The Catswold Portal

They lit three of the oil lamps stored within the tunnel, and then began to climb up the black twisting way. Their journey became a montage of the miles of tunnel. Melissa saw deep cracks in the ancient earth, dark trickles of water, falling space; time tilted and changed, and the earth around them changed as they rose within it. Melissa thought many hours had passed when suddenly thunder echoed above them and they entered a tunnel with smooth pale walls and a floor of glazed tiles marked with occasional shallow puddles. Then, where a black rune marked the pale wall, the prince said an opening spell.

A portion of the wall swung back. They passed into another smooth tunnel lit from above by yellow lights which were not oil lamps. This passage led to an echoing basement. They climbed iron steps strewn with paper and bottles. At the top of the long flight they pushed out through a metal door into white fog. Lights sped past them incredibly fast, smeared within the fog. A hissing noise ran with the lights, like wet snakes. The young woman drew back, afraid. The prince took her hand, urging her on. But Siddonie walked alone, small and erect, staring around her at this world with a sharp, canny interest.

The three refugees crossed half the city, climbing hills crowded with tall, pale buildings. High up, they left the fog behind them. It lay below them like a white sea. Now above them a black sky reeled away empty, pierced with lights that Melissa knew were stars. The vast space in which those stars swam terrified her.

Then came a scene of daylight painfully bright. Melissa could see through a large window the city spread below, the tall smooth buildings thrusting up through that vast space that was bright now, pale blue and awash with the yellow sun. She thought of elven tales of the sun. The yellow ball blinded her. The young wife stood at the window, her hair more golden than the sun. Behind her Ithilel and young Siddonie worked at a desk littered with papers. Another montage of scenes showed Siddonie and Ithilel writing in ledgers, entering figures, then the two out on the street, going into buildings carrying a leather satchel. She saw them enter a paneled room and empty Netherworld trinkets from the satchel onto a desk: emeralds, opals, diamonds, sapphires. She watched them trade these for a slip of paper. This happened many times. Their clothing became rich. Their dwelling changed to a huge house looking down at a bay. She saw servants, rich food, and rich fabrics. She saw in a last sharp scene the face of the child Siddonie looking directly into the mirror. Her black eyes were appraising and cold. Then Melissa was jerked back to the dungeons.

She felt as weary and drained as if she herself had made that terrible journey. Before her, the Harpy ruffled and stroked her white feathers. Melissa saw that the rebels were still in sight, searching the cellar as if no time had passed. She faced the Harpy crossly. “That was a fine vision but it told me nothing about who I am.”

The Harpy snorted with disgust. “Yes, it told you. You will figure it out soon if you are using your mind.” The beast looked hard at her then brought another vision. “After this I will have my mirror or I will yell so loud every guard in the palace will hear me.”

Chapter 16

Now in the Harpy’s mirror mist clung against the buildings of the upperworld city and shrouded the upperworld alleys where cats roamed lithe and restless. The sight of cats stirred a strange feeling in Melissa. She watched a yellow tom circle a doorway, watched a gray female shoulder out through the flimsy screen door in the back of a wineshop. She saw a thin tiger cat in the alley behind a grocery picking through trash, stopping often to stare up at the sky where, through fog, glowed the diffused light of the upperworld moon. She saw within a satin apartment a tan and brown cat waking her mistress with harsh cries then streaking past the woman’s silk-gowned legs into the night. She watched a fat white female cat lead four starving cats through an open cellar door into a shabby room. There the female vanished; and a white-haired woman opened tins of cat food and fed the strays, then went out again, leaving the door ajar.

Inside apartments cats cried and paced, staring out through dirty back windows or through curtained front windows, or leaping over furniture and across desk-tops seeking a way out into the moonlit night. All over the city cats moved restlessly, caught by the moon’s pull. Melissa knew more from the vision than simply what she saw. She knew that this night, not only the moon called to them.

In an alley between the Tracy Theater and a tall Victorian house, a big, heavy-boned tiger cat leaped from the fence to a rooftop. Pausing on the flat tar roof, he looked around, puzzled, restless and irritable, and a strange eagerness gripped him. Tail lashing, he jumped from that roof to the next, a four-foot span, and trotted to the next chasm and leaped again.