It Is a Silly Place

First impressions are not always reliable. Back in the early mid-eighties, when assorted publishers were doing their best to grab a share of the market opened up by Fighting Fantasy, and new gamebook series started fighting for shelf space in the local bookshops, I would often take a quick look at non-FF gamebooks in the shop, fail to be impressed, and reshelve them.

Lone Wolf is one of the few series that I retained when I got rid of the bulk of my gamebook collection back in the nineties, and yet it failed to grab me when I flicked through Flight from the Dark in WHSmith's. I've previously mentioned what finally prompted me to give the books a proper go and got me collecting them, so I shan't go into that again here. I only bring up the subject at all because I'm about to start replaying the other gamebook series that got off to such a rocky start with me, only to become so beloved that I never even contemplated disposing of the set. I'm pretty sure that I was even in the same shop when I first looked at a copy of The Castle of Darkness, book one of J.H. Brennan's gloriously silly Grailquest series.

As with Brennan's later Horror Classics books, as well as The Legends of Skyfall and one other series (about which I will say more at a later date), it was my friend Simon who got me interested in Grailquest. I played his copy of Castle while visiting his house, neglected to avail my character of the healing available at an appropriate moment and, as I recall, took my first trip to section 14 (where Grailquest characters go when they die) after losing a fight against an animated compost heap. Soon afterwards I bought my own copy, along with the second book in the series, after which I went on to buy every subsequent release at the earliest opportunity. I think there's only ever been one other series that I collected with such zeal (and that's another story for another blog post).

The series name is informative, up to a point. Insofar as it is evocative of an Arthurian setting, it's accurate. And the potential implication of Pythonesque absurdity is not far off the mark either. Still, while most of the books do involve some kind of quest, the Holy Grail is never actually the item sought.

I've spent a chunk of today tinkering with my gamebook manager to get it to handle the Grailquest rules (well, the basic set-up, at least - the additional rules introduced in book 2 can wait for another day), so I'm ready to give the first book a try. It purports to be a spell cast by Merlin, which will transport the reader's consciousness into the body of Pip, a youth living in Merlin's time.

The Grailquest system only has one randomised attribute, namely Life Points. To determine them, I roll two dice three times, pick the best result, and multiply it by four. That's a bit more straightforward than the character generation process Brennan came up with for his next gamebook series, and a lucky double six gives me a total of 48 Life.

Following a quick explanation of the combat rules and a short list of hints on play, the book launches into a scene-setting passage, retelling the background of the Arthurian legends (and providing a few indications that these books are not entirely serious, such as the author's going out of his way to contradict the 'many' people who insist that King Arthur invented cricket). This section ends by focusing on a farm near Glastonbury, home to a freeman named John, along with his wife Mary and their adopted child Pip, who lives a quiet, peaceful life.

Cue ironic jump to a series of OTT threats of violence. I have been left guarding Freeman John's cart in the market square while he sees to other business in town, and now local bully Mean Jake has turned up with the avowed intent of decapitating, dismembering and otherwise terminally inconveniencing me. This is the prelude to an introductory fight which, despite Mean Jake's bluster, ought not to end in a fatality. If I'd been incredibly unlucky when rolling up my Life, there would be a slim possibility of Pip's not surviving the encounter, but anyone with stats that abysmal is going to be doomed anyway, so now's as good a time as any for getting rid of a hopeless character.

The punch-up with Mean Jake includes an additional rule, which I don't think it worth taking advantage of. Should I choose to target Mean Jake's nose (which involves a trickier roll than the standard 'to hit' one), I could do extra damage, but the increased difficulty makes it five times as likely that I'll do less damage than I would fighting normally. In this instance it makes no difference anyway: a couple of lucky rolls on Mean Jake's part give him a decisive victory, regardless of whether I went for the easier target or the harder one. Even so, the beating I've taken cost me less than a quarter of my Life, and the book clearly states that on this occasion I'll heal all the damage by the end of the day, so while this is not the most promising start, it's no cause for concern.

