Rhiow jumped out of the circle and meandered over to where Arhu was, and sat down by him, and started composure-washing with a vengeance. Under cover of this, she said very quietly to Arhu, a little exasperated, “What is it with you two?”
“She hates me,” Arhu said.
Urruah reappeared, sat down beside them, and started to wash as well. “But she has no reason to,” Rhiow said.
“She seems to think she does.”
Rhiow blinked at that. “How do you know?”
“I see it.”
Urruah glanced up briefly at that. “This is new,” he said.
“I’m seeing a lot of things since I went flying with Odin,” Arhu said. “It’s as if seeing a new way to See has made some kind of difference. It’s happening more often, for one thing.”
“So what did you See about her?”
“It’s nothing specific. In fact, once I tried to See, on purpose, and—” He shrugged his tail. “Just nothing. Like she was blocking me somehow.”
“How would she do that?” Urruah said, mystified. “I wouldn’t have thought there was any way to block vision.”
“I wonder if she’d discuss it,” Rhiow said.
“Oh, try that by all means,” Urruah said. “But bring a new pair of ears.”
Rhiow sighed. It would have to wait. Auhlae jumped back up onto the platform, followed by Huff. “Are we ready?” Huff said.
“Absolutely,” said Rhiow, and got up to meet him by the timeslide. “I take it our first priority is the pastlings—sweeping them up, if we can, and confining them all safe in one place.”
“That’s Fhrio’s plan,” said Huff. “Where is he?”
“Here, Huff,” said Fhrio, and came up from the end of the platform to join them.
“Arhu? Urruah? Let’s go,” said Huff.
They paced over and leapt into the timeslide-circle, taking their positions. Siffha’h put herself down on the power point and glanced up at Fhrio.
He hooked a claw into the spell-tracery which would handle the “sweep” routine. “Half a breath,” he said. And then: “It’s ready. Standing by—”
“Now,” said Siffha’h, and reared up, and put her forepaws down hard.
Rhiow blinked … or thought she had. Then she realized it was the spell doing it for her. There was no physical sensation to this transit any more than there usually was from crossing through a gate: but the view flickered and flickered again, showing brief vistas of fluorescent-lit rooms, shocked ehhif faces, and assorted machinery scattered about. Every now and then, the spell would pause a little longer as it tried to determine whether some particularly ancient ehhif fit the criteria for which it had been instructed to search; then it would move on, almost hurriedly, as if to make up for lost time. Blink, blink, blink, the vistas of people in white came and went—
—And suddenly, there was someone with them in the circle. He was a sorry-looking ehhif indeed, with longish black hair and a hospital gown, and he was looking at them all with dopy astonishment while he rubbed the wrists which were suddenly no longer restrained. He opened his mouth, possibly to shout for help at the sight of seven cats in a circle of light, but Fhrio slipped one paw under one of the control lines of the spell, and the ehhif froze just that way, staring, with his mouth open.
“It’s going to start getting crowded in here,” Rhiow said, unable to resist being at least a little amused. Blink, blink, blink, blink, went the spell, and she had to start keeping her eyes closed; the effect was rather disturbing, for it was starting to go faster and faster. How many hospitals does this city have, anyway? Rhiow thought.
It had quite a few, and they got to visit about eight more of them before yet another ehhif, a tall handsome woman in a borrowed nightshirt, found herself standing in the circle. Rhiow could tell that the nightgown was borrowed, since no one from the last century was really that likely to own a nightshirt featuring a picture of a famous gorilla climbing up the Empire State Building. The woman took one look at the cats in the circle, and opened her mouth to scream.
She too froze, and outside the timeslide, the blink blink blink started again. The center of the circle began filling with ehhif, all still as statuary by some eccentric artist, some dressed, some not very, all looking like people who have been through a great deal in a short time.
And on and on the blinking went, until Rhiow had to squeeze her eyes shut again, and even when they were shut, she could still sense the timeslide flickering from place to place, until the mere thought of it made her queasy. Then there came a surprised shout, and suddenly Artie was standing in the circle with them, looking in astonishment at the other ehhif who were already there.
“No,” Huff said quickly, “not him.”
Artie vanished again and the flickering went on. Rhiow was slightly reassured by this proof of the spell’s ability to sort for the right people. But meantime she closed her eyes again and just concentrated on standing where she was and not falling over.
After a few moments, someone poked her. She opened her eyes again, swallowing, and trying to command her stomach not to do anything rash. Auhlae patted her again with the paw, and said, “Are you all right?”
“If we’re done with the hospital sweep,” Rhiow said, “then yes.”
“Is that all of them?” Arhu said.
Huff looked at Fhrio, and Fhrio waved his tail in acknowledgment. “That’s all the spell could find,” Fhrio said. “It’s more than we had ten minutes ago, anyway.”
Rhiow gulped. “Fhrio, a beautiful job. Can we leave them here safely a while? We still have one more thing to try to do. We’ve got to get at the contaminated timeline and get that assassination date.”
“No problem,” Fhrio said. He reached into the glowing hedge of the timeslide, and hooked out another line of light; the whole timeslide slipped sideways, with the people in it, but leaving the ehhif off by themselves at one side of the platform. “I’ve thrown a nonpermeable shield around them. No one will be able to see them, hear them, or get at them.”
“Then let’s go. One more time—!”
—and once more the pressure built and built, and Rhiow closed her eyes against it, sure it was going to push them straight back in through their sockets. She waited for the release of pressure that would let them all know that the slide had been successful; but it didn’t come. It just built, and built, and got worse and worse—
—Can’t, said Siffha’h. On the other side of the circle was a terrible feeling of strain, counterbalanced with the sense of some massive force planted in their way, not to be moved.
Don’t bother, said someone’s voice, Huff’s voice, from inside the spell. Let it go, we’ll try again later!
I—will not—let It—Siffha’h gasped. There may not be a chance later. We’re wizards—what else are we for?
Not for killing ourselves! Rhiow cried. Siffha’h, let it go!
Silence, and that unbearable strain, getting worse every moment. It won’t give, Siffha’h said, between straining breaths, almost in a grunt. It won’t give. It won’t—
Let it go! Siffha’h, let it go! That was Fhrio, now. Don’t try—
Yes—it will—
And silence for a moment … and then the cry.