Moana: aka Great Ocean: that mighty body of water which has
to its west the continent of Argan, to the east Yestron, to the
north Tameran, and to the south Parengarenga. The several notable
islands of the Great Ocean include Ashmolea (homeland of the
formidable Ashdans), Asral (home of a breed of semi-piratical
traders) and Untunchilamon.

                                                 * * *

        Mighty is the Great Ocean of Moana and many are its islands.
Lost on a speck of sand anchored somewhere in the vastness of that
ocean, Guest Gulkan endured his solitude, feeding on black slime
from the cornucopia and living under the rowing boat.
        The Door remained steadfastly closed.
        And Shabble -
        Shabble did not return.
        Guest was not exactly surprised by the bubble's
disappearance. He could well imagine Shabble swimming in the sea
with the dolphins and the sharks, or browsing through the forests
of Ashmolea, or flirting with dragons amidst the higher mountains
of Argan.
        But what had happened to Sken-Pitilkin? And to Thayer Levant?
Even without Shabble to inform them and summon them, surely they
would have reopened the Door to rescue the Weaponmaster. Wouldn't
they? Or were they too scared of the unknown dangers of the Door?
Or too scared of discovering an angry Shabble? Or - had something
happened to them?
        Guest could only guess, and though he guessed a thousand
times he never struck precisely at the truth, for it never occurred
to him that Levant might have had sufficient independent will to
betray his master. Though Levant had kept Guest company for a good
many years of wandering, Guest had never really got to know the
man. He had always thought of Levant as a creature owned and
operated by Plandruk Qinplaqus, and had never given him that
uncompromising trust which is necessary for the fullest
friendship.
        In the absence of rescue, Guest languished on his island
through day after day of sterile frustration, with nothing but
Strogloth's Compendium of Delights to comfort him.
        Guest's long marooning was doubtless of great benefit to his
scholarship, for, with Strogloth as his guide, he at last (and
with great resentment, and with many sighs, moans and whimpers)
began to explore the highways and byways of foreign linguistic
irregularities. He studied in the Geltic, for instance - Geltic
being the language of the Rice Empire.
        Now Geltic is not one of the world's most complicated
languages, and its irregular verbs are distressingly few in
number. However, the verb "jop", which means "to be", is worthy of
the scholar's attention. The present tense of jop, for example,
runs thus:-

        Po ojop - I am.
        Skobo hunjasp - thou art.
        Soth jopskop - he is.
        Mo sadithjop - she is.
        Parakama ipjop - mother is.
        Yem opdop - father is.
        Zodo nop - we are.
        Bara jolp - you are.
        Haji jijop - they (friends or associates) are.
        Aski jujop - they (strangers or neutral parties) are.
        Jili jilijop - they (enemies) are.
        Bo jo - they (slaves, inferiors, animals or things) are.

        Ah, how sweet it is to contemplate this spectacle! The
barbarian has been tamed! His sword has failed him, and so, with
the sweet resignation of a milkmaid, he bends himself at last to
the Book!
        And so the days passed; and the weeks; and the months; and
sun piled up on sun, and moon on moon; and Guest began to mutter
to himself in the foreign tongues, and found his dreams beset by
their verbs, hooked verbs and winged verbs, verbs which crawled
and verbs which tunneled, verbs with antennae and verbs with
teeth. He imagined himself becoming a monstrous creature like the
demons Ko and Italis, or like the therapist Schoptomov: a thing
which sits and waits and broods and conjugates its verbs.
        Surely, on release - if release ever came - he would be a
master of all the languages of the world. He would be as adroitly
fluent in his linguistics as one of the jade-green monsters of the
Circle of the Partnership Banks, or those lurking torturing
machines which skulked variously in the mazeways Downstairs
beneath Injiltaprajura or in the Stench Caves of Logthok Norgos.
        So thought Guest.
        But - alas! - the Weaponmaster had yet to start upon the
complexities of Janjuladoola, or of Slandolin, or of the High
Speech of wizards, when the peace of his scholarly studies was
rudely interrupted.
