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"Let's get inside," I suggested.

It was a fine idea. Until we stepped through the front door.

Around the corner came a goblin serving-girl carrying a silver dinner tray. At least, I think it was a girl—with goblins it's hard to be sure. They all have mushroom-pale skin and tufts of shoulder-length hair the color of dragonflies' wings. Their faces are lumpish, having none of the expression of people's faces, like a Play-Doh project given up halfway through. But what looked like a goblin serving-girl came around the corner and saw us. And what sounded like a goblin serving-girl threw the dinner tray into the air and screeched.

By the time the white linen napkins floated down to the flagstone floor, she had disappeared down one of the four halls branching from the entryway.

"Whatever we're going to do," Thea said, "we better do it quick."

Each of the hallways looked as good as the others, and there was also a set of stairs leading down, probably to the dungeon. All the passageways were well lit and painted in what could only be described as designer colors—colors like aquamarine and fuchsia. There were life-size family portraits lining the walls too: families of humans and elves and dwarfs and halflings. The whole thing looked like a little kid's idea of a castle, a picturebook version.

Just then a squad of ten or twelve goblin guards leapt in from outside, their swords already drawn and their pikes already leveled. Mom gasped and backed away.

And not a single one of them even looked at her.

Cornelius crackled a bolt of Wizards' Lightning at two of the guards who were close together, but the others spread out immediately.

One of them came straight at me as I was still pulling my sword from its sheath. He practically stepped on Mom on the way.

"Move," I commanded her. My sword was about three-quarters of the way out, and the guard would reach me before I was ready.

But he hesitated. He glanced warily to either side, and that gave me time to draw my sword. All I could see of his face were his eyes, for his helmet had cheekguards, a nose protector, and chin strap. The eyes were orange.

"Get back," I snapped at Mom. "Stop crowding me." I gave her a shove toward a doorway. "Stay there."

Yet again the guard looked distracted, missing the opportunity to move in.

I
moved in and swept off his head, spattering thick yellow goblin blood.

I checked my companions. Mom seemed OK, huddling in the doorway. Cornelius had just let loose another volley of Wizards' Lightning. Feordin was by his side, protecting him, since he'd be helpless to protect himself if any of the goblins should get in close. Considering that the mace was Feordin's weapon of choice, he was doing quite well with a sword: two goblin guards lay dead at his feet. Thea had used my knife to kill a goblin with a bronze sword, which she'd taken and was now using on another goblin.

However, Nocona was in trouble. This was too close-quarters for him to use his bow, so he was forced to use his dagger. Backed up against a wall and dangerously close to the steep dungeon stairs, he was hard pressed by three goblin guards with swords. I stabbed one of them in the back, but one of the others whipped around, nearly taking my nose off with his sword.

I dodged. The guard came after me, coming in close, his sword striking sparks off mine. He was real fast, real strong—and I had all I could do to keep him off me.

He growled, showing his teeth, and strong-armed me yet again.
Where were those stairs?
I'd lost track of them and only knew they were behind me and close. The air was hot and thick with the smell of Cornelius's Wizards' Lightning, sweat was pouring off me, and I was having trouble catching my breath. Killing people is a lot harder work than it looks in the movies. Even if they are goblins.

The goblin swung at my face, and I got my sword up just in time. Our blades locked. While I was concentrating on getting loose, he reached in with his left hand and grabbed a fistful of my hair. Twisting my head back, he exposed my neck. Then, with his right arm, he pushed both our still-locked swords toward me.

I fought back using both hands, but my left was still weak from where Wolstan had gouged me, and I couldn't get my sword free from the goblin's.

And then I felt a tremor start in my elbow.

I saw the goblin's face when he realized it, when he knew for a fact that my arm was about to give and he had won. My entire arm was beginning to shake with the strain. Who was going to take care of Mom? Who was going to see to it that the game ended as quickly as possible so that she could be rushed to the hospital? At least my death would be fast. My arm wasn't going to bend slowly back to the point where the edge of my own sword pressed agonizingly into my throat; it was going to give all at once, sweeping through me in another second, two at the most.

