Ptolemy's Gate (49 page)

A
hop, a limp—we fell up the steps between the columns. Ahead of us, a door of bronze, green with age. I shoved it open, pitched forward into the sanctuary of the god. Cool, dank air, no windows. I pushed the door shut and slammed fast an ancient bolt. Even as I did so, something collided against the other side.

I put a Seal upon the door for neatness' sake, then sent a Wisp-light flaring against the ceiling, where it hummed and flickered with a pinkish glow. At the end of the room a metal statue of a bearded cove looked at us with grave disapproval. Beyond the door, and all around the sanctuary, came the thwack of leather wings.

I laid my master beneath the Wisp-light and bent my muzzle close. His breathing came erratically. Blood seeped against his clothes. His ravaged face, all weals and wrinkles like an ancient fruit, was bleached of color.

His eyes opened; he raised himself on one arm. “Steady,” I said. “Save your strength.”

“I don't need to, Bartimaeus,” he said, using my true name. “Not anymore.”

The lion gave a growl. “None of that talk,” I said. “This is called tactics. We're having a rest. I'll break us out of here in a minute.”

He coughed. Blood came up. “To be honest, I don't think I could take another of your flights.”

“Oh, go on. It'll be even more interesting with just one wing. Think you could flap an arm?”

“No. What happened?”

“It was this stupid mane! I didn't see that djinni coming from the side. He ambushed us; got me with a Detonation! That's the last time I wear one as bushy as this.”

There was a small grating up near the top of the old smooth wall. Several shadows wheeled across its strips of light. Something heavy landed on the roof above.

Ptolemy cursed softly under his breath. The lion frowned. “What?”

“Back at the market. I dropped the parchment. My notes on the Other Place.”

I sighed. I could sense the movement all around, the click-clack of claw on stone, the small skitterings of scales across the roof tiles; I could hear the whisperings in Latin. I visualized them, clinging to every surface of the building like giant flies. “That's unfortunate,” I said, “but it's not our main concern.”

“I've not finished my account,” he whispered. “Nothing's left in my rooms but fragments.”

“Ptolemy, it doesn't matter.”

“But it does! This was going to make things different. It was going to change the way magicians worked. It was going to end your slavery.”

The lion looked down at him. “Let's be frank,” I said. “My slavery—and my life—are going to end in … oh, approximately two minutes.”

He frowned. “Not so, Bartimaeus.”

The walls echoed to the muffled sound of blows. “Yes so.”

“I can't get out, but
you
can.”

“With
this
wing? You must be—Ah … I see.” The lion shook its head. “Not a chance.”

“I'm technically your master, don't forget. I say you can go. I say you
will
go.”

By way of reply, I rose, stood in the center of the little temple, and let out a roar of defiance. The building shook; for a couple of seconds afterward all activity outside was stilled. Then it industriously resumed again.

I snapped my teeth together nastily. “In a few moments,” I said, “they're going to break through, and when they do, they'll learn to fear the power of Bartimaeus of Uruk! Anyhow—who knows? I've taken out six djinn at once before now.”

“And how many are out there?”

“Oh, about twenty.”

“Right. That settles it.” With shaking arms, the boy rose to a sitting position. “Help me lean back against that wall. Come on! Come on! Do you want me to die lying down?”

The lion did as he was bid, then straightened. I took up my post facing the door, which, in the center, was glowing red with an intense heat and beginning to bulge a little. “Don't ask again,” I said. “I'm not shifting.”

“Oh, I won't
ask
, Bartimaeus.”

Something in his tone made me swivel round. I saw Ptolemy grinning lopsidedly at me, one hand raised.

I reached toward him. “Don't—”

He snapped his fingers, spoke the Dismissal words. Even as he did so, the door exploded in a shower of molten metal; three tall figures sprang into the room. Ptolemy gave me a small salute, then his head fell back gently against the wall. I rotated toward the enemy and raised a paw to smite them, but my substance had become diffuse like smoke. Despite my most desperate urgings, I could do nothing to hold it firm. All light around me vanished, my consciousness departed; the Other Place pulled me away. Furiously, against my will, I accepted Ptolemy's last gift.

31

T
he first feeling was that of terrible constriction. With the sudden act of waking, her infinite dimensions were all at once reduced to a single point. She was compressed back down to the margins of her body, tangled up within its lumpen weight. A moment of suffocation, the hideous sensation of being buried alive—then she remembered how to breathe. She lay in darkness, hearing the rhythms within her: the blood moving, the air wheezing back and forth, the bubbles shifting and gurgling in stomach and bowels. She'd never realized before quite how
noisy
she was, how heavy, how densely packed. It seemed an appalling complexity, and one that would be quite impossible to operate. The idea of
moving
it mystified her.