        Guest was sitting one day beneath his fishing boat, with a
fishing line laid out along the beach. He was fishing. No, he was
not mad. Though his baited hook lay upon the sand rather than in
the water, he was still fishing in earnest. He was not fishing for
fish - he had eaten fish sufficient to feed a whale, and had no
wish to catch another fin for as long as he lived. Guest Gulkan
was fishing for seagulls; and, though you would be right in
thinking this a cruel and vicious sport, it was the only way he
could get himself any fresh meat.
        While Guest was so fishing - idly, for seagulls were few and
far between that day - his peace was shattered by a battle-cry
scream. Guest was jerked away from a semi-doze dream. He sat up in
such a hurry that he cracked his head against his rowing boat. He
swore, then rolled out into the sun, crouched on all fours then
looked to the Door.
        There was a small group of people on and around the marble
plinth of the Door. And Guest realized he could hear the hum of
the Door in action - a hum which he had not noticed in his earlier
drowsiness. The arch of the Door was filled with a screen of
liquid silver.
        Hastily, Guest concealed the yellow bottle beneath his rags,
then strode down the beach toward the strangers. If they had come
to hunt him, then they would find him soon enough, since he had no
caves or jungles to hide in. And, if they had come to rescue him,
why, all he wanted was time sufficient to make a ceremonial
burning of Strogloth's Compendium of Delights. Then he would be
ready to leave his island.
        As Guest closed the distance with the strangers, he was
confronted by the largest of them, a whale-built thing larger than
any two-footed creature in all Guest Gulkan's experience. It
towered above him. Its height was equal to that of the monsters Ko
or Italis, and it towered over him all the more because it was
standing on the plinth whereas he was standing on the sand. It had
bulging cheeks and a skin which had the yellowness of vomit. Its
eyes were small: glimmering buttons bright with malign suspicion.
        It had no ears.
        Not wishing to show any fear - and afraid he was, for the
monster was armed with a monstrous species of crowbar, fit for the
pulping of a hippopotamus - Guest jumped up onto the plinth, an
act which made great demands on his courage.
        In response, the monster opened its mouth.
        Then it spoke, and, to Guest's surprise, its speech proved
surprisingly intelligible. It spoke in a roughwork variant of the
Galish Trading Tongue, that language which Guest had formerly been
accustomed to use in his converse with Thayer Levant.
        "Who you be?" said the thing.
        Of all the questions it could have asked, this was the most
surprising. In his exile on the island, Guest Gulkan had thought
himself very much the focus of the world's concerns. He had
imagined that his fate, whereabouts and destiny would be
vigorously debated in Chi'ash-lan and Molothair, on Drum and in
Obooloo. He had imagined demons, Bankers, wizards and warriors
studying maps and debating his whereabouts. He had imagined
quests, searches and hunts, all focused on him.
        To console himself when he had nothing else but the verbs as
his comfort, Guest had studiously inflated his own sense of his
own importance, until it had come to seem entirely logical to him
that the whole world must surely be aflame with the news of his
loss, and must surely be hunting for him.
        So, of all possible questions, the one addressed to him by
the monster was the most surprising. For what was the thing doing
on this desolate island if it was not hunting for the great Guest
Gulkan, the famed and fabled Weaponmaster, the hero of the Stench
Caves, the Emperor in Exile?
        Seeking to buy time so he could puzzle over this conundrum,
Guest braced himself for possible action, and said:
        "Who asks?"
        But before he could be answered, a monster came bursting
through the Door - a brute of a thing as gray as one of the
Janjuladoola, its neck frilled with a collar of ruffled armor
from which great man-tearing spikes projected.
        Moments later, the monster was dead, killed by the swift
reactions of those it had incontinently assailed. The speed of the
battle-blades of his new companions told Guest they were all
trained for war. Dangerous men, then. He scanned the dead monster,
noting the heavy-duty claws on its feet, and the mud on those
feet, and the dead leaves plastered to its underbelly. On the
slender evidence of the mud and leaves, he guessed that the thing
had come from the Old City in Penvash.
        But -
        "What is it?" said Guest.
        "No member of my family, you can be sure of that," said one
of the bloodthirsty ruffians who had helped kill the thing.
