Two disastrous marriages. Actually the latest had been the worst. Frank was ... stillis , from all reports ... nuts. He had problems;serious problems. Her lawyer files, he gets the papers at work, and what does he do? He leaves work, goes straight to the house, breaks in (the locks had all been changed), and proceeds to trash the place from top to bottom. All the furniture, slashed, ripped, broken apart.

Carpeting slit down the middle with a linoleum cutter. Dishes smashed, the stereo stomped on and wrecked, the bed ... thebed , for Christ's sake, a complete shambles. The crazy bastard didn't miss a piece of communal property. Property settlement! Hah! What property?

What if she had been home at the time? Ohmygawd. He would have killed her.

Sure, she got a judgment against him for the damages, but who knew when he'd pay up, if ever? The schmuck was broke. Meanwhile, she had a house full of broken junk, this monster mortgage, a shit job at Mellon Bank, and she was stuck in Wilmerding.

Wilmerding.

Wilmer ...ding .

She rinsed, then poured out another gob of goop and lathered again. Gonna wash that jerk right outta my ... yeah, right.

No date. So we bathe,madame , and we brush on a little Clinique, and spritz on a touch of ... oh, what would be good for tonight? - some cheap smelly crap, real whory stuff, and then,mesdames et messieurs , we go down to Chauncey's and watch the pretty lights and listen to the music and nurse a glass of Chablis until some insurance underwriter sidles up and asks us to dance to a disco (migraine-inducing rhythm track overlaid) redub of an old Beatles number....

A sudden cold blast of air hit her, and she began to shiver. Her heart thumped against her breastbone.

Somebody had come in! Somebody had opened the bathroom door!

But the draft was coming from the wrong direction, from the wall. Suds-blind, she reached out.

And there was no wall. She felt the shower curtain to make sure that she hadn't gotten turned around somehow. No! But ... there was nothing but empty space to her right, where the side of the one-piece molded-fiberglass tub and the section of water-stained wall above it should have been. She stretched her arm and swung it in a wide arc. Nothing! She was freezing. She bent and reached out as far as she could.

She slipped, stumbled, and fell onto a hard cold floor.

There came a sudden quiet.

Soap burning her eyes, she struggled to her feet. She wiped and wiped at her face but stuff wouldn't get out of her eyes and she yelled in pain.

After an agonizing few moments she could see a tiny bit.

What the hell - ?

She was standing in a room with walls of stone and a ceiling like a church or something. There was a table and two chairs, and cold fireplace, and a sort of couch. Nothing else. She was standing on a gray stone floor, naked, dripping wet, and covered with suds. And freezing to death.

She whirled. She stood about two feet from a blank stone wall. The shower, the water ... her house, were gone. Gone.

Slowly she turned around, her soap-reddened eyes in a zombie stare.

Gone. One second she was ... and then she ...

She screamed. But it didn't do any good. Nothing changed. She was still naked, cold, wet, scared, and in a situation she didn't understand.

She screamed again, then decided not to do it a third time.

She searched the wall for any sign of an opening, a hole, a seam, a crack, something, anything - any trace of a connection or bridge or transition between her existence of not half a minute ago and her existence now. There was nothing. The wall was as solid and as unyielding as stone walls rightly should be. She searched again. No change; no bathtub, no bathroom, no house, no Wilmerding. This was someplace else. Someplace else entirely.

There was a doorway to her right and she approached it cautiously, her sudsy feet precarious on wet, slippery stone. She poked her head out into a hallway, looked one way, then the other. Nothing but a corridor lit only by a few windows up and down it.

Grimacing from the chill and hugging her rib cage, she went out into the hall and trotted to the nearest window.

She was in a church, a cathedral, or some huge Gothic stone edifice. She could see a forest outside, and mountains. It was a bright day. Last time she had looked outside, it was a dark winter Saturday night.

Now it was broad daylight. Different place, different time.

A castle - yes, the building looked more like a castle. A huge one, from what she could see. The window must have been forty stories off the ground.

She was cold. She toddled off down the hallway, at length discovering a huge wooden door to the left.

She tried the wrought-iron handle; the door wouldn't budge. She passed another window and came to a dead halt, as if hitting an invisible barrier. No, she couldn't have seen what she thought she'd seen. She backtracked and looked out.

Yes, she'd seen it. There was a desert out there, vast and dry and empty. A molten sun beat down on endless salt flats, scorched and featureless, upon which there grew not a weed, nor a blade of grass.

She went back to the first window. The forest - as lush and green as before - was still out there, as were the glorious snow-capped mountains that rose in the distance.

She returned to the second window and stared out, forgetting her nudity, forgetting herself.

Presently the drying soap began to itch, and she turned away and continued down the hall. She again grew aware that she was cold.

"Help," she called, as calmly as possible. "Somebody help me, please."

No one answered. She came to a casement window with panes of leaded glass, but declined to look out. She called out again, and again no answer came.

