The Princess Bride

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With nothing but rocks to crush his body at the end.

True, he had climbed the Cliffs of Insanity, but that was different. He'd had a rope to hold on to so he knew which way to go, and he'd had Vizzini insulting him, which always made the time pass more pleasantly.

If only the madman possessed some other baggage, Fezzik would have stopped and crept back down to safety. If only it was all the silver in Persia or a pill that you only took once and you weren't a giant anymore.

Easy to stop the chase then.

But this was Waverly, his blessing, and though he knew in his great heart he would lose this pursuit, knew he would somehow slip, Fezzik lumbered on.

He glanced up. She was rolled in the blanket she had been kidnapped in—and how long ago was that now? Fezzik chose not to remember because the kidnapping had been his fault. He had allowed it somehow—it had happened on his watch. Fezzik blinked back quick tears of remorse. Her body was still. The madman probably gave her some potion. To make her easier to carry.

Above him, the madman stopped, pushed, kicked out—

—and giant rocks were coming down toward him.

Fezzik did his best to get out of their way, but he was too slow. The rocks grazed his feet, knocking them loose from their holds, and now he, Fezzik the Turk, was swinging high in space, holding on by just the strength of a few fingers.

The madman cried out with delight, then climbed on, rounded a mountain corner, was gone.

Fezzik hung in space. So very afraid.

The winds picked at his body.

His left hand began to cramp so Fezzik took it out of the hold, reached a yard up to a better one.

He hung there, thinking, and what he thought was not how very afraid he was but that he had just gone up three entire feet, using only his hands. Could he do that again? He reached up another yard, found another hold. This is all very interesting, he told himself. I actually went up without using my feet. I went up faster than before, without using my feet.

Hmmm.

And then suddenly he was moving. Just using his hands to reach, grab, then the next, reach, grab, and never mind using all fours, just use the upper twos—

—and then he was moving fast.

Fezzik flew up the mountain now. Somewhere on the other side was the madman, probably taking his time, feeling sure that Fezzik was gone. Fezzik increased his speed, up to the crest, then to the plateau, racing across it with enormous strides, and when the madman got there with the babe, Fezzik was waiting.

'I would like the child,' Fezzik said softly.

'Of course you would.' The madman had no mouth. The sound came from somewhere inside his skinless face. He still held Waverly's body.

Fezzik took a step nearer.

'I can breathe fire,' the madman said.

Fezzik knew that it was true. But he was unafraid.

Another step closer.

'I can change shape,' the madman said, louder now, and Fezzik knew that it was true. But he also knew this: fear had entered the heart of his enemy.

'These are my final words,' Fezzik said. 'When I tell you to give me the child, you will give me the child.'

'I will use all my magic on you!'

'You can try,' Fezzik said softly. 'But even though you have no face, I can see how frightened you are. You are frightened that I will hurt you.' He paused. 'And I will.' He paused again. 'Badly.'

The fear inside the madman was pulsing now.

Fezzik's great hands reached toward the blanket. 'Give me the child,' he said, and the madman started to do that very thing, but then, instead, he flipped his hands so that Waverly rolled out of her blanket, spun high into the mountain air—

—the momentum carried her over the edge where the two men were standing, and as she spun, her eyes fluttered open, and she looked around wildly, saw Fezzik, reached out toward him as she fell from sight, said the word she alone called him: 'Shade.'

Fezzik had no choice. He dove into space after her, gave up his life for the child....

***

Well, what do you think?

It's exciting, I'll give Morgenstern that. A 'grabber,' as TV guys say. But this is a novel, you have time to develop plot and character, no one's changing the channel here. So I'm not nuts about it. I also don't like calling Chapter 1 'Fezzik Dies.'

Do you believe that Morgenstern's really going to kill Fezzik? I sure don't, not for a New York minute. Forget that he's my favorite. But think what he did for Buttercup and Westley: he let himself get set on fire, just before the castle storming; he found the four white horses they all rode to freedom on; and don't think for a minute Inigo would have made it down through the Zoo of Death without Fezzik right there with him, so in a way, he saved Westley.

And, I'm sorry, you don't knock off someone like that. It's wrong. Just to get your story off with a bang.

In other words, I disapprove of this opening. There are, in fact, a number of things I'm not happy with in this chapter. But you know the reasons I have to go along.

And I'm also not sure I should be including this next section about Inigo. I had a big fight with my publisher, Peter Gethers. He's against putting it in, finds it confusing. Before I give my reasons, I think you better have a chance to see for yourself what we're arguing about.

2. Inigo

INIGO WAS IN Despair.

Hard to find on the map (this was after maps) not because cartographers didn't know of its existence, but because when they visited to measure its precise dimensions, they became so depressed they began to drink and question everything, most notably why would anyone want to be something as stupid as a cartographer? It required constant travel, no one ever knew your name, and, most of all, since wars were always changing boundaries, why bother? There grew up, then, a gentleman's agreement among mapmakers of the period to keep the place as secret as possible, lest tourists flock there and die. (Should you insist on paying a visit, it's closer to the Baltic states than most places.)

Everything about Despair was depressing. Nothing grew in the ground and what fell from the skies did not provoke much happy conversation. The entire country was damp and dank, and why the locals all did not flee was not only a good question, it was the only question. Locals talked about nothing else. 'Why don't we move?' husbands would say each day to wives, and wives would answer, 'God, I don't know, let's,' and children would jump and shout, 'Hooray hooray, we're out of here,' but then nothing would happen. Bindibus live in more hideous conditions but they don't travel a lot either. There was a certain comfort in knowing that no matter how bad things were, they couldn't get worse. 'We have endured everything,' the locals would tell themselves. 'Whereas if we pick up and go, say, to Paris, we would get gout and be insulted by Parisians all day.'

Inigo, however, had a warm spot for the place. For it was here, years and years ago, that he had won his