        Guest summed the man. An Ashdan. Beyond his prime. Bald. Hard
death in his weathered blue eyes. A battle-worthy confidence in
his shoulder-width stance. A warrior's training confirmed by the
methodical cleansing of his blooded blade. Guest realized that
blood was still dripping from the blade of his own sword, which
had taken its share of the gray-skinned monster's lifeforce. He
should clean it, but -
        Guest wanted time, time to think, time to question, to find
out who and what and when and where and why. But the Ashdan was
already ordering his men through the Door. But to where? Where
were they going, and why?
        "Where does this Door go to?" said Guest.
        "You know about Doors, do you?" said the Ashdan.
Guest almost gaped at the question. How could the fellow be
so stupid? Of course he knew about Doors! Else how could he have
arrived on the island?
        Even as he was thus thinking, and parrying the question with
a joking reply, Guest remembered the rowing boat. Of course! The
Ashdan had seen the rowing boat, and had presumed that Guest had
arrived on the island by means of that vehicle! So he didn't know
who Guest was! Or how he had got here!
        Even as Guest was figuring that out, his companions were
bustling through the Door at the scramble.
        "What did you say?" said Guest, realizing the Ashdan had said
something.
        But the Ashdan, having done with dialog, went plunging
through the Door himself.
        It was like a battle. Everything was happening too quickly,
with not enough time to sit down and figure out what was going on,
or why, or who was involved.
        As Guest was thinking then, two more men came through the
Door. The first hacked at Guest, who almost died then and there.
But his sword was in his hand, and a short and vicious battle saw
him hack down both of his would-be murderers.
        "What the hell is going on?" said Guest.
        Then, unable to answer that question on his own account - and
realizing that he was now alone again, if corpses be not counted
as company - the Weaponmaster plunged through the Door.
        To his shocked surprise, Guest found himself by Drangsturm.
Drangsturm, of all places! Yes, and the wrong side of Drangsturm
at that!
        During his time at the Castle of Controlling Power, Guest had
studied the fortifications of Drangsturm with a battle-commander's
diligence; and, on a march from the Castle of Controlling Power to
the Castle of Ultimate Peace, he had taken every opportunity to
back up study with scrutiny.
        So Guest could place himself with a great degree of
exactitude, and was surprised to find his small group of new
companions were entirely ignorant as to where they were. He
started to explain, and, as he gave his explanations, he realized
one of his companions was - why, it was Rolf Thelemite!
Wasn't it?
        It was now so many years since Guest and Rolf Thelemite had
last seen each other that Guest was not certain of this
identification. When Rolf had bodyguarded Guest in the city of
Gendormargensis, both had been mere striplings. Since then, the
battering of the years had seen them mature, age, thicken and
change. Yet -
        Guest caught Rolf's eye, and Rolf gave him half a wink.
        So it was Rolf!
        Then Guest began to conjecture wildly. Maybe Rolf was engaged
in a plan to rescue him. Maybe Rolf had been directed to the
island by Shabble, or by Sken-Pitilkin, or by Thayer Levant. Maybe
there was conspiracy here, and danger. Maybe Rolf was rescuing the
Weaponmaster in defiance of his Ashdan master, the bald-headed
warrior who seemed to be in charge of the party. Maybe -
        But at this point Guest was forced to abort thought in favor
of action, for a gigantic green centipede came trundling across
the landscape, forcing all to retreat through the Door.
        They came out on a mountainside of precipitous ice and
driving cold, a mountainside so high and bleak that Guest was more
than half-convinced it was a part of Ibsen-Iktus. There they
thought themselves safe, but the centipedes attacked them through
the Door.
        They fought viciously with one of the monsters, by brute
strength precipitating it from the plinth of the Door, and sending
it hurtling down the mountainside in an avalanche of snow which
saw it precipitated over a cliff. Guest realized he was fighting
in the company of great warriors, for none shirked combat. But one
of their number was dead by the time the silver-shining screen of
the Door suddenly snapped out of existence, amputating the head of
one of the monsters.
        Then Guest asked the obvious question:
        "Who was controlling the Door for you?"
        "Nobody," said the Ashdan. "We had a star-globe. We left it
where we started out."
