rope between two worlds.”
Better than a circus! thought Sulis mutinously. All the same, she admired the way the scryer still held his rhythm clear of their words. It was dextrous, if a little sinister.
A moment later there was a raucous croak in the rafters overhead. Looking up, Sulis saw a raven.
Charlatan! she thought. An obvious plant!
Perhaps, but the raven was her true totem bird and who but she knew that? Thereafter, it could be heard commenting throatily on the whole consultation.
“Each line shows a way to your man of dust, your Ossian,” said the scryer. “From where he has gone there is no easy return, I think. He has been…” The scryer seemed briefly at a loss. “How can I put it in a way that won’t seem too alarming?”
“I’m paying you for truth, not tact,” said Sulis. “Are you saying you don’t know where he is?”
“On the contrary, lady. I know very well. Only he is not all… in one place.”
“What do you mean by that? Has he been dismembered?”
“Not exactly. Not physically, that is. But he has been scattered, all the same. Scattered like light through a prism. It is the effect of the flight, the difference in time. To put it bluntly, the boy you seek is no longer a living person.”
“Oh!” exclaimed Sulis in alarm.
“Do not misunderstand me. One might say he is alive several times over. There are many Ossians. I see his face reflected back in the stream of time at myriad angles.”
Sulis had recovered herself. “Then let us by all means cover every angle,” she said with laboured patience.
The scryer looked troubled. “You are aware, no doubt, of the difficulty of a retrieval from history in even the most propitious circumstances. When the subject is in a known location and there are plain tokens of his wish to return, when the signs have all been agreed in advance – even then there is no guarantee of success. I have known cases where what was recovered was mad, or terribly deformed—”
“He’ll have to take the risk. He owes me that. Is this all you have to say against the operation?”
The scryer gave another of his embarrassed laughs.
“It’s all right,” said Sulis impatiently. “I realise it will mean more gold. Just tell your clerk to prepare the equipment.”
The raven fluttered down from the rafter and sat on her shoulder. It croaked – encouragingly, Sulis thought.
“I cannot do it yet. No, lady, put away your gold, this has nothing to do with money – though the process is expensive and in due course an adjustment of my fee will no doubt be required. But the technical difficulties are formidable. You wish to find Ossian? Then in each of the places where he now dwells you will need to assume an appropriate form. To determine that takes time.”
Sulis sighed. Why did scryers insist on expressing themselves so elliptically?
She was sure that money lay at the root of it. A few more minutes and the scryer would go stiff and start speaking gibberish. Then she would be asked to lay out extra on one of those interpreting women, always so gummy and unhygienic, to render him intelligible. Such a racket!
However, the scryer showed no sign of stiffening just yet. “I can help you to enter Ossian’s sphere of existence, once the proper observances have been made. Your way, however, lies by the path of oblivion. In passing through it you must learn to suppress – partially suppress – your higher nature.”
Sulis was poised to take offence. “What are you saying? That I should put aside my divinity?”
“For the noblest of reasons, I assure you! Ossian is located in a particularly impoverished environment, one that will not sustain a person of your great eminence without peril. I can place you there, of course…”
“But what?” prompted Sulis stonily.
“But not in your – habitual form.”
“I don’t care what form I assume. I shall manifest myself, claim Ossian and be gone. If the people yield him up without fuss, I may even plant a shrine among them.” Sulis pondered the idea. “A spring of healing water, perhaps. I’m fond of springs.”
“A very pretty thought, lady. But it may not be so easy. Should you act in ways that are too obviously divine you will weaken the barriers that separate the worlds, with danger to both. On the other hand,” the scryer added with a dark emphasis, “there is an equal and opposite danger: that you will be absorbed wholly into their world.”
“Me? Absorbed?” retorted Sulis grandly. “Do you know who you are talking to?”
The scryer trembled slightly at her tone, but persisted. “When you are there, you will belong to the Ossian’s place and time. You yourself will not know, except in the most shadowy and imperfect manner, who you truly are.”
The scryer had been reluctant to broach this subject and with good reason. Perfect memory was as much part of Sulis’s divinity as her eternal youth. But Sulis, for once, showed no resentment. She actually smiled and told the scryer condescendingly: “Not know who I am? That might be possible for certain classes of person, I dare say. I don’t think I shall forget myself, gentle scryer. Never worry on that account.”
The scryer seemed relieved, but was obliged to add: “There remains the problem of temporal dispersal.”
Sulis clapped for a dish of sherbet. “Explain that part again,” she sighed.
LYCHFONT HOUSE
LYCHFONT
HANTS
Hi Lizzy
I said I’d write as soon as I got here, didn’t I, and tell you about the journey. And here I am doing it, just like the dork you’ve always called me. The flight was fine. Soggy chicken but I kind of liked it. I even survived Dad’s driving – just. The only lousy thing was the direction. Away from you. I don’t know much about art, but I know this landscape would look better with you in it. I don’t know much about love either, but I think I’m in it with you. With you but without you. Philosophical, huh? On the whole, I’d rather be in Philadelph—
Ossian put a diagonal line through all that. How come he was suddenly so gushy? He seemed to have got sidetracked into writing exactly the wrong kind of letter. This wasn’t Lizzy’s thing at all. She liked to know about people and music and clothes; she liked to hear the funny things people said and who laughed. She liked – needed – to picture it all, as if she were watching a movie. But Ossian did not notice things in that way, or did not remember them; in any case, he couldn’t shape them into words. And now he had lost the knack of saying easy, natural things. He drew a picture instead, of Catherine and her friends yakking under summer hats and stuffing
