This was no part of a troll maze. This was a djeli’s mirror, like the one on the first-floor landing of our old home. In such a mirror, a djeli could see into the spirit world.
My image stared back at me, caught in all my surprise and consternation. Shadows coiled around me like living things leashed to my flesh. I resembled the spinning dancers in their wreaths of flowing ribbons. A silver cord stretched from my heart into the silent depths: the magical chain that bound me to Vai. I had never before seen it so clearly. I took a step forward and brushed fingers over the surface of the mirror where it seemed the glowing cord cut through into the other side. Where my fingers touched, they slid as into water, pulling through a viscous liquid neither cold nor hot but exactly the same temperature as my skin.
“Andevai’s bride! This I did not expect.” A djeli spoke from within the mirror.
I had walked right into his trap. A crash sounded from upstairs.
I bolted out the door and slammed into Bee.
“We’ve got to run!” I steadied her before she stumbled down the steps. Rory waited on the street, looking alarmed. “The law offices have been abandoned. Someone has set a djeli to watch the premises with magic. I’m afraid it’s the mansa’s djeli, Bakary.”
In such circumstances Bee never argued or questioned. “Where do we go?”
“We need to find out what happened to the law offices.”
At the corner of Enterprise Road and Fox Close, the loitering man had reappeared. He looked our way as he deliberately took off his hat and replaced it with the cap worn by the radicals. He’d seen us, so there was no harm in asking, since he already knew we were there. I strode back to the corner. He touched two fingers to his forehead in a welcoming salute.
I smiled saucily, for I had discovered at the boardinghouse that a flirting smile was likely to get a tip, and right now we needed a tip badly. “May the day bring you peace, Maester. How is it with you and your family? Well, I hope.”
The man measured me with a grin. “Better now you’ve come, lass!”
“Cat, really!” muttered Bee.
“Have you news of what happened to the law office?” I asked.
A pair of mounted men appeared far down Enterprise Road.