had saved his life.  A little girl to whom he owed everything.
	Now it was time to repay that debt.
	Bloodied, battered, exhausted, emotionally drained by what he had done, Tarrin faced that door without fear.  The Goddess was with him.
	They would face this together.
	He padded up to the door.  It was simple, unassuming, a simple wooden door with a rusty chain holding it shut.  But it was cold to the touch, like the cold of a Wraith.  Hooking the chain with his claws, he broke the rusted obstacle easily, twisting it apart, and then he pushed the door open carefully and slowly, exposing the chamber beyond.
	It was very large.  Very large.  Nearly a hundred spans long, and it looked to be almost perfectly circular.  There was a single light in the room, coming from the ceiling, surprisingly bright to his dark-attuned eyes, making him blink to adjust them to the increased light from inside the room.  It was devoid of decoration, of furniture, save a small dais in the exact center of the room, a dais that supported a simple iron stand, upon which rested a large book.  A very unassuming book, with a black leather binding and a simple metal lock keeping it closed.  The light above shone down direcly upon the dais, bookstand, and book, as if to showcase them to any who entered.
	He had finally reached the Book of Ages.
	Trying not to let his impatience get the best of him, he looked into the room without stepping inside.  It was empty, only the circular walls of grayish stone, the light that seemed to come from the top of a domed ceiling, and the dais and its stand and the book on top of it.  There was no indication that there was a guardian lurking within the chamber, not a scent, not a rustle of air, not a whisper of sound.  The chamber was empty.  There it was, the Book of Ages, and it looked like there was nothing between him and it but fifty spans of empty air.
	He knew that that was far from reality.
	There was no sense in standing outside and waiting.  There was no way around this.  He would have to face this Demon sooner or later, and the longer he waited, the more of a chance that fear would gnaw into his resolve. Gripping his sword tightly, Tarrin lifted his foot and sent it over the threshold, then set it down onto the stone of the chamber.
	Nothing happened.
	Stepping completely into the chamber, his every sense keenly aware of the slightest change to his surroundings, Tarrin began to slowly and carefully walk towards the book.  He was ready, even expecting, an attack.  There was no telling if it knew he was there, or he simply hadn't gotten close enough to the book to trigger a response.
	His ears twitched.  There was a sound now...very faint, very far.  Like the hum of a gnat's wings.  He stood up and turned his head this way and that, trying to track the source of that sound, and it became louder and louder.  The faint hum turned into a rhythmic buzzing sound as it approached, the sound of large chitinous wings beating at the air.
	No!  Not now!
	Sarraya's form simply wavered into view just as the Faerie passed by him, her wings buzzing in his ears.  She flew quickly and arrow-straight towards the podium, towards the book, unaware of the danger into which she had just placed herself.
	"Sarraya, NO!" he screamed suddenly, raising his sword, lunging after her.
	The room darkened when Sarraya reached the midpoint, and the shadows seemed to coalesce, to gather into a form immediately in front of the dais holding the book.  She pulled up into a hover and watched in shock as the shadows melded, merged, and solid form replaced the immaterial darkness, a form that caused Sarraya to scream in terror.
	Tarrin was absolutely awestruck.  How horrifying!
	It was nearly fifteen spans tall, twice as tall as Tarrin, formed more or less like a humanoid.  It was unclothed, covered with patchy, manged fur of a rust color.  Its body was thin, but it was most certainly powerful, for its wiry body was defined and sleek.  It had four arms, two small ones sprouting directly from its chest, ending in clawed hands.  The other set, where they should be, ended in clawed pincers that looked like tusks attached to flesh, the claws as long as he was tall, the insides of them covered with sharp ridges and spines to injure trapped prey.  The tips of those pincer-tusks nearly dragged the ground, so long were its arms and its pincers.  Its head was that of a dog, a frothing maw with glowing red eyes above, and goat's horns atop its canine skull.
	It roared, a sound of utter darkness, of pure evil, and Sarraya turned and tried to flee from it mindlessly.  Tarrin rushed forward to protect his tiny friend, ready to face this monster, to distract it so she could get away, but he could run fast enough.
	With a raised pincer-arm, the Demon smashed Sarraya like a bug, sending her tiny body catapulting to the side, all the way to the wall.  Her multicolored wings shattered when she slammed into the wall back first, bouncing off of it and falling limply to the floor, surrounded by tiny fragments of what had once been her beautiful wings as they drifted to the ground in sparkling spirals.
