Read The Door Into Fire for Free Online

tucking its forepaws beneath its chest so that it looked like a broody hen, and half-closed its eyes.
    “Well, hello,” Herewiss said, putting down his mug to scratch under the cat’s chin. It squeezed its eyes shut altogether and stretched its neck out all the way, purring like a gray-furred thunderstorm.
    Herewiss went back to the contemplation of his ale, rubbing under the cat’s chin automatically for a few minutes. Then suddenly the cat opened up its round blue eyes. “Prince,” it said in its soft raspy voice, “mind the innkeeper’s daughter.”
    He laughed under his breath. “No one keeps a secret from a cat,” he quoted. “May I ask what you’re called?”
    “M’ssssai,” it said. “That’s my inner Name, prince: the outer doesn’t matter.”
    Herewiss blinked in surprise. “I’ll keep your secret,” he said in ritual response. “But I fear I have none to give you in return. I don’t know mine yet.”
    “Well enough. Time will come, and then you can come back and tell me.”
    “Forgive me,” Herewiss said, “but how did you know who I am?”
    “I’ve been in your saddlebag.”
    “It had a binding on it.”
    The cat smiled, and after a moment Herewiss smiled back at it. Cats, the legend said, had been created second after men, and had a Flame of their own, one which they had never lost.
    “The very fact of a binding,” M’ssssai said, “made me slightly suspicious. I could smell it from down here, and know you for its author. And the contents of the bags settled the matter. Only two men alive wear that surcoat, and you’re too young to be one of them, so you must be the other.”
    “Granted.”
    “What are you doing with those grimoires in your bags?”
    Herewiss made a face. “Isn’t it said of my line that there’s no accounting for us? I’m a part-time sorcerer, out seeing the world.”
    M’ssssai half-closed his eyes again. “Sorcerers usually stay home unless they have something in hand. And you’re more than just a sorcerer, prince. I know the smell of Flame.”
    “I have no focus,” Herewiss said, very softly, “and no control. I can’t use a Rod.”
    “The innkeeper’s daughter,” said the cat, “is a dabbler; she has just enough Flame to be able to smell it herself, though she has no control or focus either. But she’s looking for a way to free her Power, and I dare say she’s noticed at least part of what you are. If I were you, I’d keep the shields up around your bags tonight, or else sleep lightly. She’s a brewer of semi-effective love potions, and she throws her curses crooked. She has a most undisciplined mind. Not to mention that she’d probably try to drain you—”
    “A vampire?”
    “Only between the bedsheets; unfortunately she’s acquired a taste for that kind of thing. I see too many people going out of here looking lost and drained in the morning.”
    “M’ssssai, I thank you.” Herewiss scratched behind the cat’s ears. “But why are you telling me all this?”
    The cat put its whiskers forward, amused. “You have good hands.”
    M’ssssai stood up, stretched, arching his back, his tail straight up in the air. “Mind her, now,” he said, and jumped down from the table, vanishing into the forest of trestles and benches.
    Herewiss looked up cautiously. The innkeeper’s daughter had just come down from upstairs, and was going through the kitchen door. He took his opportunity and eased out from behind the table, heading hurriedly for the protection of the shadows of the stairway. He took the stairs two at a time, sloshing ale in all directions, pausing at the top of the stairs to get his bearings; it was dark up there. Then Herewiss headed softly down the hall, trying to keep the floor from creaking under him, his breath going up before him like pale smoke in the chill air.
    His room door was ajar. He listened at it, but heard nothing. A swift cold draft was whispering through the crack. Gently he put his weight against the