Maia

87: WHAT MAIA OVERHEARD

Maia had been milking the cows. She had not lost the knack-or at all events jt had come back quickly enough- but her soft, white fingers and pampered, upper city wrists were aching, and now the yoke seemed pressing hard on her shoulders. All the same it was reassuring-the feel of wooden pattens on bare feet and the well-remembered sensation of treading on cracked, summer-baked mud and powdery dust. The dark cowshed was heartening, too, with bright spots of light showing through the knotholes of its planks; likewise the stamping and kloofing of the cows and the smells of cow-dung and of evening water from the brook outside. Her mind might prompt her as often as it liked that she was not out of danger, but in her heart these familiar things spoke of security. It is always satisfying to show oneself unexpectedly capable in some chance-encountered situation where one's companions are all at sixes and sevens. Meris was a shocking bad hand about the place, and even Zirek, though willing enough, knew next to nothing and was continually having to be instructed.

Doing her damnedest to look as though she didn't find the pails heavy, Maia carried them across the yard, through the stone-flagged kitchen and into the little, narrow dairy beyond. Here she set them down, ducked out of the yoke and then, lifting first one pail and then the other, emptied them into the big clay vessels on the shelf above the churn.

Even the dairy was not properly cool this weather. The milk would have to be used quickly. A little would be sold round about, but most would go to themselves-drunk fresh or made into butter, cheese or whey. This was hardly more than a subsistence farm, a bit better than Morca's patch on the Tonildan Waste, but still a long way behind the kind of place where Maia had met Gehta. The farmer, Kerkol, his wife Clystis and her fourteen-year-old brother lived almost entirely on what they produced. Still, at least there was plenty of black bread, cheese, brillions and ten-drionas. The strangers weren't eating them out of house and home and Kerkol was glad enough of their money, to say nothing of the extra help.

Coming back into the kitchen, Maia stepped out of her pattens and rinsed her hands in the wooden tub opposite the door. The water was getting greasy, she noticed: she'd

tip it out after supper and refill the tub from the brook. She gave her face a quick rub with her wet hands and was just drying it on a bit of sacking when Clystis came in.

Clystis was a big, healthy girl, happy in her youth and strength!-in being equal to life-and in her first baby, a boy not quite a year old. She had a quick mind and from the first had struck them all as more forthcoming and go-ahead than her husband, a slow, rather taciturn fellow who always seemed happiest out working. It was undoubtedly Clystis who had convinced Kerkol that they stood to gain from letting the strangers stay. He himself, like most peasants, tended to be dubious of anything unfamiliar.

Clystis smiled at Maia, showing a row of sound, white teeth. "Cows done, then?"

"Ah," Maia smiled back. "Gettin' a bit quicker now, see?"

"Didn't take you long, did it? How many days is it you been here now?"

"Ten." Maia looked round towards the passage. "How is he this evening?"

"The poor lad? I reckon he's a lot better. The young chap's with him."

They had never been asked where they came from, nor their names; and Clystis never used any except Maia's. Bayub-Otal was "the gentleman," Zen-Kurel "the poor lad," Zirek "the young chap," while Meris was "your friend" or "the other girl." They were fugitives from the fighting beyond; a "beyond" known only vaguely to Kerkol and Clystis, neither of whom had ever been to Bekla.

During the night of her flight from the city and all the following morning, Maia had been in a state of almost trance-like shock. If she had not been young and in perfect health she would have collapsed. Zirek and Meris, after their months of hiding, were weak and not rightly themselves: nervous, unsteady, starting at everything and incapable-or so it seemed-of normal talk or thought. Only Bayub-Otal, though clearly almost at the end of his tether from fatigue and lack of sleep, had remained comparatively self-possessed, limping on beside Zen-Kurel's stretcher, leaning on a long stick cut with Maia's knife and now and then exchanging a word with the soldiers. Long afterwards, Maia still remembered that night as the worst of her life.

Some time after moonset they stopped in a thicket. Maia,

who alone knew how large a sum of money she was carrying, and remembering the footpads on the way up from Puhra the year before, was so much afraid that she could not bring herself to rest. At the near-by call of an owl she leapt up and would have run if Bayub-Otal had not restrained her. They had been there no more than five minutes before she asked him whether they could not go on.

"But where to, Maia?" he replied in a dry whisper. "We may just as likely be going into danger as away from it."

"Where you making for, then, sir?" asked one of the soldiers who had been carrying the stretcher. "Only we didn't reckon to come this far: the captain's expecting us back."

Maia gave them twenty meld apiece. "I'll write something to your captain," said Bayub-Otal. "It won't be much further, but if we don't get this young man into shelter he's going to die."

The second soldier nodded. "Looks bad enough now. Should I try to give him some water, do you think, sai-yett?"

She shook her head. "He couldn't swallow it."

She herself now believed that Zen-Kurel would die. Since she had first seen him in Pokada's room he had not spoken a word, though once or twice he had muttered unintelligibly and moaned as though in pain. To add to her misery and the nightmare-like nature of all she was feeling, it now seemed to her that she would have done better to leave him in the care of the Lapanese. But-Fornis? She doubted whether, with Randronoth dead, the Lapanese could hold the city. Before long either Kembri or Fornis would recapture it. So in that respect they had been right to escape; yet if only they had stayed, Zen-Kurel would have had a chance of recovery.

She was kneeling beside him when Bayub-Otal, taking her hand, drew her to one side.

"Maia," he said, "I'm too exhausted to think clearly, but can I ask you this? Have you any destination-any plan?"

She shook her head. "No, Anda-Nokomis. All I ever had in mind was to get the four of you out of Bekla."

"You?" He looked at her in perplexity, apparently wondering whether his hardships might not have brought about some breakdown in his rational powers. "But-er-why?"

She shrugged. "Well, I did, anyway. What d'you reckon we ought to do now?"

"You aren't counting on help from anyone else?"

"No."

"Have you got any money?"

She gave a wry little laugh. "Much as you like."

"Then we ought to try to find some sort of shelter: a farm; somewhere like that. The lonelier the better: pay them to take us in. Otherwise Zenka'll die. These soldiers, too-we can't keep them. They're impatient now: they want to be back with their friends, looting Bekla."

"I'll pay them to go on, Anda-Nokomis, until we find somewhere."

So in the morning, an hour or two after sunrise, they had come, a hobbling, staggering little bunch of exhausted vagrants, to Kerkol's farmstead-a house and some acres of rough fields about three miles west of the Ikat road. Kerkol and the lad, Blarda, were in the fields, getting in the last of harvest, and Maia had gone in alone and spoken with Clystis in the dairy. They had taken to each other. Besides, the sight of Zen-Kurel would have wrung pity from anyone with the least spark of humanity, and Maia was offering good money. She had assured the girl that his illness was no pestilence. They were fugitives, victims of the hated Leopards. They wanted to stay only until Zen-Kurel was better, and would move on as soon as they could. Kerkol, when he came in at mid-day, had found three of them sound asleep on straw in the barn, with Maia watching by Zen-Kurel, whom Clystis had told the soldiers to put into Blarda's bed. Inclined to be surly at first, he had gradually warmed to the pretty girl so obviously in distress; and being (as they later came to perceive) a man who secretly knew his wife sharper than himself, he was finally persuaded that there was more to be gained from letting them stay than from sending them packing. In any case, with the soldiers already gone, to compel them to leave would certainly have meant Zen-Kurel's death.

By the following day everyone except Zen-Kurel was in better shape. Zirek and Meris, naturally, were only too glad to get out of doors and try to give some help about the place. Zirek made fun of his own ignorance and clumsiness, and sometimes made even Kerkol laugh with his clowning. Maia had forgotten the stormy streak in Meris; or perhaps, she thought, their former circumstances had

prevented her from seeing it in its true colors. In Sencho's house, where they had all been slaves and all afraid of Terebinthia, her continual foul language and swiftness to anger might almost be said to have expressed a common feeling. Now, seeing her tense, glittering-eyed manner among ordinary, decent folk and blushing before Clystis to hear her cursing over the butter-churn, she began to understand why Terebinthia had been so anxious to get rid of her. Meris might be all very well for a concubine, but she was precious little use for anything else. She was a natural trouble-maker, not really capable of steady work, short-tempered as a bear and as prone to outburst. One evening, tripping over Blarda's whip in the dusky passage, she snatched it up, swearing, and snapped it across her knee. Maia, apologizing to Clystis, did her best to make out that Meris had had a very bad time and was not herself.

This sort of thing was worrying enough, but in addition Maia had once or twice seen Meris glancing at the fourteen-year-old Blarda with a look which she herself understood if no one else did. A baste in the barn, she thought, even with an innocent, might be neither here nor there, but she doubted whether Meris would rest content with that. Before she was satisfied, someone would have to suffer. She was a girl getting her own back on the world, and the innocuous and simple were her natural prey. Even with nothing else to worry about, Meris would have been a nuisance, but with Zenka on her hands Maia simply had no energy or attention to spare.

Next to Zen-Kurel, Bayub-Otal was the worst affected. There could be no question, for the time being, of him helping on the farm. He was worn out and half-starved, and for several days could eat only whey, eggs in milk and such other slops as the kindly Clystis prepared. His feet were in such a terrible state that Maia could not imagine how he had walked from Bekla. She had learned, of course, on the journey to Suba, that he was an exceptionally unflinching, determined man, but she had not hitherto realized how much he was capable of enduring.

Resting by day in the shade of the sestuaga trees on one side of the yard, he told her, at odd times and little by little, all that had befallen him since the fight near Rallur. The prisoners, as she knew, had been sent to the fortress at Dari-Paltesh. Here they had been in the charge of Dur-akkon's younger son, a humane but very ineffectual young

man who, it was generally known, had been promoted out of harm's way before he could discredit himself further in the field. Plotho ("the rabbit"), as he was nick-named, had done what little he could to make their lives bearable, forbidding the soldiers to ill-treat them and ensuring that their wounds received attention. Despite his kindness, however, several had died.

"You were locked up all that time, then?" asked Maia, trying to imagine it.

"No," replied Bayub-Otal. "It's not like that at Dari-Paltesh. There are no dungeons. The lowest floor lies below the level of the moat like the bottom of a great, drained well. We were free to wander about. We looked after each other as best we could. We lost count of time. The food was very bad and there was never enough, and although we'd made everyone swear to divide it fairly there were always quarrels. One man was killed in his sleep-"

"How?" asked Maia.

"Sharp stick driven through his throat. We never found out who'd done it. I keep dreaming I'm back there, though I suppose it'll stop after a time."

In telling her all this Bayub-Otal never uttered any word of reproach against Maia. He might have been talking to someone who had had no more to do with his capture than had Clystis. Nor was there in his manner any suggestion that he particularly wanted to arouse remorse in her. Most of what he told her, indeed, was vouchsafed with his habitual restraint, briefly and bit by bit, in reply to her own questions. „

A day or two later he went on to tell her how Han-Glat and Fornis had given orders to bring out the officers and tryzatts-some nineteen or twenty altogether-to join the march from Paltesh to Bekla. These were supposed to be hostages against the risk of an attack across the Zhairgen by Karnat, but it soon became plain that although that might be a principal reason for their presence, there was another. During the march the Sacred Queen had devised various ways of amusing herself. She had begun by compelling the hostages to beg on their knees for their rations, or else go hungry; but after a day or two had become more ingenious, requiring them to perform various things to their own degradation-things of a nature which Maia recognized as being in accordance with what she herself had

seen in Fornis's bedroom on the morning when Occula had hidden her in the closet.

Bayub-Otal had held out against this cruelty, and accordingly he had starved; or rather, he had half-starved, for it so chanced that one of the Palteshi guards, who had a Suban wife in Dari, knew him to be none other than Anda-Nokomis. This man, moved to pity, had risked giving him scraps when no one was looking: otherwise he would have died.

He told Maia how, very soon after the murder of Durakkon and his son, Fornis, as soon as it was clear that Kerithra-Thrain lacked numbers to destroy her army, had persuaded Han-Glat to join her in a forced march to take Bekla by surprise.

"She knew that Kembri had gone south to fight Santil-ke-Erketlis and that Eud-Ecachlon had no troops worth the name. But she knew, too, that he could still close the gates against her, and she meant to get there before he'd even learned of Durakkon's death.

"There wasn't a single man in that company of Han-Glat's with more speed and endurance than Fornis. I'd never have believed it possible. She led them for twenty-four hours without sleep and with scarcely a halt. They ate as they marched. Half of them were barely on their feet, but only one man tried to drop out. It was in the early morning, just after first light. He said he'd twisted his ankle. She called him out and asked him whether he was married, and he answered yes. So then she said she'd spare him the shame of going home and telling his wife that a woman had more guts than he had. She had a spear in her hand-she was carrying everything the men were carrying-and before he'd had time to say another word she'd run him through. 'Now we'll get on!' she said. 'We've wasted enough time already.' No one else could have done a thing like that and not been faced with mutiny. The men simply left him lying there and followed her like dogs."

"But Zenka-on the march from Dari-was he-forced to-you know-?"

"Zen-Kurel? He held out for quite a time. But that was part of the sport for Fornis, of course, to see how long some people would hold out. It was I who advised him to forget his pride and take his food. I told him that if we ever got out alive it would all be forgotten anyway. But he still got far too little, because for a full ration she used

to make people do-well-things to each other, and that Zen-Kurel always refused."

"Did she bring all the hostages on this dash for Bekla, then?"

"No, only about a dozen, I think, but I'm afraid I wasn't even counting very well by then. How she picked them I can't tell. I doubt she knew herself: she's mad, really, you know. Not raving mad, but-well-deranged. I think she just couldn't deny herself the pleasure of keeping a few with her. Three of us fell down on the way and she speared them, too. To tell you the truth, I remember very little about the last part of the march. But you'll understand now why Zenka's so ill."

"And you walked here with us-the night after that?" "To save my life, yes. What was the alternative?" "You could have stayed with the Lapanese in Bekla." "They'll never be able to hold the city. Eud-Ecachlon's got the citadel, you told me, and once the rest of Han-Glat's troops reach Bekla the Lapanese'll have no chance. Besides, you say Randronoth's dead?"

She nodded. Their talk had tired him-he was still very weak-and after a little she left him to rest while she went to milk the cows. Alone in the shed, she wept to think of her own part in all this misery. "But what else could I have done?" she whispered aloud. "Dear Lespa, what else could I have done? I never wished Karnat's men any harm." She had as yet told Bayub-Otal nothing of Tharrin's story or of whom she had discovered herself to be. Intuitively, she felt that the time had not yet come.

Yet this was not the only cause for weeping which afflicted her during these days. Indeed, she was thankful for the relief and distraction of working on the place, for whenever she was unoccupied, and always when she lay down to sleep, her thoughts were so wretched that in all reality she would rather have had to endure again the pain and illness she had suffered after swimming the Valderra. Worst -obsessive, indeed-was the memory of Milvushina; that futile death which made nonsense of any notion of the gods as kindly patrons of mankind. Many times, recalling the cruelty which Milvushina had endured, the dignity and courage she had maintained in the face of it, her brief span of happiness as the lover of Elvair-ka-Vir-rion and the selfless generosity she had shown at her pitiful end, Maia would begin sobbing, and steal away to some

lonely place where no one could see her. How poignantly, now, did she recall Occula's reproof for her childish, unimaginative resentment of Milvushina's aristocratic reserve and brave show of detachment in Sencho's house!

In actual fact, of course, Maia had finally achieved a deep affinity and friendship with Milvushina, and had come both to love and respect her. Yet that only served, now, to heighten her sorrow, and she mourned for her friend with an intensity which, while it was upon her, blotted out all else. This was poor Maia's first experience of true, grievous bereavement. The death of Sphelthon, a stranger, had frightened and horrified her. The death.of Tharrin had angered and humiliated more than it had actually afflicted her-except with pity. But the death of Milvushina, a girl of her own age, whom she had comforted in affliction, her companion both in misery and good fortune, she many times wished, and wished sincerely, that she could have taken upon herself. Whatever the future might hold, never again would she see the world through the eyes with which she had seen it before Milvushina died. This was her real loss of innocence; far sharper and deeper than that conventionally-termed "loss" which she had so gaily experienced in the fishing-net.

Coupled with this grief was a bitter sense of reappraisal and disillusion, flowing from the memory of her last sight of Elvair-ka-Virrion and of what he had said. To her, he now stood for the whole upper city and almost everyone in it.

At other times she was troubled by the fear of pursuit and murder. They had heard no news, either of Bekla, or of Kembri and Erketlis to the east; and Kerkol-never talkative anyway-seemed oddly reluctant to try to get hold of any. Seekron must have discovered, of course- perhaps even before she had left Bekla-that Randronoth had died by violence. Might she herself be suspected of his death? (It did not occur to her that Ogma, given the chance, could testify to the contrary.) But perhaps Fornis and Han-Glat had already overcome the Lapanese? If Fornis were now mistress of Bekla, one of the first things she would certainly apply herself to was hunting down the Serrelinda: and one man unlikely to put any obstacle in her way was Eud-Ecachlon. But again, was it possible that Santil-ke-Erketlis might have defeated Kembri? This, she realized bitterly, was the best hope for herself-for all five

of them. In other words Bekla, the Leopards and the whole upper city-not entirely excluding that happy, golden innocent known as the Serrelinda-stood revealed as so much glittering dross, internecine and treacherous, as Nasada had said. For it seemed to her now that she could not excuse herself from the general indictment. She, Maia, had done with them; but had they done with her?

Later, the reason for Kerkol's uncommunicative disposition became reasonably conjecturable. Somehow or other he had managed to dodge being taken for a soldier, and he was not unnaturally afraid that it might catch up with him. As Maia knew, it was in fact unlikely to do so now, when whatever authority might be left in Bekla could hardly have tentacles to spare for probing after odd peasants in lonely places. But Kerkol was not to know this, and his anxiety explained his unfriendliness on their arrival; for though slow and dour he was not, as they gradually learned, an ill-natured man. Although it was harvest-time, he had even taken a turn or two in watching beside Zen-Kurel at night. Everyone, indeed, except Bayub-Otal, had a share in this, for Zen-Kurel was never left alone.

During the first few days they had all felt almost certain that he could not recover. He seemed to have no vitality to combat the ceaseless, restive discomfort under which his mind and body appeared to be crumbling away. At first he could keep down no food at all, and although unconscious of where he was or who was with him, seemed never truly to sleep. He tossed and turned continually, muttering unintelligibly and giving himself no rest. Yet when they spoke to him he neither replied nor gave any sign that he had understood.

Maia's grief was extreme, and the worse for having no one to whom she could unburden herself. She could not make a confidante of Meris, while Zirek she felt she hardly knew. Clystis, of whom, on account of her kind heart and honest, decent goodness, she had become genuinely fond, she already felt she knew well. But it would have been quite beyond Clystis to comprehend her dealings with Kembri and Karnat or her secret mission to Suba: and if she had tried to explain, it would only have seemed, to a simple woman like Clystis, as though she were boasting about her grand, exciting life in high places.

There was no one to whom she could have spoken freely except Bayub-Otal; and he, even when answering her

questions, always maintained that same unsmiling reserve and detachment which had galled her in the old days, when her pride had been so bitterly hurt by his indifference to what she now thought of as her stupid, childish advances. She perceived that he meant to maintain between them that indeterminate yet apparently impassable distance which had always been part of their relationship. She, of course, had never, before now, had any chance to speak to him of what had passed between herself and Zen-Kurel at Melvda-Rain. Yet surely he must know? He and Zen-Kurel had spent months together in the fortress. Besides, what motive could he suppose her to have had for risking her life in Bekla to effect Zen-Kurel's release?

Always, however, his manner, as he sat in the shade or walked slowly back and forth on the path beside the brook, rather resembled that of some Beklan dignitary or provincial delegate such as she had now and then met at supper-parties in the upper city: polite and courteous, yet offering no crack through which she could thrust any real confidentiality, let alone any plea for comfort.

All five of them, she often felt, were in ignorance and uncertainty about one another, their perception obscured by troubles past and present as though by clouded, muddy water. Well, if he preferred to wait for the mud to settle, she had no choice but to do the same. Zenka's recovery was more important than any ease of mind she might have been able to derive from pouring out her feelings to Bayub-Otal.

And now, at last, he was recovering. They had finally allowed themselves to feel sure that he would not die. He had been taking food, had had long spells of tranquil sleep and was beginning to look less haggard and famished. Yet still he did not recognize even Bayub-Otal, and had not conversed intelligibly with anyone. It had now become Maia's chief anxiety that his mind might not recover. If that were the will of the gods, she believed she could accept it. (So generous-hearted in love are the young, so eager to give all, so heedless of long years ahead and of all that is truly involved in an act of self-sacrifice.) Certainly, when she had fallen in love with Zen-Kurel at Melvda-Rain, a great part of it had been that he was so plainly a likely lad. Nonetheless, it had not come deliberately, from her mind, but spontaneously, from her heart. She had loved him for himself and as he was, not primarily for any ma-

terial expectations. Besides, through her care and devotion he might in time recover, which would be matter for great pride. Yet inwardly she shrank from such a prospect, and prayed with all her heart that it might not have to be. Of all the afflictions that oppress mankind, insanity is the hardest for friends to accept and the hardest to reconcile with any faith in divine order.

"How is he this evening?"

"The poor lad? I reckon he's a lot better. The young chap's with him."

Clystis went across to the fire, over which, on a heavy chain, hung a bronze caldron. She was understandably proud of this, for there were not many to be seen in farm kitchens in the empire. Into it, of course, went practically everything edible. During harvest, Kerkol and Blarda had been lucky enough to kill two hares in the corn. These had been duly hung, skinned and quartered, and had gone into the pot that morning. This, as Maia well knew, was luxury.

Clystis added more water, stirred the pot with a wooden ladle and sipped.

"M'm, that's a nice broth! I'll put in a few brillions. I reckon he might manage some of it for supper, don't you?"

"Ah!" answered Maia. "I'll take it along, if you like."

"He's been talking to the young chap, you know," remarked Clystis casually.

"What?" Maia turned, staring as if unable to believe her ears. "Talking sense, d'you mean?"

"Young chap said so. Said he seemed ever so much better."

"Oh, Clystis!" Maia came over to the fire. "You couldn't have told me anything better!"

"Reckoned you'd be pleased."

Clystis had never said a word to suggest that she had perceived Maia's feelings about Zen-Kurel but, as Maia was well aware, not to have done so she would have to have been a lot stupider than she was.

Ladling out the broth, she gave Maia the bowl and a spoon. Across the steam and the savory smell the two girls met each other's eyes and smiled complicitly. Then Maia, holding the bowl carefully in both hands, made her way down the short, dark passage-way towards Zen-Kurel's room.

The door was just ajar. She had not yet reached it when her ear caught the sound of two voices-Zirek's and Zen-

ka's. She felt so happy that she could scarcely contain herself. It was she who should be talking to him, of course, not Zirek. Nevertheless, it occurred to her that in her present state of emotion it might perhaps be better not to burst in upon them. He still needed to be kept free from excitement. She paused to compose herself, and as she did so caught the tail-end of what Zirek had been saying.

"No, no, Fornis isn't here. You'll probably never see her again."

There was a pause, and then Zen-Kurel's own voice, the voice she remembered, restoring on the instant, as might a smell or a song, the entire feel of that night in Melvda-Rain, replied, "I don't-understand. Is she dead?"

Prom where Maia was standing his utterance was barely audible, thin as a stream shrunken by drought.

"Not that we know," answered Zirek. "She's in Bekla."

Zen-Kurd seemed, as best he could, to be weighing this. At length he said, "And we're not. Is that right?"

Zirek must have nodded, for after a moment he went on, "Then-where?"

"You're safe," said Zirek, "with friends. Nothing to worry about, sir. But you've been very ill. Why don't you just try to rest now?"

This time there was a still longer pause, almost as though Zen-Kurel had decided to follow this advice. Maia tiptoed forward and had just reached the threshold when he spoke again.