	She did not move.
	"No!  NOOOOOOOOO!!!!!!!" Tarrin shrieked, his eyes igniting from within with the unholy greenish aura that marked his fury.  Not again!  He would not lose another friend!  He would not!  Abandoning rational thought, abandoning fear, abandoning care, Tarrin threw himself into his rage, raised his bestial half to its highest state, a state where the need to destroy overrode even the instinct to survive.  Tarrin raised his weapon and literally leaped at the horrifying monster before him, unafraid of it, unconcerned that he was overmatched.  There was nothing but the need to destroy.
	The creature met his charge without concern, but that nonchalance evaporated when it raised one of its pincer-arms to catch the airborne Were-cat, and got the bottom claw of its pincer sliced off as the Were-cat got within reach.  Tarrin literally landed on top of its extended arm, leaping from it with madness in his eyes, flying right into the monster's face with his sword held high over his head.  He brought the weapon down in a savage overhanded chop, a chop that would split the monster's head clean in half--
	--but it simply wasn't there anymore.
	Tarrin turned a full somersault as the momentum of his attack carried him into a spin, landing on the ground in confusion.  The Cat did not understand.  It was there one instant, and the next it was simply gone.  His nose detected the enemy behind him, and Tarrin dove forward and rolled to his feet facing behind him, but there was nothing there.  He could feel it, it was in the room.
	A shadow behind warned him.  He ducked instinctively as something whooshed over his head, but the Were-cat cried out when the long pincer claws of the monster's undamaged hand appeared on either side of him, and then closed.  The power in that crushing grip instantly sent fire through him, cracked his ribs, crushed the air from his lungs, but the Cat had the presence of mind to react.  Spinning the sword in his paw so the blade faced the other way, he twisted and stabbed blindly behind him, hitting nothing, but then tried again and felt the tip hit something, something that gave to its deadly edge.  The beast bellowed in pain and the grip eased reflexively, allowing him to twist aside and duck under the pincer, sacrificing his shirt to it in the bargain.
	Backing up, panting to recover from the pain, the Were-cat brandished his sword and squared off against the massive monster.  They had proved to each other that they could hurt one another, but the monster seemed rather unimpressed.  Its canine maw almost curled up in a smile as it looked down on its foe.  It pointed at him with one of its smaller hands, and the Were-cat felt something strike the Ward protecting him from magical assault, turning even this monster's magic aside.  That caused it to turn its head sideways, as if intrigued, and then its eyes began to glow with a bright red light as it motioned again.
	Something smothered the Ward, flowed over it, surrounded it, and then attacked it like a pack of wolves hounding a wounded fawn.  The Were-cat staggered under the attack, felt it penetrate the Ward, eat into it like acid, and then disrupt it.  The Ward dissolved like smoke around him.
	Despite his fury, the Cat knew it was now in trouble.  That was confirmed when the creature made a flicking motion with its finger, and Tarrin felt gravity turn over, pulling him up towards the ceiling rather than down to the floor.  The Cat was agile and lithe, twisting in midair to land easily on the sloped ceiling, looking down at the amused creature with burning eyes.  In a quick move, he lunged directly over the monster just as the magic causing the reversal faded, and gravity reasserted itself properly.  Tarrin did not turn over again, he fell headfirst towards the monster with the tip of his sword leading.
	And it simply vanished once again.
	Twisting in midair, he barely managed to land on his feet.  How did it do that?
	All thought ended when something smashed him from behind, sending him sprawling to the floor.  Shaking his head fuzzily, Tarrin got back to his hands and knees, then rolled aside as a huge clawed foot sought to crush him into the floor.  He twisted on the floor inhumanly and took a swipe at that leg, but it was simply gone.
	It was toying with him!
	He was struck again on the side, sent careening across the floor, and he lost his grip on the sword in the tumble.  He heard it clang several times as it bounced along the floor, then skid to a stop somewhere behind him and to his right.  Even the Cat understood that death would be the result if he could not recover the sword.  A sudden red glow behind him sent him scrambling forward, as a raging cone of fire scorched the floor where he had been, a cone that moved to follow him for a terrifying second before exhausting itself mere fingers from reaching his tail.  He snapped to his feet and whirled around, and found himself cut off from his weapon.  It lay behind the massive Demon, who had placed itself squarely in the path to reclaim it, a ball of fire formed around the hand of the arm protruding from its chest.  It gave him an evil, toothy smile, crooking a finger at him with its other human-like hand, taunting him.