        Guest was all the more perplexed to know who he was dealing
with. Who were these people? Adventurers? Bandits? Pirates?
Deserters? How come they were so organized for action, yet so
disorganized in their management of the Door? If they were bent on
exploring the Circle of the Old City of Penvash, then why hadn't
they left a party to guard their star-globe? And who were the
people whom Guest had fought on his own desert island?
        Guest was about to ask about this last point when he checked
himself. For a dreadful possibility occurred to him. Two men had
assailed him on his desert island, and he had killed both. But
maybe those men had been in the service of the Ashdan with whom he
was now in dialog! If so, then what would happen if this whole
party went right round the Circle of the Door and discovered the
corpses?
        Realizing he might have some explaining to do, Guest wondered
if he should make his escape. He clutched the yellow bottle under
his rags. He could toss it to the snows. Then, as it slid down the
mountainside, following the path of the avalanching centipede, he
could turn the ring on his finger, which would cause him to get
sucked into the bottle.
        Should he do it?
        Guest flexed his fingers, which were rapidly losing all
sensation. If he was going to act, he must act soon, else he would
be quite incapable of turning the ring. The shock of transit from
tropical heat to iceland mountainside was telling on him, and
quickly. All warmth had been stripped from his body already, and
he would be a casualty of the cold unless he did something, and
quickly.
        Meantime, his companions were arguing angrily, arguing in a
babble of voices, discussing the possibility of killing and
cooking one of their number. Grief of gods! What manner of people
was he mixed up with?
        No sooner had he asked himself this question than the Door
abruptly reopened. One of the adventurers - apparently in danger
of being immediately slaughtered and cooked - bolted for safety.
Guest expected his companions to go yahooing after him, hot for
slaughter. But they hesitated.
        Why?
        Everyone was going to freeze to death unless they moved
quickly!
        Then Guest took a better look at his new companions, and
realized that all of them were dressed for cold weather. He caught
sight of bits of grass sticking out from the lumpy jackets of one
or two of that number, and realized that some of them had
used vegetative padding to supplement the warmth of their
clothing. A good trick, but not one Guest could emulate, not when
he had nothing but snow available as padding.
        Guest flexed his fingers. Or tried to. His gloveless digits
were so stiff he would be hard put to turn the ring.
        Decisions, decisions!
        He was right out of the habit of making quick decisions, but
the weather was giving him a helping hand. The bottle or the Door!
        Choose! Choose now! Or die!
        Guest chose, and led the way through the Door, through to -
        "Mother of god!" said Guest, in disbelief.
        He was on a battlefield. A battlefield, of all places!
        Some of Guest's new companions shared his shock, so he did
his best to steady them, speaking as a leader should.
The earth was dusty, and the sky was black with thunder. The
air boomed with drums, wailed with screams, roared with fear. But
battle had not yet been joined. As Guest's companions mobbed
around him, he realized he was standing slap bang between two
armies, and that war was about to be joined.
        "There is war here," said Guest, wondering if his own self-
possession might allow him to displace the bald-headed Ashdan as
the leader of this band, "hence there is opportunity."
        So he said. But what he did not add was that the opportunity
was mostly for death, for maiming, for capture and imprisonment,
for suffering and thirst, for fear and for terror, for trauma and
regrets.
        A warrior rode from the army to the west. He was mounted on a
heavyweight black horse, and from his accoutrements Guest summed
him as a Yudonic Knight of Wen Endex. One of Guest's new
companions said something to the rider. Guest failed to catch the
words, but they must have been mightily provocative, for those few
words precipitated a fight.
        Moments later, the rider was dead, and his horse likewise.
One of the killers started drinking the blood of the horse, and
another - not to be outdone - started drinking the blood of the
man. Guest realized the monster with the oversized crowbar had
gone through the Door, with one or two of his fellows. The others
- those of them who were not greeding on blood - had fallen to
arguing.
        Guest took the opportunity to grab Rolf Thelemite by the arm
and drag him out of earshot of the others for a private word.
        "Rolf," said Guest. "It's Rolf, isn't it?"
        "Who else would it be?" said Rolf Thelemite.
