"But don't you see?" Junthin said, on his side, "It arranged you and her to be here. And me to be at home. A client canceled. Gods know why—" Owlish eyes blinked at Melot and sent chills down Melot's back before they slid away to blink at the doctor and to glance down at the paper again and up. "If they don't stop this—"

"You canfind them."

"Yes." The paper shook in Junthin's wrinkled hands. He wiped his face with his sleeve, the paper still trembling and wavering. "Oh dear gods, dear gods. A nexus. A nexus. O dear gods. How far?"

Melot looked from him to the doctor, whose handsome face was starkly sober. "Master Junthin," said Dr. Toth, "you know that I'm a tolerably important nexus myself. You know I enjoy a certain latitude with the Profession on that account, not mentioning my talent. That my researches persistently turn up a certain set of consequences should I be . . . eliminated, or bothered, or directly hampered in my work: do you see? And those consequences are far-reaching. I consult every wizard's text and put all the prohibitions and the possible interferences together and they do assume a pattern into which I fit rather centrally, I may say, which assures that of all individuals in all Liavek not safe to trifle with, I am at the head of the list, I in my modest house, my quiet researches, my inquiries—"

"Yes, yes, we all know that. We pay you handsomely, extravagantly. Ipay you. You render a service."

"And keep you from eliminating yourselves or a city street or perchance Liavek itself by combination of unforeseen consequences . . . Perhaps. I always considered, that would be justification enough for what I cast for my horoscope and my own luck—"

"We never doubt it. But, my dear doctor Toth, we cannot stand on—"

"But do you see, Master Junthin, tonight I learned a different truth about my importance. It wasn't myself had the importance all along. Shedid. Her luck arranged all of this. Arranged my birth two hundred years ago. Arranged your client's cancellation. Arranged all of this and my profession and our very existence. Nexus, man. A big one. That'swhat those fools are playing with. They've got her brother. His luck didn't outmaneuver theirs; they mistake him for some petty little trinket they can use not knowing that the nexus-sense they pick up is just the overspill from hers. And I'm telling you, Master Junthin, if they harm him in their brigandish behavior, if they run afoul of herluck and tie anythingimportant to it—like the welfare of Liavek, do you see? Do you see what they're meddling with?"

"O dear gods and stars."

"Wait. Wait." Facts and insinuations and promises went flying this way and that in confusion, like pigeons, and Melot's head spun. "You promised about my brother . . ." It was not precisely so, but it was never wasted to try to convince the other side in a bargain there wasa bargain. It was all the wit she had left, with the red wine dizzying her and the warmth and the profusion of candles and wizard-talk flying past her ears. "You got to get him out, Master Toth. You do got to do that, you took my money—" O fool! To mention the money, the pitiful money— She blinked at them and shivered and saw two men and them both magicians staring at her as if she had snakes for hair. "You got to. I got this feeling—I get these feelings—things will go wrong if something happens to him."

"Is she lying?" asked Master Junthin.

"I don't know," said the doctor.

She was. She was lying with a vengeance, because premonitions seemed the only cash these wizard-types understood, premonitions and bad luck and good. She knew how to throw an evil-eye scare into a drunk or to ill-wish a street ruffian and give him the doubts enough to get away; so she did it with a first-class wizard and the wizards' own lawyer; and saw them stare at her and wonder.

"Bless," said the wizard, and the air went a little colder and the candles dimmed all together and came up again.

" Dosomething. Get the neighbors, can you?"

"Summon? With herinvolved?"

"Have you a countersuggestion, Master Junthin?"

"O gods, O gods," Master Junthin murmured. And shut his eyes. The air went decided chill. A bell began to ring somewhere in the hall. Another rang far away as if it was outside the house. And farther and farther and farther until the air whispered with them. Melot took up the goblet and took another sip of wine. She wanted it for her nerves. And she pretended a composure which was the greatest lie yet.

Meanwhile the bells rang and Dr. Toth stood there with his arms folded looking down at her. With that look on his handsome face that said he had his doubts in both directions.

"Mmmph," she said, and offered the plate of cheese with eyes wide and naive. He caught the irony. It was dangerous to have done. A meticulous brow lifted. But by the gods, a woman never got anywhere in the world letting the opposition drag her about and tell her sit here and sit here and stare at her like that. Her hair was snarled from running. It fell down around her ears and her eyes, too tangled with itself to stay put; and she sweated, and her best (and only) dress wanted laundering, while he smelled of books and fine soap and even his sweat smelled clean. She was despicable. She was plain and starved and her dress hung about her ribs. And he had talked about him being born—( two hundred years ago?)—to satisfy her luck, which rattled around in her brain without a niche to fall into. Two hundred years ago?

Was the way he looked—something he had taken in payment?

The front door opened. Master Junthin went out into the hall and brought in an out-of-breath little man in a dressing-gown . . . "What's toward, what's toward? Good gods, Junthin—" The little man spied Dr. Toth and stopped in midword. And even then the front door was opening again. Two women came into the room on their own, like as peas except one had her hair in pins and the other had it dripping wet; and hard on their heels came a fat man with a marmoset on his shoulder. "What is this?" the marmoset piped, falsetto. "What is this?" There were more arriving. A boy with scales on one cheek. A black woman who cast no shadow. The door kept opening and closing and Melot clutched the wine goblet, aware of the stares no less on her than on Dr. Toth, and hoping—hoping desperately for the sight of two wizards in particular.

But they did not come. And Junthin began to explain the whole affair to the others, using words that slipped in and out of language she knew, till Dr. Toth, unlike himself, stole over to Melot and took the goblet away, took her hand and drew her to her feet like a grand lady, holding her arm locked gentlemanly-like in his.

"You just have to want your brother," Dr. Toth said. "Mind is very important in this."

"I wanthim."

"Fine, fine. Now you've got to trust Junthin for this. This isn't my kind of affair." He gave her hand a little squeeze and passed her hand grandly to Junthin's reach.

The wizard's skin was cold and damp. "My dear woman, my dear, just stand there, right where you are. Just shut your eyes, hold your eyes shut. O, gods, my furniture—" And from the woman with the wet hair: "A nexus of that size, O ye gods and stars, Junthin, quit babbling about the furniture—"

"But my vases, my vases—" Junthin fled and set one and another of the great ornate vases on the floor, then scurried back to the large rug where others were clearing the tables. The door opened to another arrival— "Never mind," the woman of the pins said to the latecomer, an aged, wizened man, "stand here, Gaffer Bedizi'n—" And from the old man: "Eh? I was in bed, my cat woke me— Eh, Dr. Toth? It is Dr. Toth, 'pon my soul—"