The opposite wall of the elevator was farther away than usual. So was the ceiling, and the floor. I rubbed my eyes. The light in the car was fading. I knew, suddenly, what was happening. This time, for the first time, I had some scrap of warning. And it didn’t help a bit.

I went down.

Card 4: Behind

Seven of Swords

Gray: Possible failure of a plan, arguments, spying, incomplete success, unstable efforts.

Crowley: The policy of appeasement, which may fail if violent, uncompromising forces take it as their natural prey.

4.0: What friends are for

… And came back up, easy as a swimmer who rises, breaks the water’s surface, and opens eyes and mouth to the air. I opened mine to the night. I heard the churning, guttering sound of water moving over something; smelled a faint odor of dead fish, beer, perfumes, and old smoke; and saw row after row of little electric lights, swinging vigorously on their strings overhead. My Hyde persona had brought me to the street in front of the Underbridge and dropped me off. I was standing up, my feet wide apart on the uneven concrete. Finding myself so suddenly in charge of my own legs almost made me fall off them. I caught myself on an iron stanchion that marked the edge of an old parking lot.

The Underbridge had been a generating plant for electricity once, stealing force from the water dashing past the river dam. Electricity was still generated there, but on a much smaller scale. Now the river ran spotlights and a few tubes of neon and the sound system and the video projector and these festive strings of lights outside the building. When the river was low in midsummer, we snuffed the outside lights and the neon, and kept the volume down and our fingers crossed. Yes, we; the operation of the Underbridge was the only thing I did in which I identified myself as one of a group. I didn’t do it with very good grace, but even so I recognized the Deal in action. I got to work with the skills I’d been born to; I paid with my independence. Fair’s fair.

This was the first time I’d come back up without discomfort or outright pain somewhere on or in me, and in a familiar place. So it was a minute or two before I panicked. What time was it? How had I gotten here from the Night Fair on the other side of the river, and what had gone on while I did? Were Dana and her friends still there? Had they found the third room? No, they couldn’t have, not without knowing to look for it, and even Dana wasn’t aware of my collection. Had they found and braved the stairs? If they had, maybe they’d all broken their necks. But if they’d made it to the ground floor, they might be in pursuit of me even now.

A frantic look around told me they weren’t, at least not immediately; nor was anyone else. Then I realized that for all I knew, it had been months since I went down. By now we might all be best friends. I hated this.