Ptolemy's Gate

batted about was not doing me any good. Mandrake . . . It was Mandrake's doing. He'd pay for this, first chance I got. [6]

[5] Insert achievement of your choice from the following selection: (a) fought the utukku single-handed at the battle of Qadesh, (b) carved the great walls of Uruk from the living ground, (c) destroyed three consecutive masters by use of the Hermetic Quibble, (d) spoke with Solomon, or (e) other.

[6] Not that I could do anything against him in my current state. At least, not alone. Certain djinn, Faquarl among them, had long espoused collective rebellion against the magicians. I'd always dismissed this as so much hogwash, impossible to achieve, but if Faquarl had come up to me with some boneheaded scheme right then, I'd have joined him with much high-flying and inane whoops of joy.

I was worried that Jenkins might have suspected I was no ordinary insect, and have taken evasive steps, but to my relief he appeared at the door a few minutes later and set off back up Whitehall. I knew the fly guise would no longer wash with him, so—groaning with the pain—I became a sparrow once more, and set off in pursuit.
    As dusk settled on the city, the magician Jenkins made his way, on foot, along the lanes of central London. He had three further assignations. The first was in a hostelry not far from Trafalgar Square. I didn't attempt to enter this time, but watched him through a window, speaking to a narrow-eyed woman in dowdy dress. Next he crossed Covent Garden up to Holborn, where he entered a small coffee shop. Again I deemed it sensible to keep my distance, but I got a clear view of the person he spoke to, a middle-aged man with an oddly fishlike face. His lips looked as if they'd been loaned him by a cod. Like my essence, my memory was full of holes; even so, something about him was a bit familiar. . . No—I gave up. I couldn't place him.
    It was a curious business all round. From what I'd overheard, some kind of plot was certainly on the boil. But these people seemed oddly unsuited for dangerous machinations. None of them was powerful or dynamic. In fact, the reverse was true. If you'd lined every magician in London up against a playground wall and picked sides for soccer, they'd have been the ones left standing at the end, next to the fat kid and the one with the plaster cast. Their general rubbishness was evidently part of a pattern, but I couldn't for the life of me tell what it was.
    We came at last to a dilapidated cafe in Clerkenwell and here, for the first time, I noticed a slight alteration in Jenkins. Hitherto he had been breezy, abrupt, casual in his dealings; now, before entering, he paused as if to steady himself. He slicked back his hair, adjusted his tie, and went so far as to inspect the pimple on his chin with a small mirror he had in his pocket. Then he entered the cafe.
    Now this was interesting. He wasn't talking to equals or inferiors any more. Perhaps the mysterious Mr. Hopkins himself waited inside. I needed to find out.
    Which meant I had to gird my diminutive sparrow's loins and make another change.
    The cafe door was shut, the windows likewise. A small gap beneath the door let out a slit of yellow light. With a groan of despair, I shifted and became a wisp of coiling smoke, which issued its weary way through the crack.
    A warm fug of coffee, cigarettes, and frying bacon. The smoke's tip peeped under the door, reared up, and looked left and right. Everything was a little blurred—following my transformation my eyes were misting worse than ever—but I could make out Jenkins settling himself at a distant table. A dark shape sat there too.
    The smoke slithered across the room, keeping low against the floor, winding cautiously around chair legs and the shoes of customers. An uneasy thought occurred to me; halting beneath a table, I sent forth a Pulse to search for hostile magic.[7] While waiting, I looked toward Jenkins's companion, but his back was to me: I could see no details.

[7] The Pulse had the form of a small green-blue sphere, about the size of a marble, visible only on the seventh plane. It would meander at speed around the locale before returning to its sender. On its return its appearance indicated the level of magic it had discovered: green-blue meant the area was clear; yellow that a trace of magic existed; orange suggested strong enchantments, while red and indigo were my cue to make my excuses and head for the exit.

The Pulse returned—virulent orange,