Indeed, life goes on, with a brief narratorial shift from second to third person. The most noteworthy event in Pip's life following his recovery from that fight is that Freeman John buys some chickens. Elsewhere in the Kingdom, the Wizard Ansalom is becoming a nuisance, inflicting misfortune on people as the mood takes him. When asked to deal with him, the Knights of the Round Table tend to suddenly remember prior commitments. All except King Pellinore, who at least agrees to try and thwart the Wizard, but gets lost on the way to his castle.

And we shift back to second person narrative as a group of men-at-arms turns up at Freeman John's farm, seeking Pip. After establishing my identity, they indicate that I should get on the spare horse they have brought and accompany them. Refusal is not an option. Well, actually it is, this being a gamebook, but I remember that turning to the relevant section merely delays the inevitable, so I just go with the men-at-arms. After a while we enter an unfamiliar forest, and towards sundown we arrive at a log castle. No, that's not a typo: the structure is a small castle, complete with moat and drawbridge, but made of logs rather than stones. Inside the castle we are greeted by a limping hunchback named Igor, and the men-at-arms make a rapid departure once they've dropped me off.

Igor leads me to a study and transforms into Merlin, who explains that the disguise is because someone of his standing is expected to have servants, but he can't afford the wages. Following a brief detour back into third person to address the question of how demented Merlin must be to think that a local farmhand could be housing the consciousness of someone from the distant future, Merlin explains that Ansalom is going to kidnap Queen Guinevere, and I shall have to rescue her, so I need to be prepared for the mission.

For starters, Merlin provides me with a magic sword, Excalibur Junior (who prefers to be addressed as E.J. - yes, my sword is sapient, self-aware, and able to talk), as well as a suit of dragonhide armour and a few bottles of healing potion. He then draws pentagrams on both of my palms and asks me if I can read a piece of parchment that has 'FIREFINGER 1' written on it. This is one instance where it pays to be a pedant: saying, 'Yes I can read it, thank you very much,' rather than just reading out the words keeps me from wasting one of the spells that I have just been equipped to cast (and almost setting the place on fire). I am now able to fire lightning bolts from my forefingers (five per hand), and to hurl fireballs (only one per hand, but they do a lot more damage if they hit their target).

A commotion outside indicates the arrival of messengers bearing news of the kidnapping of the Queen, so Merlin shifts his shape back into the form of Igor and heads out to greet them. Again the narrative focus shifts, to provide the reader with a rather witty account of the circumstances surrounding the kidnap, the response made by King Arthur and his knights (I love the understatement of the observation that Lancelot "was really a bit too fond of the Queen for his own good"), and the sequence of events that lead to "a very nervous and confused young person, equipped with a sword that looked suspiciously like a sawn-off version of Excalibur" being left on the outskirts of Ansalom's demesne. The humour takes on a slight dark edge when the knights subsequently realise that nobody thought to ask for the name of this unlikely-looking hero: "The oversight caused much general annoyance. As Percival remarked, they would have nothing to put on the tombstone."

Back in the second person, I find myself in the forest surrounding the Dark Castle of the Wizard Ansalom, checking the contents of the backpack provided by the Quartermaster General. My gamebook manager is going to need a bigger inventory section. The list of additional equipment includes a couple of anachronisms - the rope is in metres (unless you want to argue that sloppy workmanship just happened to make what should have been a 50-foot rope almost 9½ inches too short), and my lunchbox contains bully-beef sandwiches - and deviously downplays the significance of one item that will prove very important towards the end of the adventure. I was never caught out by the trick, as Fighting Fantasy had already reminded me of a certain non-culinary use of garlic by the time I read The Castle of Darkness, but even my mid-eighties self could appreciate the sneakiness.

The path leading into the forest forks, and the turning I take leads me to a clearing containing the ruins of a building, possibly an abbey. Inside the ruin I come face to visor with a forbidding figure in jet-black armour, who could be the Black Knight, second only to Ansalom in the 'local villain' stakes. As it turns out, he's just King Pellinore, still lost in the forest, and likely to remain so for a while yet. After he rides off, I find an exit from the clearing and proceed to an oddly-structured section that provides the option of exploring a side turning before giving away (in hard-to-miss capital letters) the fact that the main path leads to the Wizard Ansalom's Dark Castle. Okay, so exploring 'insignificant' diversions often turns out to be essential in gamebooks, but this is one instance where it's not, so I shan't.

