In their own quarters, the women groaned too. “More wasting time!” Roz strode angrily up and down the bare blue room. “I’m sick of you lot sitting about like a wet week! What are all these rituals about? You realize they’re excluding us, don’t you?”
“We don’t count as mages,” Helen said dryly. She was sitting upright against the wall, twiddling her long thumbs.
This irritated Roz. Most things irritated her by then. “I count myself a perfectly good female mage,” she said. “When I think of all I’ve learnt—”
“Have you learnt a way to get home?” asked Sandra, slumped beside Helen.
“Well, no,” Roz conceded. “But that’s obviously a closely guarded—”
“I’ve told you,” Flan called from her corner. “The only way to get home is to get turned into a reptile. I saw—”
“Flan!” Helen said warningly, and sighed. Sandra was in tears again. Tears rolled down her face, across her mouth, and dripped unheeded off her chin.
“I want to go home,” Sandra said. “I didn’t mean for him to lose his post for being mad. I liked him — a lot. He’s a nice guy once you get used to—”
“Oh, do please bloody well spare me your nervous breakdowns, you two!” Roz snapped. She was not happy either. It was bad enough to have to hide in here for doing the job she had been sent to do, but she did not deserve the way the cadets were behaving. Whenever any of them saw her now, they fell into lockstep behind her. And they seemed to be whispering something like “Haw, haw, haw!” Roz refused to be paranoid about silly boys, but it was horribly depressing that there did not seem to be any real way home. And—
They all looked up as Judy came in, wandering among the veils looking obscurely nervous. Flan was galvanized, and uncurled from her corner with a bounce.
“At last! Did he know what happened to Zillah?”
Judy shook her head, and Flan curled up again.
“So where have you been?” Roz demanded. “It can’t have taken you two whole days just to make sure he didn’t know!”
“Nowhere,” said Judy. “With Edward. And wandering. Thinking. I decided in the end I’d better come and warn you. We may be in trouble when Edward decides what to do. I told him we all came from the otherworld.”
“You what?” said all four as one woman.
“Told him where we come from,” said Judy. “I was sick of pretending. Edward thinks he’ll have to tell High Horns.”
“Christ!” said Roz. “And didn’t you even have the nous to swear him to secrecy first? Honestly! What kind of a bunch of women have I got myself mixed up with? Not one of you has a scrap of patriotism. Not one of you even has a spine! Sandra goes and falls in love — in love! — with the man she’s supposed to be seducing in order to save her world. And our poor world goes out of the window at once. Flan sees a ritual and thinks Zillah’s been put through it, so Flan curls up and decides to die. Our world goes out of the window again. Helen gets turned out of the kitchen, so what does Helen do? Helen sits and twiddles her thumbs. Our world goes out of the window a third time. And then, to crown it all, little Judy goes and prattles to her Edward about exactly where we come from. World out of the window for good. Lord! Are you lot trying to be traitors? Well, I’m not. I’m a patriot. I love my world. I came here to do a job, and I want it done. Thanks to Judy, we’ve got a real crisis on. So let’s have some action, shall we?”
“Speech!” Flan murmured rudely. “What a lot of good you did!” Judy simply turned around and walked out of the room again. Sandra got up and bolted after her, sobbing.
Helen unfolded herself and advanced on Roz. “And what action do you suggest? Haven’t you noticed that we’ve all worked like stink in our own ways, and it’s all come to nothing? That’s what’s the matter!” She stalked past Roz and out through the veiling too.
Flan was still curled in her corner, so Roz turned to her. “Worked? Who’s worked? None of you except me. I’m the only one who seems to know the meaning of the word! I’ve worked. Good stern work! That’s what this fortress responds to. I can feel it responding. And it’s responding to me. Me working. Keeping our mission going single-handed. You don’t catch me moping in a corner doing nothing. You don’t—”
“Oh, shut up!” said Flan. “You’re worse than High Horns. Your stern work my left buttock! Zillah got it right. What this fortress wants is a little fun for a change!”
“I’m not staying here to be insulted,” said Roz.
“Go away then,” said Flan.
Roz marched out. The door veiled and there was quiet. But not peace, Flan thought. Maybe she was having a nervous breakdown. She couldn’t seem to get that horrible ritual out of her mind. It sapped her of all desire to do anything but curl up in a corner and listen to the pulsing of the citadel — or it could be just the pulse in her own ears. At the moment, citadel or ears, it was a sulky, sick bumping, as insistent as Roz’s voice, which seemed to be hating all these rituals, every one of them, and urging Flan to do something to give them both some peace. Flan was fairly sure the sight of Tod turning gray and oozy had sent her mad.
There was a sort of sigh, and a feeling of release, followed by multiple movement like an army breaking step to cross a bridge. Flan raised her head. Yes, there were footsteps and voices in the distance. The latest ritual was over. Good. Roz had called for action. Let’s have some action then. But better catch them before they all went to meditate or whatever.
Flan sprang up and ran. Burst out through the door veil, raced down blue corridors. Shot past mages in groups and pairs coming the other way. Plunged through the veil into the main hall of Ritual Horn. Her friends from Ritual were mostly still there, either standing about looking jaded or packing chalices away in caskets. Nearly everyone turned to greet her. Most smiled. Even Brother Nathan, far from descending on her with more blackmail, kept over the other side of the hall, where he smiled at her anxiously and rather diffidently. How nice, Flan thought. They all like me!
“Had a good ritual?” she said. There was a glum, dead silence. “And how are the vibes?” There were shrugs. Not good, evidently. “Well then,” said Flan, “how about a bit of fun to take the taste away?” The way everyone reacted, they would have liked fun, but they thought High Horns might have forbidden it along with most other things. “There’s no harm in it,” Flan said. “It’s a very simple dance. Here, let me show you.” And, quite in her old manner — or perhaps a little more feverishly — she seized the four or five who were always ready to have a go and put them in a line with their arms around one another’s waists. She put herself at the head of the line and wrapped the arms of good-looking Alexander firmly around her. “Now, just do as I do. Four bouncing steps — left-right-left-right. And right leg out. That’s it. And again, people. Let’s all do the conga — ah! Again! Let’s all do the conga—ah!” She led the line around the hall. “Come on, people. You sing too!”
They got the idea. The conga is probably the easiest dance ever learned. “Let’s all do the conga — AH!” the five shouted, capering and shooting out legs in unison. The others, Brother Nathan among them, took up the rhythm, clapping.