The Anubis Gates

Doyle slammed the clothes trunk shut and, ignoring the cowering gypsies who lay on the floor panting, ran outside. The blazing wheel around the camp shone as white as the sun, impossible to look at, and he was gasping in the depleted air, feeling the sweat steam away as fast as it appeared on him. Tents around the periphery were all ablaze, and even the inner ones near him had begun to smoke. My God, he thought fearfully, why doesn’t he stop them? If the temperature in here goes up a few more degrees we’ll all torch off like matches on a griddle.

He ran to the next tent, the fringe of which burst into a trim of blue fire just as he struck the flap aside and stumbled in. Doctor Romany stood inside, next to a desk, with one hand flung out toward Doyle and the other clutching a piece of paper. Doyle sprang at him——and was swept up on an incandescent wind. For several seconds he just hunched, waiting for a shattering impact, and then he was free falling through a silent and lightless void … until without warning light and sound abruptly crashed back at him. He got a quick, bewildered impression of a large room lit by candles in crude wooden chandeliers, and then he was falling again, through air that felt shockingly cold, and a second later his boots crashed onto a table, one exploding a cooked, stuffed duck and the other splashing in all directions nearly the entire contents of a bowl of soup—his legs skidded away and he sat down jarringly in a platter of baked ham.

Spattered diners along both sides of the table yelled in astonishment and reared back, and Doyle saw Doctor Romany sprawled face down among the plates on the next table over.

“Excuse me… I beg your pardon,” Doyle muttered in confusion, scrambling down off the table.

“Damn me!” exclaimed one pop-eyed old fellow, mopping at his shirt with a napkin. “What is this damnable trick?” Everyone, in the aftermath of surprise, seemed to be angry, and Doyle heard someone say, “Stinking witchery it is. Let’s have them arrested.”

Romany too had attained the floor, and spread his arms so authoritatively that the people who had leaped to their feet near him now stepped back obediently. “There was an explosion,” he gasped, managing to sound stern as well as breathless. “Get out of my way, I must—” Then he noticed Doyle. And despite his total disorientation Doyle was surprised and gratified to see the sorcerer turn pale and then whirl, and punch and curse his way to the nearest door, which he wrenched open. He shot Doyle one last fearful look before disappearing into the night outside.

“After him, Sammy, and bring him back here,” spoke a calm voice from behind Doyle. He turned and met the suspicious gaze of a heavyset man wearing an apron and holding a cleaver with relaxed familiarity. “I heered no explosion,” he said to Doyle as a burly young man hurried out after Romany. “You’ll bide here until we determine at least who’s to pay for the spoilt dinners.”

“No,” said Doyle, forcing his new voice to sound reasonable—which wasn’t easy, for he’d noticed several men wearing wide-cuffed jackboots, knee-length vests and short wigs, and the accents he was hearing were nearly incomprehensible, and he was pretty sure he knew what had somehow happened. “I’m getting out of here, you understand. Now you can try to stop me with that thing, but I’m so scared that I’ll make a real try at taking it away from you, and I imagine we’ll both get hurt, and this looks like a lousy year to be injured in.”

To emphasize his words he reached out and lifted an empty pewter beer mug from a table. Benner, he thought as he hefted it and got a good grip on it, I hope you were capable of this. He squeezed the mug hard, hard enough to whiten his knuckles—the chatter had subsided, and everyone, even the innkeeper, was watching with interest—and then he redoubled the pressure, feeling every little nick and pit on the surface of the cup biting into the insides of his fingers; his arm was aching all the way back to his shoulder, and trembling violently… but the cup didn’t give at all.

After several more moments of useless straining he let off the pressure and gently set the cup back down on the table. “Very solid workmanship,” he muttered.

Several people near him were grinning, and there was open laughter from the farther tables. A grudged grin was even breaking through the innkeeper’s stolid frown. As Doyle turned to leave everyone began laughing, and like cracks starring a stretch of ice it broke the tension, so that he was able to thread his way, red-faced but unhindered, through the merriment to the door.