“You can turn it on,” said Jack, “but can you turn it off?” “Shut the door!” the others yelled together, and Jack did, just as a gore-laden bardiche buried itself on the other side. They held their breath, but heard no further impacts. “Apparently,” said Bert, “closing the door closes the portal.” “Thank God,” said Jack. Just then, a rumbling sound echoed throughout the tower, and the floor seemed to shift beneath their feet. As quickly as it had begun, it stopped. “What was that?” said John. “No clue,” said Bert. “But it still smells awful in here.” “Yes,” said Aven, “it does. But why? That smelly prehistoric doorway was at the bottom of the stairs, and we’ve been climbing for hours. We have to be several miles high by now—why do we still smell it?” Jack was looking at the door the huntsmen had just attacked. “Artus? The door you opened below—you did close it, right?” “I’m almost certain I did,” said Artus. “Almost. Certain.” Before Jack could respond, a great mucous-colored maw with rows of sharp teeth rose up between the stairwells and chewed, swallowed, and regurgitated Artus’s certainty. The head and neck of the sea monster trailed downward to a great bulbous body, supported by four enormous flippers that were braced against both stairwells, using them like ladders. “How did it get through that door?” Artus shouted, startled. “It’s too large to fit!” “Curse it,” said Aven. “I left my sword on the ship!” Jack was casting about for a means of defense. There was nothing to be found—the walls of the keep were bare. Suddenly, he snapped his fingers. “If it came in, it can go out again,” said Jack. “John! Go over and below with Charles, and stand ready! Artus! Open a door behind me!” “Which door?” “Any! I don’t care which! Just be ready!” The monster had turned its head to focus on Charles, who was the closest. “Well, this is a fine how-do- you-do,” said Charles. “I’ve finally found something big enough to eat Maggot, and he’s nowhere around.” “Hey!” Jack yelled at the beast, waving his arms to get its attention. “Over here!” The sea monster scooped the air with its neck, and came nose-to-nose with the young man. “Damnation,” Jack exclaimed as he cocked his arm. “That worked too well.” Jack let fly with his fist and smacked the great beast square in the left eye. With an enraged roar, the sea monster lunged forward at Jack, who threw himself into the air across the open stairwell. John and Charles caught him by the arms and lifted him safely onto the opposite stair. The momentum of the sea monster’s attack propelled its head and neck through the open doorway, where it caught—impossibly, the beast’s body constricted until it fit through the doorway. When it had passed through entirely, Artus slammed the door shut. “That was very close,” he said. “I’m sure this one is closed. Sorry about the other one.” “Bravo, lads!” Bert exclaimed, clapping his hands. “Bravo! Well done!” “Did you get a look inside the door when he opened it?” asked Charles. “Yes,” Jack said, breathing heavily. “There were Scotsmen—Scotsmen in kilts, maybe sixteenth century.” “Well,” said Charles. “A sea monster loose in Scotland. That’s going to have some interesting repercussions.” The companions sat on the stairs to catch their collective breath. All of them seemed overjoyed by their narrow escape except for John, who seemed on the verge of tears. “What’s the matter, John?” said Bert. “Chin up—we seem to have a knack for beating the odds.” “Jack has a knack, you mean,” John muttered. “No matter what our dilemma, it seems he can always come up with some way to resolve it.” “It seems like I can, doesn’t it?” said Jack. “Bad form, Jack,” said Charles. “We’re each doing our part. I’m as much to blame as anyone for not keeping a firmer hand on Magwich.” “It’s more than Magwich, though,” said Jack. “It’s a matter of taking action when action is called for. Of just seeing something that needs doing, and doing it. And it seems as if John never does.” John stared at his friends for a moment, then stood and began climbing the stairs. With anxious glances both upward and below, the others followed. They climbed.
Conserving their breath for the exertion, they climbed in silence that was interrupted only by the strange rumbling that occurred every hour or so.
Charles had started counting levels when they began, lost count after the run-in with the sea monster, started again, and gave up sometime after counting to four hundred.
“I’m starting to see why he removed himself from the affairs of the Archipelago,” said Charles. “It takes him a century just to go downstairs to greet the milkman.”
“Is it me,” said Artus, “or is it growing darker up above?”
Bert looked up and gave a joyful shout. “A ceiling! I see the ceiling! We’re almost at the top!”
There were three more landings, and four more doors. The one at the top had no stairs. “The future,” said Bert. “Unreachable. That means the next-to-last will be the Cartographer. I’m sure of it.”
John, however, had paused at the nearest door below. He was looking at it curiously and sniffing the air.
“What is it, John?” said Aven. “Trouble?” “No,” said John. “Cinnamon.” Chapter Fourteen The caretakes of the Imaginarium Geographica had been transported by a smell—and suddenly, he was no longer responsible for the fate of two worlds, or the resolution of a war, or the many failures he felt had become chains around his neck, grown heavier with each passing hour. He was once again merely a student/soldier, whose greatest responsibilities involved reading Old English manuscripts and making sure he didn’t leave his rifle in a trench.
John reached out a tentative hand and stroked the air a whisper above the surface of the door.
“John!” Charles exclaimed. “After what just happened below, I can’t believe you’re going to risk opening another door!”
“Agreed,” said Jack. “We should proceed to the last door and find out if the Cartographer really is here. We’ve wasted enough time on the past—uh, so to speak.”
