With a skeptical expression I let my eye fall upon the otherwise clear table. Zol smiled. "Just like the books from which you saw the little Pervect reading, there is also a desk, though it exists only inside here."

"Ah," I breathed, enlightened at last. "Magik."

"Yes, indeed," Zol declared. "We Kobolds thrive upon this kind of magik."

The longer he worked, the more agitated the specters surrounding him became. The faces grew ugly and hollow-eyed, threatening him with claws and fangs. They distorted into big blobs with hair scattered on their surfaces.

"Stay away from me now," Zol warned. "Those are viruses. I've been inoculated, but you haven't. If they touch you they will take over your mind. Ah!"

Suddenly the whole end of the room lit up. I recoiled from it, narrowly avoiding a cluster of the blobs.

"That's the map," I confirmed, eyeing the circling blobs.

"It's the only thing in the files that's not password protected," Zol informed me. "But what does it represent?"

"It's not part of Wuh," Wensley stated.

"I don't recognize it, either," Tananda frowned. "It's certainly not Trollia or Klahd." "I'll have to compare it with maps of the other dimensions I've visited," Zol remarked.

"How?" I asked. "You can't memorize something like that."

"I don't have to," the Kobold assured me. "Coley will remember it for us." From his shoulder bag he removed a silverbacked book. When he opened it I saw it had no pages. It was a computer, but in miniature. He held the shiny screen toward the map. I peered at the bright surface with interest. Unlike the computers I had seen on Perv, this one featured color images as well as words. At the moment it had a picture on it of shutterbugs, those tiny denizens of Nikkonia who could capture images on the translucent cells of their wings. They looked so real I reached out to touch them and found my hand stopped by a clear barrier. The shutterbugs looked up at me and gestured impatiently for me to get out of their way. I dodged to one side. One of them held up his thumb, squinted one eye shut, then began fluttering his wings. Zol watched it until it looked up at him to signal that it had finished.

"And a backup, please."

The second shutterbug stepped forward, framed the scene with its hands, then began fluttering. In a moment it, too, was finished. Zol clapped the covers of his miniature computer closed and put it back in his satchel.

"Now, to Kobol!"

TEN

"What a lovely place," Bunny breathed, gazing all around her as Zol led us toward a round building I could just see above the tops of the trees. It was daylight in this part of Kobol. We had arrived in a garden surrounded by high hedges. Arched doorways carved directly into the dense green bushes led from section to section. Every plant, every tree appeared to have been planted and tended with mathematical precision. I couldn't see a leaf out of place. Even the flowerbeds were neat, not a dead or faded bloom in sight. Wensley felt nervous in such utter tidiness. He stayed by Tananda, who seemed perfectly happy to cuddle close to him. I had my hand on Gleep's collar so he wouldn't go running off through the maze. I would get in trouble if he destroyed the precise perfection of this placid scene by punching holes through the hedges.

"Yes," Zol smiled, guiding her along the shady lanes on paths of clipped green grass. "We always have gardens, not that most of us spend too much time in one, but they are here for our mathematicians to take mental health breaks. Numbers can become all-consuming, you know."

"There really was no need for me to come with you," Wensley babbled, looking around him in dismay. "I trust your judgment. You know I do. I… someone needs to keep watch on the castle. I can do that while you are away. It would be very nice if I could go back, just for a while…"

"Don't you want to help in your own dimension's defense?" I asked, fixing him with a gaze that made him wriggle like a worm on a hook.

"Well, of course," Wensley managed, "but is this a matter of Wuh? It would seem to me that my people's concern is mainly with the well being of our own dimension. Not that others are unimportant, of course. Wuhses have compassion for others. We might just be concerned that you are dividing your attention. That's your business, of course. I would never be the one to tell you that you are not doing the job you promised us you would do."

That was the most direct statement I had heard him almost make. "This is connected to Wuh," I assured him as positively as I could. "We're trying to figure out a place where they are vulnerable. Now, they're stronger than we are, they're experienced, they're better magicians, they understand technology and they have all of you under their control. Does it sound like we have any lever to pry them out of Wuh?"

"Er… not that I could discern," Wensley admitted.

"Right! That's what we're doing here. We're looking for a weakness, and in the meantime saving another species who don't know what's hitting them."

"Bravo, Master Skeeve!" Zol cheered. "Well said! And we of Kobol will do our best to facilitate your aims. Count upon us!"

Wensley looked discontented, but he stopped grumbling, especially when Tananda melted a little closer to him.

We passed a niche where a Kobol female sat on a bench. She wore a long, shapeless white garment with a high neck and wide sleeves. In her fingers she had a single blue-petaled flower which she raised to her nose occasionally to sniff. Her large black eyes, fixed in the distance, came back into focus as she acknowledged Zol's cheerful greeting.

"This is Ruta," Zol introduced us, "one of our most talented programmers."

"©," she replied, her cheeks turning a deep gray. "Too kind, Zol."

"What did she say?" I asked, as we passed.

"She smiled at us," Zol answered.

"Why didn't she just smile?"

"She did, in our language."

The round, flattened building had a silvery gray shell not unlike the book in Zol's satchel. It loomed over us as we stopped at a curved, translucent panel. Zol placed his open hand on a pale blue square beside it.

"Zol Icty and four visitors," he announced, beaming at us. "Excuse me. Five visitors." He winked at Gleep. A humming sound erupted out of nowhere. I felt as if someone was touching me on the back. When I jumped around to see who it was, the touch moved to my front, but no one was there. Gleep swiveled his long neck to peer over his back and under his belly. By the expression on their faces Bunny, Tananda and Wensley had also felt it. Only Zol looked calm. He gestured as the translucent panel slid sideways. It was a door.

"This way," our host directed us. He led us down an immaculately clean, white-walled corridor. Oddly, this surprisingly clean place reminded me of the Bazaar, because loud, unintelligible noises, music and shouting poured out of every door. Tananda, Gleep and I stuck close together, on guard in case anything jumped out at us. Bunny walked with Zol, hanging on his every word. "I confess I am a trifle peckish after all that work. Would you like something to eat while I and my friends analyze the map?" "Yeah!" I replied avidly. Zol smiled and pushed through one of the identical doors. The room beyond was filled with Kobolds, all staring into screens like his and playing upon keyboards as though they were pianos. At the far end of the room was a long table filled with brightly colored packages.

"Help yourselves," he offered. "The amount of nourishment in each bag is approximately equal to one-sixth of a Kobold's daily needs, therefore Master Skeeve will need twelve, Mistress Tananda nine, and Mistress Bunny eight. Gleep can have as many as he likes."