"Where's Anda-Nokomis, then? Is he dead?"

"Who?"

"Suban leader-withered hand-"

"Oh, he's here too; he's all right-more or less."

"Where-are we, then-with Erketlis?"

"No, but we're safe. Why don't you just rest now, sir?"

Zen-Kurel's next words, though still weak, were spoken in a tone of authority.

"I shall be able to rest better if you'll tell me a little more, please. What is this place?"

"A farm; a good way outside Bekla, quite lonely. We brought you here. We all escaped from Bekla together, you see, sir."

"Why-why did you need to escape, then?"

"Well; it was me as killed Sencho, you see-me and a girl. She's here too."

"You killed Sencho? You yoursclf?"

"You lie down, now!" said Zirek sharply. "You've been very ill, sir, and if you don't keep quiet you may be ill again, and that won't help anybody. These questions'll keep. I can't tell you everything all at once. Anyway, either Clystis or Maia'll be bringing your supper in a minute."

For a few moments Zen-Kurel made no reply. Then, in a tone of puzzled uncertainty, he asked, "Maia? Who's Maia?"

Zirek did not answer at once and he went on more urgently, "You don't mean-not the girl who swam the Valderra?"

"Yes, she's here with us," said Zirek.'

"Maia? But-but why don't you kill her, then?"

"Kill her? What you talking about? Why, it was her as got you and your friend out of prison in Bekla. Near as a touch got killed herself doing it."

Maia, holding her breath behind the door, stood still as moss.

"Then," said Zen-Kurel, "it can only have been for some vile, mean purpose. That bitch-" She heard Zirek try to answer, but he ran on, his voice rising, "She's the most treacherous, rotten whore in the world! Oh, yes, she fooled me all right! She betrayed us all and she'll betray you, too, if you don't kill her! I know what I'm talking about! Go and kill her now, before it's too late! Tell Anda-Nokomis I want to see him-get him in here-"

Maia heard no more. Still clutching the bowl of broth, she stumbled back up the passage and into the kitchen. Clystis, busy at the table, looked up in surprise.

"Wouldn't he have it, then?"

Maia, not answering and almost upsetting the bowl in putting it down, went across to the door that led into the yard.

"Maia, you all right?"

"Yes; I'll-I'll be back in a minute."

Out she ran, across the yard to the belt of trees. He wasn't there and she pushed through them, down the slopes beyond to the bank of the stream.

"Anda-Nokomis?" she called.

He stood up. He had been sitting in a kind of little arbor about a hundred yards downstream, where a tangle of scarlet trepsis trailed over the bushes. She ran along the bank, but just as she reached him tripped and measured

her length at his feet. He bent to help her up, but she only lay sobbing, face down, her head on her arms.

He knelt beside her. "What's happened, Maia? What's the matter?"

"Zenka! Zen-Kurel, Anda-Nokomis-"

"O gods! Has he taken a turn for the worse?"

"No no! He's able to talk now. He told Zirek-I heard him, I was in the passage-he said I was the rottenest- woman in the world; he said why didn't you kill me-" Her weeping became passionate and uncontrollable.

Bayub-Otal waited in silence. At length, in a cold, expressionless tone, he asked, "Are you so very much surprised?"

"What, Anda-Nokomis?" She knelt up and looked at him, her face swollen and tear-wet. After a moment, like a child driven to desperation by someone else's inexplicable failure to understand the obvious, she shouted, "Well, 'course I am! What d'you think-"

He took her hand and she allowed him to lead her the few steps into the arbor. Here there was a big log, from which a segment had been cut, making a flat seat. They sat side by side. The stream below was a mere trickle, almost lost among clumps of water-plants and dried beds of weed. A pair of green dragonflies were hovering and darting here and there.

"There's a lot I'm extremely puzzled about," he said, "and obviously if we're to go on at all it's got to be sorted out. Do you want to talk, or shall I?"

She was still weeping, but he made no attempt to check or comfort her. After a little he went on, "One thing's plain: you evidently don't see what's happened in the same light as I do or as Zen-Kurel does. If you did, you wouldn't be here."

She did not answer, but he had caught her attention and she was waiting to hear what he was going to say next.

"I'll start from the beginning. Last Melekril, in Bekla, I-well, I thought that perhaps I'd found a friend; a young slave-girl. I never made friends easily in Bekla, of course, being a suspect and dispossessed man with no prospects. But I liked this girl and felt sorry for her. Anyone with the least decency would have felt sorry for her. She was very young and inexperienced and she belonged to the most evil, disgusting brute in the upper city. She was being sent from one bed to another for money and even seemed

to be taking to it. It was obvious that in a year or two she'd be corrupted and that in a few years after that she'd probably be on the scrap-heap-that's if she hadn't been brought to some horrible end first. I thought she deserved better.

"One night, soon after the murder of her master, I received a warning to leave Bekla at once. Within the same hour the girl came to my lodgings in terror-or so you'd have thought. She said she'd escaped from the temple- from torture-and implored me to help her.

"I got her out of Bekla and took her with me to Suba. I told both Lenkrit and King Karnat that she was a girl to be trusted. I pointed out that she'd be valuable to us because of her extraordinary resemblance to my mother, Nokomis. She was treated honorably and gave the most convincing appearance of being entirely on our side."

For a moment Bayub-Otal's voice quavered. He bent down, picked up a stick and began breaking it into pieces and tossing them into the stream.

"That same night, however, she quite deliberately seduced one of Karnat's staff officers, a young man who knew-and she must have known that he knew-the plan of attack. He told it to her. He was much to blame, of course, but then he trusted her, you see; just as I did. She'd been very cunning in convincing him that she'd fallen in love with him.

"In fact, she achieved all that the Leopards could possibly have hoped for. She made her fortune that night. She became a demi-goddess, almost; her fame spread throughout the empire and beyond. It spread to Suba; and to Katria and Terekenalt. It even spread to Dari-Paltesh, where some of the men she'd betrayed-the ones who weren't dead, I mean, or who hadn't managed to get back to Suba-were shut up in squalor and misery. I remember one man actually cursing her with his last breath."

The light was fading. The dragonflies had vanished. In an isolated pool a little way downstream, some tiny fish suddenly skittered across the surface, here and gone, like the margets in Suba. A flock of starlings flickered over on their way to roost.

"But then, quite suddenly, when this same young staff officer's at death's door himself, after suffering the most revolting cruelty and degradation at the hands of Queen Fornis, he's taken out of prison in Bekla and carried away delirious. Some days later he recovers his senses and al-

most the first thing he hears is that among those with him is this same girl-the girl he trusted, the girl who betrayed him. This makes him feel angry and perplexed-afraid, even, perhaps."

As though he were now going back to the farmhouse, Bayub-Otal stood up and stepped out onto the bank. Then, without looking round, he said, "He's not the only one. Perhaps that girl might, in fact, be better out of the way. There's no telling what she might get up to next, you see."

He had gone some yards when he found Maia beside him.

"Anda-Nokomis!"

As though at any rate unwilling to fail in propriety he halted, but did not look at her.

"Here's one thing there's no catch in it, and you'd better just know it! I'm your cousin! My mother was Nokomis's sister."

The tone in which she spoke carried immediate conviction. He looked at her, startled. After some moments he said, "We'd better sit down again, and you can tell me what makes you think that."

Thereupon he himself returned and sat down, but she was so much agitated that she could not keep still, pacing back and forth on the bank as she talked.

"Earlier this summer, while you was still in that prison, the Leopards arrested a bunch of heldro agents in Tonilda. One of them was my stepfather, Tharrin; the man as took up with my mother-or her I always thought was my mother. He'd been a secret messenger for Erketlis. Tharrin was the first man as I ever went with. That's how I come to be sold for a slave; only Morca, her I thought was my mother, she found out, see? And she tricked me and sold me while Tharrin was away."

"Go on," said Bayub-Otal.

"I talked to Tharrin in prison before he died, and it was then as he told me-"

She went on to speak of the assassins sent from Kendron-Urtah and of her true mother's desperate flight and pathetic death. When she had ended Bayub-Otal remained silent, gazing down at the brook. "Do you believe me?" she asked at length.

"Yes, of course," he answered. He nodded slowly. "You couldn't be lying about that." She winced at the emphasis. "In fact, it explains a great deal." He looked directly up

at her and for the first time she could see that he was moved.

"I can tell you your mother's name. Her name was Sheldis. I remember her in Suba when I was a child, but I never knew what became of her. Children don't think much about anyone who isn't there, of course. When I grew older, I learned that she'd married an Urtan and tried to settle down quietly, but they'd both been murdered on the orders of my father's wife. I suppose when the murderers got back to Kendron-Urtah they'd naturally have reported that they'd been entirely successful. After all, Sheldis, not her husband, was the one she really wanted dead." After a pause, he added, "The village is Kryle, in eastern Urtah. I'm afraid I can't remember her husband's name-your father-but you could easily find out."

While he was talking she had sensed a barely-perceptible softening of his earlier hostility; yet not enough to make her want to try to explain to him the truth, her truth, about what had passed between herself and Zenka at Melvda-Rain and the true reason why she had swum the Valderra. He had as good as threatened her life. That life-her life as the Serrelinda-had conferred on her a dignity and courage of which the Tonildan peasant girl would not have been capable. She would be damned if she was going to beg for it-or even to seem to be doing so-by offering unsought explanations. If he was so keen to kill a defenseless girl, Jet him. She was, of course, too young for it to occur to her that he himself might, beneath his harsh manner, feel grieved and sorrowful. In telling him of her mother, she had been concerned simply to let him know who it was he would be killing-a girl as well derived as himself, or nearly; his kinswoman, one whose resemblance to the legendary Nokomis was no mere coincidence.

After an even longer silence he said, "I talked to you without mincing words because I think you ought to realize how much misery and suffering you've caused with your treachery and your cold-hearted deceit of that Katrian lad. You broke his heart-do you know that? I had plenty of time in Dari-Paltesh to get to know it. He couldn't believe you'd done that to him: yet there it was, beyond doubt or argument. While you were living in luxury in the upper city, he was keeping half-alive on filthy scraps, with nothing to think about but the false words you'd said and the promises you'd broken."

She answered nothing, only looking him in the eye and waiting.

"Do you want to say anything?" he asked.

"No, thank you."

"Well, there are one or two things puzzling me, so perhaps I'll go on to ask you some questions. First, was it on orders from Kembri that you went with me to Suba?"

"Yes."

"But I suppose-I want to be fair to you, Maia-you had no alternative?"

"Not really. Only I hated you then, see. By the time we'd reached Suba I didn't hate you any more."

This seemed to take him aback; he hesitated, thrown out of his customary, bleak composure. After a pause he went on, "Then I suppose that it was just a matter of your own self-interest being too strong, was it? Here was this golden opportunity to make your fortune and you took it?"

Of all that she had been accused of that evening, the thing-naturally-which had cut her to the heart had been the unquestioning assumption that she had deliberately deceived Zen-Kurel, that she had felt no sincerity and had gone about to seduce him for her own gain. She could not, would not speak of it.

"You can suppose what you like, Anda-Nokomis."

"Very well. Now there's something else: something that struck me as odd while we were coming here. Those La-panese soldiers who were with us-they knew you'd swum the river, of course, but they told me that no one had ever learned how you discovered Karnat's plan: it was commonly believed that Karnat himself must have told you."

"Anybody wants to think it was Karnat, that's their business."

"You never told Kembri or Sendekar what actually happened?"

"No, nor any of the Leopards."

"Then may I ask, lastly, why you went to the trouble and risk of releasing us and getting us out of Bekla?"

She shook her head.

"I suppose you're working for Erketlis now, are you? He pays better, or he's going to win and there's still time to change, is that it?"

Once again, it did not occur to her that the mordancy and scorn in his manner might flow from his own pride

and pain; from his sense of disillusion with someone for whom he had allowed himself the rare luxury of feeling affection. Nor did it occur to her that he might want her- might almost be begging her-to tell him he was wrong, to give him an explanation which would somehow or other clear things up. All she knew was that apparently neither he nor Zenka had been able to see all that was plain as noonday; Gehta and her dad's farm, poor Sphelthon at the ford, the detachment of three hundred Tonildans downstream of Rallur, the horrible risk of death to which she had twice exposed herself in order to save-amongst others-two people she loved and who, whatever they might have suffered, were now indisputably alive. She felt ready to weep with chagrin. Mercifully, Occula came boiling up.

"You dirty, rotten, basting venda!"

"Ah, unmistakably one of Sencho's young ladies! Perhaps-"

But before he could say more, his name was being called from up by the sestuagas and a few moments later Zirek came running along the bank.

''Sorry to interrupt you, Anda-Nokomis, sir-you too, Maia-but there's wonderful news! Captain Zen-Kurel's taken a great turn for the better! He's in his right mind and he's been talking to me. I've told him to stay quiet, of course: but he's made a good supper and he seems comfortable. He asked me to say would you go and see him, Anda-Nokomis."

"Thank you," said Bayub-Otal. "I'll go at once."

He walked away towards the house.

Zirek clapped Maia on the shoulder. "I'm a pedlar, remember? I sell anything-good news an' all! It's cheap to pretty girls like you, too-only a kiss."

Absently, she put one arm round his neck and kissed his cheek. He raised a hand to his face.

"Tears, eh? Well, it's natural, I suppose. You love him, don't you?"

Of course, she thought, he did not know that she had overheard what Zen-Kurel had said. Himself a good-natured, easy-going fellow, he had probably discounted it, anyway, as the petulance of a sick man who had had a bad time.

After a moment he laughed.

"Come on, Maia! You can't fool the demon pedlar of

Tonilda! D'you think I can't see what's plain before my eyes?"

"There's some can and some can't," she said, and wandered away along the bank, where the bats had begun hunting for moths in the dusk.

"Kill her?" said Bayub-Otal, with an air of indifference, moving the candle to where it no longer shone into Zen-Kurel's eyes. "Well, from all that Zirek fellow's told me, I'm sure Fornis would be happy enough to do that for you." '

"Before she kills us, I mean," said Zen-Kurel. "Otherwise how can we feel safe? We know what she's capable of, don't we?"

"Well, you certainly make it sound very convincing. Would you care to do it, perhaps?"

"How can I do it while I'm like this, Anda-Nokomis?"

"Oh, well, it might wait a day or two, I suppose. But I was only thinking, Zenka, if she really is working for Er-ketlis now, might it perhaps be a little unrealistic to kill her? I mean, in that case it would be for revenge, really, wouldn't it, and not for our safety? If she's really gone over to the heldro side, she won't be likely to harm us any more."

"There's no telling which side she's on, is there? Do you mean to say-"

"Now, you mustn't get excited, Zenka. Just lie back and go on drinking that milk. Where was I? Oh, yes, it did occur to me that we're supposed to be noblemen, you and I, though I admit no one would have thought so in Dari-Paltesh. So perhaps personal resentment wouldn't really be a very appropriate motive for killing this peasant girl-"

"But Cran and Airtha! doesn't she deserve it? Think of the-"

"Oh, no doubt. But at that rate, surely, the correct thing would be to have her properly indicted, as soon as we get anywhere where we're among heldro people and there's any sort of law and order. After all, Erketlis must know what she did. Everyone does."

"Yes, everyone does! So it's not only a case of how much she harmed us. She's made me look the biggest fool-"

"You know, Zenka, it's very odd, but she hasn't."

"She hasn't!"

"No. She's consistently kept it a complete secret, how she found out that plan of Karnat's. Plotho told me, when we were in Dari-Paltesh, that no one had any idea how she'd found it out: and those Lapanese soldiers who carried you here told me exactly the same. Everyone supposes Karnat himself must have told her, and apparently she's let them go on thinking that. She's assured me that she never even told Kembri or Sendekar-she didn't need to, of course; the thing itself was enough for them-and I personally believe she's speaking the truth. These farm people too, you see; they know what she did, but they don't know how she found out the plan. I asked them."

"Perhaps there are some things that even she's ashamed of."

"Perhaps. But anyway, I've just thought of two rather more down-to-earth reasons for not killing her. First, we haven't any weapons-I only wish to Cran we had; and I'm sure these farm people wouldn't like it if we hanged her. But secondly, she's got money and we haven't any at all. Whatever we decide to attempt, money's going to be important. I don't really care for the idea of killing her and then taking her money, do you? Sencho might, I suppose. That would be quite in his line, but hardly in ours."

"All right, Anda-Nokomis, you've convinced me: so what are we going to do with her? Leave her here?"

"Difficult, isn't it?" said Bayub-Otal. "I mean, we can't get away from the fact that she very nearly got herself killed getting us out of Bekla-"

"Without her, Karnat would have taken it months ago."

"I know: but we've got our reputations to bear in mind. We both hope, don't we, that the Leopards are going to be defeated, that Santil's going to take Bekla and make peace with Karnat, and that you're going to get back to Katria and I'm going to get back to Suba."

"Have you ordered the wings for the pigs?"

"Well, but seriously, Zenka, we don't want some sort of half-and-half rumor following us for years, that we abandoned this girl-possibly left her to the mercy of Fornis- after she'd got us out of Bekla at the risk of her own life."

"Well, what, then?"

"I think that all depends on what we decide to do ourselves as soon as you're better. What do you want to do; make for Erketlis at Ikat Yeldashay?"

"No, be damned to that!" said Zen-Kurel. "You talk about our reputations. Karnat's still at war with Bekla. I'm one of his officers and I've escaped from the enemy. My duty's to report back as soon as I can, not to go buggering about with irregulars at the other end of nowhere."

"Well, I'll go along with that, Zenka. If it comes to that, I want to get back to Suba. The only question is how?"

"The left foot, the right foot. What's to stop us?"

"Be sensible: it's more difficult than that. We're completely ignorant about our enemies. We can't go back to Bekla, obviously. If we go directly west, it'll take us into Paltesh-Fornis's province. And I repeat, we haven't got any weapons, in a country swarming with bandits and escaped slaves; though we might try to buy some later, I suppose, with Maia's money."

"Well, what's your idea, then, Anda-Nokomis?"

"We won't discuss it tonight. It's high time, now, that I left you to sleep. But it did just cross my mind that we can't be too far from the upper Zhairgen. If only we could reach it and get hold of a boat, that might be the answer."

Clystis came in, clicking her tongue.

"It's not my place to say it, sir, but you shouldn't keep the poor young man talking any more. We don't want him bad again, do we, just when he's begun doing so well?"

"You're quite right and very kind, Clystis," replied Ba-yub-Otal. "I'm just going. Boats cost money, you know, Zenka. But put it out of your mind now and go to sleep."

88: MEMS IS MISTAKEN

A week passed. Zen-Kurel steadily regained his health. He was a difficult invalid, with all the impatient restiveness of a young man not used to restraint on his bold, forceful character. He fretted to be up and about. Zirek remarked one day to Maia that he could not imagine how he had survived imprisonment at Dari-Paltesh. "You'd wonder he hadn't knocked those damn' walls down, wouldn't you?" These days were among the most unhappy Maia had ever known. She had, of course, foreseen-had not Sednil stressed it plainly enough in Bekla?-that Zenka was bound to be angry over what she had done. But in her youth and inexperience, and in the ardor of her love for him, she had

entirely under-estimated that anger. She bad supposed that she would be able to explain matters. It is a common error of the young and sincere, when they know that they have at least an arguably valid point of view and have acted from honest and justifiable motives, to feel that others will surely understand if only there is a fair chance to make everything clear. The discovery that even friends and loved ones can misconceive, can remain deaf to explanations; or worse still, receive them with frigid courtesy and a humiliating assurance that to be sure they quite understand- this is perhaps the most painful of all steps on the road to maturity. Ever since Melvda-Rain there had never been far from Maia's mind the memory of the passionate, heartfelt promises which she and Zenka had exchanged. He had made them as ardently as she. In her heart, nothing had superseded those promises-not her new-found wealth, the city's adulation, the advances of any number of rich admirers or Eud-Ecachlon's offer of an outstanding marriage. The only man who had bedded her since parting from Zenka was Randronoth, whom she had accepted solely in order to save poor Tharrin's life. By her reckoning, she had sacrificed enough to her love for Zenka to convince anyone of her sincerity. Hadn't she lived, for his sake, in almost daily danger of being put out of the way by Kembri or Fornis? And finally, hadn't she unhesitatingly entered the very doorway of death to release him and Anda-No-komis, her liege lord, from prison in Bekla?

Of course he would come to realize that she had swum the river only to stop the bloodshed and save the Tonil-dans! Nasada had grasped it. So, obviously, would Zenka, in whose arms she had known herself entirely understood and fulfilled.

What-in the light of her own memories-had never once occurred to her, was that he would have concluded that all the promises, all the joy, the choosing of the daggers and every other happy delight, had been nothing but deliberate, cold-hearted deception-that he had been the dupe of the Leopards' cleverest agent. As often as she thought of that, tears of mortified disappointment sprang to her eyes.

It had also not occurred to her-and it hurt her very much that his memory should (so she felt) be at fault in this respect, since she herself remembered every whisper, every touch, every kiss and look-that he would believe

that she had gone about to worm Karnat's plan out of him. Why, he himself had begun the talk of it, and insisted on telling it to her-or anyway, that was how it appeared to her in recollection. Nor did she for one moment regret- and she wasn't going to say she did-what she had done to prevent the whole silly, nasty business of the fighting. Given, of course, that he thought she had acted cold-heart-edly from the outset, it didn't make much difference what he thought about that particular detail. Yet it added still further to her grief.

Furthermore, she thought-remembering her talk with Bayub-Otal on the bank-she had unimaginatively underrated how dreadfully Zenka had suffered. The months of foetid twilight, anxiety, bad food and near-madness, with the deaths of his comrades and his own self-reproach gnawing at him night and day-all this, in his mind, was attributable to her alone. He was only too well aware of the dreadful things he had suffered on her account. He did not know, and there was no one to tell him-least of all herself-what she had suffered on his.

For there was no approaching him. The day after their talk she was feeding the hens when Bayub-Otal, ever punctilious, took the opportunity to speak to her while no one else was near. It was important, he said, that at present Zen-Kurel should not be upset or over-excited. He was sure she would understand that for that reason it would be better if she were to keep out of his way for the time being. She had responded with two words of acquiescence, followed by a correct, cold and formal apology for having, being a Suban, sworn at her liege lord; and this he had accepted with a silent bow.

Yet even had things been otherwise, her womanhood was firm that it was beneath her to take the first step. If he should later want to talk to her, she was ready. Meanwhile, though her heart might break, she felt, as any woman would feel, that she was not going to initiate explanations.

And yet, far below her unhappiness, at some profound level within her, there shone out intermittently a kind of here-and-gone glimmer-like the taulapa, that phenomenon of the Pacific, the phosphorescent streaks appearing at depth which, because they are always aligned towards the nearest land, were once invaluable in darkness to Polynesian navigators of days gone by. The mind of a man is like a ruled kingdom: it may often be badly ruled, or

partly or wholly in anarchy, but nevertheless a ruled kingdom is what it is supposed and trying to be. Women are microcosms, in which the mind, instinctive as the great migrations of terns, is subject to all manner of age-old, God-given stimuli comparable to seasons, stars and winds. Maia understood more of Zen-Kurel than she knew, or than he knew himself. Deep below the unnavigable tempest of his anger there still flashed, involuntary and unregarded, his former desire; and not only desire, but also the memory of that world-changing affinity which at Melvda-Rain had cried aloud to his heart that here at last was a girl whose capacity and abilities were at least equal and certainly complementary to his own; a girl whom to love was a privilege and not an indulgence; the girl the gods had intended to stand up beside him so that one plus one would total more than two. The very excessiveness of his antipathy-his refusal to let her come near him-was indicatory. What was it he unconsciously feared in himself, from which he had to take such strenuous steps to keep her apart? All this Maia sometimes glimpsed as dimly and fitfully as a weather-beaten, exhausted migrant, its wings sodden with rain, might for an instant perceive, behind scudding clouds, the shape of Orion or the Southern Cross.

