Muni lowered his head and narrowed his leonine eyes at the young man, covertly moving his unoccupied hand to his sash, making sure of his dagger. "As you wish, Cheyne."

Cheyne bent again to the opening, this time dropping all the way to his knees as Muni passed him the lantern. Cheyne startled a bit as several hand-sized black scorpions instantly raised their claws and arched their tails.

"Vermin." Muni sniffed in distaste. "You are going in there?"

Cheyne gritted his teeth, held the lantern out as far

Teri McLaren

as he could, sending the scorpions skittering for deeper cover, and then drew it close again, motioning to Muni to back away.

"No. I'm not going in. There is no need. See for yourself."

Muni cocked a dark eyebrow at him, took the lantern, and looked into the crevice. Five feet into the wall, the opening was blocked with sand. A great knot of cobwebs crisscrossed the end of the short tunnel, their silken strands completely intact. The vermin had had the tunnel to themselves for centuries.

"Most adored Schreefa, jewel of the desert, luminous beacon of mercy, they have found Kalkuk the shopkeeper… ah, very, very dead, in a sealed vault out at the ruin. I thought you would wish to know." The dark-robed assassin bowed deeply to his employer.

"Well. That's too very, very bad." Riolla Hifrata mulled the words around in her mouth as if they tasted of poison.

Damn this jewel! she thought, rubbing the black pearl between her fingers. Why can't I get it to work right anymore? Well, at least now I know where I sent the old boy. But maybe this is all right anyway… if those diggers are blamed for his death, perhaps the Fascini will shut them down. And the Raptor will then find better humor and stop charging me so much. Ever since they've been at the ruin, he's been ten times the beast he usually is.

Riolla sighed and dismissed the assassin, who rose gratefully, having begun to feel the intricate, linked weave of the rug digging into his knee. As he backed out of the room, she trudged up the stairs to the top floor of her shop, thinking about her last attempt to work the pearl's magic

"Og, you old fool, however did you do it? How could you make the stones sing for you?" she muttered, reaching the landing.

She entered her bedchamber, drew the shades against the morning sun, and lay down on the gold-embroidered coverlet. Riolla's head had started pounding the moment she had tried to use the pearl to transport old Katkuk's body the night before. It had been years since she had dared to attempt the stone, but alone and desperate, the Raptor's increasing demand for payments upon her, she had been forced to "collect" on Kalkuk. And Riolla knew, despite the fact that she was Mercanto Schreefa, that the Raptor would collect on her without a second thought if she were late with her protection payment.

It had been such a shame, really. Kalkuk was her best supplier; the man had come up with things none of the others could ever equal in value. She had never discovered his source, either. This time, though, poor old Kalkuk had missed his promised delivery-some kind of antique music box he had rambled on about, saving that it had been in his family for generations beyond counting, that it was so old that it might even have belonged to the Collector himself. Of course, of course; everyone in debt has such treasures. Riolla had smirked at him, marked his name on her list as delinquent, and gone on to other business. But when the Raptor had sent a summons for her to appear within three days, with double her usual payment, she had gone to Kalkuk's shop by herself, pressed him for the artifact, and he had threatened her with some old totem he had snatched from his shelf.

You shouldn't have done that, Kalkuk, / had to kill you then. She picked up a pumice stone and filed a snag on one of her long, sharp nails. Word gets around if the Schreefa gets soft. Things just don't work right then.

She sighed. Her head seemed to split with dark imaginings and the smell of dead seaweed filled her nostrils. She took a cup of tea to her lips, swallowing a tiny sip of the spiced brew. But it tasted of decay, just as had her breakfast, just as had her dinner the night

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before. Og had warned her about the pearl. Of all the stones in his ring, it was both the easiest to use and the most difficult to direct. The other times she had risked it had never been this bad.

Why hadn't the song done its job? She had sung it just as Og had taught her. She had meant to place the body in the middle of the Mercanto's sundial, before the scowling face of Nin, where it would have served as warning to the other businessmen and women who paid Riolla for her protection. Especially all those who had been just a little late. How had the body wound up out in the desert? Inside some old building? She hadn't even known there were old buildings out there. Imagine that, the ancient city of Sum if a was real.

Riolla paused, the stone in her hand growing strangely warm. She smiled a little. Then a little more. For if the ancient city were real, then why not the Clock itself? Maybe the treasure the silly Barcans were always looking for really did exist. This would bear further inquiry. When she could think more clearly.

So much for Kalkuk, she mused, trying the tea again, with no better results. But I still don't have his payment, either. And her own time was quickly running out.

A timid knock at her chamber door brought Riolla's head up too suddenly, the sound seeming to be pitched at the most irritating tone possible.

"Yes! Yes! Stop that. What is it?" she snapped, her own voice raking over her ears like claws.

"Schreefa, Prince Maceo sends greeting. He says to inform you that he has reconsidered your proposal."

"I still say there is no way anyone could have moved that block, and no way anyone could have used that tunnel, Javin," Cheyne repeated, slamming the water jug down on the camp table where he had spread his drawings of the room. A few stray droplets colored the bata-paper for a few seconds, then faded, drying

quickly. "Go down there and see for yourself, if you like. It's just an old looter's hole, covered up by the sandstorms long ago."

Javin drummed his fingers over the drawings and shook his head. "I'm not saying you're wrong. I just don't like the alternative. The method looked too familiar. And by the way, you should stay close until this is over. They might know we are here after all."

"You mean the Broken Circle, the Ninnites?"

"Keep your voice down." Javin frowned.

"Javin, why is it every time we come up with something you can't explain, it has to be the result of some old grudge between a long dead bunch of sorcerers?" Cheyne met Javin's eyes and locked him in a long stare. "This time, I want to know."

"It is better you do not know yet. Besides, I couldn't tell you more if I wanted to. It's just not safe."

"Javin," Cheyne said, sighing, "if I were still ten years old, that would be the right answer. But I'm a grown man now. It's time for me to be on my own. Find a wife, find my own work. Find my name. I have to know what all this sorcery and lore you are always poring over and thinking about has to do with me. Who am I? What happened to the first ten years of my life? Why can't I see myself in a mirror like everyone else? Whatever you know about these things, Javin, I deserve to know, too. At last we are in Sumifa-and there is something about this place, this particular place, that feels so familiar to me. I have to be free to explore this place. Maybe here I will find someone who knows what this means-" he added softly, pulling an amulet from under his shirt, its odd marking, very like a tiny fingerprint, deeply and precisely etched into the end of the smooth, cylindrical stone.