The Castle looks forbidding, and has a reputation to match, but I am not deterred. The book recommends that from this point onwards I draw a map, and as navigation in Brennan's books can be tricky, I shall take that advice.

Across the drawbridge is a tunnel leading to an open portcullis. I can either hurry through or proceed with caution, and I'm pretty sure the latter option is the wiser one. Yep, going slow enables me to notice the murder holes and stay out of the way of the boiling oil that gets tipped through them.

Beyond the portcullis is a courtyard, and I can still remember every mistake I made here when attempting this book at Simon's, so I can now avoid taking damage several ways. The chickens ambling around in the courtyard are a lot more vicious than your average chicken (and, having had to look after my neighbour's chickens while she was on holiday, I know that even an ordinary chicken can get nasty), and the battlements are populated by projectile-firing insects, so I'm best off staying away from both of them. That leaves heading straight across to the double doors in the north or heading east to investigate an assortment of carts, crates and barrels. I go east, not because there's anything worth having among the clutter, but because heading for the doors from there is the only way to avoid falling through a surprisingly well-camouflaged hole in the middle of the courtyard.

The doors open onto a second courtyard, this one paved. It has a skeleton manacled to a whipping post in the middle, and there are several buildings around the walls. I remember that the skeleton is animated (and, in the unlikely event of my getting a Friendly Reaction, proves a little informative), but my memory of what can be found in the different buildings is unhelpfully vague (even though I must have read the relevant paragraphs a little more recently than I did the ones relating to all the harmful encounters in the first courtyard).

The bolted door suggests that there may be something hostile in the structure to the west. I think the one near the east wall is where I find the sneaky old man, and as he may have something useful, I'll risk checking. Yes, beyond the door I find an elderly Watchman eating stale bread and mouldy cheese, who pleads with me not to harm him, and then goes for me with a concealed dagger while I'm reassuring him. Thanks to my armour I take negligible damage in the fight, though I may still incur a minor case of blood poisoning that'll cost me a little more Life.

Incidentally, this section has one of several poorly-placed illustrations, as the picture of the Watchman is on the other side of the page, next to the section detailing the nigh-unreachable conversation with the Skeleton. While taking a look at the illustration I noticed for the first time that it includes the dagger, though mostly hidden by the table rather than up the wretch's sleeve as in the text. I also inadvertently read part of the facing page, and was reminded that the Skeleton unsuccessfully attempts to impersonate Queen Guinevere if it doesn't attack. And there I was, thinking the hard-core daftness didn't kick in until about book 3...

But I digress. The outcome of the fight is slightly awkward, as I render the Watchman unconscious, but the text only gives section numbers to turn to for killing or being killed by him. Well, I'll just have to treat unconscious as equivalent to dead, because stabbing a helpless opponent is not right even if he is a treacherous front-stabbing rogue. The only noteworthy possession he has is a quantity of money, which I take. Not that it'll be of much use to me in this book, unless I want to try bribing an opponent, which is probably not worth it.

Still, the damage I took in the fight is low enough that I can risk trying to heal it by sleeping. Sleep is a risky prospect in Grailquest, as it carries a 2 in 3 chance of leading to Dreamtime, and dreaming can be harmful to the health, especially in the first couple of books. I get lucky, though, and am restored to full Life. A few of the dreams are amusing as well as dangerous, so I might try sleeping again at some point.

Returning to the paved courtyard, I now check out the cluster of buildings along the north wall, as I think they might be where I can potentially find a little information. They're stables, currently disused, and containing only rotting straw and manure. Or so it seems, but a thorough search reveals a scrap of parchment on which is drawn a map of the first courtyard, including the location of the trapdoor (not just a hole, then).

This is one of the places where having drawn my own map comes in handy, as the paragraph describing the discovery of the parchment gives the section number for safely lowering oneself through the trapdoor but says nothing about going back to the paved courtyard, which ought to still be possible: the hints section states that "You are free to wander about as much as you like just so long as you know where you're going and the way has not been blocked." And as the parchment is not the vaguely-remembered item I was expecting to find, I want to risk checking out the building with the bolted door.