It was not, of course, lost upon Clystis that the two of them were on bad terms and that Maia was unhappy. Yet she asked no questions, only letting Maia see that she felt sympathetic. Insofar as her own feelings could be inferred, they appeared to be that the quicker Zen-Kurel recovered his health, the quicker the trouble was likely to blow over (she could, of course, have no idea of its gravity) and to this end she applied herself with natural, unselfish kindliness.

After four or five days he was up and about, and almost at once began to show his natural force of character and those qualities of initiative and resourcefulness which had gained him his place on Karnat's staff. At first, while still not allowed to do much, he busied himself in shaping three rough but serviceable bows and then in cutting and fletch-ing arrows. There was, of course, no metal for the tips, but he sharpened and fire-hardened the points so skillfully that they felt strong enough to penetrate not only flesh but any clothing lighter than leather. He then set to work to make three wooden spears.

"They'll be a lot better than nothing, Anda-Nokomis,"

he said, offering Bayub-Otal his choice, "and we may be able to come by some knives later on."

There was no dissuading him, a day or two later, from going out to reconnoiter beyond the bounds of the farm. He took Zirek, but would not let Bayub-Otal accompany them. "Three's really no better than two, Anda-No-komis," he said. "Not on a job like this. One of us ought to stay behind, and the Ban of Suba's more valuable than me."

Bayub-Otal smiled and gave in, only begging him not to exhaust himself. Maia, who had overheard their conversation while hanging out the washing, drew the conclusion that Bayub-Otal was not going to be able to stop Zen-Kurel from doing anything he had decided upon.

He returned that evening. Maia was at her needle, helping Clystis to patch and darn. Naturally, it was beneath her dignity to get up and leave, and she sat working silently while he and Zirek ate supper and talked to Bayub-Otal.

"You were right about the upper Zhairgen," he said. "We're only about eleven or twelve miles from it here."

"You didn't go that far today, I hope?" said Bayub-Otal.

"I would have," replied Zen-Kurel, "but it's not so easy as I've made it sound. Two or three miles from here you come to a forest stretching all the way down to the north bank. Eight or nine miles of deep forest, Anda-Nokomis- Purn, they call it-dividing Bekla province from Lapan."

"I don't see any point in making for the Zhairgen unless there's some hope of getting hold of a boat," said Bayub-Otal. "How far does the forest extend along the river; did anyone tell you that?"

"I was told it goes as far as the Ikat road one way and the Herl-Belishba road the other," answered Zen-Kurel, "but I don't think we ought to risk being found on either of those roads, do you?"

"I agree about the Ikat road," said Bayub-Otal. "Kem-bri's army will almost certainly be somewhere near there. Anyhow, that's not the way we want to go. But the Herl road-"

"We could very well get into just as much trouble on that," said Zen-Kurel decisively. "What d'you think, Zirek?"

"Well, I doubt we could get there, sir, anyway," answered Zirek. "It must be nearly twenty miles, I'd guess,

across dangerous country-robbers and that, I mean-to say nothing of the river."

"What river?" asked Bayub-Otal. "You don't mean the Zhairgen?"

"No, he means the one they call the Daulis," said Zen-Kurel. "It rises on Mount Crandor, you know, Anda-No-komis-actually inside the citadel, so I'm told-and then comes down in a chain of falls they call the White Girls. Down here it's not all that wide-we went and had a look at it today-but it's deep. There aren't any fords and I don't believe we could get across. I think," he added with a certain emphasis, "I think only an expert could hope to do that."

Maia gave no sign of having heard him. Zirek drew in his breath involuntarily, and it almost seemed as though Zen-Kurel himself half-regretted what he had said, for he went on rather hurriedly,

"But going into the forest may be a bit risky-there seem to be no tracks at all, and apparently hardly anyone ever goes in."

"Ah, that's right," put in Clystis. "You don't want to get wandering about in there, sir, not in Purn you don't. Lose your way easy-there's them as has-an' you'd be lucky to get out again. 'Sides which there's all manner of wild beasts an' that-"

"But I think we are going in, all the same," continued Zen-Kurel, smiling at her. "You see, Anda-Nokomis," he resumed, "no one from Bekla's going to find us in there, are they? And once we've reached the Zhairgen, we'll be able to follow the bank down to some sort of town or village and then get hold of a boat. I was told today that there's a town about twenty miles below where the Daulis runs into the Zhairgen."

"Do you know anything about that, Clystis?" asked Bayub-Otal.

"Well, I've cert'nly heard tell of a town," she replied. "Nybril, they call it, but none of us has ever bin that far. It's-oh, right away beyond the other side of Purn, see." Looking up at Zen-Kurel in the candlelight, she shook her head. "There's no one goes into Purn, sir. You'd really best not try that, honest."

"Well, but we can't stay here for ever, Clystis," he said, "kind as you are."

"You're very welcome to stay as long as you like," she answered. "That's if you don't mind-"

Suddenly the door into the yard was flung open so violently that it crashed against the wall behind, and Meris came into the room. Her dress was torn at the shoulder, exposing one breast, her hair was dishevelled and she was bleeding from a graze on her arm. Without a word she went across to the tub and began to rinse her face and arms. Then, turning to Clystis, she said sharply, "Perhaps I could use your needle and thread, could I?"

"Why, Whatever's happened?" asked Clystis, staring.

Meris went over to her and plucked the needle from between her fingers.

"Oh, nothing but what you're quite used to here, I dare say," she replied; and thereupon sat down and began stitching up her ripped bodice.

At this moment Blarda entered. Everyone turned to look at him. The boy was plainly not himself. He had a hang-dog look, faltering and apprehensive, and his eyes wandered from one person to another. In the middle of the room he stopped uncertainly, as though awaiting he could not tell what.

"But what's happened?" asked Clystis, with more urgency.

Meris laid down the needle, put her hands in her lap in such a way that the bleeding graze showed more plainly in the candlelight, and gazed at Blarda with compressed lips.

"It's not my fault!" blurted Blarda. No one said anything and his voice rose hysterically. "It's not my fault, sis! I never done anything, honest!"

Meris, tapping the fingers of one hand on the opposite wrist, let out her breath and cast her eyes up to the ceiling. Clystis, her cheeks flaming, stood up and advanced on Blarda, who backed away, whimpering,

"Are you going to tell me what's happened?" she said in a whisper like a passing arrow.

"I-I-that's to say-well, she got angry all on a sudden, like, didn't she?" said Blarda, now almost in tears. -

"Why did she?" said Clystis. "What are you talking about?"

"It's not fair!" burst out Blarda. "The other day she says to me-she says'Let's go in the hay'-"

For two minutes he babbled on with the inability, typical

of a youngster in trouble and under pressure, to do anything but come out with all the banal and embarrassing truth.

"But what's happened now?" interrupted Clystis at length. "Are you or aren't you going to tell me why she's-"

"She was in the shed, wasn't she?" muttered Blarda. "Up by the hay. So I says to her, 'Come on, then,' and I went to-to do like we done before, see. But then suddenly she comes over angry. She says 'Go away!' So I says 'No,' 'cos I thought she was only playing around. And I had my hand down inside the front of her clothes and she pulls away and then she says, 'Now look what you done,' she says, and I tried to stop her but she went off quick. Honest, sis, I never done anything 'ceptin' what-well, what-"

To an elder sibling, the emergent sexuality of the younger is often shaky ground; sometimes a matter of sensitivity to the point of anger; a cryptic variant of the discomposure not uncommonly felt by parents. Clystis, like most country folk, spoke and behaved to people according to her own personal opinion of them. Respectful towards Bayub-Otal and Zen-Kurel, she had already sized up Meris accurately enough. She now turned and faced her, hands on hips.

"Perhaps you can tell me some more about what the lad's bin saying, can you?"

"Perhaps I can," replied Meris coolly. "What would you like to hear? He's coming on very well, really. He'll be ready to clear out of this place soon, I wouldn't wonder."

"What the devil d'you mean, coming on very well?" shouted Clystis. "Are you sayin'-"

"Yes, I am," answered Meris. "He is coming on very well. He just got a bit over-excited, that's all." She dabbed ostentatiously at the bleeding scratch. "He's much better than your husband already. Well, I dare say you do know about him. Anyway, I do if you don't."

"What did you say?" cried Clystis, staring.

"Not my fault," said Meris composedly. "Poor man, I feel sorry for him. I was just obliging him, really."

"You liar!" screamed Clystis, bursting into tears and stamping her foot. "You're lying, lying-"

"Lying?" said Meris, standing up and facing her. "How funny, then, isn't it, that I should know that Kerkol's got a mole at the bottom of his zard, just a bit on the right side? And how funny that I should know he's got a white scar on the other side, just at the top of his left thigh! In

fact I'll tell you some more while I'm about it, if you like. He-"

"No, you won't," interjected Zen-Kurel suddenly. Hitherto none of the three men in the room had spoken, as though each felt that to try to intervene in an unhappy family affair of this kind would avail little and possibly even do more harm than good. Now, however, Zen-Ku-rel's manner was unhesitant and authoritative. He stood up and crossed the room, interposing himself between the two women.

"Go outside, Meris, please," he said.

"Outside? Where?" answered Meris insolently.

"I don't mind where," replied Zen-Kurel in the same quiet, controlled tone, "but don't come back until I send for you."

As Meris hesitated he gently raised his hand, as though if necessary to take her by the arm. Meris tossed her head, flung down the bone needle on the flags and went quickly out the door. After a moment Zirek followed her.

Clystis, sitting at the table with her face sunk on her arms, was weeping unrestrainedly. Maia put a hand on her shoulder.

"Look, dear, you mustn't take on like this. It's not the end of the world. There's lots of worse things-"

"You let me be!" cried Clystis. "You'll have to go now- tomorrow-all of you. You can't stay here after this!"

Maia, concerned only to comfort her, felt at a loss. It had never entered her head that Meris, in indulging her taste for mischief, would make such a cruelly thorough job of it. In effect, thought Maia, she had inflicted a wound which would go on hurting Clystis for years, perhaps for life. She racked her brains for some sort of comfort.

"Listen, she's not worth crying about, Clystis-"

"It's Kerkol I'm crying about," sobbed the girl. "Oh, I never did Meris any harm-"

"Meris is a bad, spiteful girl," said Maia, "and that's no more than the truth."

At this moment Zen-Kurel spoke again. "Well, I'm fairly certain-, myself, of something that is the truth. Clystis, will you try to listen to me, please, because I think this is very important?"

His voice had a compelling quality and a quiet confidence which reinforced his request so effectively that Clystis raised her head, looking at him in silence. He, however,

was looking riot at her but at Blarda, standing over by the far wall with a look of utter dismay, as though he had opened a door at random and found he had let out a wolf.

"Blarda," said Zen-Kurel, "can you come over here, please? There's nothing at all to be afraid of. I'm not going to hurt you; I just want to ask you a question, that's all."

Rather nervously, Blarda complied.

"Well," said Zen-Kurel, smiling and taking his hand, "so you and Meris have been amusing yourselves in the barn; and I'm sure no one's going to blame you for that. A handy young fellow like you-why on earth wouldn't you? As far as I'm concerned you can go with all the girls between her and Bekla-probably will, I dare say."

This produced from Blarda the ghost of a smile.

"Now look," went on Zen-Kurel, "answer me this like a good lad and don't be ashamed, because I'll tell you now, I've done the same kind of thing myself, and that's no more than the truth. When you've been with Meris- you know, afterwards, when you were talking and so on- did you ever tell her what Kerkol looks like with no clothes on? You know what I mean, don't you?"

"Yes," whispered Blarda. "Yes, sir, I did."

Zen-Kurel nodded. "But that was only because she asked you, wasn't it?"

"Yes, sir."

"Do you think Kerkol could ever have done the same with Meris as you did?"

Blarda shook his head. "I'm quite sure he couldn't, sir."

"Why?"

" 'Cos he don't like her. He's said so to me-oh, three four times."

"Thank you," said Zen-Kurel. "I'm very glad, Blarda, that you had the guts and honesty to tell me that. Now would you please go and ask Meris to come back in here?"

Meris returned almost at once, shut the door, put her back against it and stood waiting with a look of sulky disdain.

"Meris," said Zen-Kurel, "we're leaving here tomorrow. I'm afraid you'll have to stay behind, but I thought you'd probably want to know all the same."

"Stay behind?" said Meris, visibly startled.

Zen-Kurel said nothing.

"Stay behind?" cried Meris. "What the basting hell do you mean? Why?"

"Because Lord Anda-Nokomis and I have decided that that would be best," replied Zen-Kurel. "Besides, since you have this attachment to Kerkol-"

"Kerkol?" said Meris. "I've no more had anything to do with Kerkol than Maia there!"

"How very strange!" said Zen-Kurel. "Well, then, it must all be a mistake, but Clystis very unfortunately got the idea from somewhere that you had. I'm afraid you may quite accidentally have upset her. So I'm sure you'll want to reassure her and beg her pardon."

"Sorry!" snapped Meris, as though she were spitting in the gutter. i

"Oh, in proper words and a proper voice," said Zen-Kurel a shade more sharply. "But if you prefer, you can leave it over until the rest of us have gone tomorrow."

There was a pause. Zen-Kurel picked up the bone needle from the floor and began idly examining it in the candlelight.

Suddenly Meris, pushing herself forward with a thrust of her shoulders against the door, went quickly over to Clystis.

"The truth is I've never had anything at all to do with Kerkol," she said. "I'm very sorry and I beg your pardon."

"Why did you try to make me think you had, then?" asked Clystis.

"I don't know. Like I say, I'm sorry."

"And you found out those things by asking Blarda?"

"Yes."

"He didn't tell you first: you asked him?"

"Yes."

"But whyl"

"I don't know."

"She-er-she did kill Sencho," murmured Bayub-Otal. He had not spoken since Meris's first entry, and Blarda and the three girls all looked round at him.

"Yes, she did kill Sencho," replied Zen-Kurel, not taking his eyes off Meris, "and that shows how courageous and useful she can be when she likes. Well, do you want to come with us tomorrow, Meris, or not?"

"Yes, please," said Meris, like a child. Suddenly she snatched up Clystis's two hands and kissed them. "I'm sorry! I'm really sorry! Oh, if only-"

The door from the yard opened again and Kerkol came in, followed by Zirek.

"Sorry I'm late in, lass," he said to Clystis. "Had a bit of trouble with two goats got out down the bottom. I was on gettin' 'em back and then I had to mend the gap they'd bin through, see?"

He stopped to rinse his head and shoulders in the tub.

"I'm afraid we've got to leave you tomorrow, Kerkol," said Zen-Kurel. "It's a pity, but there it is. I'm fit enough now, you see, and we've got important business elsewhere. We're going to miss you all, and that's a fact."

Kerkol nodded stolidly, dried his face and sat down at the table.

"Ah, well, that's it, then." He paused. "Place won't seem the same, will it, lass?" Then, to Bayub-Otal, "Reckon we'd best have a bit of a drink on it, sir, while she's gett'n' us some supper. Fetch a drop of djebbah up, Blarda lad, so's we c'ri drink good luck to 'em all."

89: INTO THE FOREST

Later Bayub-Otal asked Maia, Meris and Zirek to accompany him down to the stream. The night was clear and star-lit, with a faint breeze from the east and a scent of planella from Clystis's little patch of garden. Of the comet there was no longer the least trace. Maia, who ever since her childhood had been alive to the progress of the seasons with an apprehension almost as unconscious as that of birds, felt sure that it could not now be much longer until the rains.

Bayub-Otal sat down on the ground, looking from one to another as he spoke.

"What we have to get clear now, I think, is where we're making for: I mean, where each of us wants to go. As you know, Zen-Kurel wants to get back to Terekenalt and I mean to return to Suba. What about you, Zirek? You're a Tonildan, aren't you?"

"Well, I don't know as that really comes into it, sir," he answered. "Specially just at present, when no one knows what's going to come out of all the fighting. I'll take my chance with you; as far as Lapan anyway. Then if Lord Santil's still in business, I'll go and join him-that's if you agree. Only I've got a notion he might be quite pleased to see them as killed Sencho; he's got a reputation, you

know, for not being mean to people who've done him a good turn."

"Yes, he has," said Bayub-Otal, "and after all you've risked and suffered, both you and Meris are fully entitled to whatever he'll give you. Well, that's clear, then."

With a certain air of embarrassment he continued, "And have you thought, Maia, about where you're going?"

She had indeed. She wanted and intended to go wherever Zen-Kurel went; and if she could not, she did not care what became of her.

"It's all one to me, Anda-Nokomis," she said. "Perhaps I may think of something later." '

"But do you want to try to reach the Zhairgen with us?" He was just perceptibly impatient.

"That'll do as well as anything else. Will you excuse me if I go to bed now? I'm very tired." And she turned away without waiting for a reply.

When they came to set out the following morning, it was clear that Zen-Kurel must have been giving thought to the importance of maintaining at least a civil working relationship with the two girls. He greeted both of them courteously if rather distantly, and went on to say that he thought they could hope to reach the Zhairgen that evening.

"Of course it won't be like twelve miles in open country," he said. "It'll be rough going in the forest, I dare say, but we can make sure of keeping our direction by following the Daulis downstream. Even if we do have to spend a night in the forest, we shall be able to manage all right. A fire's the great thing. I was once three nights in the Blue Forest in Katria, and that was quite bearable."

They had become his soldiers, thought Maia, with secret, fond amusement. He felt it his responsibility to look after them, to show no favorites, to set an example and raise everyone's confidence. In some respects she felt so much older than he. Probably it was as well that for now things should remain as they were; impersonal and matter-of-fact. Anyway, he should have all the loyalty and help he would permit her to give him. She would act her part of the dutiful follower, even though she suspected that in his courage and ardor he might very well be leading them all into grave danger. Reckon I've caught love like I was ill, she thought. I couldn't stop loving him whatever hap-

pened, whatever he did. I've got to suffer it, but I'll be damned if I'm going to show it.

Bayub-Otal was his usual chilly, composed self. His great virtue, thought Maia-one more likely to appeal to men than women-was his consistency. He could always be relied upon to be much the same, whether in good fortune or bad, in danger or out of it. She could well imagine that he must have been a tower of strength to his friends in the prison at Dari-Paltesh.

Meris seemed subdued-even anxious to please. That was the pathetic thing about Meris, thought Maia. It was as though she really couldn't help the things she did. So then someone hit her or humiliated her and she became quite a nice girl-for a while. She wondered how deeply Zirek felt about her. Despite all they had undergone, she was still very beautiful; and obviously, as Zen-Kurel had conceded, indisputably possessed of courage and endurance.

Zirek himself struck Maia as being in a mood of well-masked apprehension, when Zen-Kurel's back was turned he winked at her and mimed the action of tossing a coin, catching it in his palm and turning it over on the back of the other hand. Then, pretending to uncover and look at it, he stared up at her with an expression of comical dismay.

Their farewells were brief but sincere. Kerkol and Blarda wished them luck and Clystis gave them what food she could spare. Maia gave her an extra hundred meld, embraced her and wished her the perpetual favor of the gods. Then they set off across the pasture in the direction of the river.

They reached it about two hours later, just as the day was growing hot. The bank, though rough and lonely, was fairly open. The river was about twenty yards wide and certainly deep. Despite the time of year, there was no bottom to be seen. There was indeed a good, steady current, but nothing so swift as Zen-Kurd's account had led Maia to expect.

"No crossing that, you see, Anda-Nokomis," said Zen-Kurel in a conclusive tone.

"And no point, either,' replied Bayub-Otal, "if we can reach the Zhairgen without."

They turned downstream, picking their way through gradually thickening scrub and now seeing ahead of them tiie outskirts of the forest, dark against the growing glare

of the southern sky. "It'll be cooler once we get in there," said Zen-Kurel, slashing at the flies with a broken-off branch.

The approach to the forest consisted of fairly close brush and, beside the river, wide patches of dried-up reeds and cracked mud, which at any other time of year would have been impassable. These they pressed through, putting up great clouds of gnats which tormented them, following them about in front, as Zirek put it, and settling on their necks and arms. Once Meris startled a bright-green snake, which whipped between her and Maia and was gone before either of them had time to feel afraid-of that particular one. ›

Emerging at length from the further side of this marshland, they found themselves at the foot of a long, gradual slope, so thickly overgrown that they could not really see how high it might be. To the right of this the river wound away among tangles of undergrowth until it was lost to sight.

"We mustn't lose touch with the river, Anda-Nokomis, if we can help it," said Zen-Kurel, "but the best thing will be to get up this ridge and then go down and pick up the bank again. We'll be able to see more of the lie of the land from the top."

They began to climb. Maia, who had started a menstrual period the previous morning and now had a headache, was beginning to feel thoroughly out of patience. Damn these fools who couldn't swim! There-just there-was the river- safe, smooth, cool and free from flies. She could easily have been three or four miles down it in an hour.

"Are you all right, Maia?" asked Bayub-Otal, turning back to give her his hand over a fallen tree-trunk. She nodded curtly, smacked a gnat on her arm and pushed on uphill.

An hour later, having at last topped the ridge, they found themselves gazing down on the forest proper. The prospect was formidable and worse. Maia, surveying it with something close to terror, could only suppose that either Clystis must have thought that Zen-Kurel possessed magic powers or else that she had been too nervous of him to speak out more strongly.

Ahead of and below them lay a vast, shallow dip, something like two or three miles across. In every direction, as far as the eye could see, it was compact with trees, unbroken and even as a roof in the still heat. So uniform, so

featureless was this prospect that they might have been looking out across a smoothly undulant, green lake. No tree seemed taller than another and none, one would suppose, could have moved even in a wind, so close together were they crowded. Looking at that forest, no one could tell in what millennium he might be living. The god of that place, thought Maia, was not hostile to mankind; no, he was simply indifferent, distinguishing not at all between men, beasts and the insects darting among the leaves. Once in there, their lives would have no more value than those of ants; and they themselves would be as helpless.

On the farther side of this great bowl the horizon was closed by a line of the same trees; and one could imagine the forest continuing unchanged beyond. Away to their right, below the ridge on which they were standing, they could catch, here and there, glimpses of the river.

"Jumping Cran!" muttered Zirek, staring. "It can't be done, sir!"

"Nobody has to do it who doesn't want to," replied Zen-Kurel with (so it seemed to Maia) a somewhat forced air of confidence. "Personally, I'm going to Terekenalt and that's the way. But let's have a rest and eat now, shall we?"

"I was just thinking about the eating,' said Bayub-Otal. "I think it may take us quite a long time to reach the Zhairgen through that; certainly two days. We ought to be rather sparing, I think, of what food we've got."

"We might be able to kill something," said Zen-Kurel. "I'd like a chance to try these arrows."

Having eaten, they descended the ridge, making once more for the river, and now entered in earnest the forest depth. Within half an hour Maia was almost as frightened as though Fornis herself, innumerably multiplied, were lying in wait behind every tree. There was no true light; only a murky, green gloom filtering down from far above, so dim that neither they themselves nor the trees cast shadows. They could not see more than twenty or thirty yards ahead, partly for the gloom and partly for the undergrowth all around. The humidity was like damp felt clinging to skin and clothes; a thick, resistant film which they seemed to thrust apart with their bodies in pushing on. There were weird, disturbing noises-sudden cries and chatterings, and sometimes the squawking of alarmed birds in the confined stillness-but the creatures making them remained unseen.

She felt diminished, shrunken as though by an evil spell, a minute creature walking between the legs of a giant. And the giant was vigilant. He, she now knew, was the god: a god unknown to man; nameless-what were names?-infinitely remote and old. He was watching them as he watched everything in the forest, yet their fate was nothing to him. Nor would propitiation be of the least avail. He was lord of a world in which prayer had no meaning and death itself very little; a world in which the frog sat impassively as the snake approached closer to devour it.

