The Big Meow

It’s one of those little camp lanterns ehhif use, Arhu said. It burns one of those petroleum liquids they use. I saw one bring it in a while ago through the door they’re using down there… then he went away. A few others came in too, looked around, then left again. They were talking about the others coming here, getting ready to come in here very soon and do something…

Probably best we should scatter around before they start coming in here in numbers, Rhiow said. Stay by the walls. Their eyes aren’t anything like as good as ours under these conditions: they won’t be able to see much even if they bring more lights in here.

Her team split up and took off in both directions. Off to one side, Arhu was lingering. How many have you seen coming into the house so far? Rhiow said.

Twenty or so.

All right. Go on. And Arhu – He paused. Watch Sif’s back. She’s likely to make the difference between us being able to stop what starts happening here or not making any difference at all.

Don’t worry… I’ll be right with her. He faded off into the darkness.

Rhiow looked at the stones again, trying to force herself to concentrate on the nearest of the large ones. It was hard: she felt her eyes burning as something made her want more and more to look away. Nasty, she said. Come on, Hwaith, no point in lurking there and hoping I won’t notice you. If you’re going to be with me, be with me.

She headed off toward the nearest of the big stones, being careful to keep it between her and that dim light down by the doorway. Are you seeing what I’m seeing? Hwaith said.

I’m not seeing much of anything, Rhiow said as they got closer to the stone: her eyes were bothering her more and more as she tried to focus on the thing.

Not that, Rhiow. Look at the strings!

Unusually for a gate technician, she had been paying little attention to the hyperstring structure in the area. Now Rhiow made the little mental shift necessary to alter the way she was seeing the physical world, and the hyperstrings in the area sprang into view. But she didn’t see the normal relatively straight warp and weft of brilliant lines that grossly marked the structure on which the physical universe was hung. Here the lines of force invisibly filling the air were all warped out of shape, unnaturally bundled together around the circle, as if they were writhing away from the stones in the circle.

It wasn’t the stones themselves that were the major force disrupting the string structures, however. It was the hard-to-see diagram dug into the rammed clay in the circle’s center. All right, Rhiow said silently, we knew something like this would probably be here… She moved forward cautiously, avoiding the chance of touching any of the stones, and watching where she put her feet to make sure she didn’t come in contact with any of the figure inscribed into the ground. Even if the thing was composed entirely of fragments of charms, it was entirely capable of containing “tripwires” that would alert whoever had drawn it.

From way down the cavern, near the wall, she caught a flash of Urruah’s eyes as he paused near the kerosene lamp to look back her way. This is so un-Hollywood, he said. There should be all kinds of evil carved figures, a big dais, a sacrificial altar…

We’ve got more than enough nasty stuff here without starting to complain about the aesthetics, Rhiow said, pausing at the edge of the diagram and looking it over. Behind her, Hwaith was circling past one of the stones to her left to get another angle on it.