	Separated from his weapon, the Were-cat's enraged mind allowed the rational part of it analyze the situation.  It quickly concluded that he stood no chance against this monster so long as it could disappear like it did, and turn gravity over and throw fire at him.  He had no choice.  He had to fight magic with magic.  Despite the fact that his body was too exhausted to survive.
	He never got a chance to try.  A sudden strange force emanated from the creature, striking him like a cudgel to the head, sending him flying to his back with stars dancing before his eyes and a buzzing in his ears.  He swam in a grey mist for what seemed like an eternity, and then felt something lock around his middle, pick him up off the floor.  The pain in that sudden intense grip shocked him back to his senses, and he found himself in the Demon's clutches, held off the floor like a child with its pincers locked around his waist.  And it was squeezing him, driving the sharp ridges and protrusions on its pincers into his middle, tearing a scream from his mouth as he felt as if he was being snapped in half.
	Tarrin grabbed those pincers with his paws and pushed, pushed with all his might, his desperation giving him even more strength.  But it wasn't enough.  He could feel the monster strain against him, have to struggle to maintain its grip, but the pain overwhelmed him momentarily and caused him to lose his purchase.  Pain blasting through him, he grabbed at a desperate ploy, one that just may work.
	Soundlessly, quickly, his great understanding and experience giving him the ability to perform through the pain, Tarrin shapeshifted into his cat form.
	The pincers collapsed around his suddenly small body, and they stopped before they could crush him, striking each other trying to grab the suddenly tiny prey.  They could not close far enough fast enough.  Tarrin dropped from the pincers unabated, landing on all four feet and instantly dashing forward, directly between the monster's legs.  He shifted back in the blink of an eye and raised his paws, driving them up into the crotch of his opponent.  He couldn't hurt it, but he could knock it off its feet, surprise it long enough for him to recover his sword.  A leg snapped out and slammed into the back of its ankle as he pushed on it from below, and he succeeded in knocking it off balance.  It teetered for a moment, then crashed to the floor with such force that he could feel it under his feet.
	Directly on top of his sword.
	That hadn't been in the plan when he did that.  He tried to topple it forward, but it had teetered and fell backward.  Backing away in chagrin, the Were-cat extended his claws and entered a crouching stance, ready for just about anything.  His chagrin deepened when the monster picked up his sword as it got back up, holding it in one of its hands, holding the one thing that gave him a chance.  He had no choice now.  He had to attack it, if only to recover his weapon.
	Putting his ears back, his eyes glowing brightly, forgetting in his rage about the conclusion that his rational mind made but seconds before, the Were-cat lunged forward.  He slid around another blast of fire as if he had not a bone in his body, slithering around it without allowing it to touch him, then he leaped right for the Demon's face with all ten claws out and seeking its eyes.  The sudden, irrational attack seemed to take the Demon aback, and it vanished from before him almost too late to avoid having the Were-cat's claws futilly attempt to gouge out its eyes.  Tarrin flew right through where the monster had been an instant before, landing on all fours near where the book was located--
	--the book!
	Of course!  Even in his fury, he understood the significance of that book!  It was why he was here!  Abandoning even trying to locate the Demon, Tarrin twisted to the side and made a break for the book, his paw outstretched to grab it as soon as he could reach it.  If he could get the book, he could get around the Demon and flee with it!  But a dark shadow to the side told him that it was too close to try, and he suddenly careened aside, abandoning his attempt.
	But it was too late.
	The single pincer-claw on its outside arm drove towards him like a spear, and he felt it hit him in the belly.  He felt every agonizing spine and protrusion as it drove into him, through him, erupting from his back smeared with his blood and with bits of flesh and tissue hanging from the bony protrusions along the inside edge.  There was no pain, only the awareness that he had been impaled, speared like a fish, and with that realization came a curious weakness in his limbs.
	The Demon raised him, turned him so he could look into its eyes, eyes that were without remorse.  Those eyes bored into him as its hands moved the sword, laid the edge of the blade against the side of his neck, taunting him that it could end him right then and there.
	That was a huge mistake.