Except that suddenly the goblin had this weird look on his face, like someone had scraped fingernails across a blackboard, and he hadn't exactly stopped leaning against our two swords, but he wasn't pushing quite as hard as before.

Over his shoulder I saw Nocona.
Don't just stand there,
I thought. Because that's exactly what he was doing. He was maybe six or seven yards away, standing with his arm outstretched, not even holding a weapon. What'd he think he was—a wizard?

The goblin coughed, spitting up yellow blood onto my shirt.
Oh,
I thought, finally catching on. Nocona had thrown his dagger into the guy's back. The goblin's eyes rolled upward. I stepped back.

Mom screamed. Just as I realized there was nothing under my foot.

The goblin's weight tipped me backward, and the next thing I knew, we were bouncing down the stairs, me and the corpse together.

We slid to a stop maybe a dozen steps later, still on the stairs. I was on my back, pointed down headfirst with my blood rushing to my brain, the guard on top of me. I didn't dare move, for fear I would cause us to tumble even farther.

My companions clattered down the stairs. "Are you all right?" several voices asked before someone thought to roll the goblin off me.

I swayed dizzily for a moment before they came entirely into focus. "I'm..." I couldn't manage
fine. "...
OK." The only thing that had saved me from cracking my head wide open was that the stairs had the same bouncy texture as the cobblestoned courtyard. I made sure Mom could see me, though a couple days ago I would have avoided her attention. "Really, I'm OK." I clasped her hand.

"We better get out of here," Cornelius warned. "Down is probably best. We've made enough noise to raise the dead."

In her strained whisper-voice Mom said, "Can't raise the dead: we don't have a cleric."

I gave her hand an extra squeeze. But then the seriousness of the situation set in. "They can't see you," I said. "None of the nonplayer characters can see or hear you anymore."

"Wolstan could," she said. "The old man with the troll. Those other two..." She gestured vaguely, too headachey to grope for the names Brynhild and Abbot Simon.

Yeah. But not since yesterday.
I glared at Cornelius.

He gave a guilty, noncommittal shrug.

"This is all your fault," I said.

He looked ready to protest, but Thea whacked him on the arm and gave a warning scowl.

The thing was, she didn't look so much angry with him as anxious that he not say anything stupid in front of Mom.

Nocona, stepping around me because I wasn't moving fast enough, gave me a long, hard look. "Listen," he said to the others in an urgent whisper, "anybody down there heard us coming a mile away." He nodded to where the stairs disappeared around a curve. No shadows as far as we could see, indicating more torches in the walls, same as up here. Indicating, maybe, occupancy.

"Yeah?" Thea said.

"First one down may well get his head chopped off."

"Yeah?" Thea repeated. "So?"

Nocona shrugged. "So the first one down should be someone who wouldn't notice if his head got chopped off."

We all looked at the dead goblin. I must have made a face, because Nocona gave me another of his looks. "It's just a goblin," he said.

Yeah, and the wolves were just wolves, and the orcs were just orcs, and the bandits were just bandits, and I was the next gentlest thing to Mother Teresa.

"Nothing to it," Feordin said. He and Nocona picked up the dead goblin and heaved him down the stairs. He thudded and clanked and sounded like a whole squad racing down.

There was a moment of silence.

Then another.

And another.

"Nothing to it," Feordin repeated.

Still, we were careful on the way down, leaping out into the guard area at the ready, assuming the defensive position.

The torches in their wall sockets sputtered and hissed. That, and the thudding of my heart, was all I could hear.

Nobody home.

At least ... nobody we could see.

We were facing four doors arranged in a semicircle around the deserted mint-green guard area. Like the rest of the castle, the dungeon seemed the brainchild of an interior decorator gone over the edge. The doors to the cells were colored rose, turquoise, violet, and acid-yellow.

Cautiously, we approached the rose door. Like the doors to the cells in the bandits' fortress, these had little barred windows through which the guards could check on the prisoners. Cornelius opened the peek-hole door.

"Well?" I snapped.

Cornelius put his finger to his lips, then moved on to the turquoise door.