After a time they had lost all sense of direction. There was, of course, no telling where the sun might be. Zen-Kurel, using Maia's knife-the only one they had-tried to maintain a line by marking successive tree-trunks, but the undergrowth, in many places so impenetrable as to force them to turn this way and that, rendered the scheme futile. After a long time they came upon a tree already marked and realized that they must have returned to it. Of the river there was neither sight nor sound.

Zen-Kurel, however, remained outwardly calm. The river, he insisted, could not be far away, but when Zirek asked him how he could be sure that they were not going away from it, he could only reply that he expected before long to come on some tributary brook which they would be able to follow. As the afternoon wore on, Maia began to entertain first the possibility, then the likelihood and finally the conviction that they might very well wander until they died. When, like a specter, the idea first glimmered in her mind, she dismissed it as a morbid fancy. But with growing thirst and fatigue adding to the discomfort of her menstruation, it was all she could do-and, as we have seen, Maia did not lack courage-not to give way openly to her fear. If ever they did find the basting river, she thought, she would plunge in and be damned to the lot of them, so she would. Meanwhile, Meris was showing no alarm whatever. Meris, as well she knew, had seen unspeakable things, and survived them. She, Maia, was not going to be put to shame by Meris. Well, not yet, anyway.

At last they happened to come out into a clearing-an acre or two of relatively open ground which none of them could remember seeing from the ridge. Here there must have been, or so it seemed, some local disease of the trees, for a great many were dead; several leaning against those still living, others lying their huge length along the open

ground. There was a little pool of water, too, in a rock-hollow, from which they drank. Although this was apparently fed by a spring, it flowed nowhere, the overflow merely seeping away into the surrounding, parched ground.

Now at last they could see the sun. It was low, reddening to evening, and lay on their right. Looking back, they could catch sight, far off above the trees, of the ridge which they had descended.

"Well, at least we've been going more or less in the right direction, Anda-Nokomis," said Zen-Kurel, "though I'm afraid we must have gone something like two miles for every one that's been any good to us. And, now we know where the river must be, too."

"I don't think we'd better try to reach it tonight," said Bayub-Otal. "Everyone's tired out. Wherever we are, we're going to need a fire, and there's plenty of dead wood here. I suggest we camp."

"How much further d'you reckon it is to the Zhairgen, then, sir?" asked Zirek. "We've got very little food, and the girls can't be expected to stand up to much more of this."

"We must just hope for the best, mustn't we?" replied Bayub-Otal expressionlessly. He turned away and began gathering sticks with his one hand.

"We shall get there tomorrow," said Zen-Kurel. "Why not, once we reach the river bank?"

A few hours later, as night fell with only the briefest of twilight, Maia realized that in the forest, darkness called forth another world. Here, human order was reversed. Daylight was the time appointed by the god for concealment, inaction and sleep. In daylight he was sole, a presence absorbing his creatures into himself, sheltering them from the intrusion of that upstart, the sun. At nightfall he became manifold, breathing into them his fell, rapacious spirit, so that they became as he, indifferent to fear, suffering and death, intent only upon obeying his will. They must kill and eat, for with the renewal of day it was decreed that they should return once more into the single essence of their master. Kill-be killed: eat-be eaten: which, mattered little. This was their pursuit and calling, and they were impelled to it without power of decision.

Zirek still had his pedlar's fire-making tools-quartz, iron and sulphur-and had little trouble in transferring the flame to a heap of dry grass. Soon their sticks were burning

well, and Maia and Meris joined the men in dragging up fallen branches and logs. Having no axe, they set the logs to burn at one end, pushing them forward into the blaze as they were consumed. Neither Bayub-Otal nor Zen-Ku-rel said anything about turns on watch, and Maia guessed that the three men had already come to some arrangement among themselves.

When she had eaten the few mouthfuls that were her share of supper, she wrapped herself in her cloak and lay down to sleep. Yet tired out as she was, sleep would not come. She was hungry; her head ached; her belly hurt. Her flux had come on strongly and there was nothing clean or dry to put between her legs. But these discomforts were as nothing compared with her terror of the forest and the thought of the morrow. I can't go on, she thought. Even if no one'll come with me, I'll go back to the farm alone. Yet she knew very well that she could not attempt it.

The active night was full of wild, disturbing cries. From somewhere far off sounded a many-voiced clamor which must, she thought, be the howling of wolves. As she lay listening to this and trying to guess how distant it might be, there came from close by a deep, mewling cough, repeated several times. She turned faint with fear. At supper-parties in the upper city she had once or twice listened to Beklan hunters' stories of the great cats. An armed man, someone had told her, stood iio least chance against one of these creatures, and hunters invariably left them alone in their wild, forest territories, which, he had added, it was their nature to defend fiercely against intruders.

Looking out into the darkness she could see, here and there, eyes reflecting the firelight-some glowing red, others white or green. There seemed a continual coming and going of eyes between the trees. They were being watched. How could these watchers be anything but hostile? And they themselves-what could they do against them? Nothing; and this was the worst of her fear. Danger is far harder to bear when one can neither retaliate nor fly.

Meris was sleeping as soundly as a child. How strangely contradictory people often were, thought Maia. Meris, the agent of so much pointless, destructive trouble, had been composed and cooperative all day; unsmiling, but also uncomplaining and performing promptly whatever was asked of her. Probably the men felt less encumbered by Meris than by herself.

Zirek was on watch, pacing slowly up and down on the opposite side of the fire as he looked out into the darkness. In one hand he was carrying his bow and an arrow, but seemed not so much tense as simply wary. On impulse she got up and walked round to him, conscious of the fouled cloth chafing between her legs. He nodded and smiled but said nothing.

"Zirek," she whispered, "how are we going to get out of this?"

He raised his eyebrows, feigning surprise.

"Why, your chap's going to get us out, isn't he?"

"My chap?" She was vexed. She did not,want teasing.

"Well, the man you love, then. But he has been your lover, even if he isn't now."

"Oh, don't be silly, Zirek! It really makes me angry to hear you go on like that. Why, he hates me! He thinks I tricked him and deceived him."

"Maybe he does: but he's still in love with you, even if he wishes he wasn't."

"How do you know that? He's never told you so, I'm sure."

"No, but I can tell. A man can tell, you know.".

"How?"

"I don't know, but you can." He paused. "Well, for a start, the way you treated each other at the farm."

"But Anda-Nokomis-he's just as angry with me for swimming the river."

"I know, but he hasn't been your lover. He's just in love with you: that's different."

"What? Zirek, whatever do you mean? I never heard such nonsense!"

"Funny, isn't it, how men can see things women can't? And sometimes the other way round. But I'd bet all I've got; which isn't much, unless we ever get to Santil. If only we can get to Santil, though, I reckon I'll be made for life. He might even give me some sort of estate, I dare say."

"Will you marry Meris, then?"

He looked at her sidelong and winked. "Pretty girl, isn't she?" Then, briskly, "But we were talking about you, Maia, not about me. Your Katrian, he's a good lad. I trust him, anyway. He's got plenty of guts and he's no fool. I'm sure he will get us through this damned place, somehow or other." He shoved the heaviest log a couple of feet further into the fire with his foot and added some sticks

to make a brighter blaze. "Besides, he's still in love with you, so he's bound to."

Suddenly, about eighty yards away from the trees, something squealed in agony. It was the death-cry of some fairly large animal-monkey, orjtvda, perhaps, or creeping hak-kukar. They both waited unspeaking, but nothing followed-only the resumption of the swarming babble all about them.

"And that's why I personally believe he is going to get us out of it," said Zirek. "Or you are, or someone is. Because that's what the gods intend, you see. They've put it into our hearts. We shan't die. We've allof us got much too much motive for staying alive."

"Even Meris?"

"Meris? She's got more motive than all the rest of us put together."

"What's that, then?"

"To be basted by more men than any girl yet. Do you know, she even managed to have a few while we were hiding in the warehouse? Malendik, of course; and even N'Kasit, now and again. But others, too. I was always terrified she was going to get us caught, only somehow she never quite did."

He looked up at the scatter of stars visible above the clearing. Then, turning aside and making as though to rake the fire with his wooden spear, he asked, "Did you know it was me that gave the information about Tharrin?"

"About Tharrin? To Sencho, you mean?"

"Well, Tharrin was-he meant something to you once, didn't he?"

"How did you know?"

"Oh, pedlars hear everything, you know; and people in Meerzat are no blinder than anywhere else. I've often felt very bad about Tharrin. But you see, I had to give some sort of worthwhile information to Sencho if I was going to keep him convinced that I really was a Leopard agent. And anyway, the plain truth was that Tharrin had as good as done for himself before ever I spoke a word."

"It doesn't matter now," she said. "Not any more it doesn't."

"I'd warned him to get out," went on Zirek, "but he was always such a fool. Tharrin-he never really understood what he'd taken on, you know. It was all just a matter of easy money-kind of a game-to him; until the day he

found it wasn't, I suppose. 'Oh, I'm a master of cunning!' he said to me once. Cran! That was about the last damn' thing he was! Santil had already come to see him as a liability-he could never keep his mouth shut, you see. All the same, I've been very sorry, Maia. I wanted to tell you and get it off my chest."

"It doesn't matter now-not any more," she said again. "Tharrin-if he hadn't 'a done for himself one way he'd 'a done it another; I c'n see that now. But Bekla-Sen-cho-the Leopards-it's all so far away now, isn't it?"

"Not for Occula it isn't. She's pledged herself to her goddess, you know, to revenge her father; to revenge him or die. I was there, in Thettit, when she did it. I believe she'll succeed, too."

"I pray for Occula night and morning," she answered. He nodded: then raised her hand to his lips for a moment.

"I reckon my watch is finished and more than finished. The demon pedlar's given good value, as usual: I'm going to wake the young master. Why don't you get some sleep now, Maia? It's a short enough night and you'll need it all tomorrow. There isn't really anything to be afraid of, you know. None of those bastards out there's going to come any nearer, and we've plenty of wood to last till morning."

She gave him a quick kiss on each cheek and went back to her place. Her head still ached, but she felt in better spirits for their talk. Yet how strange-what he had said of Zen-Kurel and Anda-Nokomis! She couldn't tell what to make of it. Both the forest clamor and the eyes were still as present as ever, yet now she was so tired that she was past all caring. They can eat me in my sleep, she thought; I wouldn't even bother to wake. Soon she was sleeping as soundly as any healthy sixteen-year-old in the world.

90: DOWN THE DAUUS

When Maia awoke, in daylight, the first sight that met her eyes was Zen-Kurel standing a few yards away and looking intently down at her. Somehow she had the feeling that he had been doing so for a little while. His expression was certainly not one of dislike. It was difficult to feel sure exactly how it struck her; it suggested at one and the same

time both aloofness-well, distance, say-and a kind of wistful admiration; rather as a man might look while standing beside a lake and watching a graceful boat passing offshore. However, it was only there for a second, for she had hardly met his gaze before he had glanced away.

She looked around her. There was no one else in sight. Uncertain and alarmed, she addressed him directly for the first time since Suba.

"Where are the others?"

"They've gone hunting."

But he hadn't, she thought. Why not? If they were going hunting, the obvious person to leave behind would have been Anda-Nokomis.

He said no more, and she began to feel tense and embarrassed. After a little she rubbed the sleep out of her eyes, got up and went into the undergrowth to pass water and get cleaned up as best she could.

She remained there until she heard the others coming back.

The only person who had had any success was Meris, who had shot a fair-sized monkey. Zirek had missed a parrot and lost the arrow. It was clear, however, that both he and Bayub-Otal were in better spirits, while Meris, when Maia congratulated her, came close to smiling.

"I always could shoot," she said. "Latto used to say I had a natural eye. You never know what's going to come in useful."

"Oh, I don't know; sometimes you do," said Zirek, looking at her with his head on one side. Maia had to turn away to conceal her amusement. Yet all the same, she thought, perhaps there had once been a time when Meris's ways had had power to give him pain.

Zen-Kurel gutted, skinned and quartered the monkey with Maia's knife and they roasted it over the glowing ashes. It tasted better than she had expected; especially the kidneys, which they shared between them. Wiping her knife and sheathing it at her belt, she recalled what Zirek had said about the gods intending them to survive. Well, it wouldn't hurt to believe it: he himself evidently did. She only wished that she, like him, had the assurance of gaining everything she desired in the world.

Setting off westwards into the forest, they soon found themselves lost in the same dim maze as before. Indeed, thought Maia, one might suppose it to be the very ground

they had covered yesterday. In this place there were no landmarks, no localities, no distinctive features at all. The thought of the identical miles of jungle extending round them began to fill her with despair.

She was plodding behind Zirek, thinking wretchedly of her house in Bekla and wondering what might have happened to Occula, when Zen-Kurel, who was in front, turned quickly round, a finger to his lips, and gestured to them to remain still. For a moment she felt afraid, until she saw that he was not. The next instant he had crouched down, pointing towards a place a little way ahead where the undergrowth and bushes appeared to have been trodden almost fiat.

As they waited silently, her ear caught a sound familiar enough from days gone by-the grunting of pigs. A moment later the leaders came in sight between the trees; two big boars, tusked and bristle-backed, making their way along what must for them be an accustomed track. They were followed by about a dozen sows and as many piglets.

Zen-Kurel whispered first to Bayub-Otal and Meris. Then, having crept silently over to Zirek and herself, he murmured barely audibly, "They'll be making for the water. We'll follow them."

It was an eerie business-proper job for a ghost, she thought-this stealing through the gloom in the wake of the unhurrying sounder. Zen-Kurel led the way, flitting from one tree-trunk to another and often, without looking round, motioning to them to stay where they were.

At last, after what she judged to have been well over two hours, Maia found herself peering cautiously down into a shallow dell of bare earth. Here the pigs were gathered; several, on the far side, wading and rolling in a muddy, shallow morass. Beyond lay the river, overhung with trees and flowing smoothly from right to left.

Meris touched Zen-Kurel's arm. "Can't we kill one? Choose a piglet: all shoot together."

The nearest piglet was hardly more than twenty yards away below them. Zen-Kurel, Zirek and Meris crept back among the trees, strung their bows and laid arrows on the strings. Then they stood up together, came quickly forward and loosed within a second of one another.

Zirek missed, but the other two arrows pierced the piglet's flank. It squealed shrilly and on the instant the whole sounder, heaving themselves up from the mud, went blun-

dering away through the undergrowth. As the wretched piglet tried to follow, Meris hit it with a second arrow and it fell to the ground, jerking and kicking. Zen-Kurel, leaping down, transfixed it with his stake.

"Eat it now, sir?" asked Zirek, following with Maia and pulling his arrow out of the ground. Zen-Kurel nodded and Zirek at once set about making a fire.

About an hour later, as they were quenching the ashes and Zirek was getting together what little remained of the meat to carry with them, Maia finally gathered courage to speak.

"Captain Zen-Kurel, I want to make a'suggestion. I hope you'll listen to it fair and square, 'cos I reckon it might make a lot of difference."

They all stopped what they were doing and looked at her with some surprise, for not once in their hearing had she addressed him directly before. Zen-Kurel, too, was obviously startled.

"Naturally I'll listen," he answered after a few moments; his manner suggesting that while he did not particularly wish to, he had no alternative, "if you've got something to suggest which you think's important."

She forced herself to look him in the eye and assume an air of detachment.

"Trying to walk down the bank of this river's going to be next to impossible. I don't reckon it can be done, not with all the undergrowth an' that." She waited to see whether he would interrupt her, but he said nothing. "What we ought to do is use the river. I don't mean swim; even without tools we can make a raft as'll be plenty good enough. Three or four logs, that's all, lashed together down their length. You don't sit on it: you just hold on to it and it'll take us down."

He was looking at her uncertainly and frowning slightly. She hurried on, "I wouldn't have said anything, only I reckon it might very well make all the difference 'tween being dead and staying alive."

It was Bayub-Otal who broke the pause. "I think she's probably right, Zenka, but before we make up your minds I'd like to get a clearer idea of this raft and how we're to make it."

"I've helped to make them on Lake Serrelind 'fore now," she said. "Of course we had proper cord for binding then, but I reckon creeper'll do near enough, long as we use

plenty, right down the length. 'Sides, we can use some of our clothes as well."

As they discussed the idea, it was clear that Zen-Kurel was anxious to avoid giving any impression that he might be prejudiced against Maia. He sat silently, looking from one to another and listening intently. It struck her that he had probably realized, as had she, that in fact the practicability of her plan depended on whether the rest of them decided in favor of attempting it.

"Maia," asked Meris, "are you sure there's nothing in the river that might attack us?"

She shook her head. "River's safer than the forest. All we'd have to look out for would be sunken branches an' that under water, might go into you, but 'tain't very likely. 'Course, we don't even have to make a raft. If everyone had a log it would be enough to keep afloat. Only we could put our stuff on a raft, see."

Having said this much, she kept quiet. To be too insistent would only spoil everything. Anyway it could, she felt, only be a matter of waiting until they had accustomed themselves to the idea. After all, the only alternative was the forest, and surely to Cran they must have had enough of that by now?

"But this raft-it can only be a very rough sort of job, Maia, can't it?" asked Zirek. "What happens if it hits something in the river and falls to pieces?"

"We'd still be able to get to shore holding on to the logs," she said. "I taught myself to swim holding on to a log, when I wasn't no more 'n five or six years old."

"Years and years ago," said Zirek solemnly. Even Zen-Kurel smiled.

Anda-Nokomis was with her, she knew; the least fit for it of them all. Even as she realized this, Zirek put it to him point-blank.

"Do you want to try it, sir?"

"Y-es," he replied pausingly. "Yes, on the whole I think I do. Even if we don't get very far, you see, we'll still be no worse off."

"I think we must try it," said Zen-Kurel. "I admit I had no idea the forest would be as bad as this. If we're to get through at all it's the river or nothing."

They toiled for three or four hours, and with every hour Maia's standing gained. Though she was, of course, careful to avoid any suggestion of it, they were dependent on her.

Zen-Kurel, obliged from time to time to confer with her as the work went on, spoke to her with detachment, his manner suggesting that their joint need made it necessary, for the moment at all events, simply to concentrate on what had to be done.

Finding suitable logs took longer than Maia had expected. When she had first put forward her suggestion, she had had in mind the idea of a raft about five feet long and three feet wide, made of no more than four logs. They were lucky enough to find two good ones almost at once. One was already smooth along its entire length, while the other had a few outgrowths and small brandies which they were able more or less to trim with her knife. After this, however, they hunted in vain for the best part of an hour. Finally Maia decided that they would have to be content with two smaller rafts.

For the second raft they made do with three thinner logs of unequal length. One was more crooked than she really cared about-there would not be a snug fit along the lengtli- but as long as there was enough lashing she judged that it would probably serve at a pinch.

There was no lack of creepers, but the difficulty was to disentangle them from the branches and one another. Maia, knowing that possible collisions, prolonged immersion and the force of the current were bound to soften and slacken them, insisted on their using a great many-up and down the whole length of the logs, like a weave. When this task was at last finished, they strengthened the bindings with their tunics, knotted together by the sleeves. The creepers might break up, thought Maia, but at least these would not. Her own tunic, however, with the money in it, she kept on, reckoning that it would not be too heavy for her to swim in. Both rafts were far from perfect, but it was now well after noon and if they wanted to escape a second night in the forest they must get on.

In the event, two rafts proved better than one would have been. In the first place they were, of course, lighter and therefore easily carried out through the inshore mud. As Bayub-Otal said, they could hardly have hoisted anything bigger. And once in the water they were more maneuverable and easily controlled.

All but Maia, as soon as they found themselves out of their depth, drifting with the current and entirely dependent on the support of the logs, were hard put to it not to

give way to fear. To them, this was an altogether strange and hazardous experience. Even Zen-Kurel was tense, biting his lip and clutching tightly as the raft he was sharing with Meris began to bob and gather the full speed of the current.

The river, running strongly between dense trees and half-dried swamps, was for the most part narrower than Maia had expected; and therefore deeper, too, she thought with relief. The last thing she wanted was for someone to become entangled in weed or ripped by a submerged branch, and then perhaps to panic and lose hold. Any quick, unexpected tHt would be unfortunate, too, for their few belongings-their bows, arrows and spears, their shoes and what little food was left, together with three cloaks (Zen-Kurel and Bayub-Otal had none), were stacked on the rafts; lashed down, of course; but they would be better dry than wet.

As soon as Maia had shown Meris how to trim her raft by pressing down on it more strongly than Zen-Kurel, she left them, swam across to the other and held it back until the first had floated past, so that the two were in line instead of side by side. In this way both could drift on the midstream current without risk of fouling each other.

For the first quarter of an hour and more she remained hard at work, continually swimming back and forth between the rafts to right them as they drifted one way and another and above all to keep an anxious eye on the lashings. However, they seemed to grow none the looser for being soaked and after a time she decided that they would probably hold up well enough, unless either raft were to get snagged or rammed.

She could not help feeling, now, that she was lucky in her companions. Meris, agile, and hard as nails, had never been one to ask or expect indulgence from anybody. Things might have been very different, thought Maia, if it had happened to be Nennaunir or Otavis. As for Bayub-Otal and Zen-Kurel, both had soon fought down their initial nervousness and begun to steer their rafts by using their free hands. Only Zirek-to his own chagrin and annoyance-remained tense and clumsy, so that for a while Maia stayed beside him, patiently demonstrating again and again what she wanted him to learn.

After they had been drifting for nearly half an hour there came into sight, about two hundred yards ahead, what she

had been dreading-a fallen tree spanning almost the entire stream. A quick look showed her that under the right bank, where the base and the torn-up roots were lying, there was probably just room for the rafts to pass below the trunk where it slanted down to the water. From midstream to the left bank extended a hopeless tangle of branches and trapped flotsam.

It was not going to be possible to guide both rafts across to the right bank in time.

"Anda-Nokomis," she said, "try to do all you can to stop your raft ramming the tree hard, 'cos that might break it up. I'll be back as quick as I can."

With this depressing advice-all she had time for-she left him, swam ahead to the other raft, gripped it with both hands and succeeded in swinging it over to the right, just upstream of the overhanging trunk, where she let it go. The raft slipped away from her, passed under the trunk and continued on its way.

Meanwhile Bayub-Otal and Zirek had drifted into the branchy tangle in midstream. To free them proved beyond her powers. For several minutes she struggled, sawing at the sodden branches with her knife and trying as best she could to pull the raft backwards and sideways. At last she was obliged to tell Zirek and Bayub-Otal to scramble up onto the transverse tree-trunk and crawl along it as far as the right bank, thus lightening the raft sufficiently for her to drag it across to the gap and hold it while they slid back into the water on either side. A moment later they were through.

Meanwhile, however, Meris and Zen-Kurel had drifted alarmingly far ahead. It took Maia twenty minutes or more to overtake them and then to halt their raft inshore until the other had closed the distance. She felt exhausted and was glad enough to hold on beside Meris until she had recovered herself.

For three hours and more they drifted on with the stream. The river made many bends, and towards the end of the afternoon she realized that they must have travelled a considerably greater distance than the breadth of the forest. Never once had there been any break in the gloomy tangle of trees and creepers, and she supposed that after all there was no remedy but they would have to pass another night in Purn. At that rate it was time to be looking out for a place to come to shore and get a fire going before sunset.

Just as she was about to put this to her companions, Meris laid a hand on her arm.

"Maia, listen! What's that noise?"

Maia pinched her nose and blew her ears. The sound, still distant but clearly audible between the trees, called to mind instantly her childhood; then, hard upon, a swift rush of fear. Who should recognize that sound if not she? It was the pouring of a fairly heavy waterfall.

91: THE SARKIDIAN CAMP

There was no time to be lost. Already she could feel the current growing swifter and, looking ahead, see the banks narrowing. In one way this was an advantage, for she could hope to get the rafts inshore more quickly. Which bank? she wondered. The left; yes, it must be the left, for they were a little nearer that side and even seconds might be vital. It looked nasty, though. At this time of year, with the river at its lowest, the bank was steep and high; four or five feet of dried-up earth and stones falling more-or-less sheer to the water, and nothing that she could see- no overhanging bushes or branches-to catch hold of. That seemed strange: why weren't there any? Throughout the afternoon they had come down many reaches with similarly steep banks, but all, as far as she could remember, had been to some extent overgrown.