I was right about it containing something hostile: two Hounds go for me as soon as I unbolt the door. But as I was anticipating trouble and had E.J. ready, I get the first blow. The Hounds do more damage than the Watchman did before I knock them out, but I'm still in pretty good health, so I might try sleeping again once I've searched the building. It contains a casket which holds a diamond ring, possibly magical. The dice decide... and yes, I can use it to heal a good deal of Life, or to give me an extra lightning bolt. If it were non-magical I'd have found a slip of paper with a possibly helpful hint on it inside the casket as well, but I think the magic is going to be more useful.

I do try sleeping again, and this time I dream that I'm in a banquet hall, forced to drink from one of two chalices. I'd riff on The Court Jester here, but now is not the time for poetry as bad as what comes to mind. Anyway, I choose poorly, and lose more Life before waking. All right, I'll try the Healing Potion instead.

Restored to full health, I return to the first courtyard and use the trapdoor to climb down to a damp, mildewed corridor, which leads to a cave. I head along it, and tumble into a pit trap with poisoned spikes at the bottom. I need to roll two dice to determine how I fare, and authorial or editorial sloppiness means that the possible totals are given as 1-3, 5-10 and 11-12. Not a big deal on this occasion, as I get 6, which means I miss the spikes and 'only' take 20 points of damage. Time for another nap: if I dream, I might lose enough Life to make it worth using the healing from that ring. But my slumbers are untroubled, so I regain some of the Life I lost. I'll use a little of the healing salve that came in the backpack, and while that won't restore me to full health, it should at least make me fit enough to survive the next encounter.

I'd forgotten about the cave to which the corridor leads. The floor is littered with bones, some of them human-looking. Searching the cave turns up no treasure or unpleasantness, and merely wastes a bit of time. Not as much as writing this paragraph did, though.

The cave beyond is more familiar territory, as it contains a Compost Heap (and Brennan's use of capitals is a bit of a giveaway). There's no way of avoiding a fight with this sentient midden, but as I recall, I can go for a more dangerous battle that nets me a little cash if I survive or a less hazardous combat with no reward. Money's not everything. And a quick section comparison reveals that the difference between the fights is negligible, but I've made my decision, so I'll stick with it. The Compost Heap does a fair bit of damage before I kill it, but I'd have survived even without that healing. Nevertheless, I take another tot of Merlin's potion before going any further.

A corridor leads north from this cave, soon turns left, and ends in a door. I'm offered three courses of action, but common sense tells me that charging 25 metres and then headbutting the door is not clever, the fact that another of the options is covered in the section directly below my current one makes it hard not to notice that knocking achieves nothing, so that really only leaves trying the handle... which causes the door to open. How's that for a twist, Mr Night Shyamalan?

Beyond is a torchlit room, with a flight of steps leading up to a door in the north wall and a ground-level door leading west. I wasn't expecting this room quite so soon. Remembering what can be reached from it, I swig down another dose of healing potion. And then risk sleeping. Bad idea, as I dream that while hunting boar I encounter an Ogre intent on devouring a young woman. Still, the Ogre's a slow mover, so I might manage to kill him with my arrows before he can pulp me with his club. Regrettably, only three of my shots are on target, but I also get to strike one blow at him with my bare hands before he tries to hit me. There's no way I can kill him with a single punch, but if I get really lucky, I could knock him out. I'm not that lucky, but the Ogre's first attack misses, and my second blow does the required damage, so the Ogre becomes unconscious and I get to wake up in no worse condition than I was. Arguably slightly better condition, as the rules don't say that fights in Dreamtime contribute no Experience points.

Still not happy about the state of my Life, so I drink more potion and use another application of salve. That brings me back up to 46, which I hope will be enough to get me through the encounter behind the door to the west. For that door leads to a hallway populated by Zombies. Half a dozen of the things. And Grailquest zombies are a pain, as they can only be killed by rolling 9 or above on two dice. On the more positive side, they're sufficiently slow-moving that I get to strike twice before the survivors hit at me en masse, but this has the potential to be a slow battle, and potentially death by painful attrition for me.