Self-important jerk,
I thought. I had to stand on tiptoe to look through the rose door's window.

Empty.

Behind me, I was aware of Nocona, Thea, and Feordin lining up for a look also. Mom sat on the bottom step, pale and listless, with her head leaning against the wall, her eyes closed.

I caught up to Cornelius at the window of the turquoise door. Nothing: I could tell by his lack of expression. I lingered to check anyway, since I didn't put it beyond Cornelius to miss something.

I was right the first time: nothing.

And nothing at the violet cell either. Just a perfectly normal, perfectly empty dungeon room.

When I looked up, the others were crowded around the yellow door, Nocona, Thea, and Feordin elbowing each other for a chance to look through the bars. Cornelius, who'd spent an average of three seconds per window, was hogging the middle.

"What did you find?" I asked. I figured if it was Princess Dorinda, somebody would have said something to her by now: "Don't worry." "We're here to rescue you." That sort of thing.

I stood on tiptoe to see over their heads.

The fourth cell was a treasure room: golden coffers overflowing with coins, gems, golden crowns and tiaras; a golden table standing in the middle of the room, with a golden chair behind it, a half dozen golden carrying buckets stacked beside it, and golden measuring scales on it. A crystal chandelier hung over all, glittering in its own right, reflecting back the dazzle of gold.

In a voice made husky by awe, Cornelius intoned, "The Mother Lode."

"Yeah," I said. "
If
we were looking for treasure."

"But of course we are," Cornelius told me. "There may well be something in here we need for the next step of our quest. Like Nocona's key."

"How would we know it if we found it?" I asked. "I think we should go check the rooms upstairs."

"Stop worrying," Cornelius said. "Everyone step back."

I looked at Thea for support, but she shrugged. "He might be right." Then to the others, she said, "We'll take a quick look for magic items. We can always come back for the gold."

Talk about not taking a definite stand on issues. "Fine." I stood back, furious.

Cornelius leveled a concentrated blast of Wizards' Lightning at the door. The thick metal disintegrated, revealing even more gold. A huge golden platter hung on the wall—big as the table in our kitchen back home. I could see our life-size reflections in it.
Look at us,
I thought.
We're too grungy to be recognized.

"Felice," Thea called. "Come take a look at this."

Mom didn't appear interested, but was too polite to say so. As soon as she got there, she sat on the floor.

The others were running their fingers through the coins and jewelry.

"Magic items," I said. "Remember?"

"Ta-dah!" Cornelius sang out. He held up a box labeled
MAGIC ITEMS.

"Oh, that's very generous of someone," I said.

The thing was as big as a stereo speaker lying on its side, and apparently not very heavy. Cornelius sat down on the floor with it and pulled back the hinged cover. It opened about two inches, then stuck. "Hmmm." He put his eye up to the opening.

"What do you see?" Feordin asked.

"Nothing." Cornelius tipped the box and shook.

Something—
somethings
—rattled and thumped, but nothing came out.

"Must be caught." Cornelius reached his right hand into the box. Then, "Wonderful," he grumbled. "Now my hand's stuck." He wiggled the fingers of his left hand into the space between the box and the cover. "Hmmm. Can't feel anything."

"Wonderful treasure," Nocona sighed.

"Harek," the wizard said, inexplicably turning to me. "Both my hands are stuck."

How could they be stuck?
I wanted to ask him. The right hand, conceivably, since he had shoved it in all the way up to the wrist; but his left hand only had the fingers in there. But he had this panicked glaze to his eyes, and I didn't think he was kidding. "Take it easy," I told him. I leaned over and looked, but I couldn't see anything. The left hand wasn't caught on anything. It had enough room that it should have slipped out easily.

"Can you close the lid?" Thea asked.

"Hey! My hands are in there."

"I mean just a little bit," she explained. "Sometimes that works to get a zipper restarted."

The lid didn't budge in either direction. Cornelius was beginning to sweat. You'd have thought that would make his hands slick and able to slip out, but no, nothing.

"Here." I picked up a long, thin candlestick holder from one of the piles of golden treasure. "Let's pry it open."