Anyway, there was no time to be thinking about it. The lip of the falls was only about a hundred yards away now, and since she couldn't see the river beyond, they must be high enough to be dangerous. She called back to Bayub-Otal.

"Anda-Nokomis, I'm going to drag this other raft over to the bank. Try to come in to the left. I'll only be a minute!"

In fact it took her something less than a minute to push Zen-Kurel and Meris into the slacker water under the bank, but already the second raft had drifted past her.

"I'll have to leave you!" she cried to Zen-Kurel. "Find something to hold on to-anything!"

He nodded with assumed unconcern. "We'll be all right: you get on."

Now she was swimming in a frenzy, desperately trying

to overtake Zirek and Anda-Nokomis as they were swept on towards the lip of the falls. She could see the mist of spray and hear from the further side the ceaseless, plunging boom. The current had grown headlong: she felt as though she were falling. Gasping, she reached the stern of the raft, clutched it and swung it over to the left. As she did so she saw that the lashings at the forward end had at last worked loose. The raft was not responding as a single whole. Any strain and it would come to pieces.

If I was to swim for the bank on my own now, she thought, I'd get there in time. If I was to swim for the basting bank-

She swam to the front of the raft, pressed the logs together as hard as she could and then, turning on her back, began pulling it inshore behind her.

Everything was tumult, everything was spray and thunder and an appalling sensation of swift, uncontrollable gliding. The eyes of Anda-Nokomis and Zirek were staring into hers as she still struggled, throwing all her weight sideways against the current. She went under, swallowed water, came up and and kicked out once more.

Something jabbed her right shoulder: she was pivoting on it, pivoting to the left; something bending, pliant and rough, not so thick as her arm. She snatched at it, clutching, holding on.

"Grab it, Zirek!"

The stern of the raft was rotating. Her left arm was round Anda-Nokomis's neck and shoulder. She was looking down into seething water and white spume fifteen feet below. What was it she'd got hold of? She looked round and back at her right hand: something gray and gnarled, like a stiffened rope. It was the exposed root of a tree projecting from the earth of the bank; bending with their weight, yet enough to hold them as long as she herself could hold on. Then the raft broke up and spun away, turned back into two logs that hung a moment on the lip of the falls and toppled, gone, lost in the roaring smother below.

Anda-Nokomis was shouting in her ear. "It's too much for you! Let go!"»

"No."

"Yes! Never mind me! Let go!"

"No!"

"-'bove you!"

Was it " 'bove you!" he had said? She could see almost

nothing now. Her ears and nostrils were blocked with spray. She was hanging in a howling, spray-clouded trance. Her arm-her arm was giving way. She couldn't hold on any longer. Tharrin, Sphelthon, Randronoth-she could hear their voices, men's voices, calling, shouting to her, the dead.

Rough, dry hands caught her under the arms, heaving her upward.

"Let go of him, lass! Let go! We've got him!"

Her left arm was strengthless, numb. She let go of Anda-Nokomis. She was being dragged upward, earth and stones grating against her sodden tunic, pulled backward, heels slithering over grass, coming to rest on her back, looking up at leaves and the sky.

After a few moments of choking bewilderment she struggled to her knees. "Anda-Nokomis!"

"I'm here," his voice answered.

She looked about her. She was on the bank of the river, immediately above the falls. Anda-Nokomis, water streaming from his hair, shoulders and arms, was standing near-by. Further off, to her right, Zirek, on his hands and knees, was vomiting water. Something out in the stream caught her eye. It was the second raft, floating past and over the brink.

There were men all round her: forty, fifty, it looked like. She stared at them in amazement. Had Lespa sent them, or what? Some were armed. Others had axes, saws, scythes, heavy hacking knives. One of them spat on the ground. They were human, then: she was alive.

These were soldiers; they had pulled her and Zirek and Anda-Nokomis out of the river. And-and-? Quickly she looked upstream. Meris and Zen-Kurel, also surrounded by soldiers, were limping towards her along the bank.

One of the men had spoken to her. She realized he had spoken, but had not caught what he said. She turned and looked at him.

He was perhaps twenty-five, of middle height, with a shock of short, brown hair and bushy eyebrows. His gray eyes were rather small, his nose rather broad, and he had a strong chin. He looked a rugged, practical sort of man; resourceful if not clever; one not to be trifled with or turned aside. He was holding a drawn sword, and as he spoke again he leaned forward, pointing it upstream to emphasize his words.

"Who's up there? How many?"

"What? I don't-"

"Come on, no time to waste, that's it! Who's up there? How far off?"

Another, younger man laid a hand on his arm. "Steady, captain. We've only just got the poor lass out of the water, for Cran's sake!"

"No time to waste, Tolis," retorted the captain. He laid one hand on Maia's shoulder. "Come on now, you tell me-"

A gasping voice said "Just a moment." It was Zen-Kurel, with Meris hanging on his arm. He looked badly shaken, trying not to show it but unable to help himself. He hesitated a moment, closing his eyes and clenching one hand impatiently as he pulled himself together. Then he said, "Thank you for saving us. Lucky you were here. May I ask who you are?"

"No, you answer me," replied the shock-headed man peremptorily. "I've no time to waste."

"If you just listen to me for a moment-" began Zen-Kurel.

"There are more of us than you, that's it," said the captain. "So you just sit down and answer my questions."

Zen-Kurel shrugged his shoulders and sat down. Maia sat beside him. His sacking smock was ripped across and beneath it she saw a bleeding gash along his right thigh. She pointed to it.

"That ought to be seen to."

Zen-Kurel looked at it with surprise. "I never even felt it!"

"You wouldn't," she said. "It's the water-softens your flesh. You can get badly cut in warm water and never feel it at all. That ought to be seen to!" she said to the captain.

He made an impatient gesture to one of his men, who went away, came back with a cloth and began binding up the wound with intent detachment, like a servant waiting at table.

"Where have you come from and who's upstream?" said the captain. "How many?"

"I'll answer you," replied Zen-Kurel firmly, "when you've told me who you are. Are you for Erketlis or the Leopards, or neither?"

"Look, if necessary we can torture you-"

"I know that. But you say you're in a hurry, so it'll be

quicker to answer me. Are you for Erketlis or Kembri?"

"Why, they're from Sarkid!" said Meris suddenly. "Look at their corn sheaves!" She pointed.

The soldiers' clothes were rough, torn and anything but uniform. Several, however, were wearing the corn-sheaves emblem of Sarkid.

"We're with Elleroth of Sarkid," said the captain shortly. "Will that satisfy you?"

"Indeed it will," said Bayub-Otal, speaking for the first time. "In that case, you will be glad to know that my name is-"

"I'm not interested in your names," interrupted the captain. "I want to know who's upstream? How many and how close?"

"There's no armed force at all upstream," replied Zen-Kurel. "The forest's empty and as far as I know there's nothing between you and Bekla."

This plainly had a considerable effect on the soldiers standing round. There was a buzz of talk and some of the men began calling to others further off.

"Well, at that rate what were you trying to get away from? Must've been something pretty bad to make you risk that." He jerked his thumb towards the falls.

"I was about to tell you who I am." Bayub-Otal spoke with icy dignity. "I am Anda-Nokomis, son of the High Baron of Urtah, and Ban of Suba."

"Anda-Nofcomis? Are you sure?"

Maia could not restrain a slightly hysterical gurgle of laughter. The captain looked round at her angrily, then turned back to Bayub-Otal.

"I heard you were dead."

"Then you heard wrong."

By this time both Bayub-Otal and Zen-Kurel, soaking wet and dressed in torn sacking, had evidently begun to strike the captain as people of rather more weight than he had originally supposed.

"Well, I'm sorry, my lord; only the times are every which way just now, that's it, and you must admit you don't look like the Ban of Suba, now do you? Put yourself in my position. We're the pioneer group of Lord Elleroth's company, across the Zhairgen on our own. We don't know the first thing about the forest ahead, the whereabouts of the Leopard army or anything else. We're just clearing the bank when suddenly you come floating down like a lot of

blasted turtles. What am I supposed to do-guess who you are or just salute you on sight?"

Maia laughed again. She was beginning to like this man.

"For all I know you could be reconnoitring, couldn't you?"

"Do people generally go reconnoitring unarmed," said Zen-Kurel, "and take a couple of girls with them?"

"Leopards? They never go anywhere without girls, I'm told. Shearnas on the blasted battlefield, that's it-"

"We're not Leopards, curse you!" cried Zirek suddenly. "I'm the chap as killed Sencho-me and this girl here. Santil knows me well enough."

At this there was another buzz of excitement among the soldiers. They were crowding round so closely now that Maia, still sitting on the ground at their feet, was beginning to feel shut in and oppressed.

"Captain," she said, "could we go somewhere less crowded? This is making me feel btd."

He stared at her, apparently surprised at a girl speaking up for herself at all. After a moment he looked at Bayub-Otal, who nodded.

"Everyone back to work!" shouted the captain. "Go and get on with what you were doing! You'd better stay here with us," he added to Tolis.

The men dispersed. Maia now saw that what they were engaged in doing was felling the saplings and undergrowth along the bank. Downstream of the falls a narrow, recently-cleared track wound away out of sight.

"You were lucky," said the captain to Bayub-Otal. "If you'd come down an hour earlier you wouldn't have found us above the falls."

"But how is it we didn't see your men on the bank?" he asked.

"The men were taking a break under the trees. We heard you shouting. Now look," he went on, "Elleroth will certainly want to see you and I shall have to make a report to him. Tell me how you come to be here."

Bayub-Otal proceeded to do so. Mollo and Tolis listened attentively.

"Well, you'd better take them back to camp, Tolis," said Mollo at length. "Tell Elleroth I'll be back myself before sunset." And thereupon he walked away to where the men had resumed work.

"Is it far?" asked Maia apprehensively, as Tolis began

conducting them downstream. She felt almost too tired to take a step.

He shook his head. "Less than a mile: just across the Zhairgen. We've got a raft on ropes. It'll carry away in the rains, of course, but it's all right for now."

The path Mollo's men had cleared was narrow, but the job had been done very thoroughly and it was easy walking. As they went on in single file, the sound of the falls gradually receding behind them, Tolis asked over his shoulder, "Have any of you met Elleroth before?" As no one answered, he said "No?"

"What's he like, then?" asked Zirek. '

"Well, obviously we all like him," answered Tolis, "or we wouldn't be here. But he may not be quite what you're expecting." He laughed. "You'll be all right, though."

With this enigmatic remark he continued on their way.

Maia noticed a flask attached to his belt. She touched his shoulder.

"Can I ask you what's in that?"

"Djebbah," he answered. "D'you want some?"

"No, but that cut on Captain Zen-Kurel's leg ought to be cleaned. Could turn nasty else."

Zen-Kurel tried to demur, but Bayub-Otal was emphatic in supporting Maia. "Of course it must be cleaned. River water at this time of year. Any Suban could tell you that."

It was not lost upon Maia that that included her-and that he must have meant it to.

Tolis gave her the flask. Taking out the stopper, she turned to Zen-Kurel.

"It'll sting."

He nodded indifferently. She gripped his thigh with one hand, untied the cloth and began cleaning the wound with one corner, remembering as she did so the last time she had touched his body. Looking up, she met his eye for an instant and felt herself coloring. Was he thinking the same?

"I'm going to tie it a little tighter."

"Thank you. That feels much more comfortable."

They went on. Evening was beginning to fall, but in the forest the air remained humid and close. After a little she smelt wood-smoke and could hear through the trees a distant, multiform hum and murmur. A few minutes later they came out on the north bank of the Zhairgen at its confluence with the Daub's. Now, at low water before the rains, the two rivers mingled with scarcely a ripple, shrun-

ken between their banks; the Zhairgen, perhaps forty yards wide, flowing darkly here under the trees, but on the opposite side-the open bank beyond the forest-tinged with the light of the westering sun.

It was at this open bank that Maia stared. She remembered the soldiers' camps at Melvda-Rain. What she was looking at now appeared less like a camp than a sort of village. She could see women tending fires, girls carrying water-jars and children running about shouting and playing. Over an area of perhaps three or four acres the scrub bordering the bank had been cut down and the ground cleared. Shelters of poles and straw thatch stood in neat rows. Stacks of wood had been piled at intervals and near these, away from the huts, cooking fires were burning under pots hung over dug-out trenches. From a tall mast in the center of the camp a banner-three corn-sheaves on a blue ground-hung drooping in the still air.

The others, like Maia, stopped short, gazing at the scene in surprise.

"You say the Leopards never go anywhere without women?" said Zirek at length.

Tolis laughed. "Captain Mollo said that; I didn't. Those are the women and children we brought from the slave-farm at Orthid."

"What are you going to do with them?" asked Maia.

"I've no idea; you'd better ask Lord Elleroth. Most of them'll be coming with us to Bekla, I dare say."

"But do you seriously mean to march to Bekla through the forest?" asked Zen-Kurel.

"Oh, we'll march to Zeray if we have to. You don't know Elleroth."

The raft ran on a rope fixed to stout posts driven into either bank. It looked solid and well-constructed, and Zen-Kurel admired it.

"Oh, we're first-class pioneers all right," said Tolis. "By Shakkarn! we ought to be by now, too, the work we've put in these last few weeks. We cleared the ground for those huts, and now we're chopping down Purn!"

"Well, if you're going to take those women and children through the forest," said Zirek, "all I can say is I hope the rains don't start while you're still at it."

"I'm with you there," said Tolis, as they stepped out on the further bank. "I'll take you straight up to Elleroth now. You don't mind waiting, do you, while I go in and

tell him who you are? I'm sure he won't keep you hanging about long."

He led the way to a larger hut in the center of the camp. No one they passed paid them any particular attention and Maia guessed that among this motley community on the move the sight of strangers had not the same effect as in an ordinary village. Probably no one thought in terms of strangers at all.

There were no guards outside the hut. Tolis left them and went in. They were glad enough to sit on the ground in the evening sunshine. To Maia it was a conscious pleasure simply to be still, to close her eyes and know that they were not going to spend the night in the forests She hoped this Elleroth would give them a good meal. Beyond that and sleep she had not the least wish to think for the moment.

She was roused by a child's voice beside her.

"You're new, aren't you? Have you just come?"

She raised her head. A little girl, perhaps six or seven years old, was standing on the grass near-by, looking them over with a self-possessed air. She herself certainly merited a glance. She was slim, dark-eyed and dark-haired, with a long, straight, intelligent nose and something strikingly graceful and vivacious in her manner, as though, like a warbler in the spring trees, she could not keep still, but must be constantly moving in response to everything round her. She was bare-footed and dressed in a makeshift, gray tunic, on the skirt of which some colored beads had been stitched-by herself, it looked like. She was carrying a length of old cord and, in the few moments while she waited for Maia to answer her, swung it two or three times, skipping first on one foot and then the other. Indeed, she seemed so full of vitality that Maia half-expected her to go bouncing away without waiting for a reply. As suddenly as she had begun, however, she stopped skipping and stood looking down with a pert air which suggested that she thought it was about time she was answered.

Maia laughed. "Yes, we're new. What's your name?"

"Melathys," said the child. She skipped again. "My name's Melathys. I knew you were new, knew you were new!" She was plainly gratified to find herself right. "You weren't at Orthid, were you?"

"Where's Orthid?"

"Where we were before the soldiers came." She sat

down beside Maia. "The soldiers killed Snekkeron, and then they took us all away."

"Who was Snekkeron?"

"The dog-man-the top man at Orthid. He used to walk about with a big, white dog. Then anyone did anything he didn't like, he used to tell the dog to bite them."

"Did the soldiers kill the dog, too?"

"I don't know," said Melathys. "What's your name?"

"Maia."

"And where are you going?"

"I don't know."

"Oh, haven't they told you yet? When are they going to?"

"How d'you mean?" asked Maia.

"Well, we're all going to different places. But you see-" and here the little girl, bending forward, looked at Maia bright-eyed, with the obvious self-satisfaction of one about to impart something which will establish her as superior and enviable. This must have been why she had raised the subject. "I'm going to a special place-a holy place. They chose me to go!"

"How marvelous for you!" said Maia. "Where is it?"

"It's called Quiso," replied Melathys. "Quiso of the Ledges. So I shall be a Ledge myself when I'm grown up."

"You mean a priestess, don't you?"

"Bria's going too," said Melathys quickly (to avoid accepting the correction, or so it seemed to Maia). "We're going with Captain Muzarkalleen. He was hurt in the fighting, but they'll make him better at Quiso, you see."

She looked at Zen-Kurel, lying supine on the grass nearby.

"You belong to him, don't you?" she asked.

"No," answered Maia. To her annoyance she felt herself coloring once more.

"To him, then?" asked the child, looking at Bayub-Otal.

"No."

Melathys looked puzzled. "She does belong to you, doesn't she?" she asked Zen-Kurel. "She's pretending, isn't she?"

"Here," said Maia desperately, "I'll teach you a new game if you like."

"Standing up, she took the little girl in her arms and as best she could-for she was quite a weight-began tossing her up and down.

"Bring me my dagger and bring me my sword. Melathys the lady to go by my side. I'm off to Bekla to meet the great lord-"

But at this point, as once before, she was interrupted. Tolis had come out of the hut and the others were on their feet. She kissed Melathys and put her down.

"I'll have to go now. Good-bye: I hope you'll be very happy at Quiso."

The little girl ran off through the sunset light. Maia, looking back as she went towards the door of the hut, saw her turn and wave before she disappeared round one of the shelters.

92: ELLEROTH EXPRESSES AN OPINION

Immediately inside the hut was a kind of miniature anteroom or lobby, its walls made of thin, wooden partitions. Here weapons, shields, cloaks, boots, belts and every kind of military gear were hanging on nails or laid out on the floor. It was all neatly disposed, however; the floor was sanded and clean and the general impression was of preparedness rather than disorder. On the far side of this improvised antechamber was another entrance, covered with a curtain made of old cloaks stitched together. This had been half drawn aside by a tall young man, who was standing in the aperture and regarding them intently, though with a cordial smile.

This personage immediately made a strong impression on Maia. Since she was at the rear of their little group and he was not for the moment directing his attention to her, she was able to look at him closely. He was tall-slightly taller, indeed, than Anda-Nokomis-and clean-shaven (which was unusual in the Beklan Empire at this time). His fair hair was cut rather shorter than was fashionable in the upper city. He had blue eyes, a short-indeed, rather a stubby-nose and very even, white teeth, which made his smile attractive. He was wearing a very well-fitting, spotlessly clean, gray veltron and over this a blue robe elaborately embroidered-weeks of work, thought Maia- in gold thread. Round his neck was a fine chain, from which hung a corn-sheaves emblem in wrought silver. Not

only his dress but his manner was strikingly elegant, reminding her a little of Elvair-ka-Virrion; yet for all his youth he had an experienced, seasoned, responsible look which-as she could now appreciate-Elvair-ka-Virrion had never possessed. Despite this, however, he struck her as a man with whom humor and amusement were prevalent, so that even his elegance seemed a kind of joke, an act deliberately put on the better to deal with the world and keep it in a good temper.

Elleroth-for it was he-stepped forward and took Bayub-Otal's hands.

"Are you really Anda-Nokomis of Suba? Do you know, I can only just manage to believe that you've really appeared out of the forest like a benevolent wood-spirit? Still, fortunately that's belief enough. This is an honor and a great pleasure. Santil-ke-Erketlis told me he thought you were dead, you see. It's rather refreshing, don't you think, to find that even he can be wrong from time to time? I mean, it restores one's faith in universal human fallibility. I'm very glad to welcome you and your friends. Come inside and have some wine for a few minutes before you go to your quarters, so that I needn't wait to begin enjoying your company. They're heating some water for you now and I've told them to find you all some fresh clothes. You'll be tolerant of our emergency wardrobe, won't you? We've all been running about a good deal just recently, you know."

As he talked he was conducting them through the inner entrance into the main body of the hut beyond. It was rough-and-ready enough-three trestle tables, four or five benches and a kind of dresser or sideboard which the camp carpenter must have knocked together from such materials as he had been able to come by. On this stood a few dishes and goblets of bronze and a good many more of wood and horn, together with some knives and two or three wooden trenchers containing fruit and black bread. A group of four or five young officers stood up as the strangers entered, their eyes moving immediately to Maia and Meris.

Elleroth himself poured and served the wine, handing it round from a tray carried behind him by a soldier servant.

"We ought to have a nice, popular toast, don't you think, that everyone can drink with unbridled enthusiasm?"

"To heldro victory?" suggested Zen-Kurel, smiling and raising his cup.

"Heldro victory!" echoed Elleroth. "And no heeltaps!"

They drank the toast. Maia was startled by the quality of the wine. During the past year she had, of course, learned a great deal about wine; and to be perfectly honest, she thought, she could not remember to have tasted better, even at Sencho's. Just as she was thinking this, Zirek corroborated it.

"By Shakkarn, sir, that's a drop of the real stuff, all right! That ought to make victory certain enough for anyone, I'd say!"

"It comes up from Ikat," said Elleroth. "The vintner follows us about at enormous risk; to make his fortune, you know. He's caused more casualties than the enemy so far. Perhaps we should all have some more; what do you think?"

No one refused. Maia, silent, had the impression that Elleroth, under cover of this urbane drollery, was weighing them up and forming his conclusions. After a few moments he went on, "Anda-Nokomis, of course I know very well where you fit into our wicked schemes. In fact, I've already taken the liberty of sending a messenger to Santil to tell him you're with me." (For a moment Maia wondered how he could feel so certain, until she recalled that of course he would know about the withered hand.) "But tell me, now, about your friends." He looked genially from one to another. "Tolis says that apparently two of you are really and truly the hero and heroine who killed Sencho. You ought to be rewarded with a kingdom: two kingdoms. You, was it?" he said to Zirek. "And you, saiyett? May I have the honor of embracing you both?"

Maia thought it highly probable that this was the first time in her life that Meris had been addressed as "saiyett." It must also surely have been the first time that she had blushed, which she did as Elleroth embraced her and kissed her on both cheeks.

The admiration of the young officers was warm. They began eagerly asking Zirek and Meris how they had contrived the killing and about their escape. After a little, however, and before Elleroth had had time to inquire about Zen-Kurel or Maia, Bayub-Otal interposed, "U-Elleroth, what I would like to suggest, if I may, is that we should go to our quarters now and make ourselves pre-

sentable; and then, after we've had something to eat-if that's not hoping for too much-I'll tell you how we all come to be here."

"Well, then, you must be sure to break off at the most exciting point," replied Elleroth, "and I'll be delighted to provide you with a bowl for people to put their melds in before you go on. But come along, let me show you the way. The water must be hot by now."

As she followed them out, Maia heard Bayub-Otal saying to Elleroth in a low voice, "… in private, really… few things need to be explained.",

"Of course," answered Elleroth. "No questions until you're ready, then."

Outside, a woman of about thirty, with black hair and a missing front tooth, was waiting, evidently to take charge of Meris and herself. The excellent wine, on an empty stomach, had rather gone to Maia's head and she felt quite content to be shepherded along in a not unpleasant haze of evening air, failing light, wood-smoke and the shouts and calls of children, until they came to the shelter prepared for them.

"My name's Tekordis," said the woman chattily. "I was two years at Orthid, but now I've taken up with a tryzatt on the general's headquarters. How do you come to be here?"

"Oh, we're refugees from the Leopards," answered Maia, happy to be stripped off and sitting rather muzzily in a tub of warm water. "We were coming through the forest and had the good luck to run into Captain Mollo."