My armour is invaluable here: after two rounds of battle I've lost just 1 Life Point, but without the armour I'd have taken over 15 damage. And it's not until the third round of combat that I manage to kill my first Zombie. Another two bite the dust in the fourth round, and then there's just ineffectual slashing and clawing until I take another point of damage in the seventh round and kill another Zombie in the eighth. The fifth Zombie manages to hit me for another 2 damage before I kill it, and the sixth just flails ineptly until I'm finally able to deliver the coup de grace. That didn't go as badly as I'd feared, but was still a tiresome slog. Mind you, there are worse Zombie encounters in gamebooks (and one of these days I may come back to this post and add a hyperlink to that observation).

So, with the Zombies dead, I search the corpses, finding only a silver ring with an incomprehensible inscription. Without thinking (i.e. having the decision made for me by the book) I put the ring on. It tingles slightly, and the book makes no big deal about it. Yet.

Beyond a curtained doorway in the north wall I find another corridor, which leads to a crossroads. Enforcing learning from past mistakes, the book insists that I check for pit traps as I continue along it. There are none, and as I'm liable to be returning to this crossroads a few times, the 'No pit traps' at the start of the section is going to become increasingly redundant.

This crossroads is, incidentally, what I was expecting to encounter before the room that led to the hall of Zombies. I know what to expect along two of the passages I can take from here, but not the third, as it's not going to lead to the Zombies I've already killed. And as I now know my memories to be vaguer than I'd thought, I'm not sure how much I can trust the impression that the place I don't want to visit first is to the east. Still, the passage north leads to a door, which seems promising.

It's a dead end. The door vanished somehow while I was unnecessarily checking for pit traps. And while the existence of the number 4 is not ignored this time round, the roll to search for a concealed door still allows for the possibility of scoring just 1 on two dice. I succeed at the roll, and a section of the wall opens to reveal a stairway leading down.

The steps lead via a short corridor to a vast subterranean cavern containing a lake. It's so quiet I can hear my own heart beating. Until a voice starts whispering my name. It takes me a little while to twig that I'm being addressed by EJ, who doesn't like it down here because there might be spiders in the darkness. A faint glow out on the lake catches my eye, and as it gets closer I can see that it emanates from a small boat, moving with no obvious means of propulsion. The boat draws up beside me and, ignoring the book's insinuations that nothing good can come of this, I step aboard.

The boat pulls away again, taking me on a long journey to an island that appears moonlit (though the text acknowledges that having the moon underground isn't exactly likely). I get out, and the boat promptly departs. Close by is what appears to be a Grecian temple, but I opt to explore the rest of the island before approaching it.

There's not much else here. Lots of rock formations that look as if they could be hideous monsters until I get close enough to see that they are just rocks. And a cave mouth in a cliff to the north. Naturally I check it out, disregarding the slightly skull-like appearance of the cave. A narrow fissure leads to a cavern containing a rather incongruous signpost. Arms point to all cardinal points of the compass, though three of them just say 'NOWHERE'. The exception is the arm pointing east, which indicates the way to the Crypt of the Fiend, helpfully labelled as an ancient monument. And just three metres from the signpost is the door to the crypt, which bears a plaque confirming that this is the Crypt of the Fiend and requesting that I knock.

The door opens at my touch, revealing a chamber with a jet-black marble floor, walls draped in black velvet, and an ebony coffin on a dais at the centre. It's like, how much more black could this be? And the answer is none. Except maybe the silver plaque on the dais could be less shiny. Which would make it harder to read, and given the quality of the doggerel inscribed upon it, decreased legibility would be a positive. The poem, in lines of inconsistent length, indicates that the Fiend within the coffin is a poet, and if I solve the puzzle on the lid and praise his poetry, assistance will be forthcoming, while failure to do so will prove more than slightly lethal.

It's too late to turn back. A plaque on the coffin lid precedes the puzzle with a warning that if I fail to follow the instructions given, the coffin will explode, destroying the castle, all Avalon, the world, the universe, and probably me. No pressure, then. The puzzle essentially consists of a series of If... Then... Else...  statements that explain how many times I should knock on the coffin, followed by a warning that if I don't start knocking within five seconds, the coffin will explode anyway.

