“Gone,” Ben cried in fury.
Questor looked faint. “High Lord, I am afraid that I have some very bad news for you.”
Ben sighed stoically. Somehow, he wasn’t surprised.
Graum Wythe
Abernathy came awake with a start. He didn’t come awake in the ordinary sense because he had never really been asleep, just wishing he was, his eyes squinched closed, his breath held like a swimmer underwater. It seemed as if he came awake, however, because first the light was there, all around him, so intense he could feel its brightness even with his eyes closed, and then all of a sudden it was gone.
He blinked and looked around. A screen of shadows and half-light masked everything. He took a moment to let his vision clear fully. There were bars in front of his face. He blinked again. There were bars all around! Good heavens, he was in a cage!
He tried to scramble up from the sitting position in which he found himself and discovered that his cage would not permit it. His head was right up against the ceiling. He maneuvered one arm—he could barely move that either—to touch the ceiling experimentally, then the bars… Wait, what was this? He touched the bars again. They were set in glass of some sort—and weren’t really bars, but some sort of latticework, very ornate, very intricate. And the cage wasn’t square, it was hexagonal!
Who ever heard of a hexagonal cage?
He glanced down. A pair of delicate-looking vases were squashed between his legs and the glass, looking for all the world as if they would shatter with his next breath.
Nevertheless, he did breathe, mostly from astonishment. He wasn’t in a cage; he was in some sort of display case!
For a moment he was so bewildered that he was at a complete loss as to what to do next. He stared out beyond the case into the shadows and half-light. He was in a massive stone and timber hall filled with cabinets and shelving, cases and pedestals, all displaying various artifacts and art objects. The light was so poor that he could barely make any of it out. A scattering of windows that were small and set high on the walls allowed in what little light there was. Tapestries decorated the walls at various intervals, and a floor of stone flagging was covered with scattered squares of what appeared to be hand-woven carpet.
Abernathy scowled. Where in the name of all that was good and decent in the world was he? That confounded Questor Thews! He might still be in Sterling Silver for all he knew, locked away in some half-forgotten room of old art, except… He let me thought trail away unfinished. Except that he wasn’t, he sensed. His scowl deepened. That muddleheaded wizard! What had he done?
A door opened at one end of the room and closed softly. Abernathy squinted through the gloom. Someone was there, but he couldn’t see who. He held his breath and listened. Whoever was there apparently didn’t know about him yet. Whoever was mere was strolling idly about the room, moving very slowly, stopping from time to time, looking things over. A visitor, Abernathy decided, come to look at the art. The footsteps grew closer, off to his left now. His display case sat rather far out from the wall, and he could not see clearly behind him without turning his head and shoulders. If he did that he was afraid he might break something in the case. He sighed. Well, maybe he should. After all, he couldn’t just sit there indefinitely, could he?
The footsteps passed behind him, slowed, came around, and stopped. He looked down. A small girl was looking up. She was very young, he decided, no more than maybe twelve, with a tiny body, a round face and curly honey-blond hair cut short. Her eyes were blue and there was a scattering of freckles on her nose. She was apparently trying to decide what he was. He held his breath momentarily, hoping that she might lose interest and go away. She didn’t. He tried to stay perfectly still. Then he blinked in spite of his resolve, and she drew back in surprise.