The woman, who was obviously impressed at their having been received personally by Elleroth, asked no more direct questions, but was plainly hoping to learn more if she could. Both girls, however, felt that it might be more prudent not to oblige her. Maia, changing into the rough but clean clothes she was given, nevertheless took care to retain her travel-stained tunic, with the money and valuables in its pockets. Tekordis having found them a comb (which they were obliged to use for their nails as well as their hair), they felt they had done as much as they could by way of preparing for supper.

Walking back towards Elleroth's headquarters, they passed a group of soldiers throwing dice on the grass, who, as they went by, made their approval plain enough. Maia,

well accustomed to this sort of thing, acknowledged them with a smile and a wave.

"Maia," asked Meris a few moments later, "have you got any money?"

Maia, never one to cavil at a little stretching of the strict truth in a good cause, shrugged her shoulders.

"Lend you ten meld if you like."

"We could make a damned sight more than that in a place like this," said Meris. "Or I could, anyway."

" 'Tain't for me to tell you what's what, Meris, but we're supposed to be guests of this Elleroth, and anyway Anda-Nokomis wouldn't-" ›

"Oh, balls!" said Meris. "You're a fine one to talk, Saiyett Serrelinda, aren't you? D'you think I don't remember you tickling up old Sencho and enjoying every minute of it? Give me that shit-"

"Shut up!" cried Maia angrily. "Haven't you made enough trouble already, without going looking for more here? Great Cran, 's far as I can make out you've only to hang on till you get to Erketlis to be set up for the rest of your life, and now you want to start working this place on your back! Anyway, here's that young Tolis coming to meet us. El-leroth's sent him to hurry us up, I s'pose."

Elleroth was as good as his word to Bayub-Otal. During the meal (too many damned flies! thought Maia: in the upper city, she'd forgotten how bad they could be at this time of year) he asked no questions, but talked instead of the Chalcon campaign, SantiFs victory on the Thettit-Ikat road and the dash he had made afterwards to take the Orthid slave-camp.

"Dear me, we did proceed rapidly," he remarked, stabbing with his knife at a lump of cheese. "I sincerely trust I'll never be required to do anything so energetic as that again."

"But did Santil order it, or did you dream it up by yourself?" asked Zen-Kurel.

"Well, he-er-he may have mentioned it to me in passing as a sporting possibility," replied Elleroth. "I honestly find it difficult to have any very clear recollection: that march-I began to fear that creation would expire before we got there. I was praying ardently to be struck down with sunstroke, but I confess with no very lively hope of success. And the dried meat and bad water kept on making me sick. Digestion is the great secret of life, after all. Do

have some more cheese; then you can at least console yourselves by eating while I talk. That may not only comfort you a little for the quality of the conversation but also increase our mutual confidence."

"You're sure of that, are you?" said Zen-Kurel, smiling and helping himself to the cheese., "So sure that I'll be delighted to offer you an appointment as a captain in this band of ragamuffins, if you like," answered EUeroth. "We're a trifle short of officers at the moment. They will keep on doing such foolish things-"

"Not for lack of example, sir," put in one of his captains.

"I do set a bad example, I know," sighed EHeroth, nodding dolefully. "We don't actually pay anyone for participating in this rabble, you know," he went on, turning back to Zen-Kurel, "but if you'd care to take part in the loot of Bekla-"

"It's been looted already, sir, I rather think, both by the Palteshis and the Lapanese," replied Zen-Kurel.

"Yet you yourself succeeded in bringing away some- er-swag of this exceptional quality?" asked EUeroth, smiling towards Maia.

It was said as lightly and charmingly as any compliment ever paid, yet an awkward silence fell. Maia bit her lip and looked down at the table. EUeroth, perceiving that he had unwittingly said something unfortunate, hesitated, clearly hoping that someone would come to his rescue. It was Zen-Kurel himself who answered him.

"No, in point of fact it was she who brought us away: otherwise we'd still be there; or else dead. We're all greatly in her debt. But tell me, Lord Elleroth, if I'm not asking you to betray any secrets, what's your strategy in trying to reach Bekla through Purn? You've set yourselves an even harder job than Orthid this time, haven't you?"

"I'm sadly afraid we may have," replied Elleroth, taking his cue gratefully, "but if anyone can get us through that forest, Mollo will. We're lucky to have a pioneer commander like him. As for the strategy-well; that's supposed to be a little surprise for Kembri, really. You see, he knows where Santil is, but at the moment he doesn't know where we are: at least, I don't think he does. He must think his right flank's completely secure, resting on Purn. So I thought, well, supposing we were to go up through the forest, and then pop out-pop out, you know, just nip across and cut the Ikat-Bekla road behind him,

that might make him feel slightly uncomfortable. What d'you think?" It was clear that he respected Zen-Kurel and was genuinely seeking his opinion.

Zen-Kurel paused, reflecting. "If you can do it, yes; but the forest's very bad, you know. And it can't be long now until the rains, either. Besides, we don't know, do we?- Kembri may already be falling back on Bekla."

As their military talk continued, Maia began to feel so tired and drowsy that she could hardly keep her eyes open. Snatches of the conversation reached her meaninglessly through a daze. The discomfort of her period, the anxiety of the previous night in the forest, the long swim ending in the terror and near-disaster of the waterfall-all these had by now exhausted even her youthful vitality. Looking across at Meris, she could see that she was in little better case.

The young officers, delighted by the unexpected surprise of having two such girls as guests in the middle of a hard campaign, would hardly have noticed if she had made no response at all to their sallies and tall stories. They were perfectly happy just to look at her; to speak to her and merely to enjoy her presence. They were not going to let her go for as long as they could keep her. She realized that if she did not extricate herself, no one was going to do it for her.

She turned to Elleroth. "My lord, if you won't mind, I'm really that worn out I'd like to go to bed now. We've had a very hard day and I'm almost asleep as 'tis: I reckon Meris feels the same. Would you be so kind as to excuse us?"

Elleroth, as might have been expected, was immediately all courtesy, begging the girls' pardon for his lack of consideration and asking whether they needed anything else which he could provide. He was about to call a servant to accompany them back to their quarters when Zirek also begged to be excused, saying that he too felt very tired. One of the officers thereupon suggested that by way of an end to the evening they should all escort the girls to their shelter and sing them a song. This was enthusiastically received. Maia, only too glad that she was really going to be allowed to go to sleep, consented as gracefully as anyone could have wished; and thereupon she and Meris, amid much laughter and cheering, were carried shoulder-high into the sultry, brilliantly starred night and-after a little

tipsy altercation about the right way-back to their shelter, leaving Elleroth alone with Bayub-Otal and Zen-Kurel.

"Through the forest? Well, apart from anything else, you see," said Elleroth, refilling the wine-cups himself (he had dismissed the servants), "we have to stay on the move if we're to keep ourselves in supplies. There aren't a lot of us, it's true-rather less than five hundred, now-and since we got back here we've been able to get stuff sent up from Sarkid. But I can't go on drawing on Sarkid for more than another few days. Then there's the whole question of reward-loot, boodle, plunder and spoil. My men are all volunteers and I haven't paid one of them a meld as yet. They've fought and marched splendidly, but all they've got out of it so far is women. You know that old story, 'Oh, gods, not rape again!' Now that they've blooded themselves on that Elvair-ka-Virrion fellow, what we need is a really impressive exploit, leading to a dramatic victory. Not to mince words, I'd like to be the first heldro into Bekla and send a runner to Santil with the news. You see, he's still got Kembri between him and Bekla, but I've only got Purn. Santil will be taking on Kembri and I shan't be there. So I really ought to have a go at Purn, if only to justify my existence, don't you think? And, of course, cut off Kembri's retreat, if we can."

Bayub-Otal nodded. "Yes, I follow all that. It's only that Zenka and I have had a taste of that forest, and we wouldn't like your to come to any harm."

"Well, I'll have to be the judge of that, won't I?" replied Elleroth a shade brusquely. "I confess I could do with a little more sheer manpower to cut our way through. Still, never mind; that's enough of that. Anda-Nokomis, I really can't wait any longer to learn why you're not dead, and what exactly happened at Rallur."

Bayub-Otal's account lasted some time, though he omitted any reference to what had passed between Zen-Kurel and Maia. Elleroth listened intently and asked several questions. At last he said to Zen-Kurel, "Yes; well, Isee now why my little sally about your swag fell even flatter than most of my efforts. Most unfortunate. No one ever invites me twice, you know. But it certainly is rather mysterious, isn't it? This Serrelinda girl-and now that one's seen her one has to admit she really is all they say: if she

can look like that after two days in the forest, Cran knows what she must have looked like in the upper city-first she makes her fortune by betraying you all to Sendekar on the Valderra, and the next thing you know she nearly loses her life getting the two of you out of prison and out of Bekla. If I hadn't actually met her, I'd be the first to say she'd realized that Fornis was out to kill her and was trying to change sides in time to save her own skin."

"You mean you don't think that?" asked Zen-Kurel.

"Well, somehow it doesn't quite square with the impression I've formed of her, though I can't say exactly why. Tell me, has she herself raised the matter with you at all?"

"No, not at all: not once."

"I mean, she hasn't suggested that since she's saved your lives you might now save hers by writing a nice, cheery letter to Santil, or anything like that?"

"No, nothing like that," replied Zen-Kurel.

"And how has she made out on your little journey? Has she been useful at all since you left Bekla?"

"Well, the plain truth is that without her we wouldn't be here."

"It never occurred to you to slice her into little bits for what she'd done in Suba?"

"It occurred to Zenka," broke in Bayub-Otal, "but to tell you the truth I dissuaded him."

"Why?"

Bayub-Otal paused. Elleroth, perceiving that his hesitation proceeded not from ignorance or uncertainty, but from doubt over whether to speak or to remain silent, was beginning, "If you'd rather not-" when suddenly Bayub-Otal said, "This will have to come out some time or other, so it may as well be now. That night at the farm, Zenka, when you and I talked about Maia, there was something I didn't tell you."

"You mean you and she had already come to some sort of understanding?" Zen-Kurel spoke so sharply that both his hearers were startled.

"No," replied Bayub-Otal, "no, nothing like that. I haven't any-understanding with her. It was something she told me." They waited and he continued, "She'd told me that she and I are kinsfolk; in fact, we're first cousins."

"She told you that?"

"Yes. That evening, at the farm."

"And you believed her?"

"Oh, yes," said Bayub-Otal, "there's no doubt about it at all. She's my mother's sister's daughter, and what she said explains a great deal. I'll tell you how."

He did so, ending, "I can't see how this poor man Thar-rin could possibly have made up that story-or why he'd want to. Besides, it explains not only her extraordinary resemblance to my mother, but also why the Tonildan woman she thought was her mother should have felt able to sell her as a slave."

"It might explain something else, too," said Elleroth. "I hasten to say I'm only trying to make the best case I can for a girl who's struck me, quite frankly, as being rather honest and likable. From all you've told me she's certainly not short on courage."

"What does it explain?" asked Zen-Kurel.

"I only remarked that it might. You said this girl didn't find out that she was your cousin-that her mother was Suban-until some considerable time after her exploit on the Valderra. But mightn't that discovery have altered her whole outlook very much?"

"Then why hasn't she said so?"

"My dear man, actions speak louder than words. She has as good as said so, or so it seems to me. Presumably the poor girl has her pride. You don't expect her, do you, to go down on her knees and say, 'I've discovered I'm a Suban, so please will you forget all about the Valderra and spare my life?' She's told you who she is and left the rest up to you; I call that dignified."

"So-that might mean-you're saying, are you, that that might mean-"

Zen-Kurel came to a stop, but Elleroth said nothing to help him to a conclusion, only gazing at his shadowed face in the candlelight and waiting. "She could have had a perfectly creditable motive-" he stopped again-"for taking the enormous risk of going into that prison to release us?"

"Well, as I see it, having learned that she was first cousin to the rightful and imprisoned Ban of Suba, she was simply fulfilling her duty to her liege lord with the utmost courage. That's if you want my personal opinion."

After a long pause, Zen-Kurel said, "I suppose-well, I suppose that might be the truth of it."

"And what's more, you hope it is, don't you?" said

Elleroth. "Seeing through brick walls is rather a specialty of mine, you know. The clairvoyant freebooter-"

There was a tap on the doorpost outside: Elleroth's personal tryzatt drew aside the curtain, entered and saluted.

"Excuse me for interrupting you, Lord Elleroth, sir, but there's an urgent message from the guard commander. One of our patrols has reported a large force bivouacked about a mile away to the east. The patrol commander says they evidently don't know anything about us yet. He took good care not to be seen or heard, but he got close enough to hear some of them talking, and he's more or less certain they're Ortelgans."

93: MAIA'S NIGHT ADVENTURE

Maia woke in the dark. The air was close and heavy. She was sweating but her headache had gone. She could not tell how long she had been asleep, but it felt like not very long-perhaps only an hour or two. Everything seemed quiet outside and she had no idea what might have woken her. The bed was comfortable enough; better than she'd expected, in fact. She'd drop off again in a few minutes.

She wondered whether whatever it had been might have woken Meris too. She murmured "Meris?" but there was no reply.

"Meris?" Suddenly she felt more or less sure that there was no one there: the realization jolted her wide awake.

She slid out of her bed, reached across and felt the other one in the dark. Yes, it was empty; but in this heat there was no telling how long Meris might have been gone-an hour or only a few minutes. Well, but perhaps she was with Zirek.

And perhaps she wasn't, reflected Maia. The thought of the trouble that Meris was capable of causing made her feel quite sick with apprehension. Elleroth, of course, was obviously no kill-joy. If Meris wanted a bit of fun with one of his men, whether officer or soldier, that would no doubt be all one to him. Or even if Meris was plying for hire; though in a guest of the commander that would look pretty disreputable. Knowing Meris, however, there was always the likelihood that she would not rest content with that. What Meris enjoyed was using her sexuality to make trou-

ble. She recalled their interrupted quarrel earlier that evening. She wouldn't put it past Meris to devise some way of involving her, Maia, simply out of spite. Since the affair at the farm she had probably felt a grudge against Zenka, too. She might even-oh, no!

Yet why not? This camp was full of all manner of people who scarcely knew one another. Would Meris be capable of-might she have gone to-to hurt Zenka, or discredit him by means of one of her tricks? Zirek had told her how it had been when they killed Sencho. "She seemed to go completely crazy-she went on stabbing and stabbing in a kind of-well, I don't know, a kind of rapture-I had to drag her away."

This recollection was enough for Maia. Quickly she got dressed and went outside. The shelter allotted to Bayub-Otal, Zenka and Zirek was not far off, but in the dim starlight and this unfamiliar place it was difficult to recall exactly which one it was. She set off in the general direction, hoping that something might turn up to help her.

She could tell now, by the stars, that it was not very late in the night. Perhaps Meris had waited no longer than it had taken herself to fall asleep. Suddenly she caught sight of a sentinel, javelin over his shoulder and shield on the other arm, pacing slowly between the huts. She ran towards him. He stopped, raised his javelin and called sharply, "Stay where you are! Else I'll throw!"

Accustomed to the ways of the upper city, she had not taken into account that these were men who had just undergone a hard campaign. She stood stock-still as the man came up to her.

"You're breaking curfew. Why?"

"What curfew?"

"There's a curfew on women from two hours after sunset. You've no business to be out of your hut: I can take you in charge for this. What are you doing?"

"I'm sorry: I'm a stranger. I only came tonight. I'm worried about my friend-the girl who's sharing my shelter. I woke up and found her gone and now I'm looking for her. But she may be with a man-I don't know-in one of these huts here."

The sentry remained unsympathetic. "Well, there's a man who was sleeping on his own in there-that one."

He pointed. She was about to leave when he put a hand on her shoulder. "I'll come with you."

As they went towards the shelter he added, "If you've just come here, you'd better understand once and for all that women aren't allowed to go wandering about the camp at night. That's been a strict rule since Orthid. Place'd be like a damn' cat-house else, some of the women we took out of there."

"Well, that's as may be," retorted Maia briskly. "All I want is to find my friend. Neither of us came out of Orthid: we're personal guests of Lord Elleroth."

There were three beds in the hut. Two were empty: Zirek was sound asleep on the one farthest from the entrance. Maia shook him awake with some difficulty.

"Zirek, it's Maia! I woke and found Meris gone. Have you seen her?"

"Oh, Cran and Airtha! That blasted girl! No, I haven't! Who cares, anyway? Let me alone, lass; I want to sleep!"

"Where's Anda-Nokomis and Zenka, then?"

"Aren't they here? Well, then, as far as I know, they can't have come back from Elleroth, that's all."

At this moment all three of them became aware of a kind of muffled commotion somewhere in the distance- voices both of men and women, together with the piping cries of children and the occasional wail of a baby. As they listened it seemed to be coming nearer.

"What's that, then?" said the sentry.

"If you don't know, I'm sure I don't," replied Maia. Her first thought was that it could only be something to do with Meris.

They went back outside, followed a few moments later by Zirek. In the starlight they could make out a considerable crowd approaching between the shelters. It consisted mainly of women, dishevelled and obviously frightened, many leading children or carrying babies. On either side were soldiers, whom Maia could hear giving encouragement and reassurance in low voices.

"Come along, now, m'dear." "Won't be for long; you'll soon be back." "Only for the kids' safety, you know, that's all." "Sorry, missus, not now, strict orders." "Yes, General's coming directly to tell you all about it himself." "Get in that hut there, Liftil, wake 'em up, get 'em out!" "Keep that kid quiet, lass! Much for your good as everyone else's!" "Come on now, keep moving! Keep moving!"

It was a strange sight in the starlight-the shadowy, evergrowing crowd shuffling along, the women and children

stumbling out of the huts by twos and threes, the soldiers hastening hither and thither, the continual, low-voiced injunctions, the quickly-stifled whimpers of the babies, the rustling and soft padding of feet through the dry grass and over the bare-trodden ground.

Suddenly there were low calls of "Wait! Wait there!" and a tryzatt, holding out a spear, butt foremost, ran quickly to the head of the straggling procession. The women stopped, looking about them uncertainly in the gloom and plainly apprehensive. Then Elleroth was among them, smiling and greeting individuals here and there, putting a hand on this shoulder and that, distributing reassurance and encouragement as he made his way to the head of the crowd and then turned to speak to them.

"I've just had word of a band of strangers a little way off, over there." He pointed. "They're camped, but apparently they don't know about us yet. If they don't attack us we're certainly not going to attack them, so don't worry. They may even be friends-we simply don't know: we have to find out. And while we're doing that we mean to make sure you're all safe-even if it means you have a sleepless night, my dear." He smiled at a woman standing near-by.

"So we want you to go across the river, please. There'll be soldiers to look after you and you'll be in no danger from wild animals or anything like that. You'll probably all be back by morning; but meanwhile, will you all help me and my soldiers by making as little noise as you possibly can? As soon as I know any more myself I'll make sure you're told. So don't worry, and just make yourselves as comfortable as you can."

In the gloom, Maia had made out the unmistakable figure of Bayub-Otal, standing against the wall of a shelter. As the women and children began shuffling on once more towards the river, she went across to him.

"Anda-Nokomis!"

He looked round. She could perceive that in the moment that he recognized her his spontaneous reaction was one of pleasure and relief. "Anda-Nokomis, do you know any more about this? Who are these strangers?"

He hesitated, and she pressed him. "Anda-Nokomis, please tell me as much as you know."

"It's very little, Maia. A patrol's reported that there's a sizable force camped about a mile away over there,

upstream. They weren't there yesterday, so presumably they're on the march. That's all we know as yet."

"How many, Anda-Nokomis?"

"I tell you, Maia, we don't know. We've got to find out. It could possibly be Kembri and his whole army. That seems unlikely to me, but we can't rule out that possibil-ity."

"Where's Zen-Kurel?"

"Gone to get hold of some weapons: and so must I."

"What sort of men were these the patrol came on?"

"We think Ortelgans."

"Ortelgans?"

"Maia, I can't stay talking any longer: it's possible we may be attacked, you see. You and Meris must go across the river with the other women. I'll see you tomorrow; and if not, thank you for all you've done for us since Bekla." He paused, and then added, "Er-I think I may have been-er-too hard on you that evening at the farm. I should be very glad to think so-cousin."

He stooped quickly, kissed her cheek and was gone into the gloom, leaving Maia staring after him.

Behind her someone coughed, and she turned to see a man wearing tryzatt's insignia on either side of his corn-sheaves emblem. Before he could speak she said, "I'm a personal guest of Lord Elleroth. I'm waiting to speak to him before I cross the river."

He looked at her uncertainly, but the Serrelinda-even deprived of her upper city splendor-had acquired a certain authority which carried its own weight. After a moment or two he replied, "Very well, saiyett. But please try not to be too long," saluted and left her.

It was during the course of this night that Maia carried out what was, perhaps, when all is said and done, the most remarkable exploit of the legendary Serrelinda; less dramatic, possibly, and to outward appearances less suicidally heroic than the swimming of the Valderra, but nevertheless a deed stamping her quite clearly as a woman no less exceptional (to say nothing of being considerably less nasty) than Queen Fornis. In retrospect, no one was to feel more surprised than herself. Yet she was not surprised at the time, for with Maia impulse was everything.

Often, throughout these past months of the summer, both awake and in dreams, it had seemed to her that the ghost of the wretched Sphelthon had been attendant near

her, silently reproachful, wistfully jealous of her youth and beauty on behalf of all those-of all in the world-who had died young. In the dreams he said never a word, merely gazing at her sorrowfully-sometimes a strong lad in his prime, sometimes the poor, blood-battered victim who was all she had seen in reality-and in some strange way making her feel guilty that he should have lost his life while she retained hers to enjoy. Sometimes he came gliding after her down a long corridor which turned into the watery, overhung channel of the Nordesh. Sometimes she was dancing the senguela and, crossing the floor to speak to Fordil, would meet instead his eyes looking up at her above the leks and zhuas. Why she should feel guilty on account of his death she could not tell. Indeed, with her reason she knew that of course no tribunal, whether of gods or men, could conceivably indict her for it. And yet he haunted her, as it were entreating her to perform some deed which would give rest to his ghost, atone for his desolate ruin. In Tharrin's cell she had felt his presence, at Milvushina's bedside and in the room where Randro-noth lay slaughtered. Sometimes it had even seemed to her that her own life would be a small price to pay for the placation of this pathetic visitant. Yet he did not come, she knew, simply to make her suffer. No; he had some undisclosed, unspoken purpose. Nor could she pray for release from him, since he came, she was instinctively aware, not by the will of Cran or Airtha, of Lespa or Shakkarn, but from Frella-Tiltheh the Inscrutable, she who has no eyes to see us; no ears to hear us; no being, indeed, that we can comprehend; she who, while infinitely remote and inaccessible, is yet within ourselves, both each and everyone.

If there were indeed Ortelgans out there in the wasteland beyond the camp, then surely they could only be those whom Ta-Kominion had led to Chalcon as part of Elvair-ka-Virrion's force. Five hundred Ortelgans; she recalled Bel-ka-Trazet saying so at the barrarz. She remembered, too, how he had also said that their assignment was largely a matter of policy. "We have to keep in with Bekla. But see your men come back alive, that's all. And if you have to get out, get out through Lapan."

Could it really be the whole of Kembri's army out there, with the Ortelgans nearest? Or had Ta-Kominion, perhaps, after the defeat on the highway and the deposition

of Elvair-ka-Virrion, decided not to wait for Kembri, but to save his men and make the best of his way home rather than face destruction with the Leopards?

Maia stood abstracted, musing in the darkness, while all around the soldiers made a final search of the shelters, here and there coming across some bewildered woman or terrified, deserted child and guiding them down to the river.

She had liked Ta-Kominion and he had liked her. It was he who had opened the bidding at the barrarz; he had gone to three thousand meld, she recalled-probably most of what he had in the worlds-before being obliged to drop out.

It would be no use trying to talk to Elleroth: no use trying to talk to Anda-Nokomis. As responsible soldiers they could not discount the possibility that it might be Kembri out there; or even if it was not, that whoever it was might strike first and ask questions afterwards. They would tell her to leave their own business to them and join the other women across the river.