	He had nothing to lose now.  His eyes turning from green to blazing white, Tarrin reached out and grabbed the Weave in a crushing grip, demanding all the power it could give to him.  The power roared into him, suffused him, threatened to burn him alive, but he did not stop.  His body exploded into Magelight, and he wove together a spell of Fire, a spell with a specific effect.
	The Demons could not be harmed by magic.  But they were still vulnerable to purely physical effects.
	Releasing the weave, Tarrin closed his eyes against what was coming.  A blazing eruption of light exploded from in front of him, moving only away from him, burning into the red eyes of his opponent with the light of a million suns, a light so intense that not even a Demon could resist it.  It staggered back with a howl, thrashing its arm in a way that threw him from its bloody pincer, causing him to crash to the ground.  The pain of having that pincer rip through him hit him like molten steel in his belly, making him convulse as the pain threatened to scour away his sanity even as the Weave sought to scour him into ash.
	But the pain eased.  It eased, turned into a strangely warm feeling inside.  He found newfound strength, newfound determination.  He felt a strange presence, a feeling of something greater, but not something that was the Goddess.  It came from beside him.  He opened his eyes and looked down.
	Sarraya.  He had nearly landed on top of her.  Her eyes were open, and she had a single, tiny hand on his side.  She was using her Druidic power on him, for him, healing his horrific injury by giving his body the energy it needed to heal itself, and accelerating his body's natural healing processes.  She infused him with new strength, replenishing his exhausted body, even gave him enough strength to get a handle back on the Weave.
	She looked up at him, a wan smile on her face, and then her eyes rolled back into her head, and she collapsed.
	There was no thought.  He put a finger to her head, assensing her, forgetting about the Demon.  She was alive.  Hurt, unconscious, but alive.  She would survive long enough for him to deal with the Demon, then come back and heal her.
	Tarrin snapped to his feet as the Demon thrashed for another couple of moments, then blinked its eyes and focused them hatefully on the Were-cat.
	"Now it's personal," Tarrin hissed at it with utter contempt, raising his limned paws before him, raising them to the sky above.  He drew in energy from the Weave, and then he turned it against the Weave itself.  His power radiated from him like an invisible sun, waves of intense power that the Weave itself could not resist.  "Let's see how tough you are without your magic, Demon!" Tarrin suddenly screamed at it, slashing his arms across his body, to the sides, in a snapping motion as he used his power to directly affect the Weave itself, throwing absolutely everything, power, Sorcery, anger, rage, will, even a part of his own soul, into the gargantuan task which he was trying to accomplish.
	The Weave shuddered.  The strands of the Weave, crisscrossing through the sky, coming up from the ground or disappearing into it, suddenly began to glow with a noticable radiance, mesmerizing the citizens of Dala Yar Arak from their daily activities.  They began to glow, then they shuddered again and then they began to move.  They spread away from the Imperial Palace like the opening of a curtain, sliding silently as if some titanic hand were working a loom, shifting them until there was no strand within fifty spans of the outer wall of the Palace.
	And then they winked back out of sight.
	Within him, Tarrin felt something disappear, something that seemed close to his soul.  There was no pain in it, no sensation, only that feeling of sudden disjointedness.  He felt the Weave escape him, drain away from him, leaving him without a backlash for the first time in a while without Sarraya's aid.  And when its power fled from him, it left him severely weakened, a strange kind of weakness that both took its toll on his body and seemed to reach all the way into his core, into the heart of his soul.  It even drained away his fury, leaving him curiously aware, curiously calm.  He tried to reach across the gulf to the Weave.
	But there was nothing.
	He could not afford to try again.  The Demon looked at him in confusion, then seemed to stand there for a moment.
	And its eyes went wide.
	"Don't be surprised," Tarrin hissed in a nearly gutteral snarl.  "No magic can flow without the Weave, and I control the Weave," he finished in a fierce declaration.  He was utterly exhausted, utterly drained.  Shifting the Weave had been what he desired, but his knees shook and he couldn't find the Weave again.  Had his ploy deprived him of magic as well as the Demon?  It certainly seemed that way.  But it had evened things considerably.  It still had his sword, still had an advantage, but it now had to come to him to kill him.  It couldn't stand back and assault him with magic, or vanish and reappear somewhere else every time Tarrin got an advantage.  He crooked his paw at the Demon tauntingly.  "Bring it on," he hissed, laying his ears back.
	If he was trying to enrage the Demon, he was monumentally successful.  With a raging howl, the monster threw his sword to the side, behind the bookstand holding the Book of Ages, then charged towards him with its huge pincers readied to either catch him or stab him.  Tarrin moved out so Sarraya wouldn't be trampled, staying near the wall, readying to receive its charge.  He let it rush him, rush him madly, blindly.  For once, Tarrin would use someone else's rage against them, rather than be the victim of his own fury.  When it was almost close enough to spear him, he suddenly jumped straight up, over its head, catching it by surprise.  It tried to reach up and grab him, stab him, but he pushed off of the dome above and out of its reach, and it turned and slammed its back into the wall, making the whole chamber shudder, as Tarrin landed well out from the wall and simply dashed for his sword, dashed for his very life.
	But in his wildest dreams, he would never have thought that something so large, so ungainly, could move with such speed.  It closed the distance between them quickly, and Tarrin had to dive aside to avoid getting impaled through the back by its mauled pincer-arm's claw.  He rolled to his feet, but it was right on top of him so quickly he barely realized it, and its pincer again managed to lash out and close around his waist.  It picked him up yet again, and he screamed when the tip of its other pincer claw drove into his side, not deeply, but deep enough to threaten to scratch his rib.
	No sliding out this time, mortal, the Demon's hideous voice echoed in his mind.  I think you can't do that with something sticking out of you.  I will crush you slowly, savoring your screams, delighting in your every agonized cry.  It will be delicious.
	Separated from the Weave, with Sarraya unconscious, with no way to injure this Demonic foe, Tarrin was out of ideas.  He simply had no tricks left.  There was nothing he could do but squirm under the crushing vice of its claws, cry out as it increased the pressure, then released it just enough for him to draw breath, then squeeze him again.
	Just to listen to him scream.
	Desperately, Tarrin sought to touch the Weave, to join with its power, but it was beyond his senses, beyond his reach.  He could not touch it.  He was the victim of his own cleverness, caught in his own trap.  Desperation turned to fear, soul-consuming fear as his own death stood before him, and that fear unleashed his other half once again.  He struggled even harder, injuring himself in his attempts to wrest free of the Demon's crushing grip, but it had him too securely.  It would not let him go.
	The sword.  He could see it, laying not ten spans from him.  Right there, waiting for him to pick it up, but it may as well be in Suld for the good it did him.  His eyes locked on the weapon, and a dim memory of something tickled him.  A memory of an exploding ship's wheel, a memory of an explosion of force that cause a collapsing building to fall away from him instead of upon him.  It had that same feeling of expansion that Sarraya's Druidic magic caused within him, a feeling of connection to a greater whole, a power that was warm and gentle.  Those things, they had not been Sorcery.
	The katzh-dashi have minor priest powers because they're technically not mortal, the Goddess had told him, long ago.  By rendering them ageless, they get around the stricture that no mortal may use more than one order of magic.
	Please don't experiment, my kitten, he remembered her saying.  My constitution couldn't take it if you did that.
	Not you can't do that, but my constitution couldn't take it.
	Were-cats don't die of old age, Jesmind had told him.  We live until something kills us.
	All Were-cats have a touch of Druidic power, she had also told him.  Mine is very weak, but it's enough to know a Sorcerer's weaving from a Wizard's spells.  It's how I know a Sorcerer put that damned collar on me.
	Of course!
	His eyes lighting up from within, Tarrin gave the Demon an evil smile.  It made perfect sense!  He wasn't mortal!  All Were-cats had at least some minor Druidic power!  Those instances of strange power, they hadn't been Sorcery, they had been Druidic magic!
	And Druidic power didn't depend on the Weave!
	Reaching into himself, for the first time, Tarrin attempted to find that power, to touch it.  He needed it, needed it like he had never needed it before.  He had no idea how to use it, only wild, instinctual responses to threat.  And he was under threat now.  But his rational mind knew exactly what it needed done.  He reached out with his instincts, the Cat, the soul of the animal within, seeking the power he knew was there.
	And it responded.
	Holding out his paw, Tarrin did exactly what he had seen Sarraya do so many times.  With barely a thought, only an image, a desire, of what he needed to do, he Summoned the sword to his paw.
	And it appeared.
