“Now then—” she said. The basic spell-circle lay traced in ghost lines on the concrete around theehhif.Rhiow now made one more turn around it, her paws pressing into the circle the graphic forms of those words of the Speech which Rhiow was assembling in her mind, the words which would control the function of the spell. One by one they appeared in graceful ghost curves and arabesques interwoven around the main curve of the circle, like vines twining around a support, until the last few words rooted themselves into the wizard’s knot and became one with it.
“Ready,” she said. Siffha’h looked the circle over, found the power-supply access point and stood on it: the circle flared for just a second with power, then damped down again.
Rhiow, still standing on the control point of the circle at the wizard’s knot, nearly jumped off it at the abrupt access of power into the spell, and secondarily, into her. It was partly the suddenness of its inrush, and partly the sheer volume of it, and the unusual taste of it when it came—mostly the taste of Siffha’h’s mind: young and fierce and bold, surprisingly so for such a young queen, with a great sense of potential unused and potential still developing, and behind everything, driving it all, some huge and dimly-perceived desire. Rhiow shied away from any attempt to look more closely at that—it was none of her business—but was impressed by it all the same. This young queen was going to be quite something as she grew into more certainty about her work and her life.
“That enough to work with for the moment?” Siffha’h said.
“For several hours, if you ask me,” Rhiow said, impressed: “Thanks, cousin!” She turned her attention to the spell. She had no proper name for theehhif,and so had used one of the species-generic terms and an indicator for his gender: now her mind ran down through that connection to his, and felt about gingerly in theehhif’smind. The part of his brain that ran breathing and blood pressure and other functions was undamaged: but the emotional shock had thrown his blood chemistry badly out of kilter, and left him in a“sigh” that was much more prolonged than the usual fifteen seconds. That chemistry was getting worse as she watched, but fortunately the problem was a simple one, already partially rectified. Rhiow cured it by increasing the acidity of his blood ever so slightly, a process already under way, and the automatic response to such an increase took over, so that theehhifgasped, and then started to breathe normally again.
“Nothing too serious, then,” Auhlae said, putting her ears forward in relief.
“No, just the kind of thing that causes hiccups, but a little more severe,” Rhiow said, relieved, and shook herself a little to get rid of the peculiar cramped narrow feeling of anehhif’smind.“It’s his emotional state that I’m more worried about, when he becomes conscious again. He may need quieting. Let’s see how he does …”
Theehhifwas stirring a little already.“Hey, sorry I’m late,” said another voice from down the tunnel, and Urruah leapt up onto the platform. “There were some things I had to take care—” He broke off, going wide-eyed as he took in the whole scene in a second. “Hey,” he said then. “So wishing works after all.”
“Whether it does or not, we’d better shut this gate down,” Fhrio said. “The last thing we need at the moment is another access, especially one into a spell-circle when whoever might come through isn’t named in the spell—”
Urruah stared at him.“Are you kidding? Lock it open!”
“What?”
“If we don’t lock it open I won’t be able to get a reading on where the other end is anchored,” Urruah said, “and that’s information we badly need. Are you set up to do it? Then let me.”
Fhrio bristled at that, but Auhlae bumped him from one side, distracting him.“He’s right,” she said. “Rhiow, you’ll want to put his personal information into the spell so that he can step through. Just make sure you lock it in nonpatent configuration, Urruah. Comeon,Fhrio, we have other things to attend to. Poorehhif,look at him, he’s in a state.”
Theehhif’s eyes were open now. He lay there staring around him at the darkness, and tried to sit up once: failed, and slumped back again.
“Where—” he said, and then trailed off at the sound of his own voice in the close darkness of the tunnel.
The wizards exchanged glances.“If this isn’t errantry,” Auhlae said, “what is?”
She padded over to the edge of the circle and sat down where theehhifcould see her. Once again he tried to sit up, and did a little better this time, managing at least to hitch himself up one elbow and look around. The light here was not good, even by feline standards: it was questionable how much he could see.
“Don’t be afraid,” Auhlae said to him in the Speech. “You’ve had a fall. Are you hurt?”
“No, I-I mean, I think not, but where—where is this?” He tried to sit up again. “Where are you?”
“Here in front of you,” Auhlae said, with a look at Rhiow.
She was ready. Theehhiflooked around him, and saw Auhlae … then looked past her. “Where?”
“Right here, in front of you,” she said, and even in the rather dire circumstances, Rhiow could hear the sound of slight amusement in Auhlae’s voice. “The cat,” she added, and this time the amusement was genuine.
Theehhiflooked at Auhlae, and then actually laughed out loud, though the laughter was shaky.“Oh surely not,” he said. “Some kind of ventriloquism. I’ve seen illusionists’ shows; I know what kind of tricks may be played on an unsuspecting audience—”
Auhlae sighed a little.“In front of an audience, a skilled stage magician can produce all kinds of illusions, I know,” she said, “but this isn’t that kind of thing. Rhiow, maybe you’d better let the light of the circle come up a little.”
She waved her tail in agreement, meanwhile watching theehhifclosely for any signs that he was about to go shocky again.
“Mr…—Illingworth,” said Auhlae after a moment, as the light of the circle grew and theehhiflooked around him,“please don’t believe this a trick. It is something out of your experience, though. Perhaps you would prefer to think of it as a dream. Do you mind if we ask you some questions?”
Theehhiflooked around at the circle, and the cat inside it with him, its paws thrust into the glowing webwork which the circle surrounded, and the four other cats outside: and he blinked.“I suppose not, but where are you? And how do you know my name?”
“Please don’t bother looking for any other humans, because you’ll see none here,” Auhlae said. “Just pretend, if you will, that the cats are speaking to you.”
“But how do you know my name?” theehhifdemanded, more urgently now.“Is it—is this some kind of plot—”
Through the spell, Rhiow could feel theehhif’sblood pressure beginning to spike. She watched it carefully, and felt down the spell for indications of any sudden physical movement: there were too many ways he could damage himself, physically and nonphysically, if he tried to break out of the circle before it was correctly disassembled.
“It’s no plot,” Auhlae said, “though I wouldn’t mind hearing why you would think it was one.”
Theehhiflooked around him, still trying to find the source of the voice which spoke to him: and now he started to look suspicious.“There are plots everywhere these days,” he said, and his voice sounded unusually troubled. “Everything used to seem so safe once … but now nothing is what it seems—”
His blood pressure spiked again with his anxiety, and Rhiow could feel his muscles getting ready for a jump.Better not,she thought, and spoke briefly to his adrenal glands through the spell. They obligingly stopped the chemical process which was already producing adrenaline, and instead produced a quick jolt of endorphins that left Mr. Illingworth blinking in slightly buzzed bemusement, and much less prepared to get up and run anywhere. Rhiow was ready to lock his muscles immobile if she had to, but she preferred less invasive and energy-intensive measures to start with.