But if she herself could only get to Ta-Kominion and tell him that these Sarkidians had no more wish to fight than he had, then any amount of misunderstanding and bloodshed might be prevented. It would be no use waiting until the morning. Once blood had been shed, injury sustained, pride aroused, these men would be at each other like cocks in a pit.

Yet if it was Kembri's whole army? He would most probably put her to death, if only for having been with Elleroth. He desired her death, as she knew. For long minutes she stood irresolute, feeling Sphelthon's invisible presence, his gaze upon her in the darkness. She raised her eyes to the glowing stars.

"O Lespa! Send me a sign! Only send your servant a sign!"

At this moment, from somewhere in the camp, there came faintly to her ears the cry of a lost child. "Mother! Mother!" The voice was Tonildan.

Maia began to run. Bending low and peering this way and that, she dodged between the huts, came to a dry watercourse, dropped silently into it and began making her way along it in the opposite direction from the river. After going about two hundred yards she climbed out on the further side, lay prone until she was sure there was no

one near and then set off eastward through the dried-up bushes and scattered clumps of trees.

She went cautiously, dodging from one thicket to the next and stopping continually to look ahead of her and listen. At all costs she must avoid running into one of Elleroth's patrols and being brought ignominiously back to the camp, for in that case it would certainly be supposed that she had been deserting-or perhaps even worse.

Once she thought she heard voices at a distance, but after waiting for some time decided that it could only have been her own frightened fancy. The scrub was open enough for her to keep direction by the stars, and this she took for a sign of Lespa's favor. Any road, she thought, there's no Valderra here. Whatever happens, I shan't drown.

None the less, she was never for a moment free from apprehension and the fear of death. The solitude, utterly still, seemed menacing. There was not an owl, not a bat to be heard. The very silence of this wilderness seemed unnatural. Twice she almost turned back; and twice glimpsed Sphelthon glimmering among the trees, a wraith that vanished even in the instant that she perceived it. Her tears were falling, but whether for him or for herself she could not have told.

For perhaps half an hour she wandered on through the empty wasteland, a prey to every kind of misgiving. Perhaps it had all been a false alarm and there were no soldiers at all? Or perhaps, whoever they were, they had already gone. Perhaps she had taken the wrong direction and already left them somewhere behind her. If they really existed, perhaps they were not Ortelgans at all, but runaway slaves like those with whom Meris had lived in Belishba. Even if they were Ortelgans, nevertheless Ta-Kominion might not be with them. He might be dead; or they might have mutinied against him. If he was with them, it now seemed to her unlikely that she would be allowed to speak with him at all. Or even if she were, why should he believe her, why should he trust her! What proof could he have that she was not a decoy sent by Elleroth?

Yet still she went on. The only possible thing to do, she thought, was to act on the assumption that the Ortelgans were there, that they were alone and that Ta-Kominion was with them.

She was picking her way through a thick grove of scrub willow when she once more heard voices. This time there

was no doubt about it: they were low but distinct. As she stopped, holding her breath, she realized with a shock that they were very close-no more than twenty or thirty yards away among the trees.

She stood listening intently.

"… should've stayed where we were, if you ask me."

"All depends, though, don't it? Who's to tell?"

Silence returned. She wondered whether the men had moved away; yet she had heard nothing. After what seemed a long time she heard a cough. Then the first voice, still speaking low, said, "The basting rains, though; how's he think we're going to get back once they start?"

"Well, I reckon soon as he's sure which way it's gone he'll go over, that's his notion."

"What, to Erketlis, you mean?"

"Ah. Quickest way home, see?"

This was enough for Maia. The men were speaking so quietly that she could not be sure of their dialect, but what she had been able to hear had convinced her that they must be Ortelgans speaking of Ta-Kominion. Well, she thought, reckon this is what I come for. If I'm going to die I'd best just get on with it. She called in a low voice, "Can I talk to you?"

There was a sound of startled movement, and then one of the men replied, "Who's there? Who are you?"

"I'm a woman, and I'm alone. Can I come and talk to you?"

"What you want, then?"

"I'm a personal friend of Lord Ta-Kominion. I've got an urgent message for him."

She could hear the men muttering. Then the same voice said, "Who's it from, then? And who are you?"

'TH tell that to Lord Ta-Kominion."

At this moment a new, authoritative voice said, "What the hell's all this basting row? Weren't you told to keep quiet, eh?"

"It's some woman, tryzatt, off in those trees," said the second man.

"What the hell d'you mean, a woman?"

"Says she knows the commander; wants to see him. Knew his name an' all. Got a message, she says."

"I'm alone, tryzatt," called Maia. "Can I come and talk to you?"

The tryzatt was evidently a man of fairly quick mind. "Where did you meet the commander?"

"In Bekla, at the barrarz in the upper city, with Lord Bel-ka-Trazet and Lord Ged-la-Dan."

"What's his woman's name, then?"

"Berialtis: brought up on Quiso."

There was a pause.

"Come out steady," said the tryzatt at length, "hands on your head."

Maia did so. The three men confronting her were typical Ortelgans, stocky and dark, the tryzatt, who had a raw, barely-healed scar across his forehead, considerably older than the two soldiers.

"A place like this-how do you come to be here?" he asked, looking her up and down.

"I've no time to explain," answered Maia, with as much authority as she could muster. "My message is urgent, see, and it could very well save your lives. You got to take me to Lord Ta-Kominion at once." As he hesitated, she added more vehemently, "For Cran's sake, what harm do you think I can do? Why else would I be here alone, in the middle of the night-"

"Well, that's what I'd like to know," replied the tryzatt. But as he spoke he gripped her arm, turned and led her away with him.

They went fast through the trees and bushes. Soon Maia became aware that the tryzatt was picking their way among men lying on the bare ground. From what little she could see they were tattered and dirty, with a general look of ill-being. All were fully clothed, with their arms lying ready to hand. Most seemed asleep, but here and there a few, lifting their heads or propping themselves on their elbows, stared as she and the tryzatt went past. None spoke, however, and Maia guessed that their orders about silence were strict. Perhaps, indeed, orders were unnecessary: no doubt Chalcon had been a hard school.

They came to a rough shelter made of branches laid either side of a pole on two forked sticks; hardly more than a kennel, its ridge perhaps three feet from the ground. A sentry was standing beside it. The tryzatt addressed him in a whisper.

"This woman says she's got a message for the commander. Seems genuine enough."

"You're asking me to wake him?"

"That's for you to say."

"Well, be fair," replied the man. "You're the tryzatt, not me."

"You're his orderly, not me."

The man was beginning, "I'd best go and ask Captain Dy-Karn-" when from inside the shelter Ta-Kominion's voice said, "What is it, Klethu?"

"This is Maia Serrelinda here, my lord," said Maia quickly. "I need to speak to you urgently: for your sake, not for mine."

"Maia?" he replied in a tone of astonishment. Then, with a quick note of alarm in his voice, "Who's with you? What's happened?"

"There's nothing wrong, my lord, but-"

"Where have you come from? Who's sent you?"

"I've got some very important news for you."

"Wait, then."

After a few moments Ta-Kominion came elbowing his way feet first out of the shelter and stood up. He was wearing a ragged shirt and breeches and looked, as she could see even in the dim starlight, like a man utterly worn out; a very different figure from the high-spirited youth who had opened the bidding at the barrarz. Her expression, as she took his hands in greeting, must have revealed her feelings, for before she could speak he said, "You needn't waste your sympathy on me: we've plenty worse. But Maia, how in Cran's name do you come to be wandering about alone in a place like this? Are you on the run or something?"

"You could call it that. But now you must tell me something, my lord, 'cos I've got to know this if I'm to help you. Is this Kembri's whole army, or are you here on your own?"

He took her arm and led her away among the trees. Like the tryzatt, he spoke in whispers.

"Why do you ask me that? Why have you come?"

"Answer my question and I'll explain. It can't hurt to tell me: I can't leave here without you let me, can I?"

As he hesitated she took his hands once more, looking up into his bloodshot, hollow eyes.

"Honest, my lord, I only want to help you: and I've risked my hfe to come here."

"Everyone's life's at risk here," replied he. "I wouldn't give much for our chances now and that's the truth. We

left Kembri's army the night before last and we've been going ever since. The men are on their last legs. We've got no food left, either. But I'll get some of them back to Ortelga yet, you see if I don't."

"Listen to me, my lord. There's a way to put the whole thing right, if you'll only do as I say."

"But who's sent you?" he asked again, impatiently.

"Just listen, my lord, please! Sit down and listen to me."

Ta-Kominion sat down on the ground, his arms round his updrawn knees, looking up at her with an expression suggesting that although he would like to believe her, he felt that to do so would be foolish.

"About a mile away over there," said Maia, pointing, "is Lord Elleroth of Sarkid. He's on his own like you, and I should guess he's got about the same number of men."

Ta-Kominion seemed about to spring to his feet, but Maia restrained him.

"They know you're here, but they don't know yet whether it's only you or Kembri's whole army. What I'm trying to tell you is that they're as much afraid of you as what you are of them."

Ta-Kominion buried his face in his hands. "Oh, Shardik, that's about all we needed! Pinned against the river, too! That's basted everything!"

"No, it hasn't, my lord. Don't you see, if you're not fighting for the Leopards any more, Elleroth's got no quarrel with you? You ought to join him-he needs men-it'd be as big a weight off his mind as what it'd be off your'n. Why don't you come back with me now and talk to him?"

"It's a trick! A Beklan trick!" In the half-darkness the girl Berialtis had come up silently and was standing beside them, clutching a soldier's cloak round her. She was shivering in the hot night and looked no less wretched than everyone else whom Maia had seen. "Don't go, Komo! She's lying!"

Her dark eyes glared at Maia-the eyes of a fanatic, intensified by fear and privation.

Maia stood up and faced her. "All right, that's it, then; I done my best. My lord, I hope you'll have the kindness to let me go back where I come from."

"Be quiet, Berialtis," said Ta-Kominion. "I'm commanding here, not you. Maia, how can I be sure of this man Elleroth-heir of Sarkid, isn't he? How can I be sure I can trust him?"

"My lord, I'll be honest with you. Like I said, no one's sent me: I just thought this lot up on my own. Lord Elleroth doesn't even know I've come-"

"You're not his woman, then?"

"Oh, Cran, no! I just don't want to see the two of you tear each other to bits, that's all; 'cos that won't be no good to you nor nobody."

"Berialtis, go and wake Dy-Karn and bring him here. Don't argue; just do as I tell you for once."

"You let yourself be taken in by this Beklan bitch; an unbeliever! I haven't forgotten that filthy barrarz, if you have-"

"Neither have I," said Ta-Kominion, getting up. "I'll go myself: you'd better come with me, Maia."

Reaching his shelter, they found a group of four or five young men whispering together.

"These are all the officers we've got left," said Ta-Kominion. "Captain Dy-Karn, my second-in-command: Maia Serrelinda."

There were murmurs of surprise. "You'd better tell them, Maia, what you've just told me," said Ta-Kominion.

Maia did so.

"But this Elleroth's an out-and-out heldro, isn't he?" asked Dy-Karn. "Why else would he be with Erketlis? If you trust us all to him, Komo-"

"All I can say is I've met him," said Maia, "and I don't reckon as he's one to take unfair advantage. I can't say n'more, 'ceptin' they're all as scared of you as what you are of them." As they hesitated, she added, "You don't have to surrender to them nor any o' that. Just offer to join them. Any road, what else you going to do?"

"By the Ledges, and I reckon she's about right there!" said another of the officers. "No food, men worn out, couldn't fight if they had to-"

"When we left Kembri, you see," said Ta-Kominion to Maia, "no one else knew what we were going to do, naturally. We reckon his lot can't last even until the rains. Erketlis'll destroy them; and we weren't going to wait for that. We were reckoning on crossing the Zhairgen by the Ikat high road, but we found the bridge held by Beklans- too many for us: so we had to come on downstream. I've been hoping we might get across somehow at Nybril, but obviously we can't get to Nybril if Elleroth's in the way."

"Elleroth's got a raft on ropes across the Zhairgen,"

said Maia. "He's cutting his way through Purn, but he needs more men to make sure of it before the rains. If you was to join him, I reckon he could probably feed you an' all. How many you got?"

"Only about three hundred and fifty now. We lost a lot in Chalcon."

"The girl's right, my lord," said Dy-Karn. "After all, we can always tell this Elleroth that if he won't have us, we'll sell our lives very dear. I'll come with you if you want."

In the event three Ortelgans set out with Maia; Ta-Kominion, Dy-Karn and an older officer named Selta-Quaid, who limped on a stick and appeared to have been wounded in half a dozen places from head to foot. The men had been woken and were standing to arms. Word had, of course, got round of what was toward. As they passed through the different groups there were murmurs of "Good luck, sir!" "Tell 'em we're not beat yet, general!" "Bring us back a few sheep, sir!" and the like. It was plain that Ta-Kominion still retained their loyalty and confidence.

The short summer night was drawing to an end and the sky behind them paling. The wilderness seemed as empty and almost as silent as before, save for the first pipings of awakening birds. She herself felt ready to drop. She had been tired enough the night before, and had had only an hour or two of sleep.

But Sphelthon: ah! he was asleep now; deeply and peacefully. She could feel it in her heart, his peace, gleaming like dew on a meadow. He was gone, but had left his blessing upon her. She had poured out on his poor, faraway grave the offering of her night's fear and resolution, and it had been sufficient even for Frella-Tiltheh.

She was startled from these thoughts by her name being called from a distance. All four of them stopped in their tracks, listening. The sound was coming from some way off among the broken woodland. There was, to say the least, nothing furtive about it. It was like the crying of wares by a street-trader. "Maia! Maia!" Whoever was calling plainly did not care who heard him. After the long hours of stealth and whispering, the concealment and silence of the tense night wanderings, the effect seemed almost preternatural, a shattering of normality sharp as lightning or the sudden falling of a tree.

After a few moments Maia (who had recognized the

voice) replied, "Here I am!" There was strenuous movement in the bushes some way off, a sound of running footsteps and next moment Zen-Kurel, armed, burst out of the undergrowth and halted a moment at the sight of the Ortelgans. Then he drew his sword.

Maia's companions instantly drew also, but she ran forward, stopping midway between them and Zen-Kurel.

"What's happened, captain? What's brought you here?"

He looked at her, opened his mouth to speak and then looked away, seeming out of countenance.

"I-er-well, I came to look for you, that's all. You've been missed." Then, as it were assuming a harsher note to cover his embarrassment, he asked abruptly, "Who are these men?"

"They're Ortelgan officers," she answered no less coldly, "come to talk with Lord Elleroth. I think you'd better put up your sword, captain. I'm acting as their surety."

Zen-Kurel, frowning perplexedly, did as she had suggested.

"What do they want with Lord Elleroth?"

"I reckon that's between him and them," she said; "in the first place, anyway." Then, as the three Ortelgans came up, "This is Lord Ta-Kominion of Ortelga: Captain Zen-Kurel of Katria."

Ta-Kominion bowed, concealing his surprise. "Has King Karnat seconded officers to Erketlis, then? I didn't know that."

"No," replied Zen-Kurel, "I'm here by an accident of war. I was a prisoner of the Leopards in Bekla, but I managed-that's to say, Maia-she-er-she contrived my escape."

"Did she?" answered Ta-Kominion. "At that rate, it seems we all owe her a debt in common."

It was full daylight now, the clear sky already blue, the grasshoppers beginning to chirp in the brown, dry grass. Pushing through a belt of trees near the river, they found themselves within fifty yards of eight or nine Sarkidian soldiers. They had thrown a plank across the dried-up water-course which Maia had crossed the night before, and set up an outpost on the nearer bank.

Maia again went forward, and addressed the tryzatt.

"Tryzatt, these Ortelgan officers have come in peace to talk with Lord Elleroth. Can you please conduct them to him at once?"

She had already turned away by herself when Zen-Kurel overtook her.

"Where are you going, Maia?"

"Across the river," she said, "to join the other women and go to sleep; I'm very tired. Thank you for coming to look for me."

94: MEWS'S LAST ESCAPADE

As the servants removed the Ortelgans' knives and plates and cleared the table Elleroth, who had briefly left them, returned and drew up a bench. With him were Mollo, Tolis and two or three more of his officers, as well as Bayub-Otal and Zen-Kurel.

"I've sent all the food we can spare over to your camp," he said to Ta-Kominion. "I'm afraid it's rather penitential stuff, but perhaps your sybaritic connoisseurs will make allowances. Have you many sick and wounded?"

"Too many," replied Ta-Kominion. "We had our own surgeon with us, but he died in Chalcon, poor fellow. The High Baron's not going to be pleased about that: he was a good doctor-trained on Quiso."

"Well, that's the place, no doubt of it," said Elleroth. "I'm sending Muzarkalleen, one of my officers, to be treated by the Tuginda, if only we can get him there. He got badly cut up at that little affair on the highway."

"So did we, sir," said Dy-Karn. "Lost seventy-six men, though some of them may have been able to get themselves back to Ortelga, I hope."

"I'll send our doctor over to your camp," said Elleroth. "Could you see to it, Tolis, please? But that reminds me, Ta-Kominion; I'd like your advice. We have these slave children to find homes for, you know, and it's not easy. I'm determined they shall go to good homes, not to places where they'll remain slaves in everything but name. I had a notion to send two of the girls to Quiso with Muzarkalleen, as a sort of offering. You never know, they might make priestesses one day. What do you think?"

"Are they clever?" asked Ta-Kominion.

"One of them-Melathys-struck me as a particularly sharp child," answered Elleroth. "That's why I picked her."

"Well," said Ta-Kominion, "I imagine that if they're

clever they'll be welcome. A little non-Ortelgan blood among the priestesses might be all to the good. They'll be well treated, anyway; you can be sure of that."

"Well, it's a small matter," said Elleroth, "but I'm glad to hear you approve. Still, we'd better get down to business, hadn't we? You say Kembri's in a bad way?"

"We all think his position's hopeless: that's why we're here, of course. You see, the army was badly demoralized in Chalcon and the reinforcements from Bekla-well, they've turned out worse than nothing, really. And then on top of that we heard that Randronoth had defected-"

"So it occurred to you to tiptoe away on fairy feet, in darkness and clandestine order, did it?"

"Well, you have to put yourself in Ortelga's position," replied Ta-Kominion. "Bel-ka-Trazet's policy has always been to keep in with Bekla, so that we can count on help against the Deelguy when it's needed."

"Dear me, yes; those dashing, vagabond laddies-"

"This isn't the first time Ortelga's had to choose the right moment to run up a tilting plank to the other end," put in Dy-Karn. "It was the same when the Leopards deposed Senda-na-Say."

"Kembri was very insistent that we should send men to join Elvair-ka-Virrion," said Ta-Kominion. "Bel-ka-Tra-zet didn't really care for the idea, but he couldn't very well get out of it. So he picked on me." He gave a short, sardonic laugh. "Oh, I admit I was keen enough: I reckoned we'd all do very well out of it; but that was more than Bel-ka-Trazet ever thought, if I know anything about him. Why, even at the barrarz in Bekla he was warning me to get out quick if we had to. I didn't think much about it at the time, but after the battle I felt it would be best to bring what was left of the men back as soon as I could."

"Yes, indeed," said Elleroth, "and perhaps a short billet-doux to Santil wouldn't come amiss, either: but that's for you to decide. Well, let us consider the ins and outs of this jolly log-roll, shall we? As a matter of fact, it will be literally that, as Captain Mollo will now explain."

"Got to get up through Purn before the rains, that's it. Need more men-got to get on faster."

"Northward through Purn: one might almost call that a step in the right direction as far as you're concerned, might not one?" asked Elleroth. "Have you a few meaty lads capable of swinging an axe?"

"Yes, but no axes."

"I have some more axes coming up from Sarkid, but swords are good enough for undergrowth and that sort of thing. Well then, when we get out on the other side of Purn I have a fancy to turn east and cut the Bekla-Ikat road behind Kembri. He'll really love that, if he hasn't already fallen back on Bekla. Would you care to join us in a little spree of that nature?"

"Well, if that's your price," replied Ta-Kominion, "we'll have to pay it-"

"Think of the novelty; the wonderful excitement-"

"-but from what I've seen, Kembri may very well collapse before he can fall back anywhere, if Erketlis attacks him."

"We don't know what's happening in Bekla, though, do we?" said Elleroth, dropping his bantering manner and speaking more seriously. "Who's got it? Fornis, Eud-Ecachlon or the Lapanese?"

"I suppose Erketlis means to have it, doesn't he?" said Dy-Karn.

"Certainly; and before the rains, if he can. I've no quarrel with Eud-Ecachlon; but that evil woman mustn't be allowed time to make herself stronger in Bekla. I'll admit I am afraid of her. She's a sorceress: she can bewitch people out of their right minds; and she'd destroy the empire before she'd relinquish power-call in the Deelguy or something like that."

Ta-Kominion nodded. "That's what I think, too. Well, let's agree on this much. As soon as my men have had a day's food and rest and got back some spirit, we'll help you through the forest. Then let's talk again in the light of what we find out when we get to the other side. That's meant to be honest and no more than I'm ready to stand to. Will you accept it?"

"Yes, I will," said Elleroth. He gave Ta-Kominion his hand. "I'm sure Maia will be delighted to hear about this little bargain of ours."

"By the Ledges, that's a girl, sir!" said Dy-Karn. "I couldn't believe it last night, when she said she'd come across to us of her own accord."

"Oh, really? Now I could, you know," answered Elleroth. "As a matter of fact, that was why I recalled our patrols. When I was told she was missing, I had a sort of notion that she might be paying you a call; and I didn't

want anything to spoil it-no little animosity in the tene-brosity, you know, or anything like that."

"You mean you'd already thought we might join you?"

"I mean nothing so vainglorious. I had no idea-none of us had-whether you might not be Kembri in full fig. As a military commander I could hardly do anything very amicable, could I, until I knew that? Awkward chap, Kembri; might have been rather stuffy, don't you know. But that splendid girl-she took the whole risk on herself and saved us all any amount of trouble, to say the very least."

"You might have let me know earlier that she was gone, sir," said Zen-Kurel. "I didn't learn it till just before dawn."

"Oh, might I, now?" replied Elleroth, gravely returning his glance. "Do you know, I'm afraid that never really occurred to me? I thought you'd said earlier on-"

"If we'd only known," broke in Bayub-Otal, "I think we'd both have gone out after her a great deal earlier."

"Well, I thought it would be a shame to wake you," replied Elleroth suavely, "after-the hard day you'd had. However, next time she does anything like that, I assure you I'll-"

Suddenly Tolis burst in, wide-eyed. As everyone looked up Elleroth broke off, laying a hand on his arm.

"I infer that something untoward has occurred, Tolis," he said composedly. "I wonder what. Not Kembri, I hope?"

"No, sir," said Tolis. "There's been a murder in camp, sir: a woman!"

"O gods!" said Elleroth, getting up. "How boring! I knew it would happen sooner or later. Who is it?"

"It's the girl who came last night, sir," said Tolis, "with these officers-"

"Not Maia?" cried Zen-Kurel. Bayub-Otal, white to the lips, sprang to his feet, gripping the edge of the table.

"No, sir," answered Tolis. "The other girl, the Belish-ban girl; she's dead, sir!"

"Do we know how?" asked Elleroth, taking his sword-belt from the orderly.

"Yes, sir. There's two men being held under guard. They reported the girl's death themselves. They admit having caused it."

"Who are they?" said Elleroth.

"Lortil and Dectaron, sir. Captain Mollo's company."

"But great Cran, those are two damned good men, that's it! Never been in any sort of trouble! What the-"

"Calm yourself, Mollo! Obviously we must look into this at once. Where have they put the poor girl?" EUeroth turned to Tolis.

"In one of the shelters, sir, up the lines."

Elleroth looked round at the officers present. "Mollo and Tolis, you'd better come with me; and of course you'll wish to come, too, won't you?" he said to Bayub-Otal and Zen-Kurel. "Perhaps the rest of you won't mind waiting here for the time being-unless, of course," he added to Ta-Kominion, "you'd prefer to go back to your camp and start making arrangements in the light of what we've just agreed. We'll meet again later." '

Having taken Ta-Kominion's hands for a moment in farewell, he ducked out under the curtain which the orderly was holding aside.

The body of Meris, covered with a blanket,-was lying in the further corner of the shelter to which Tolis led the way. A soldier on guard saluted as the commander entered. Gently, Elleroth drew back the blanket from the head. The girl's face was contorted, the teeth clenched, the lips drawn back so far that the cheeks were ridged under the open eyes.

"Where's the wound?" asked Elleroth.

"Her neck's broken, sir," answered Tolis.

One of Meris's arms was protruding stiffly from under the blanket. Elleroth took the cold hand in his own, stooped and touched it with his lips. He turned to Bayub-Otal and Zen-Kurel.

"I'm more sorry than I can tell you. My guest-your friend-I feel to blame."

As Bayub-Otal murmured some conventional words of demurral, Zirek entered in tears and fell on his knees beside the bed.

"Someone must put some clothes on the body and lay her out decently," said Elleroth to the soldier.

"Yes, sir," he answered. "There's some women waiting. Only tryzatt Miarn said not to alter anything until you'd seen her, sir, and said what was to be done, like."

"Perfectly correct," said Elleroth. "Tell the tryzatt to let the women come in. And say a pyre's to be prepared for this evening."

"Sir."

Elleroth was turning to go when Zirek touched his hand.

"I'd like to-to stay here and pray for a minute or two,

sir, if I may, before the women come. I won't be long."

"Of course," replied Elleroth. He turned to the soldier. "Wait outside, please, Hospa, until U-Zirek has finished."

"Sir."

"Where are the two men under guard?"

"With the tryzatt, sir. They're not making no trouble, sir; only they've asked if they can see Captain Mollo."

Elleroth nodded. "Well, Captain Mollo, will you go and talk to them, and then bring them to me under guard as soon as you're ready? Shall we say in about half an hour?"

The officers went out, followed by the soldier. Zirek, left alone, stood for some time prayings with raised, outstretched arms. Then, bending forward, he drew the blanket entirely away from the body, so that Meris lay naked before him as she had so often lain in life-the firm, smooth thighs, the gentle curve of the belly with its deep, hollow navel, the big circles round the nipples like dark-hued lilies on rose-pink water-a reversal of nature. Even now, against wish and will-so that he felt ashamed, and once more covered the body-her stricken, cold beauty had the power to kindle desire. He knelt and kissed her feet, one and then the other.

"I'm sorry, lass," he said aloud. "Cran knows I'm sorry. I'd have loved you and kept you safe, if only you'd let me. I always said you'd do it once too often, but you wouldn't listen, would you? At least it'll leave you in peace now."

The sentry, who had retired to a decent distance, returned at the sound of his voice. "I'm sorry, sir, did you speak to me? I'm afraid I didn't catch what you said."

"No, that's all right, lad," said Zirek. "I'm done now, thanks. Let the women come in."

Elleroth and Mollo looked up at the two soldiers standing before them. Both were conspicuously scratched and had bled about the face and neck. On either side of them stood their own tryzatt and another. Bayub-Otal, Zen-Kurel and Zirek were standing behind and to the left of Elleroth. The hut was close and stuffy, and all nine men were sweating.

"Now," said Elleroth, looking from one prisoner to the other as he addressed them, "you had better both understand at once that this is a very serious matter indeed. A young woman has come to a violent end. She was a secret

agent of General Erketlis, who had carried out a very important and dangerous exploit in Bekla with the greatest heroism. She had escaped and was on her way to General Erketlis to be honored and rewarded. She was a personal friend of the gentlemen you see here, and she was my guest and therefore under my protection. Now have you understood that, Dectaron?"

"Yes, sir."

"And you, Lortil?"

"Yes, sir."

"Am I to understand that you admit having caused this woman's death?" '

"Yes, sir."

"Both of you?"

"Yes, sir."

"I want to be perfectly plain with you. You realize that this is a hanging matter?"

"Yes, sir."

"I understand that you both came to tryzatt Miarn of your own accord and reported that you'd killed the woman. Is that correct?"

"Yes, sir."

"Well, Dectaron, you're the older man. You'd better tell me what happened."

"Beg your pardon, sir; might we have permission to sit down, sir? Not meaning any disrespect-"

"I think everybody had better sit down," said Elleroth. "Tryzatt, please set some more benches. Thank you. Now, Dectaron, how did this come about?"

"Well, sir, it was like this, sir. Last night I was on guard duty, sir, and we enforced curfew on the women and children at the usual time, in accordance with standing orders. It must have been about two hours after that, sir, as I was going round the far end of the camp on my beat, that I happened to be passing close to my own shelter, as I share with another man, Olfane, only he was on the guard too. There was no one about at all, when suddenly I sees this young woman coming towards me quite openly, sir. So I challenged her and asked her what she thought she was doing out at that hour. And she come up to me, sir, and put her arms round my neck and asked me if I'd like to go with her. 'For forty meld,' she says, 'you can do with me whatever you like.' "

Dectaron stopped, met Elleroth's eyes for a moTnent and looked down at the earth floor, hesitating.

"Go on," said Elleroth, grimly.

"She was-well, sir, she was very pressing, sir, sort of; she'd got her robe open and her deldas bare and-well, the long and short of it was, sir, I'm afraid it was too much for me, and I agreed with her for thirty meld, which was all I'd got."

"Even though you were supposed to be on guard?" asked Mollo.

"Yes, sir, I'm afraid so, sir. So I took her into my shelter, which was empty and just close by, as I've explained. And we were-we were there together, sir, for some time, like."

"And did you give her thirty meld?" asked Mollo.

"Yes, sir."

"Did you find that money on her, tryzatt?" asked Elleroth.

"In her clothes, sir, yes: that and a little more, actually."

"Go on, Dectaron."

"Well, sir, after a while I said, 'You realize I'm supposed to be on guard duty?' Naturally I was afraid of being missed, sir, you see. And she said that was nothing to her, so I says, 'Well, it is to me,' I says, 'and I'll have to be getting back quick.' So then she asked could she stay where she was, and I told her I thought it would be best if she did, right up until the morning, rather than start running about the camp again and getting into more trouble-"

"But she hadn't been in any trouble up till then, had she, soldier?" said Mollo. "And who's to blame for that, eh?"

"I am, sir." Neither Elleroth nor Mollo said more and after a short silence the wretched man, who was clearly very much afraid, went on.

"Well, so I left her there, sir, in my bed, and went back on guard duty: I hadn't been missed and I spent the rest of the night on and off sentry-go in the usual way."

"Excuse me, sir," broke in Lortil, "but I'm just as much to blame, sir, and if it's in order, I reckon I ought to go on now."

"Very well," replied Elleroth.

"Well, sir, I was one of those detailed to go across the river with the women and children. Some stayed over there all night, but the lot I was with were ordered back to camp very late, and then we were dismissed. And I was coming

back to my shelter, sir, next to Dectaron's, when this girl came out. She was naked, sir, and she came up to me and began-well, sir, she began making up to me and asking me to come into Dectaron's shelter with her."

"For money?"

"Yes, sir. I only had twelve meld and so I told her, but she said that would be all right. Like Dectaron told you, sir, she was very pressing, like."

"And you weren't, I suppose?" asked Mollo. "Is that it?"

"No, sir: I can't deny as I was willing enough. I spent the rest of the night with her and early this morning we were both asleep when Dectaron came back off guard."

"And what happened then?" said Mollo sardonically to Dectaron. "You were delighted, I suppose?"

"Well; sir, as soon as I come in I realized what must have happened-that's to say, that she'd taken on another man to make herself some more money. But I wasn't angry, like I might have been if it had been some man as I didn't know. Only you see, sir, Lortil and me, we've been together all through the campaign, ever since we joined up-"

"I know," said Mollo. "Share and share alike, eh? You seem to have stuck to that very thoroughly. Well, go on."

"Well, sir, I woke the both of 'em up, and told the girl it was highjime for her to be going before the tryzatt come round. I didn't want anyone finding her in my shelter, you see."

"Didn't you really? Well, so what did she say to that?"

"Well, sir, this was when all the trouble began, and I'm sure I'm very sorry for it-we both are-but we didn't go to start it, sir, and that's as true as I'm here. First of all the girl set out to try and make us jealous of each other. Anyone could see she hoped we were going to get angry- start fighting an' that. Only of course that didn't work, for the reasons as I've explained. So when she saw that was no good, sir, she got up off the bed, just as she was-with nothing on, I mean-and she says, 'Oh,' she says, 'I want another hundred meld before I'm going out of here.' So I told her I hadn't got any more money to give her even if I'd a mind to, which I hadn't, and Lortil told her the same. So then she said, 'Well, you'd better go out and get some, then-borrow it or something o' that, because I'm not going else, and if you try to make me I'll kick up such

a shine as'U bring your tryzatt and officers here as fast as hounds,' she says.

"Well, at that, sir, we both of us did get angry, I'll admit. So Lortil, he says, 'Don't you try that stuff with us,' he says. 'Gome on,' he says to me, 'if she won't put her clothes on, we'll just have to put 'em on for her, won't we?' So he goes to grab her and stuff a cloth in her mouth, sir; keep her quiet, see, while we was getting her clothes on. But she was too much for us, sir, and that's the plain truth. She bit my finger very near through, and then she flew at Lortil, sir, scratching and biting, and at the same time she'd begun screaming at the top of her voice, just like she'd said she would. So I thought, well, this has got to be stopped quick, I thought. She had her arms right round Lortil, sir-only he still had nothing on, you see-and she was biting and scratching at his shoulders and his neck. So I tried to pull her away from him, only I couldn't-she was locked against him that tight there was nothing I could get a hold of. Well, I wasn't thinking too clearly, sir: I mean, the girl was carrying on like a wild animal, really, and we were both just about frantic. She had her teeth sunk in Lortil's shoulder, and I took her by the head and jerked it back-well, it was hard, I don't deny it was- only I felt I had to get her off him at all costs, you see. And then all of a sudden she just went limp and fell on the ground, and Lortil, he says, 'Oh, Cran almighty,' he says, 'I reckon her neck's broke!' And so it was, sir; she was dead as a rat. There was nothing we could do. So as soon as we realized that, Lortil says, 'Well, there's no help for it,' he says. 'Only thing to do is make a clean breast of the whole business.' So we went straight off and reported to tryzatt Miarn. And that's the truth, sir, every word. We're both very sorry this should have come about, only there was provocation, like."

"Do you want to ask these men any questions, Captain Mollo?" said Elleroth.

"We're only got your word for all this, haven't we?" said Mollo. "You've no other evidence to put forward?"

"No, sir, 'ceptin' for the bites and scratches, and we had no reason to want to kill the girl, sir. Neither of us had had any drink-it was early morning, like I said: and as soon as we realized what we'd done we come straight forward, sir."

"Do you want to ask any questions?" said Elleroth,

turning to Bayub-Otal, Zen-Kurel and Zirek. They shook their heads.

"Is the guard outside?" asked Elleroth.

"Yes, sir," answered the second tryzatt.

"Take them outside and keep them somewhere nearby," said Elleroth. "Tryzatt Miarn, will you stay behind, please?"

When the two soldiers had gone he said, "Now, I want your personal opinion of these men, Miarn."

"They're both good men, sir. Done well in Chalcon, sir, and in the battle, too."

"Do you believe they're telling the truth?"

"Seeing what you said about the dead young woman, sir, I'm very sorry to have to say it, but yes, sir, I think they are."

"How much money did you find in her clothes?" asked Elleroth.

"Forty-two meld, sir; all in one-meld pieces."

"Thank you, tryzatt; that's all."

The tryzatt saluted and went out. Elleroth sat silent for almost a full minute. At length he said, "I confess this defeats me. Here's this obviously very brave and charming girl, who went to Bekla and helped to kill Sencho-one of the most heroic exploits I've ever heard of in my life- and according to these men-and they are decent enough men in the normal way, as I know myself-wouldn't you agree, Mollo?-"

"Two of the best I've got. Can't expect soldiers to be basting saints, that's it, 'specially after a campaign like this-"

"Excuse me, sir," said Zirek. "I'm afraid the truth is that what seems so strange to you is perfectly understandable to me. I knew Meris very well: I believe every word the soldiers said and I can tell you why."

The others listened as he told them all he knew of Meris, from Belishba to Lapan.

"Poor girl!" said Elleroth, when he had finished. "Well, she's not the first and she won't be the last. Thank you, Zirek: that makes everything very clear. So you'd agree, Mollo, that she really brought it on herself?"

Mollo nodded morosely. "But they can't be let off altogether."

"Oh, no. They're both guilty of condoning a woman in breaking curfew and whoring round the camp; and on top

of that, Dectaron's guilty of leaving his duty while on guard, and that's a serious offense. What do you think?"

"I'd offer them their choice between dishonorable discharge and a flogging."

"But-er-wouldn't that just mean that you'd lose two good soldiers?"

"Not a bit of it! The men are all convinced they're going to be looting Bekla in two weeks from now. That's what they've marched and fought all the summer for-to line their pockets. Offer Dectaron twenty lashes and Lortil twelve. They'll take them; you'll see. And it'll be very good for morale, Elleroth, believe me, when word gets round that you and I evidently think discharge now would be a punishment as bad as a flogging. The men'll all be sure that you must know for certain we're on the point of taking Bekla, that's it."

"Very well: I agree," said Elleroth. He became pensive once more. "Poor Meris! You've told us, Zirek, that she enjoyed making trouble. She certainly managed it this time, but it was rather expensive for her, wasn't it? And to think she only had to wait a little while to be rich and secure for the rest of her life! Human nature's a strange thing." He stood up. "Well, we'd better go and finish our job, I suppose-which I don't relish."

"Nor I ours," murmured Zirek. Elleroth looked up at him inquiringly, and he said, "Someone's got to tell Maia."

Bayub-Otal and Zen-Kurel exchanged a glance. There was a short silence.

"I suggest all three of us go together," said Zen-Kurel.

Meris burned at nightfall, her pyre surrounded by hundreds of pitying onlookers, for the women and children had been brought back from the other side of the river and many of the Ortelgans, more than content with Ta-Kominion's news of his negotiations with Elleroth, had already come over to the Sarkidian camp to fraternize. Untimely death, of course, was nothing out of the ordinary either to the soldiers or the ex-slaves, but throughout the camp there had been much talk of the beautiful girl, a guest of the commander, who had succeeded in a desperate exploit for the heldril and been on her way to Santil-ke-Erketlis to receive her reward. Fanned by hearsay, indignation had spread against the men responsible for her death,

until Mollo obtained Elleroth's consent to assemble his own company-the culprits' comrades-and tell them the rights of the matter before having the punishment inflicted (for, as he had guessed, both declined discharge and even accepted the alternative with some relief, since the possibility of being hanged for murder had been doing nothing for their peace of mind).

As the ceremony of the burning began-four soldiers, each with a resinous torch, standing to the corners of the pyre to set light to it simultaneously-Zirek moved quietly away from the group round Elleroth and stood apart, gazing intently as the blaze spread inward. Maia, overcome with grief and by the majesty and solemnity of the occasion, did not notice that he had left her side. It was only later, after Elleroth had stepped forward to throw the appointed grain, salt and wine upon the embers; after the people had begun to disperse and Bayub-Otal and Zen-Kurel had taken their places on either side of the commander as part of his recessional escort, that she caught sight of him standing solitary, with bowed head and folded arms.

She made her way to him and stood unspeaking by his side. They were alone, for Elleroth's officers, in accordance with custom, had formed two files behind him as he made his departure.

After a little Zirek said, "She had more courage than anyone I've ever known-except for Occula. She never flinched that night, never hesitated, never showed any fear e: her before or after. I couldn't have done it without her, you know."

"And I couldn't have done what she did: I know that."

"Killing Sencho-that was vital, you see. The Leopards' whole intelligence system fell to pieces. I wonder whether anyone in years to come will remember her name and what she did."

"The gods will remember."

"The gods? You'd wonder sometimes, wouldn't you? She's forfeited everything; and who-what-drove her to that but the gods?"

"You know, Zirek, somehow I feel Meris would have undone herself one way or another, even if she'd been given a fortune."

"Maybe; but there she is now. Forty-two meld and a bonfire. Not even a tarpli-not from these strangers."

"I never thought of the tarpli," said Maia. "Do they have them in Belishba same as we do in Tonilda?"

"Of course."

The tarpli, though not universal throughout the Beklan empire, was a tribute of obsequy rendered throughout Tonilda and certain other provinces. A poem or verse mourning the dead person and recalling his or her life and character would be composed by some relative or friend and sung or declaimed as the pyre burned low. Often, among simple people in the country villages, it would be rough doggerel enough, but nevertheless might well have taken the maker a deal of trouble and be offered with sincere feeling. Maia had composed one in her own mind for Tharrin, though only Lespa had been permitted to hear it.

"I made one up for her," said Zirek, "but no one said anything about a tarpli and I didn't care to put myself forward among these officers with their fine ways."

She took him by the hand and led him up to the edge of the pyre, until the heat forced them to a halt.

"Now sing it."

He hesitated. "It's not like a real tarpli-not like they generally are. But-I don't know-some god put it into my mind."

"Then he must have done it for Meris. Give it to her, go on. I'm stood here: I won't let anyone stop you."

Zirek, raising his arms as in prayer, began to sing. His voice was true and sure and after the first line or two rang out with a confidence which carried its own authority. Before the close many of the dispersing onlookers had turned back to listen and he, perceiving this, repeated his threnody from the beginning.

"The swift, black river withers in its banks, Buried in gaunt trees, blind to the sun. Only a deep chattering of stones Tells where the cold fingers of current run.

And faint ghosts of bones that lie in the wood Flicker and cackle together among the branches. Two green eyes move silently to drink, Crouching on huge, imagined haunches.

A noise of running, and startled birds fly up

In the distance. What was that, that suddenly cried?

Footsteps… Only the river pouring down

And the dumb, warlock forest stretched beside. Now I remember how, in that still town, They told of a girl wandering till she died."

In the succeeding silence, Maia stood for some moments as unstirring as though it had indeed been a god who had devised the words. Then, turning to Zirek, she flung her arms round his neck, clinging to him and weeping. This strange, oblique lament had pierced her as no conventional elegy for Meris could have done. He stood quietly, suffering her thus to reciprocate what he had offered. The people went away once more and they werejeft alone.

At length, looking up, she saw Anda-Nokomis beside them. He took Zirek's hand in his own.

"The tarpli, was it?"

"Yes, sir."

"That's well done. I'm to blame: I overlooked it. But you didn't, so all's as it should be."

He waited without impatience while Maia recovered herself and dried her eyes. Then he said, "Elleroth wants to see the four of us. There's no hurry; whenever you're ready."

"I'm ready, Anda-Nokomis," said Maia.

95: DESTINATIONS

Elleroth, having nodded to the servant to leave them, looked up at his four guests.

"The dead are at peace," he said. "We have to believe that." No one spoke and he went on, "I can't imagine the gods being very hard on that poor girl, can you? It's been a miserable business; I hope that at least you're able to feel that everything's been done decently and properly."

"Yes," replied Bayub-Otal. "We're all well satisfied as far as that goes. It was most good of you, with so much else on your hands."

"No, we're the people who feel under an obligation," said Elleroth, "and as far as we're concerned it's not discharged yet. I need to know what you want to do now, so that we can help you to do it. But before we come to that, may I ask you, Serrelinda, to do me the honor of accepting this little keepsake on behalf of me and my men?"

It was his own neck-chain, with the silver corn-sheaves emblem.

Maia's lips trembled. Yet as one might have expected, the Serrelinda, who had been presented to King Karnat dressed in golden lilies and given a tress of her own hair to Durakkon in the Caravan Market, was equal to this moment also. Having returned the Sarkid commander's smiling gaze for a moment, she bowed her head in a silent gesture of recognition and gratitude as demure as any virgin acolyte of the Thlela. As she did so he bent forward, placed the chain round her neck and centered the emblem at her bosom. '

"He knew neither his father nor his mother," murmured Elleroth.

"Among strangers he labored as a slave, An exile in a country not his own, The Lord Deparioth, God's appointed sword."

This was part of the traditional lament for the hero Deparioth, known as "The Tears of Sarkid." Maia could only guess that Anda-Nokomis must have told him her story.

She raised her head. "Thank you, my lord." Running her fingers down the chain, she closed her hand on the corn-sheaves emblem. "It's just over my heart: I reckon that's the right place for it, don't you?"

They all laughed delightedly, and as she sat down Zirek stooped and kissed her shoulder.

"Well," said Elleroth briskly, "as I've said, you shall have every help from us. U-Zirek, let's take you first, shall we; for I rather think there's not much doubt about you, is there? You'd like a safe-conduct to Santil, wouldn't you?"

"Thank you very much, my lord," replied Zirek. "Yes, that would take care of everything as far as I'm concerned."

"It's not thirty miles to my father's estate in Sarkid," said Elleroth. "You've only to get there in one piece to be treated to all you deserve-he'll be more than delighted when he learns who you are-and from there you should easily be able to reach Santil in two days."

"Well, I'll make so bold as to tell your father, my lord, what I think of his son."

"I fear that he may tell you," said Elleroth, "what he thinks of an heir who goes off freebooting with Santil with-

out asking either consent or blessing-which he knew he wouldn't get, of course. But that won't affect my father's hospitality, I can assure you. Give him my dutiful greetings and tell him to expect me back when Bekla's fallen. And now, Lord Anda-Nokomis, what are your plans?"

"The Ban of Suba," he replied, "has a duty to get back there as quickly as he can."

"That's what I thought you'd say, and I can only applaud. However, has it occurred to you that under present conditions, the most feasible route may unavoidably be circuitous-not to say ambagious, periphrastic and anfractuous? In a word, have you considered going back to Suba via Bekla? We'd be only too delighted for you to join us."

"I'm honored, Elleroth, and thank you. My own people will follow a one-handed man because they owe allegiance to his legendary mother's son, but I don't think I could reasonably expect the same of your men."

"Anda-Nokomis, I could do with a really knowledgeable, competent chief of staff. Can't I tempt you?"

"I'm sorry, Elleroth, to disappoint you, but I've thought about this very carefully, and I'm certain that my best chance of getting back to Suba is to make for Nybril and try to come by a boat."

Elleroth nodded. "You're right, I dare say. An epitaph, on my behalf-no chief of staff. So be it. But Captain Zen-Kurel, surely I can tempt you, can't I? We really do stand in need of another experienced, able company commander. Since Chalcon we've lost two or three senior officers we could very ill spare. Won't you come with us and help to cut Kembri to pieces?"

"It's tempting," he answered, "and like Anda-Nokomis, I'm flattered. But the hard fact is that I'm still an officer of King Karnat's staff. That appointment's never been terminated, as far as I know. So I'm afraid it follows that I've got to do all I can to get back."

"Ah, well: easy come, easy go. But now, Maia! Maia Serrelinda! You'll come to Bekla with us, won't you? Or would you rather go with Zirek, to be rewarded by Santil? I'll be more than happy to give you a letter telling him what you've done for us, and I've no doubt Ta-Kominion would be glad to as well."

As Elleroth waited for her reply, Maia looked up to see

all four of them regarding her intently. She colored; yet her answer came without hesitation.

"My lord, a little while back you said something as made me think you may already know that I'm Suban."

"Well, I've-er-heard something to that effect, yes."

"I want to go to Suba."

"You mean, to live there?"

Returning his gaze, she remained silent.

"But why, Maia?"

"Because I'm Suban, my lord."

"But mightn't that be rather-er-difficult for you?"

She stood up. "And I think Lord Anda-Nokomis is quite right. