“Oh, Olga,” muttered Margit, a trifle peevishly.

“Um.” Miriam nodded, pained. Two hundred miles in three days, she thought. Even Amtrak can do better than that! “Yes, but I don’t think they’d work too well over here,” she whuffed out, as a particularly bad rut in the road threw her against the padded side of the carriage.

“What a shame,” Olga replied brightly. “That means we’ll just have to take a little longer.” She pointed out of the carriage door’s open window. “Oh, look! A squirrel! On that elm!”

It was at this point that Miriam realized, with a sickly sinking feeling, that taking a carriage to the capital in this world might be how the aristocracy traveled, but in comfort terms it was the equivalent of an economy-class airline ticket to New Zealand—in an ancient turboprop with malfunctioning air-conditioning. And she’d set off with a hangover and a chatterbox for a fellow traveler, without remembering to pack the usual hand luggage. “Oh god,” she moaned faintly to herself.

“Oh, that reminds me!” Olga sat upright. “I nearly forgot!” From some hidden pocket she pulled out a small, neatly wrapped paper parcel. She opened it and removed a pinch of some powdery substance, then cast it from the window. “Im nama des’ Hummelvat sen da’ Blishkin un’ da Geshes des’reeshes, dis expedition an’ all, the mifim reesh’n,” she murmured. Then Olga noticed Miriam looking at her blankly. “Don’t you pray?” she asked.

“Pray?” Miriam shook her head. “I don’t understand—”

“Prayers! Oh, yes, I forgot. Didn’t dear Roland say that on the other side everybody is pagan? You all worship some dead god on a stick, impaled or something disgusting, and pray in English,” she said with relish.

“Olga,” Margit said warningly. “You’ve never been there. Roland’s probably telling fibs to confuse you.”

“It’s all right,” Miriam replied. What, Margit isn’t a world-walker? she wondered. Well, that would explain why she’s stuck chaperoning Olga around. “We don’t speak, um, what is the language called again?”

“Hoh’sprashe?” said Olga.

“Yes, that’s it. And the other side is similar to this side geographically, but the people and how they dress and act and talk are different,” she said, trying to think of something it would be safe to talk about.

“I’d heard that,” said Olga. She leaned back against her bench, thoughtfully. “You mean they don’t know about the Sky Father?”

“Um.” Miriam’s evident perplexity must have told its own story, because Olga beamed brightly at her.

“Oh, I see! I’ll have to tell you all about the Sky Father and the Church!” Olga leaned forward. “You don’t believe, do you?” she said very quietly.

Miriam sat up. Wha-a-at? she thought, suddenly surprised. “What do you mean?” she asked.