toward the Fortress and the coastal cliffs, while Old Seagate Street curved down to the left, toward the Throat and the Fortress Docks.
Old Seagate Street remained open to one side, overlooking the shipyards, though tall old houses replaced the storage sheds on the other side; Shipyard Street beyond the fork was lined with housing on both sides.
The bench slowed, and for a moment she thought it was going to stop and give her a chance to catch up, but then it seemed to make its decision and went charging on up Shipyard Street, up toward the Fortress.
If she followed, in a few moments she would be out of sight of the shipyards and Kelder would be unable to spot her-but, she asked herself, what did that matter? She had the chair, even if it was starting to squirm a little, and she could catch the bench soon enough, she was sure-especially if she could get some passing pedestrian to help her. She had rope to tie the bench and chair together, once she had them both cornered, and then she could lead them both home. She didn’t really need Kelder.
At least, she hoped she wouldn’t need him.
She charged onward, in pursuit of the bench.
Chapter Fifteen
Two blocks past the fork Shipyard Street began to curve to the left, the better to follow a fold in the terrain. The bench was still two and a half blocks ahead of her; by the time she passed the fork it was vanishing around the curve, out of sight.
And there were no other people around to call on for help; the street was, just for the moment, deserted. She strained to run faster, ignoring the whooping and babbling of the spriggan on her shoulder, and the twisting and kicking of the chair she carried above her head.
The chair and the spriggan did not slow her as much as the street itself did; it was sloping up steeply by the time she passed the third cross street, so steeply that along either side stone steps were provided. The earthen center was intended primarily for wheeled vehicles, not pedestrians; in dry weather, such as the city had experienced for the past two sixnights, it was suitable for walking, but in wet weather, when the dirt turned to slick mud, the steps were needed.
By the time she reached the first steps Kilisha could not see the bench.
Two blocks later Shipyard Street ended in a I with Steep Street-and Steep Street lived up to its name; it was all stone stops, with grooves cut into them for cart wheels. To the right Steep Street continued up the hill toward the Fortress; to the left it dropped down toward the Fortress Docks.
Kilisha stopped, panting, the chair still over her head, and looked both ways.
She did not entirely understand how the bench, with its short legs and cross braces, could move so fast, or how it could negotiate the steps of Steep Street, but it seemed to have done so; she could not see it in either direction.
She stood in the middle of the trapezoidal patch of level pavement where the streets intersected and slowly turned, left to right, in a full circle.
She saw narrow houses, so black with centuries of smoke that she could not tell whether they were wood, stone, or plaster between the heavy wooden beams. The figures on their carved cor-nerposts were worn down to facelessness, and their chimney tops thrust up crookedly above sagging gables; a few had shopwindows displaying jewelry or fine fabrics. She saw the gray stone steps of Steep Street leading up the hill, kept clean and worn smooth by rain and passing feet, curving to the left so that she could not see to the next intersection.
She turned past the upward-bound street.
On the corner stood a larger house, gargoyles leering over the cornice, and almost unreadably worn runes carved deep into the lintel spelled out armorer. She doubted that any armorer still lived or worked there; to the best of her knowledge all the armorers still operating were based in Wargate, near the parade ground. Presumably this house dated back at least to the end of the Great War.
Then, past the corner, came Shipyard Street, back the way she had come, tumbling down the hillside away from her, houses and shops on either side; the bench could not possibly have gotten past her in that direction.
Then the other corner, occupied by a shuttered house of no great distinction.
And finally, the other side of Steep Street, narrow stone steps curving down to the right, dropping away so steeply that a level gaze looked into third-floor windows half a block away.
Somewhere on this street lived that man who had wanted his bed enchanted, but she had no idea which house might be his, or whether that had anything to do with why the bench had come this way. Had some shred of Ithanalin’s memory guided it here, seeking out that customer? Could the bench possibly be heading that way? It didn’t seem likely. Ithanalin had presumably known where the man lived, and the bench might remember that, but why would it want to go there? It wasn’t a bed, and it surely knew that.
The customer had said he lived near the intersection with Hillside Street, and she was fairly certain that was farther up the slope-but did that mean anything? She saw no one, no sign of movement, no sign of the bench in any direction. She could hear distant voices as the city went about its business, and the faint hissing of the sea breaking over the rocks below the cliffs, but nothing that gave her any clue to the bench’s whereabouts.
“Damn,” she said.
“Not fun?” the spriggan on her shoulder asked.
“No,” Kilisha said. “No fun at all.” She realized that her arms, legs, and feet were all sore, and that she was still holding the chair over her head. She lowered it, and set it carefully on the pavement.
She looked down at it for a moment, not releasing her hold, and then did the obvious thing. She sat down, taking the weight off her feet.
The chair did not react at first; it seemed as inert and lifeless as any ordinary chair. She looked down past her hip at the edge of the seat, wondering whether she had somehow done something to it, perhaps inadvertently broken a part of the spell. Her sheathed athame might have brushed against the wood when she sat down, she thought; might that have triggered something?
Could it possibly be that simple to restore Ithanalin’s life to its rightful place?
And then the chair abruptly lifted her up an inch or so, then dropped back.
“Oh!” she said, startled by this proof that the enchantment had not been broken.
“Ooooooh!” the spriggan replied.
Kilisha had no time to respond to that; the chair was moving, and she was too busy clinging to the seat to say anything more.
It moved with an odd rocking gait that felt horribly unsteady, but was not actually bumpy or uncomfortable. It carried her to the west, to the upward-bound side of Steep Street, up to the base of the first step.
Perhaps the bench and chair really were trying to deliver the customer his spell, even though it had all gone wrong? Kilisha blinked, and brushed hair from her eyes as she tried to think.
Then the chair paused, and tentatively lifted one leg, straining and creaking as it tried to gain purchase on the step.
Kilisha was fairly certain that if she had not been sitting on it, holding it down, it would have been able to manage the step. As it was, however, it was rocking backward threateningly, on the verge of tipping over backward and spilling her out onto the granite pavement.
“No,” she said. “Don’t you dare.”
The chair hesitated, then lowered its probing leg.
Then it turned suddenly, and before Kilisha could protest it trotted across to the downward half of Steep Street.
“No, wait!” Kilisha called; she was sure that if it tried climbing down it would send her tumbling down those steps.
The chair hesitated.
“Do you know where the bench went?”
The seat seemed to quiver slightly. She could not interpret that as a useful answer.
“Tap a leg once for yes, twice for no,” she said. “Do you know which way the bench went?”
The chair tapped twice. Kilisha sighed.