She tried another door, then another. The third was unlocked, and she peeked in.

It was a bedroom. The bed was huge and looked quite comfortable, covered with blankets and quilts and decorated pillows. There were night tables on either side which held lamps, and a big wooden chest lay at the foot of the bed. A tall pine wardrobe stood off to the right, and a dressing table lay near the huge open window. She went to the window and looked out.

The castle spread out endlessly beneath her, a tumult of walls and towers and courtyards and buildings.

Beyond the farthest wall there was a sheer drop and then a wide plain. On the horizon, black mountains bulked against the sky like storm clouds.

The window had thick velvet curtains which she untied and let fall. The room darkened. She checked the door and found that it had an old-fashioned lock turned by a huge old-fashioned key. She twisted the key until she heard a click, then ran for the bed. She tore the covers down and slipped in. The sheets had been warmed by the sun, and she luxuriated in the comfort of it, sighing with relief.

She looked around the room. Ohmygawd, what a place to spend a Saturday night. Naked - and no goddamn date!

She pulled the covers over her head.

Eight.

Castle Keep - West Wing.

GENE, LINDA, AND Snowclaw approached the door to Gene's room.

"I think we should make some systematic effort to search for their portal," Gene was saying. "Find out where they're coming from."

"Track 'em," Snowclaw said.

"Yeah, that's it. We follow a couple of them. Eventually they'll go back to their world and we'll at least know - oh, damn it. The maid must have locked my door. I don't have my key, either."

Linda asked, "Want me to materialize it?"

"Yeah, sure."

A key appeared in Linda's hand. "Is this it?"

"We'll find out."

Gene fit the oversize key into the keyhole and turned it. The lock clicked open. "Anyway, we have to keep a close watch on them, that's for sure," he continued, shouldering the door open and going in. He stopped in his tracks when he saw the naked woman dash away from the door and dive into the bed.

Linda bumped into him, then saw the strange female in Gene's bed.

"Oh, excuse me," Linda said, then turned and left.

The woman was peeking over the covers, eyes as round as half-dollars. Gene stood there gawking for a moment. Then he called over his shoulder, "Linda? Hey, wait -"

Snowclaw came in, and the woman shrieked and disappeared under the sheets.

Gene said, "Uh, don't be afraid. He won't hurt you."

"Who's your new friend, Gene?" Snowclaw asked.

"Never saw her before. Uh, Miss - ?"

There came a frightened mewling from beneath the covers.

Gene laughed. "You know, that's a line right out of an old Bela Lugosi movie. 'Do not be afraid. He will not hurt you.' Snowclaw, do you mind leaving the room? I think I can handle this."

"I gotta find a room for myself, anyway. Darned if I know how I'll ever get used to sleeping on those soft bouncy things you humans like. See you later."

Snowclaw left.

"Uh, Miss? Or Ms., or whatever. You can come out now."

"I don't have any clothes!"

"Yeah. I'm aware of that. Uh, I mean, you canlook out, if you want."

"Oh my God. Oh my God."

"Now, calm down. Take it easy."

She was a redhead with green eyes. Pretty, too.

"He's gone," Gene said.

"What ...was that?" Sheila asked in wide-eyed wonder.

"I don't know the name Snowclaw's species goes by, but obviously they're humanoid, intelligent, and probably descended from ursine stock rather than anthropoids, like we are."

"Huh?"

"Bears. Polar bears."

"Oh. He didn't look much like a bear."

"No, not much. Looks ten times more ferocious."

"Oh my God."

"I'm Gene Ferraro."

"Huh? Oh. Sheila Jankowski."

"Hi, Sheila. You want some clothes?"

"Yes. Yes, please! Thank you."

Gene went to the wardrobe, opened it, and rooted. "Here's a tunic that's a little too small for me. It's just a one-piece thing. Linda can whip up a nice outfit for you anytime. I'll be in the john, there, so you can dress." He threw the garment on the bed.

When he came out of the bathroom, she was dressed and standing by the window looking at him sheepishly, apprehensively.

"I'm sorry I messed your bed up," she said. "Sorry I used your room. But, you see, I didn't know -"

"I don't mind in the slightest," Gene said.

"I heard you at the door," she said, "and I ran to see if I could bolt it. I ... I didn't know -"

"Forget it. You're probably confused, right? You're probably wondering what the hell this place is, and what you're doing here, and why the hell I'm wearing something out of a bad old Tony Curtis movie - you know, the ones where he strikes a heroic pose and says, 'Yonder is da castle of my fodder.' Right?"

"Well, what you're wearing looks ... interesting."

Gene rapped a knuckle against the leather cuirass that covered his chest. "Not much protection in a swordfight," he said, "but chain mail's too heavy and armor is ridiculous. I like to be able to move."

"Do you get a lot of use out of that?" she asked, pointing at his broadsword.

"It's saved my life any number of times."

"I see." She didn't see at all. Not at all.

Gene grinned. "Welcome to Castle Perilous."