The Book of Night With Moon by Diane Duane Page B

were supposed to be in service to the Powers That Be, sometimes… just sometimes… one or another of them will shift allegiances. There was, after all, one of those Powers that had had a profound disagreement with all the Others, very early on in the Universe. It had lost some of Its strength, as a result, but not all: and It was still around. Dealing with the Lone Power could seem very attractive to some, Rhiow knew; but she considered such dealings unacceptably hazardous. This was, after all, the same Power that had invented death and turned it loose on the worlds… a final nasty offhand gesture before turning Its back on the establishment that It felt had spurned It. The Lone One was as likely to turn on Its tools as on Its enemies.
    Carl looked at her. "You're thinking of rogues," he said. "I'd think you would be, too, Har'lh," Rhiow said, "the evidence being what it is at the moment."
    He folded the first section of the paper, put it aside. "It's circumstantial at best. Can you think of any way a gate's logs might wipe accidentally on access or transit?"
    "Not at first lick," Rhiow said, "since gates are supposedly built not to be able to function that way. But I'll take it up with Saash. If anyone can find a way to make a gate fail that way, she can. Meanwhile, I'll go Downside myself later on and check the top-level spell emplacement, just to make sure one of the other gate structures isn't interfering with the malfunctioning one."
    "If you like… but I'm not requiring it of you."
    "I know. I'd just like to be sure the trouble isn't some kind of structural problem."
    "All right. But watch yourself down there."
    "I will, Advisory."
    "Anything else I need to know about this?"
    Rhiow sneezed, a residual effect from the foul rodent-smell down on the tracks, not to mention the way she smelled herself. "A lot of rats down there, Har'lh. A lot. "
    Carl raised his eyebrows. "The early spring," he said, "combined with this hot weather? That's what the paper says. Some kind of screwup in the normal breeding season—"
    Rhiow laid her whiskers back, a "no" gesture. "A lot of rats since yesterday. In fact, to judge from the quality of the smell, since this morning.— That's the other thing: we found a hurt youngster back there."
    "Feline? Human?"
    "Feline. About the same age for us as a human child of nine. I think he ran into those rats: he's all bitten up. Urruah and Saash are seeing to him. He should be all right, after some care."
    "Very well." Carl picked up the magazine section. "The other gates are behaving themselves?"
    "No signs of trouble."
    "You don't think I need to declare them off-limits till you can look into this in detail?"
    Rhiow thought. There were three other worldgates associated with the Terminal. Taking them offline would throw the whole weight of the area's extraspatial transit on the Penn Station gates. Penn was underequipped to handle such a load— its two gates normally handled only onplanet work, and one of them would have to be extensively restrung at very short notice if the Grand Central gates went down. Jath, Hwaa, and Fhi'ss, the technical team handling Penn, would not thank her at all.
    But it wasn't a question of their feelings: what mattered was safety. Still, the nodes and string structures around the other two track-level gates, seen at a distance, looked fine; and she had Saash's report….
    "I'll double-check them shortly," Rhiow said. "But Saash says the gates at Thirty-two and One-sixteen, and the Lexington Avenue local gate, are patent and functional, and their logs and access-transit structures answered properly when interrogated. Her snap assessment is likely to be as accurate as my more leisurely one. If I find anything when I go Downside, I'll advise you. But on present data, I would advise you to leave the gates as they are."
    Carl nodded. "I'll take One-sixteen home and check it," he said.
    "Don't be seen," Rhiow said. "Nothing runs on the lower levels on Sunday."
    Carl smiled