I took a quick walk then, knocking on and finally trying both Brand's and Gerard's doors. No response, and both were locked. Odder and odder.

Frakir had given a quick pulse when I'd touched Brand's door, and while I'd gone on alert for several moments, nothing untoward had approached. I was about to dismiss it as a disturbing reaction to the remnants of eldritch spells I had occasionally seen drifting about the vicinity when I noticed that the Jewel of Judgment was pulsing.

I raised the chain and stared into the gem. Yes, an image had taken form. I beheld the hallway around the corner, my two doors, and intervening artwork on the wall in plain view. The doorway to the left-the one that let upon my bedroom-seemed to be outlined in red and pulsing. Did that mean I was supposed to avoid it or rush in there? That's the trouble with mystical advice.

I walked back and turned the corner again. This time the gem-perhaps having felt my query and decided some editing was in order-showed me approaching and opening the door it was indicating. Of course, of the two, that door was locked...

I fumbled for my key, reflecting that I could not even rush in with a drawn blade, having just disposed of Grayswandir. I did have a couple of tricky spells hung, though. Maybe one of them would save me if the going got too rough. Maybe not, too.

I turned the key and flung the door open.

“Merle!” she shrieked, and I saw that it was Coral. She stood beside my bed, where her putative sister the ty'iga was reclined. She quickly moved one hand behind her back. “You, uh, surprised me.”

“Vice versa,” I replied, for which there is an equivalent in Thari. “What's up, lady?”

“I came back to tell you that I located my father and gave him a soothing story about that Corridor of Mirrors you told me about. Is there really such a place here?”

“Yes. You won't find it in any guides, though. It comes and goes. So, he's mollified?”

“Uh-huh. But now he's wondering where Nayda is.”

“This gets trickier.”

“Yes. “

She was blushing, and she did not meet my eyes readily. She seemed aware, too, that I was noting her discomfort.

“I told him that perhaps Nayda was exploring, as I'd been,” she went on, “and that I'd ask after her.”

“Mm-hm.”

I shifted my gaze to Nayda. Coral immediately moved forward and brushed against me. She placed a hand on my shoulder, drew me toward her.

“I thought you were going to sleep,” she said.

“Yes, I was. Did, too. I was running some errands just now.”

“I don't understand,” she said.

“Time lines,” I explained. “I economized. I'm rested.”

“Fascinating,” she said, brushing my lips with her own. “I'm glad that you're rested.”

“Coral,” I said, embracing her briefly, “you don't have to bullshit me. You know I was dead tired when you left. You had no reason to believe that I'd be anything but comatose if you returned this soon.”

I caught hold of her left wrist behind her back and drew her hand around to the front, raising it between us. She was surprisingly strong. And I made no effort to pry open her hand, for I could see between the fingers what it was that she held. It was one of the metal balls Mandor often used to create impromptu spells. I released her hand. She did not draw away from me, but rather, “I can explain,” she said, finally meeting my gaze and holding it.

“I wish you would,” I said. “In fact, I wish you'd done it a bit sooner.”

“Maybe the story you heard about her being dead and her body the host for a demon is true,” she said. “But she's been good to me recently. She's finally become the sister I'd always wished she'd been. Then you brought me back here and I saw her like that, not knowing what you really planned to do with her-”

“I want you to know that I wouldn't hurt her, Coral,” I interrupted. “I owe her-it-for favors past. When I was young and naive on the shadow Earth, she probably saved my neck, several times. You have no reason to fear for her here.”

She cocked her head to the right and narrowed one eye. “I'd no way of knowing that,” she said, “from what you told me I came back, hoping to get in, hoping you were deeply asleep, hoping I could break the spell or at least lift it enough to talk with her. I wanted to find out for myself whether she was really my sister-or something else.”

I sighed. I reached out to squeeze her shoulder and realized I was still clutching the Jewel of Judgment in my left hand. I squeezed her arm with my right hand instead and said, “Look, I understand. It was boorish of me to show you your sister laid out that way and not to have gone into a little more detail. I can only plead industrial fatigue and apologize. I promise you she's in no pain. But I really don't want to mess with this spell right now because it's not one of mine-'

Just then Nayda moaned softly. I studied her for several minutes, but nothing more followed.

“Did you pluck that metal ball out of the air?” I asked. “I don't recall seeing one for the final spell.”

Coral shook her head.

“It was lying on her breast. One of her hands was over it,” she said.

“What prompted you to check there?”

“The position looked unnatural, that's all. Here.”

She handed me the ball. I took it and weighed it in the palm of my right hand. I had no idea how the things functioned. The metal balls were to Mandor what Frakir was to me-a piece of idiosyncratic personal magic, forged out of his unconscious in the heart of the Logrus.

“Are you going to put it back?” she asked.

“No,” I told her. “Like I said, it wasn't one of my spells. I don't know how it works, and I don't want to fool around with it.”

“Merlin..?"-whispered, from Nayda, her eyes still closed.

“We'd better go talk in the next room,” I said to Coral. “I'll lay a spell of my own on her first, though. Just a simple soporific-”

The air sparkled and spun behind Coral, and she must have guessed from my stare that something was going on, for she turned.

“Merle, what is it?” she asked, retreating toward me as a golden archway took form.

“Ghost?” I said.

“Right,” came the reply “Jasra was not where I left her. But I brought your brother.”

Mandor, still clad mainly in black, his hair a great mass of silver-white, appeared suddenly, glancing at Coral and Nayda, focusing on me, beginning to smile, stepping forward. Then his gaze shifted, and he halted. He stared. I had never seen that frightened expression on his face before.

“Bloody Eye of Chaos!” he exclaimed, summoning up a protective screen with a gesture. “How did you come by it?”

He took a step backward. The arch immediately collapsed into a gold-leaf calligraphed letter O, and Ghost slid around the room to hover at my right side.

Suddenly Nayda sat up on my bed, darting wild glances.

“Merlin!” she cried. “Are you all right?”

“So far so good,” I answered. “Not to worry . Take it easy. All's well.”

“Who's been tampering with my spell?” Mandor asked as Nayda swung her legs over the side of the bed and Coral cringed.

“It was a sort of accident,” I said.

I opened my right hand. The metal sphere immediately levitated and shot off in hip direction, narrowly missing Coral, whose hands were now extended in a general martial arts defense pattern, though she seemed uncertain what or whom she should be defending against. So she kept turning-Mandor, Nayda, Ghost, repeat...

“Cool it, Coral,” I said. “You're in no danger.”

“The left eye of the Serpent!” Nayda cried. “Free me, oh, Formless One, and I will pledge with mine!” Frakir in the meantime was warning me that all was not well, in case I hadn't noticed.

“Just what the hell is going on?” I yelled.

Nayda sprang to her feet, lunged forward, and with that unnatural demon strength snatched the Jewel of Judgment from my hand, pushed me aside, and tore into the hallway.