Free The Book of Jhereg by Steven Brust Page A

I’ve got a fix on you. I’ll be right there
.”
    “
Give me a minute first, so I can turn off some protections and alarms. I don’t want to have forty-eleven things go off when you teleport in
.”
    I ordered our teleport protections taken down for a few seconds. Daymar appeared in front of me—floating, cross-legged, about three feet off the floor. I rolled my eyes; Cawti shook her head sadly. Loiosh hissed. Daymar shrugged, and stretched his legs down; stood up.
    “You left off the thunderclap and the lightning flash,” I told him.
    “Should I try again?”
    “Never mind.”
    Daymar stood roughly seven feet, three inches tall. He had the sharp, well-chiseled features of the House of the Hawk, although they were somewhat gentler, softer, than those of most Hawklords I’ve met. He was incredibly thin, looking almost transparent. It seemed that his eyes rarely focused, giving him the appearance of looking past whatever he was observing, or at something deep inside it. We had been friends since the time I had almost killed him for mind-probing one of my people. He’d done it out of curiosity, and I think he never understood why I objected.
    “So,” Daymar asked, “who is this you want located?”
    “A Jhereg. With luck, I should have what you wanted for the trace. Will this do?”
    I handed him a small crystal I’d taken from the chest. He inspected it carefully, although I’m damned if I know what he was looking for. He nodded and gave it back to me.
    “I’ve seen better,” he remarked, “but it will do.”
    I set it carefully down on the right side of the brazier. I opened the envelope I’d gotten from Kiera and removed about half of the dozen or so strands of hair. These I set on top of the envelope on the left side of the brazier; the others I would save in case I had to try the spell again.
    It was interesting, I reflected, how much a witchcraft spell resembles an assassination, as opposed to either of them being similar to sorcery. To use sorcery, all you do is reach out through your link to the Imperial Orb, grab some power, shape it, and throw it. With witchcraft, however, you have to plan carefully and precisely so that you don’t end up searching around for some implement you need, right at the moment of using it.
    The room began to get smoky with the lingering scent of incense. I took my position in front of the brazier; Cawti automatically stood to my right, and I motioned Daymar to stand at my left, and back. I let my mind drift and linked up mentally with Cawti. It was not necessary for there to be physical contact between us for this to happen, which is one reason why I like to work with her. One of the clear advantages witchcraft enjoys over sorcery is that morethan one witch can participate in a single spell. I felt my power diminish and increase at the same time; which is strange to say and even stranger to experience.
    I laid a few leaves on the coals, which obliged by making the proper hissing sounds. They were large, broad leaves from the Heaken tree, which only grows out East. They had been prepared by being soaked in purified water for a number of hours, and by diverse enchantments. A large gout of steam-smoke rose up, and Cawti began chanting, low and almost inaudible. As the leaves began to blacken and burn, my left hand found the envelope and the hairs. I rolled them around on my fingertips for a moment. I felt things start to happen—the very first sign of a witchcraft spell starting to have any kind of effect is when certain senses begin to feel sharper. In this case, each hair felt distinct and unique to my fingertips, and I could almost make out tiny details on each one. I dropped them onto the burning leaves, as Cawti’s chanting became more intense, and I could almost pick out the words.
    At that moment, a sudden rush of power flooded my mind. I felt giddy, and I would certainly have lost my end of the spell if I had actually begun it. A thought came into being, and I