Ptolemy's Gate

Let's see you put your money where your mouth is."
    As he spoke this, the boy sprang up, and after a moment Kitty did so too. They stood in the opposing pentacles, staring at each other. Kitty bit her lip. She felt hot and cold at the same time. This wasn't how she'd intended it to go—rejection of her proposal followed by an immediate challenge; she hadn't imagined it this way at all. What to do now? If she broke the summons by stepping from the pentacle, Bartimaeus would be able to destroy her before vanishing. Her resilience would not prevent him from tearing her apart. The idea of this set her flesh trembling beneath her clothes.
    She looked into the face of the long-dead boy. He smiled at her in what was evidently intended to be an amiable fashion, but the eyes were hard and mocking.
    "Well?" he said. "How about it?"
    "You've just told me," she said huskily, "about what you would do to me if I broke the protections. You said you'd fall upon me faster than blinking."
    The smile flickered. "Oh, don't pay any attention to that. I was only bluffing. You don't need to believe everything old Bartimaeus says, now do you? I'm always joking, you know that." Kitty said nothing. "Go on," the boy continued, "I won't do anything to you. Put yourself in my power for a moment. You might be surprised. Put your trust in me."
    Kitty ran the tip of a dry tongue against her lower lip. The boy smiled harder than ever; he put such effort into it that the surface of his face was taut and straining. She looked down at the chalk marks on the floor, then at her foot, then at the chalk again.
    "That's the ticket," the boy said.
    Kitty suddenly realized that she had forgotten to breathe. She exhaled violently. "No," she gasped. "No. That won't achieve anything."
    The dark eyes watched her, the mouth a sudden line. "Well," the djinni said sourly, "I admit my hopes weren't high."
    "It's not about the trust," she said, lying. "It's that you'd simply dematerialize. You can't stay on Earth without the power of the summons, and I haven't got the energy to summon you again right now. The point is," she went on desperately, "that if you and other djinn joined forces with me, we could defeat the magicians and stop them summoning you. After we'd defeated them, you'd never be called on again."
    The djinni snorted. "I've no time for fantasies, Kitty. Listen to yourself—even you don't believe a word you're saying. Well, if that's all, you might as well dismiss me." The boy turned his back on her.
    At this, a great rage surged through Kitty. Memories of the last three years swam before her eyes; she felt again the enormous effort it had taken to get this far. And now this proud and blinkered spirit was rejecting her ideas out of hand. It hadn't even given them a moment's fair and considered thought. True, the details had to be worked out; there were many issues to be resolved, but clearly some kind of cooperation was both possible and necessary. She felt close to tears, but furiously drove the sensation away. She stamped her foot, making the floor reverberate. "So," she snarled, "that stupid Egyptian boy was good enough for you, was he? You put your faith in him happily enough. Then why not me? What did he do for you that I couldn't? Well? Or am I too lowly to hear about his great deeds?" She spoke bitterly, savagely, contempt for the demon rising like gall inside her.
    He did not turn to look at her. Moonlight spilled over his bare back and stick-thin limbs. "For one thing, he followed me to the Other Place."
    Kitty found her voice at last. "But that's—"
    "It's not impossible. It's just not done."
    "I don't believe it."
    "You don't have to. But Ptolemaeus did. I challenged him to prove his trust in me too. And that was the way he did it: by devising the Gate of Ptolemy. He went through the four elements to find me. And he paid the price, as he guessed he would. After that—well, if he'd proposed a harebrained union of commoners and djinn, perhaps then I'd have gone along with it. There was no limit to our bond. But for you, well-intentioned as you are . . . ? Sorry, Kitty. I think not."
    She stared at his back, saying nothing. Finally the boy turned, his face hidden in shadow. "What Ptolemy did was unique," he said softly. "I wouldn't ask it of anyone else, not even you."
    "Did it kill him?" she asked.
    He sighed. "No. . ."
    "Then what price—?"
    "My essence is a little vulnerable today," Bartimaeus said. "I'd be grateful if you would keep your