        "Then - good to see you, man!" said Guest, gripping his
erstwhile companion by the shoulder. "Now, tell me, what's going
on here?"
        "Well," said Rolf Thelemite, "it's a long story."
        A long story, and one which Guest was not to be favored
with. For, as Rolf Thelemite geared himself up for the telling of
his tale, a savagery of pale-skinned warriors came leaping out of
the Door. They were barefooted, had leather breeches, had
sheepskin jackets, and were armed with spiked clubs, with spears,
and with swords.
        In the melee which followed, Guest was separated from Rolf
Thelemite. And, as the fighting ended, Guest realized that the two
armies of the battlefield were starting to march toward each
other, bent on starting a larger war.
        "Rolf!" said Guest.
        "Here!" said Rolf Thelemite, who was standing on the plinth
of the Door. "I'll see you later!"
        And, with that, the Rovac warrior vanished through the
shining silver screen of the Door.
        Guest hesitated.
        He had two choices, both unpalatable. He could pursue Rolf
Thelemite and his mob through the Door. Or he could stand here and
get himself embroiled in a battle.
        Another horseman came riding from the west, bearing down on
the Door. And Guest, realizing this horseman might be riding for
revenge of his fallen colleague, fled precipitately through the
Door. He found himself in a huge darkness. A cave? He caught sight
of the moon, and realized it was night. Then someone or something
moved in the night, and Guest, fearing attack, plunged back
through the Door.
        No sooner had Guest plunged - jumping through to searing
sunlight - than the silver screen of the Door snapped out of
existence.
        Guest glanced back to confirm what his ears had told him. The
Door was closed! So here was sun, here was sand, he was back on
his island, but the blood -
        The sand stretched away.
        Thirty paces away, a totem pole.
        Sand hot in the sun.
        Sand scattered with bodies.
        Corpses of men and corpses of monster.
        And the sand was fringed with a circular arena, the walls of
which were of white marble. The arena's steeply-sloped tiers of
seating - packed with people, all of them yelling and roaring -
reminded Guest of Forum Three, the lecture theater in Cap Foz Para
Lash. Then, with a shock of recognition, he realized where he was.
He was standing in the Grand Arena of Dalar ken Halvar (otherwise
known as the Great Arena, and, to scholars, as the Kilsh Dilsh
Dalsh Tantasand).
        He saw the corpses of those death-lizards known as striders,
their heads pulped. He saw dead men. And he saw crocodiles.
Crocodiles very much alive! By the look of them, they looked
hungry! And they were coming in Guest Gulkan's direction!
        Guest looked around at the packed arena.
        "It's me!" he roared. "Guest Gulkan! Friend of Plandruk
Qinplaqus!"
        But the Weaponmaster's shout was drowned by the maelstrom of
the crowd's rioting enthusiasm. Dalar ken Halvar recognized him
not. He was in the arena, alone in the arena, alone with his
sword, and the crocodiles were closing in on him. There were
dozens of the monsters.
        But could they climb the plinth?
        Guest glanced around, and saw that the sand had been ramped
up at the back of the plinth. He guessed that the ramping had been
done especially for the convenience of the crocodiles. The steel
arch looked unclimbable. But just thirty paces distant was the
totem pole.
        Guest gathered his wits and ran for the totem pole. But a man
stepped from its base and challenged him with a sword. The man was
barefooted, wore leather breeches, wore sheepskin jacket - and
was, Guest realized, one of those who had so lately been engaged
in a mˆl‚e on the battlefield Guest had fled. Moreover, now that
he examined it closely, he realized the totem pole was jam packed
with such savages.
        Even had the savages been cooperative, there was simply no
room for Guest Gulkan on that totem pole. And, to judge from the
attitude of the man at the base of the pole, they were in no mood
to be cooperative.
        Guest backed off.
        The crowd went wild.
        Here was a great spectacle! One man, alone in the arena
against a horde of hungry crocodiles! The totem pole is crowded,
so he cannot climb! The gates are closed, so he cannot run! One
side of the plinth has been ramped with sand, so it is useless as
a fortress! He has nothing between him and monstrous death but the
strength of his sword!
