing exploded; no tattered bits of black monster-flesh fell.

A faint whiff of something unpleasant reached her nose as she ran, but Prossie could not tell whether that meant Valadrakul’s attack had singed the thing slightly, or whether it was the monster’s natural aroma.

Prossie glanced back over her shoulder, and saw Susan point her pistol at the thing. The lawyer looked at the weapon in her hand, then up at the descending horror; she let out a quick bark of laughter, then dropped the gun in her handbag, turned, and ran, following Prossie.

Most of the others were scattering now, as well, and Prossie could only see a few of them; the rest had vanished behind the trees. Valadrakul was standing his ground, chanting; Ted Deranian was lying where he had fallen, watching everything, not moving; but all the others were departing or already gone, at paces ranging from a slow, backward-facing, step-by-step retreat to a full-tilt heedless run.

Prossie’s own pace was somewhere in between; she was moving at a brisk trot, but watching where she was going and glancing back every so often. She didn’t need any more scrapes or scratches, and she didn’t want to leave a trail of her own blood for any of Shadow’s creatures to follow. Right now, she really didn’t want to think about the fight against Shadow itself, or what was happening back at Base One, or long-term plans of any kind; she just wanted to get away, to stay alive and in one piece.

* * * *

Amy had panicked. When she had seen that thing coming down through the trees, had seen its shadow block out the sun, had been showered with twigs and leaves as it broke past the treetops, she had frozen for an instant, and then she had screamed, and she had turned and run.

It was all too much, Colonel Carson’s death, and the hellbeasts, and Elani falling on top of her and dying there, and then that gigantic horror appearing overhead. She had gotten used to the relatively sane and normal life at Base One, and this succession of shocks had broken her nerve temporarily.

But only temporarily; as she stumbled across the uneven floor of the forest she was slowed by the irregular footing, by mounting nausea, and by a wave of guilt.

She knew better. Running away didn’t solve anything, that’s what the counselors and therapists all said. A person must face her fears. The others were still back there, fighting that thing.

She forced herself to stop and turn around.

For a moment, as she stood sweaty and panting, her gashed arm throbbing, she couldn’t see the monster or the ship, only trees—she had covered more ground than she had thought. In her unthinking panic it had seemed as if the creature was right behind her, just inches away; that it was not seemed somehow miraculous.

And then an entirely new sort of panic set in—she was alone, lost in the forest, wounded, with no one to help her and no chance at all of finding her way home. For an instant, from sheer terror, she stopped breathing.

And when the sound of her own breath stopped, she could hear the sounds from the ship—wood breaking, people shouting. She followed them with her gaze, and spotted first the hellbeast’s shadow, then the spaceship, and finally the creature itself.

It was at that moment that Valadrakul flung his new spell; Amy could see it spilling upward from a tiny figure she had not realized was there until the orange plume of fiery magic burst forth.

The scene was so distant that it didn’t seem entirely real; framed between two tree-trunks, it was like a tableau, like some sort of outdoor drama staged for her amusement. The spell was a special effect, something midway between smoke and flame, vividly painted across the image but not entirely convincing It wove upward through the air, into the monster’s open mouth, moving not with the speed of fire, nor the slow grace of smoke, but like the ascending trail of a skyrocket on the Fourth of July.

And then it entered the creature’s mouth, and something exploded, and for a moment light and smoke seemed to obscure everything; Amy had a glimpse of what looked like glowing green crystals where the creature’s eyes should be.

The sound of the explosion reached her, a dull thud that echoed and re-echoed through the forest; she blinked, and when her eyes were open again the monster was falling down through the air, covering the spaceship and the wizard in a lumpy black shroud.

Amy blinked again.

The wizard—that was Valadrakul.

The other wizard, Elani, was dead; with a shock, Amy realized that she still had Elani’s blood on her, in her hair and on her borrowed T-shirt, smeared down her right arm and across the back of her hand.

Elani, the wizard who had agreed to send them home to Earth, was dead.

And Valadrakul, buried under the dying monster, was the only other wizard in the group.

“No!” Amy shrieked. “No, no, no!” Her feet seemed to move of their own accord, and she found herself running back toward the clearing, the ship, and the monster just as desperately as she had fled a moment before.

* * * *

Upon first spotting the hellbeast above, Raven had known instantly that this gigantic manifestation of Shadow’s malice could only be fought with magic; his makeshift club could be of no effect against a beast the size of a castle.

This was Valadrakul’s fight, then. Elani was fallen, and her skills had never lain in the area of combat, in any case.

“An I can serve,” Raven called, “you need but speak!”

Valadrakul ignored him—and quite rightly.

A woman screamed, and Raven heard running feet. For his own part, he bethought him that a cautious retreat might be advised, lest he be struck down by the monster’s struggles, all unintended. He began pacing slowly back, away from the wizard and the arena.

The first spell was launched, to no effect, but that troubled Raven not a whit; Valadrakul was but trying out his foe, using against it the spell that had sufficed to destroy the lesser beasts. Raven had seen wizards do the same upon many a previous occasion.

Debris was falling freely now, leaves and branches; Raven retreated farther. He judged that the monster was free of obstructions, and stared upward, trying to determine why it did not fall, in all its fury, upon those below.

Men were shouting—undoubtedly the odious Dibbs and his underlings, but Raven spared no glance for such as they.

The beast, he could see, was gripping the great trees with its claws, holding itself aloft as it studied what lay below. It could see the sky-ship, but surely knew not what it might be. Likewise could it see Valadrakul; did it know him for what he was? If so, it might strike him down before another spell could be cast.

Raven hesitated. Valadrakul was too intrigued in his magicks to move of his own choice; should one then try to pull him thence, out from beneath his foe, ere disaster might arrive? An it might disrupt a casting, yet would it save the wizard to fight again.

Ere he could decide, another spell went up—no mere bolt like the last, but a torrent of glowing force, orange and gray, smoke and fire bound into one. It leapt up from the wizard’s hands and into the beast’s gaping maw.

The thing, in anticipation of the attack, had released its hold upon the trees, had drawn in its claws and begun to fold its great wings.

And then all happened with such speed that Raven could not follow. Valadrakul’s fire caught at the inside of the monster’s throat, and its head seemed to be burnt out from within, the glow of the flames visible for an instant through its crystalline eyes; smoke and fire billowed forth, obscuring all; and the creature fell.

Sound and wind forced Raven back; he flung up his arms to protect his face, and thus did not see the actual impact. The rush of air knocked him back against a tree; his head struck hard against the wood, and for a moment his thoughts were scattered.

When he could see again, and understand what he saw, the spaceship was gone from his sight. The clearing, too, was gone. Valadrakul was gone, and Colonel Carson’s remains, and poor Elani’s. The demented Earthman, Ted Deranian, had vanished as well.

And in the place of all of them was only a great black heap.

It needed a moment ere Raven understood that that heap was the remains of the fallen bat creature.

And that Ted Deranian and Valadrakul lay somewhere beneath it.