I didn’t have to wait long. I felt Caco’s presence within twenty minutes of sitting down, just as I was wondering how much longer I could make my drink last without raising the bartender’s ire. There was just a tickle at the base of the skull, at first. A cat’s-paw presence that whispered through my mind and caused the hair on the back of my arms to rise as a shiver slid down my spine. I was being mind-probed—my thoughts were being magically sifted and assensed. I tried to resist, but my feeble efforts to block the spell were swept aside like fragile cobwebs.