        The crowd cheered with a passion. Whooped, hollered, yelled,
stamped, clapped, applauded!
        Ah, drama!
        Blood, death, fear, pain, anguish!
        But the man in the arena was undaunted.
        For the man in the arena was no ordinary mortal. Rather, he
was the mighty Guest Gulkan, the Weaponmaster, the Emperor in
Exile. If Crabs, Bankers, therapists and Shabbles were not
sufficient to encompass his doom, how then could any mere rabble
of crocodiles hope to pull him down, however great their numbers?
        Guest Gulkan strode grimly across the burning sands of the
arena. He raised his sword on high. With a felicity beyond the
command of any ordinary mortal, the Weaponmaster took the measure
of his target. Then he struck. A mighty blow he struck, for the
training of a lifetime went into that single swordstroke.
        Down came the Weaponmaster's sword. The very sun itself burnt
hot-white in the brightness of its steel. With heroic force the
blade descended. Impact! The sword hacked into flesh! The sword
struck clean, struck true, and hacked the head away from one of
the human corpses with which the burning sands were littered.
        Guest seized the head by the hair and lifted it. The head was
heavy. The hair started to slip through his fingers, till he
clutched it tighter.
        With his grip secure, Guest raised the head on high,
scattering droplets of blood.
        Then he locked eyes with the nearest crocodile, which paused
in its waddle and regarded him suspiciously.
        "Here, big boy," said Guest.
        Then tossed the head to one side. It flew, it fell, it hit,
it rolled. It rolled in the direction of the totem pole, leaving a
splattering of blood upon the sand.
        As the crocodile hesitated, Guest hacked off a hand, and
threw it so it fell a little nearer the totem pole than the head.
        At which the savage who was standing on the sands in the
shadow of the totem pole waited no longer. He saw what must
inevitably happen. There was no room for him upon the totem pole,
therefore he must inevitably meet his doom when the Weaponmaster's
treacherous tactics betrayed him to the arena's monsters. Choosing
to meet his dead as a hero, the savage screamed, and charged
toward the crocodiles.
        Inspired by this example - and perhaps realizing that some
adroit flesh-hacking and flesh-throwing could disperse their
small-minded enemies so as to make them easy game for organized
human onslaught - his comrades came scrambling down from the totem
pole to join him in his efforts.
        Now it happens that the crocodile is a very expensive beast,
for Dalar ken Halvar lies in the heartland of the great continent
of Parengarenga, and the crocodile must be brought there at
enormous cost from the Crocodile Coast, which lies some 1500
leagues to the west of the city. There are in Dalar ken Halvar
people who devote their entire lives to this business of bringing
crocodiles from the sea to the city for the annual gladiatorial
games. Consequently -
        As Guest and his de facto allies started scattering the
crocodiles by the simple process of throwing lumps of dead meat in
all directions, those in charge of the arena started doing their
calculations.
        The crocodile is a beast of very little brain, and knows not
the virtue of alliance. So, compelled by simply hunger, the brutes
were already scattering to glut themselves on the chunks of ragged
meat which Guest and his savages were so freely delivering. It was
inevitable that Guest and his well-armed little army would soon
start the slaughter of the beasts.
        This would have been a disaster for Dalar ken Halvar's
entertainment industry, since the Arena's schedule called for
those very crocodiles to eat a great many unarmed slaves,
heretics, common criminals and juvenile delinquents in the days
which yet lay ahead.
        So, fearful of their investment and the despoilment of their
timetable, those who commanded the Grand Arena threw open the
gates which led to the burning sands, and crocodile-handlers
poured out in force to defend the poor animals against the
merciless Weaponmaster and those with whom he had leagued himself.
        Even as the crocodile-handlers started pouring out onto the
sands, the silver screen of the Door hummed into life again. The
savages cried out in excitement. Abandoning their corpse-hacking
efforts, the savages fled for the Door, and vanished through it.
But Guest stood his ground, for he thought himself as safe in
Dalar ken Halvar as anywhere.
        Or was he?
        As Guest was rethinking it, the Door snapped out of existence
once again - and he realized the decision had been made for him.