	The Demon's eyes widened in absolute shock as that black sword simply appeared his its quarry's hand.  Tarrin turned that weapon against the Demon instantly, driving it point-first right into the monster's face, hitting it right in the eye.  Only the very tip of the sword could reach, but it was enough to sink it into the Demon's eye and put it out.  With a tremenous howl, it flinched away from the deadly sword and let go of him, staggering back with one of its small hands over its wounded face.  Tarrin dropped to the ground, chest hurting, belly quaking from the pain of being in its clutches, but he ignored it as he drove forward to the attack.  He slashed the monster in the side of the leg with the weapon, sending black blood flying as the deadly edge severed its hamstrings, causing it to howl again and collapse around its lamed leg.  That brought its head within his reach.
	With a quick slice, Tarrin sent the undamaged pincer sailing away from its wrist, turned and sliced the other away, then jumped into the air once again.  It looked up at him with its remaining good eye, a look of stunned disbelief on its face as Tarrin raised the sword over his head, a look of hatred in his eyes as he met the Demon's gaze. It sought to fend him off with its pincers, but only bloody stumps rose to block the Were-cat's path to victory.  And they were not enough.  Tarrin reared back with a ragged cry, coiling his body like a spring.
	And then cleaved its head in half with a massive overhanded blow.
	Tarrin landed beside it as its destroyed body slumped to the floor, taking a few steps back as the stench of its blood assaulted him, blowing out his breath.
	He had beaten it.  He had won.
	The game was over.
	But there was little sense of victory in it.  He was hurt, bloody, wounded.  He had seen his dear friend Sarraya nearly get killed.  He had felt the ecstacy of the Weave, had discovered newfound power within.  He had vanquished an unnatural monster whose power had been incredible.  But it all seemed to pale to his bone weariness, to the sober memory of what he had done to get there.  And pale to the knowledge that though this game was over, another would soon begin.
	Getting the book was not enough.  He remembered Shiika's warning.  That if he touched it, the magic that kept it hidden would be gone, and every mage and Wizard in Arak would come after him.  Now he had to get the book out of there alive, get it to where they could open it, read it, find out where the Firestaff was.  And then go get it.
	Still holding the sword, he rushed over to Sarraya, picking her up tenderly.  He couldn't heal her without Sorcery.  He was too weary to even try if he could.  But she seemed to be alright.  Unconscious, wingless, and with a few broken bones.  But she would be alright.
	She had saved his life.  This victory was also hers, healing him of his hideous wound, giving him the strength to continue the fight.  She was something special.
	Cradling her in his paw, he sheathed his sword and walked wearily up to the stand.  This was it.  This was what he had spent more than half a year trying to find.  A large book, bound in black leather, with the ultimate secret within.  It seemed so anticlimatic to him now, to be done with all obstacles, to be standing before it.  He had won the game, but to him, there was little satisfaction in it now.  Maybe later, but not now.  The elation he thought he'd feel at standing where he was now had evaporated.  Lost in his bone weariness.
	With little fanfare, Tarrin reached down and picked up the Book of Ages.  He held it before him, looking at its featureless black leather binding, wondering tiredly that this could be one of the most precious artifacts in the world.  That countless men, men he didn't even know about, had fought, killed, or died to gain possession of it.  That entire kingdoms were fighting wars over the slightest rumor of its location.  That the entire world had gone mad over what was rumored to exist within it.
	Funny sometimes, how things turned out.
	The Questing Game was over.  And Tarrin had won.
	For what it was worth.
	Now came a new game, a new goal.  Survival.  They would come for him, come after him.  He had to get the book out of the Palace, out of Dala Yar Arak, and he had to do it fast.  It wouldn't take them long to get on his trail, he was sure of it.  Now that he had what he came for, he had to live long enough to take advantage of it.
	He turned his back on the bookstand, walking towards the door.  It was time to go, before Shiika managed to get there.  He was in no condition to fight with her now, not with his weariness and Sarraya to protect.
	There would be time enough to deal with Shiika some other day.  For now, he had more important things to do.
	Survive.

	Getting out of the Palace turned out to be a great deal harder than getting in.
	People were running everywhere now, running around and screaming, moving in large groups.  He was too tired to fight now, too worried about Sarraya to push things.  Cradling her in one paw and holding the Book of Ages in the other, the Were-cat had come up from t