The dark brown goo on the workbench was still simmering over the oil lamp, and Kilisha still had no idea what it was; she had asked the spriggan and received merely a turned-up palm and "Don't remember" as a reply. The mixture's savory smell had turned to a sort of burned odor, then that had faded away, leaving a faint sourness in the air. Kilisha was fairly sure that it was no longer fit for whatever it had been intended to do or be. Still, she could see nothing sensible to do but leave it where it was. Thinking it the safest course she had refilled the lamp when it burned low, her hands trembling in case that altered the spell and triggered some catastrophe, but nothing untoward had happened.
She had not yet had a chance to practice Javan's Restorative; the pursuit of the chair and bench, and the levitation to look for the couch and put the line down the chimney, had eaten up most of the day, and besides, she still had no jewelweed. She could not attempt the spell until she had all the ingredients.
Of course, she also did not yet have the red velvet couch. That was the only piece of furniture still missing.
She had most of what she needed to restore her master, though, after less than two full days. She was reasonably pleased with herself as she sat at the kitchen table with the children, eating the boiled supper Yara had prepared-but still, every so often she glanced uncomfortably at the empty scat at the head of the table.
"Is Dad going to stay petrified very long?" Lirrin asked, as she reached for the spiced green beans.
"I hope not, sweetie," Yara said, glancing at Kilisha.
"He's not really petrified," Kilisha said. "He isn't stone, he's just… well, deanimated."
"Is he going to stay that way?" Telleth asked. Where Lirrin had sounded worried, Telleth sounded belligerent.
"Not if I can help it," Kilisha said. "I still need two more things before I can bring him back to normal."
"What arc they?" Lirrin asked.
"I still need something called jewelweed for the spell," Kilisha explained. "I don't know what it is-a plant of some kind, I suppose. There might even be some in the workshop, but I can't tell."
"We can get that from an herbalist, I'm sure," Yara said. "Or from Kara, if it's something only wizards use."
"Who's Kara?" Lirrin asked.
"Kara's Arcana, on Arena Street," Kilisha said.
"That's where Dad gets lots of his stuff," Telleth explained to his sister.
"I want Daddy back," Pirra said, clearly on the verge of tears.
"We all do," Yara said quickly. Then she turned to Kilisha. "Jewelweed?" she said. "You know, I said I don't know what it is, but I think I remember it now. It has white flowers, and the leaves have healing properties, if I remember correctly. We can find that."
"I'm sure we can," Kilisha agreed.
"You said you need two more things. What's the other one?"
"The red velvet couch from the parlor."
"Do you know where it is?"
"No." Kilisha shook her head- "It ran off to the west, with the other furniture, and Kelder chased it, but he lost track of it. I tried to spot it-I levitated up several hundred feet and looked at all the streets and courtyards I could, but I didn't see it anywhere. I think I'll need help finding it."
"Who's Kelder?" Pirra demanded.
"The soldier who was here today," Kilisha explained.
"Oh," Lirrin said. "There's a boy across the back court called Kelder; I thought maybe you meant him."
"There arc a lot of people named Kelder," Yara remarked.
"Is the soldier going to bring Daddy back?" Pirra asked.
"No," Kilisha said. "We need a spell to do that, not a soldier. But maybe he can find the velvet couch."
"Can I help look tor it?"
Kilisha smiled. "Maybe," she said. "Anyone who can help find it is welcome, as far as I'm concerned. We'll all start looking in the morning, shall we? And we'll ask all our friends and neighbors to help."
"Couldn't we look tonight?" Telleth asked. "The torches are bright, and a couch is too big to hide in holes or anything."
"I want Daddy back," Pirra said.
Kilisha looked at Yara, who said, "We might look a little. But it probably isn't anywhere on Wizard Street, and I don't want to go too far in the dark."
"Kelder said he last saw it on the East Road," Kilisha said. "It's not on the street now, at least it wasn't when I was looking a couple of hours ago, but it might have ducked in somewhere."
"The East Road?" Yara said. Kilisha nodded.
"Headed for the gates'!" Lirrin asked, horrified.
"No, no," Kilisha said quickly. "Headed west on the East Road, toward the Fortress." The idea that it might have doubled back eastward, or turned north or south and headed for one of the gates, was not a pleasant one-but she couldn't rule it out. Maybe she hadn't spotted it from the air because she hadn't looked outside the walls…
She would want to check on that tomorrow, if the couch didn't turn up. She would ask the guards at the gates.
At least nobody was likely to have not noticed an animated couch, or forgotten seeing it.
"It's in the Fortress, then?" Telleth asked.
"Oh, I don't think so," Kilisha said. "How would it get inside?"
"Through a door!" Pirra said.
"The doors were closed," Kilisha said. "We were over there today, and it's all closed up tight because of some trouble in Eth-shar of the Sands. The couch might be near there-it was headed in that direction-but how could it have gotten inside with the guards there and the doors locked?"
"Oh."
That ended the conversation for a time, and the five of them ate in silence. A few minutes later Kilisha took a final gulp of small beer, then pushed back her chair. "I need to finish that potion I was making," she said as she rose. "I thought it might help catch the escaped furniture."
"I thought you said you just need the couch and the jewel-weed," Yara said.
"I do just need the couch and the jewelweed," Kilisha agreed. "But I didn't know that when I started the potion last night."
"Then why are you finishing the potion?" Telleth asked.
"Well, partly because it still might be useful in finding and catching the couch," Kilisha said, "but mostly because if I don't, who knows what could happen? Unfinished spells can go wrong, the way the master's did."
"You mean you'd turn into a statue?" Pirra asked, her eyes widening.
"Maybe. Or something else entirely might happen. You never know what might happen when magic goes wrong. They say there's a place in the Small Kingdoms where there's a pillar of fire a hundred feet tall that's been burning for a hundred years because somebody sneezed while doing a spell. And some people say that spriggans come from a magic mirror spell that someone did wrong, which is why they started turning up suddenly just a few years ago."
"And Dad accidentally turned Lirrin and me into tree squids once," Telleth said. "Right here in the kitchen." He grimaced, and added, "It felt really weird."
"Exactly. And he turned Istram into a platypus, as well. The master has always told me how very important it is to be careful with magic, and never leave a spell unfinished, so I'll be finishing the potion tonight."