"I thought I might," Nissitha said, with a toss of her head that sent a ripple down her lush mane of black hair.
It popped out before Kilisha could stop herself. "Why?"
Nissitha grimaced. "I don't suppose you'd believe it's just neighborhness."
"Not… uh… well, you know," Kilisha said.
"Well, it is neighborliness, partly," Nissitha said, "but I admit it's directed more at Adagan than at you or Ithanalin."
Sudden enlightenment burst in Kilisha's mind as a dozen scattered incidents over the past year suddenly fell together. Nissitha wasn't married; neither was Adagan, and Adagan was a handsome, charming fellow perhaps a year or two younger than Nissitha-close enough in age that the difference didn't seem significant, in any case.
Kilisha had suspected for some time that Adagan preferred men to women, but perhaps she was wrong-or perhaps Nissitha either hadn't noticed or hoped to change that. Nissitha clearly wanted to impress Adagan with her enterprise and helpfulness by finding the runaway couch.
"And it would be good advertising, don't you think," Nissitha added, "to find this couch that a wizard can't find?"
"I suppose it would," Kilisha agreed. And it really didn't matter why Nissitha wanted to help; any help was welcome. "Thank you."
"You're welcome. Now, is there anything else you can tell me about it?"
Kilisha turned up an empty palm. "I can't think of anything."
"Does it have any known likes or dislikes?"
"No."
"Is it dangerous?"
"I don't know," Kilisha admitted. "It's big and heavy enough that I suppose it could do some damage if it wanted to. It shouldn't be particularly aggressive, but I don't really know which personality traits it got."
"Can it do any magic?"
Startled, Kilisha considered that for a moment. A couch had no voice for incantations, no hands to gesture with, and the sprig-gan had gotten at least part of the athame's magic…
"I don't see how it could," she said.
"Can it talk? Or fly?"
"No."
"Why haven't you found it? Did you try any divinations?"
"I don't know any," Kilisha said. "And all the diviners Yara asked were too busy with some big crisis in Ethshar of the Sands."
"I heard something about that," Nissitha said. "Someone's declared herself empress and led a bunch of beggars from the Wall Street Field m taking over the overlord's palace."
"You mean Soldiers' Field?"
"They call it Wall Street Field in the Sands," Nissitha said. "It's a better name, if you ask me, but the Soldiers' Field name is traditional here, so it'll probably never change."
"But there are beggars in the Fortress there?"
"Palace," Nissitha corrected. "No Fortress there. And yes, this empress invited a bunch of beggars and thieves to be her court."
"How could she do that? Why didn't the guard stop her?"
"Because she's a magician. Some one-of-a-kind freak who came out of nowhere, and no one knows what to do with her. It's a little like the Night of Madness, I guess."
Kilisha didn't remember the Night of Madness, when war-lockry first appeared; that had happened seven or eight years be fore she was born, Nissitha would have been a little girl at the time. Kilisha had heard about it, of course; it was supposed to have been much worse in the other two Ethshars, where there were more warlocks, but even here there had been trouble.
The idea that this trouble in Ethshar of the Sands might be something similar hadn't occurred to her; she had been too caught up in Ithanalin's situation to give it much thought. "Is it really that bad?" she asked.
It was Nissitha's turn to raise an empty palm. "Who knows?" she asked. "Do you think this thing with Ithanalin and your furniture might be connected?"
"Oh, I don't think so," Kilisha said. "The master tripped on a spriggan and spilled a half-finished potion, there wasn't anything inexplicable about it."
Nissitha blinked. "He tripped on a spriggan?"
Kilisha immediately regretted her words, but it was too late to call them back. "Yes," she admitted.
"The great Ithanalin the Wise tripped on a spriggan?"
Kilisha sighed deeply. "Yes," she said. "I'd appreciate it if you didn't go around telling everyone that, though."
"Oh, of course, of course, I'll keep it quiet." Nissitha's grin belied her words. "So you don't know anything more about where this couch is?"
"Nothing," Kilisha confirmed.
"Then I suppose I had best go and start looking." The self-proclaimed seer tucked her skirt clear of the chair's inquisitive approach, then turned and stepped back out into the street. She called over her shoulder as she departed, "I'll let you know as soon as I find it."
"Thank you," Kilisha called after her, but she did not feel very grateful. She closed the door, locked it, and ordered the latch, "Stay locked until I tell you-"
She had not finished the sentence when a knock sounded.
"Never mind," she told the latch, as she opened it again.
Chapter Twenty-two
Kills ha stared when she saw who had knocked, but she quickly gathered at least a portion of her wits. "What are you doing here?" she asked.
The young man on the doorstep smiled. "It's good to see you, too, Kili."
Kilisha swung the door wide. "Come in!" she said. "I mean, I'm glad to see you, Opir, but what are you doing here? You know it's not permitted for family to interfere with an apprentice's train ing!"
"I'm not here to interfere in anything," her brother replied. "I'm here to see whether there's any truth to the rumors I've heard." He looked around, taking in the furniture as it moved about the room and the tangled ropes leading from the various pieces to the fireplace, and added, "I'd say there must be some truth in them, all right."
"What rumors?" Kilisha asked. "What have you heard?" "That some sort of magic has run wild and started bringing all your furniture to life, and nobody's seen Ithanalin in days. He's supposed to be holed up somewhere working on a counterspell.
Or maybe he got turned into a coatrack-is that him in the corner?" He pointed.
"No," Kilisha said, not wanting to be distracted by explanations just now. "Go on."
"Or that he's been spirited away by the Empress Tabaea, or that he's secretly working for her, or that he's been transformed into you, and the real Kilisha of Eastgate is imprisoned somewhere dreadful."
"That's ridiculous."
"Is it? What did you call your toy pig when you were little?"
Kilisha stared at him. "You mean Gruntpuppy?"
Opir smiled broadly. "It's you, all right-I can't imagine you'd ever tell anyone you named that pig Gruntpuppy."
Kilisha shrugged. "I'd tell Ithanalin if he asked, because he's my master and I'm an apprentice-but he's never asked, and there's no reason he would." She closed the door behind Opir. "Where did you hear all these rumors?"
"From Mother, mostly. She collects them."
Kilisha blinked, then grabbed the chair and sat down. "Lock, please," she ordered the latch. The chair shifted beneath her, and she told it, "Hold still." She gestured to Opir. "You can catch the bench if you like."
Opir eyed it uneasily, then said, "I'll stand."
"Please yourself. Now, tell me more about where Mother's been getting all these stories. I mean, Ithanalin's only been… gone for about two days."