I spell doom for David Tennant's Doctor, and the coffin lid opens, revealing a tall, pale figure anachronistically dressed in opera cape and white tie-and-tails evening suit. His eyes are dark, and two elongated teeth jut fanglike over his bottom lip. He sits up, turns to fix me with his gaze, and speaks: "Hello, Duckie."

After complimenting me on not blowing myself up, the Fiend emerges from the coffin, asks me what I want, and then seeks my opinion on his poetry. I compare it favourably to the works of Milton, Keats, Shakespeare and Pam Ayres (though McGonagall, Thribb, Barron and Jeltz would be closer to the mark) and, while obviously unfamiliar with the names I mention, the Fiend is flattered, and improvises an ode in response. Most poems have metre: this is closer to 37½cm.

He then invites me to demonstrate my own poetic talents to him. Remember how, 19 paragraphs ago, I said that it wasn't the time for poetry as bad as what I came up with in response to my dream? It was because I remembered that this challenge came later in the book. But it's in my interest to come up with more than just a few couplets, so I've embellished my original idea a little. And now, for your questionable entertainment, I present...
The Dream
I stand alone and small
In a banqueting hall.
Inside this palace is
A pair of chalices.
One is a vessel
That's carved of crystal.
The other one's
Made out of bronze.
I have to drink from one,
But that might not be fun:
While one is full of wine -
To sup from it is fine -
The other contains poison,
Which is completely noisome!
Yet drink I must.
To luck I trust,
And take a sip
But become sick.
I convulse, shake,
And - phew! - I wake.

(What I wrote at this stage of the adventure back in the eighties was no better, though at that time I wasn't being self-consciously bad.)

Anyway, the Fiend loves the poem and gives me as many gold pieces as there are lines in the poem (which is why I padded it out so much). He then admits to being a little weak in the arithmetic department, and asks how many lines long the poem is. As it's more than ten, I get an additional reward, which the Fiend declares to be his most precious possession: a garishly painted wooden duck that looks as if it used to have wheels. Apparently it's magical, though the Fiend doesn't know what it actually does. Still, if ever imperiled by evil sorcery I can call upon the duck by reciting a short verse. After explaining this, the Fiend decides that he needs a rest, and shuts himself back into the coffin.

Time to investigate the temple, then. As I approach it, I catch sight of movement within the colonnade, and draw EJ as a precautionary measure. Reassuring me that I am in no danger here, a beautiful lady in white steps out of the shadows. I wonder if this could be the Queen I seek (royal faces not being so easily recognisable in this day and age) and, reading my thoughts, the lady says she is flattered, but I am wrong. She is no queen, nor even a mortal, and Arthur knows her as the Lady of the Lake. Though the island we're on isn't in the lake, just a lake.

She beckons me into the temple and stops in front of a white marble altar, on top of which are a jewelled chalice and a velvet cushion bearing a gemstone. The Lady then explains that this temple does not exist in the world as I know it - nor, for that matter, does the island, which will disappear forever as soon as I leave it. She has come because she is opposed to evil, and offers to aid me against the Wizard Ansalom. When I indicate acceptance of her assistance, she instructs me to drink from the chalice, which I do.

The chalice contains neither wine nor poison. The liquid within tastes of honey and blackcurrants, and not only restores me to full Life, but also provides 25 Life Points on top of my regular score, which cannot be replenished but will soak up damage until depleted, after which I go back to losing and (ideally) healing Life at the normal rate.

The Lady also gives me the gemstone, which she explains is a Luckstone. As long as I have it (and I can keep it as long as I avoid getting killed, even potentially carrying it into later books in the series), I can increase or decrease any dice roll I make by 3. Before I can join in with the fourth wall-breaking aspects of the book by asking "Does your use of the term 'dice roll' indicate that a roll made on just one die is unaffected?" or "Do rolls made on behalf of my opponent during combat count as rolls that I make?" the Lady, the temple and the island disappear, leaving me back at the crossroads with no pit traps.

It's been a week since my last blog entry, and this seems like a decent point at which to take a break, so I shall now post what I've written so far for this adventure, thereby indicating that last week's resumption was not a one-off.