"Like this," she whispered, pressing herself against me. A staggering
whirl of dizzy darkness swung round my head. The street vanished. After
an instant the floor steadied and we stepped into the terminal room in
the Mastershrine, under a skylight dim with the last red slant of
sunset. Distant hammering noises rang in my ears.
Miellyn whispered, "Evarin's not here, but he might jump through at any
second." I wasn't listening.
"Where is this place, Miellyn? Where on the planet?"
"No one knows but Evarin, I think. There are no doors. Anyone who goes
in or out, jumps through the transmitter." She pointed. "The scanning
device is in there, we'll have to go through the workroom."
She was patting her crushed robes into place, smoothing her hair with
fastidious fingers. "I don't suppose you have a comb? I've no time to go
to my own--"
I'd known she was a vain and pampered brat, but this passed all reason,
and I said so, exploding at her. She looked at me as if I wasn't quite
intelligent. "The Little Ones, my friend, notice things. You are quite
enough of a roughneck, but if I, Nebran's priestess, walk through their
workroom all blown about and looking like the tag end of an orgy in
Ardcarran...."
Abashed, I fished in a pocket and offered her a somewhat battered pocket
comb. She looked at it distastefully but used it to good purpose,
smoothing her hair swiftly, rearranging her loose-pinned robe so that
the worst of the tears and stains were covered, and giving me,
meanwhile, an artless and rather tempting view of some delicious
curvature. She replaced the starred tiara on her ringlets and finally
opened the door of the workroom and we walked through.
Not for years had I known that particular sensation--thousands of eyes,
boring holes in the center of my back somewhere. There _were_ eyes; the
round inhuman orbs of the dwarf _chaks_, the faceted stare of the prism
eyes of the Toys. The workroom wasn't a hundred feet long, but it felt
longer than a good many miles I've walked. Here and there the dwarfs
murmured an obsequious greeting to Miellyn, and she made some
lighthearted answer.
She had warned me to walk as if I had every right to be there, and I
strode after her as if we were simply going to an agreed-on meeting in
the next room. But I was drenched with cold sweat before the farther
door finally closed, safe and blessedly opaque, behind us. Miellyn, too,
was shaking with fright, and I put a hand on her arm.
"Steady, kid. Where's the scanner?"
She touched the panel I'd seen. "I'm not sure I can focus it accurately.
Evarin never let me touch it."