for your sake and hers, Mother kept it a secret. When the dragon appeared, I wanted to help you—but Katya put a spell on me to hide my likeness to you and prevent me from telling you the truth. She'd promised Blumarine . . . but I came to be near you anyway."
"And I broke the spell," Estoril amplified to Delendor's puzzled expression, "by telling you who your real father was."
Delendor blinked. Then his face cleared and he beamed happily. "Well, anyway," he said, "everything's settled now."
"No," said Joe in a voice that would have chilled him if it hadn't come from his own mouth. "There's one thing yet to be settled. Between me and Ezekiel."
He squeezed Mary's hand as he released her, but the woman didn't occupy a major part of his mind just at the moment.
Joe stood and picked up Groag's sword. The shagreen scabbard had been blown away, and several of the jewels had been knocked out of the hilt, but the weapon was still serviceable.
It would serve.
With the sword in his hand, Joe began jogging down the hall. He was moving at a pace he was sure he could keep up until he reached Ezekiel's laboratory across the building.
Or wherever else the magician ran, this side of Hell.
Joe heard a crash of metal and breaking glass as he neared the last corner between him and the laboratory. When he rounded it, he saw the door of the laboratory open, a satchel dropped on the hallway, still spilling paraphernalia—
And a stairwell door still swinging closed.
Ezekiel had run from the banquet hall to his laboratory to pack the cream of his belongings. When he heard retribution coming, he'd abandoned even those valuables in his haste to escape.
Which he wasn't about to do.
"Hold it right there, Ezekiel!" Joe bellowed as he slammed down the stairs behind the fleeing magician. The long sword in Joe's hand sang and sparked crazily as its point scraped the stairwell. Ezekiel's black robe trailed back around the stone helix, almost close enough to touch, but the unencumbered magician was able to maintain his distance ahead of his pursuer, past the first landing, the second—
Ezekiel banged through the door to the ground floor.
"Stop him!" Joe called to the servant there at the door by the pantry.
The fellow might have tried, but Ezekiel snapped his fingers. The servant froze with his mouth gaping like that of a surfaced carp. He blinked a moment later, but the magician was already past.
Ezekiel wasn't—puff—casting spells at Joe—puff—because he was sure—puff—that Joe was a greater magician than he was.
Ezekiel ran outside. Joe slipped and had to grab the jamb to keep from falling. A four-horse carriage waited in the courtyard.
The driver was a smirking Mongolian.
Ezekiel recognized the 7th Plane inhabitant also. "I'll be back to defeat you yet, Joe Johnson!" the magician screamed over his shoulder. He grabbed the latch and threw open the carriage door.
A clawed, hairy paw closed on Ezekiel's neck and drew him the rest of the way into the conveyance.
Joe stood panting, still clinging to the doorjamb as the coach drew away. It was accelerating faster than horses should have been able to move it.
Something flew out of a side window just as the vehicle disappeared into the arched gateway. It looked like a hand, but Joe didn't feel any need for certainty on the point.
Someone touched Joe's shoulder. He turned to see Mary, the new Mary, with a wistful smile on her face.
"It's over," Joe said to her, all he could manage while he tried to catch his breath.
"Mother—Mother's friends, I suppose—brought you here to save my brother," Mary said. An attempt to make her smile a cheerful one failed miserably. "I suppose you'll go home to your own plane now?"
Joe grunted something that was meant to be laughter.
"I think that was my ride," he said, pointing his thumb in the direction the coach had disappeared.. "Believe me, I'm not getting in if it decides to come back again."
Mary wet her full, red lips nervously. "Are you disappointed?" she asked in a whisper.
"Do you remember what the king said upstairs?" Joe asked carefully. "About events making him do what he'd already decided he wanted to?"
Joe dropped the sword so that he could use both his arms to hug Mary.
He had a lot to learn about this world, but some things were just the same as they were back home.
The Adventure of the Pearly Gates
Mike Resnick
. . . An examination by experts leaves little doubt that