“We are servants of the One,” Kit said.
Inside the mochteroof, even through her nerves, Dairine smiled at the steady sound of Kit’s voice. He was fighting to keep his anxiety out of it, and it was working.
“Your appearance is that of servants of the Great One,” the King said. “You have the scent of Yaldiv, and the look of Yaldiv. But your souls betray you. They smell of the Other.”
Dairine broke out in a sweat again, and glanced ever so briefly in Roshaun’s direction. Kit said nothing, just met what he could see of those tiny, empty black eyes.
“What is the Great One’s will with these?” the Arch-votary said.
Here it comes, Dairine thought silently to Spot. Get something ready. Slowly, inside the mochteroof, she reached sideways into her otherspace pocket and felt around for one of the more deadly wizardries she had at hand.
Then, in the silence, the King laughed.
Dairine actually had to suppress the desire to retch, for the sound was truly revolting. It was full of the casual amusement of someone who has you completely in his power, and can do anything he likes with you. “Let them go about my business as they have done,” the King said. “They have no power here.”
Dairine’s eyes went wide.
The laughter began again, sounding even more self-assured and unconcerned. “Many other such minions are traveling among the worlds in these days,” said the King. “They seek to undo the great gift of the greatest and final Death. They cannot undo it. Now that Death is coming, inescapable, for them all.” The King chuckled as if at a particularly nasty joke. “They have no power to stop it—least of all here, where my strength is most strong.”
The Arch-votary, bowing, looked completely puzzled by all this. “To what labor shall they be put, Great One?” it said.
“They labor already,” said the King, his voice lazily, wickedly amused. “They labor to no purpose. And when their labor comes to an end, and the gift of Death comes to them all—very soon now—they will know that all their work, from the first to the last, has been in vain.”
It laughed again. Dairine gritted her teeth. “Let them go, Arch-votary. Whatever they do here, they will be doing my business. And it will amuse me to watch them doing it.”
The Arch-votary bowed down. Much against her will, Dairine bowed along with Kit and Roshaun and the others. “The Great One bids you go about Its business,” the Arch-votary said, and then turned away and ignored them.
Kit glanced at Ronan; then the two of them turned away from the dais and started to make their way across the vast hall. The others followed, and Dairine came last of all, heartily wishing she had an excuse to blow King Bug up. It’d mess everything up, of course. Our chances of doing what we came here to do would become about zero. But, boy, it’d be so much fun.
None of the others said a word as they made their way across the hall. As they approached the tunnel for which they’d originally been heading, the warriors who had been standing guard over it moved away.
Silently the wizards headed into the tunnel. Dairine was alert for whatever trap might be on the far side, but there was none. As Kit led them around a curve into the next tunnel, lined with many more tunnel exits and a number of chambers, all Dairine saw before them was the normal steady traffic of Yaldiv, going and coming about the Great One’s business.
We should find somewhere quiet, Kit said at last, get out of here, and figure out what to do next.
No argument, Ronan said. To Dairine’s ear they both sounded as if they’d been in a fight that they felt they’d lost, and couldn’t figure out why.
Ahead, Dairine saw Kit turn a corner into another tunnel. Behind him, Ponch paused, looking back, then went after Kit.
And then something unexpected happened to Dairine, something as literally shocking as when she’d brushed up against an exposed wire in the Christmas tree lights the year before last. One of the chambers they passed had a long line of Yaldiv waiting outside, and another line going out. More of these handmaidens, Dairine thought, glancing in as they passed. Getting food for King Bug. She was beginning to recognize the slender look of the handmaidens, the smaller foreclaws. One handmaiden in the incoming line, as Dairine looked in, turned to glance out at the Yaldiv “warriors” passing in the corridor.
As she met that Yaldiv’s eyes, a jolt went straight through Dairine like that shock from the Christmas lights. She knew those eyes. On the mobiles’ world, she had looked out through them. And she saw herself looking out of them now.
Hastily Dairine glanced away. But it was too late; she had seen the Yaldiv’s reaction. It was one of recognition… and then alarm. Those eyes had not seen the mochteroof, the Yaldiv shape. They had seen what lay under it. They’d seen Dairine.
In front of her, Roshaun felt Dairine’s shock. What is it? What’s the matter?
Don’t stop. We’re in trouble. Just keep going!
They headed down the tunnel at the same steady pace. Dairine reached into her otherspace pocket and got out the wizardry she’d been prepared to use earlier to give them time to escape. She was hoping even now that she wouldn’t have to use it. Time-stops were expensive in terms of energy, even in the present circumstances. But I’ll use it if I have to, she thought. The spell burned cold and ready in her hand, a rigid lattice of frozen temporal variables, all set to let go. Every moment she expected the shout from behind: “The Other! The minions of the Other are here! After them! Kill them!”
But the shout never came. Everything around them went on exactly as it had. Dairine hugged Spot to her and kept walking, too, terrified, and moment by moment increasingly confused. She saw me. Why isn’t anything happening?
Greatly daring, Dairine glanced behind her. The lines were still there, Yaldiv going in, Yaldiv going out. And in the doorway, a single Yaldiv, looking after them—
Dairine looked away before she could meet those eyes again. All the same, they were looking at her. The Yaldiv watched them go, silent, still. Then it vanished again.
Dairine hurried after the others, eager to get someplace where they could talk. Things were going terribly wrong…
…but possibly, just possibly, in the right kind of way.
***
Nita appeared among the trees at the far end of her backyard. For a long moment she just stood there, getting her breath. It wasn’t that the transit from the Crossings put you through much in the way of physical difficulties. It was just that, now that she was here, she was almost afraid to go into the house and see what she would find.
She took a deep breath and walked out from among the trees. Nita fished around in the pockets of her vest to find her house keys, but as she got close enough to the backyard gate to see the driveway, she saw her dad’s car there. The sight both reassured and scared her. If he was home before, why wasn’t he answering the phone?
She ran up the steps to the back door, got her keys out, and bumped the screen door aside with one hip to keep it open while she unlocked the inside door. “Dad?” she said, walking into the kitchen. It was clean; no one had eaten any meals here recently. “Daddy?”
She went into the dining room. The table was clean; it was almost as if no one had been here for a while.
Nita turned her head, hearing the TV in the living room. “Daddy?” she said, going in. The living room was tidy; the newspapers, usually left in a casual heap, were stacked neatly by her dad’s easy chair.