‘The Price of Portals’ by Tais Teng

Memories of Adventure

What would you do if you found a magic wardrobe or a circle of standing stones and didn’t walk through?  Contemplate that questions with the characters in Tais Teng’s ‘The Price of Portals’ in Issue 51, Summer 2026.

The Price of Portals

by Tais Teng

The two friends sat on the Hof Square, each nipping from glasses of that delicious Malvasia wine. Gerard had only found one pub in the whole of Amersfoort that carried the right brand, and for once it tasted as good as on any Canary island. Mostly carrying your holiday drinks home didn’t work. Gerard had tried ordering ouzo one or two times, but without the azure sea of Greece, it had all the flavour of a dollop of toothpaste dissolved in gin.

 “What is the most stupid thing you ever did?” Ronald asked. “Not what you’re ashamed of, mind, but what you’ll regret forever.”

It was Gerard’s third glass, and his head was filled with buzzing sunlight. Why not? he thought. Why not? The story had waited on the tip of his tongue for so long and he had never dared to share it. Not even with his wife.

“I guess I was five or six years old and we lived halfway up the Amersfoortse Berg. That hill just opposite that high school?

“You could walk straight into the woods, and then a zigzagging path went almost straight up. The central hill was steep enough for mountain bikes.” He spread his hands and his voice grew wistful. “A thousand and one hiding places, and the forest somehow never looked the same twice.

“I walked alone, terminally bored and almost hissing with chagrin. You know, the tears burning in the corners of my eyes because it was all so unfair. All the other children in my street were on holiday, but my father had just lost his job and we were going to camp at the Randmeren for only a single weekend. While all those others were flying to Thailand or yodelling on the peak of a Swiss snow mountain, waving their pickaxes.

“I had just walked past the green garbage pail which was never emptied when I heard a voice. ‘Gerard,’ the voice said, ‘do you want to leave? Completely away and experience fantastic adventures? Wear a black bear’s head as a helmet and carry your own silver sword?’

“I slowly turned. The voice sounded so weird. Not shrill but tinkling, as if someone spoke with a tongue made of glass. It was a voice that you absolutely shouldn’t trust, but …” He spread his hands. “You love classic cars, Ronald. Now, suppose a salesman offers you a second-hand car, without a scratch. Mint. Only about a dozen have ever been made. A car you have wanted all your life.”

“The Cadillac Eldorado from 1959,” Ronald nodded, and the mere thought made his eyes gleam.

“Exactly. Now, the price is actually quite a lot higher than you can afford, and you know it’s probably a fake, but suppose it is real? That kind of voice.

“A line of green flickered between the trunks with a glow that slowly intensified. The trees moved aside as if they had been stitched on enormous curtains and an invisible hand was parting them. A portal appeared, opening like a huge green eye, and behind it shone and glittered the perfect palace.

“My big sister had read the Narnia books to me aloud, and I knew everything about gates in the back of wardrobes and that super-lion Aslan. But I also knew about the White Witch.

“‘Show yourself!’ I ordered. ‘In Aslan’s name!’

“The voice laughed.”…

Read the rest of this story in Pulp Literature Issue 51, Summer 2026!

Tais Teng is a Dutch speculative fiction writer, illustrator, and sculptor with some eighty short stories and two novels published in English. With Jaap Boekestein he started the Ziltpunk movement, optimistic climate fiction set in a decidedly Dutch future. You can find more of his art at deviantart.com/taisteng/gallery. ‘The Price of Portals’ is a story about the wonders of childhood, which are taken for granted and can haunt you the rest of your life. He remembers drifting down a staircase, as light as thistledown, and thinking, “Ah, so this is how it is done.”

If you would like to explore more of Tais Teng‘s work with Pulp Literature, he has not only appeared as an author in earlier issues, like Issue 8, with his story ‘Growing Up with Your Dead Sister’, but also as an illustrator, contributing the front covers for Issues 3, 6, 9, 19, 26, 32, and 40! And to Tais, we would like to offer our ‘hartelijk dank’ for being a part of Pulp Literature from nearly the beginning, and our apologies if the attempt at Dutch was too much.