Gradually the confusion resolved itself into vague recognition of the contours of her limbs—the knees drawn up almost to her waist, the feet gently overlapping each other, the hands clasped close against her breast. She visualized it in her head, and with this, a sensation of affection and gratitude for her body came flooding through her. It warmed her: awareness grew. She sensed the hardness of the surface on which she lay; the softness of the cushion pillowing her head. She remembered where she was—and where she had been.

Kitty opened her eyes. Everything was blurred. For a second the swimming lines of light and shadow beguiled her; she thought she was drifting in the Other Place again…. Then she steadied herself and concentrated, and slowly, grudgingly, the lines snagged and stopped and yielded up a picture of a person sitting in a chair.

He sat in a posture of extreme exhaustion. His head had slumped sideways; his legs lolled left and right. She heard the rasping of his breath. His eyes were closed.

A chain hung about his neck; at its end was an oval piece of gold, centered with a green-black stone. It rose and fell with the rhythmic movement of his chest. Between his knees a long wooden staff rested at an acute diagonal. One hand was cupped loosely to support it; the other hung limply over the chair arm.

After a while she remembered his name. “Nathaniel?”

Her voice was so faint she could not be sure whether she had actually made a noise, or only sounded the word in her head. Nevertheless, it seemed to work. A grunt, a splutter—the magician's legs and arms jerked as if electrically charged. The staff fell to the floor; with something midway between a leap and a plunge, he was crouching at her side.

She tried to smile. It was hard. Her face hurt. “Hello,” she said.

The magician didn't answer. He just stared.

“You got the Staff then,” she said, and: “My throat's dry. Got any water?”

Still no reply. His skin, she noticed, was red and chafed, as if he had been out in a high wind. He was gazing at her with extreme attention, yet still contriving to ignore her words completely. Kitty became irritated.

“Move out the way,” she snapped. “I'm getting up.”

She tensed her stomach muscles, moved an arm, and pressed her fingers to the floor to push herself up. An object fell from her grasp with a dull clang. A wave of nausea filled her; her muscles felt like water.

Kitty's head fell back upon the cushion. Something about her weakness scared her. “Nathaniel…” she began. “What … ?”

He spoke for the first time. “It's all right. Just rest there.”

“I want to get up.”

“I really don't think you should.”

“Help me up!”
The fury was fueled by anxiety blossoming into sudden terror. The weakness was all wrong. “I'm not lying here. What is it? What's happened to me?”

“You'll be fine if you just stay put….” His tone was unconvincing. She tried again, pushed herself up a little, collapsed with a curse. The magician swore in tandem. “All right! Here. I'll try to support your back.
Don't
try and take your weight. Your legs will—There! What did I tell you? Do what I
say
for once.” He grasped her beneath her arms, lifted her up and swung her round, hauling her toward the chair. Her legs trailed behind her; her feet scraped across the lines of the pentacle. With scant ceremony, Kitty found herself dumped in a sitting position. The magician stood facing her, breathing hard.

“Happy now?” he said.

“Not really. What's happened to me? Why can't I walk?”

“They're not questions I can answer.” He stared at his boots—large scuffed leather ones—then across at the empty circle. “When I broke in, Kitty,” he said, “the room was icy cold. I couldn't find a pulse on you, and you weren't breathing, just lying there. I thought you were—I
really
thought you were dead this time. Instead …” He raised his eyes. “So. Tell me. Did you really—?”

She looked at him for a time without speaking.

The tension in the magician's face loosened into blank astonishment. He exhaled slowly, and half sat, half slumped against the desk. “I see,” he said. “I see.”

Kitty cleared her throat. “I'll tell you in a minute. First, pass me that mirror, would you?”

“I don't think—”

“I'd rather look,” she said crisply, “than use my imagination. So hurry it up. We've got things to do.”

No amount of argument could dissuade her.

“After all,” she said at last, “it's nothing very different to what happened to Jakob with the Black Tumbler…. And
he
was fine.”

“That's true.” The magician's hands were growing tired. He adjusted the position of the mirror.

“I can dye the hair.”

“Yes.”

“And as for the rest—I'll kind of grow into it.”

“Yes.”

“In about fifty years.”

“It's just lines, Kitty. Just lines. Lots of people have them. Besides, they might fade.”

“You think?”

“Yes. They look a lot less bad already than when I first found you.”

“Really?”

“
Definitely.
Anyway, look at me. Check out these blisters.”

“I was meaning to ask about them.”

“Pestilence did it. When I got the Staff.”

“Oh … But it's the
weakness
that really scares me, Nathaniel. What if I never—?”

“You will. Look at you waving your hands about. You weren't doing that five minutes ago.”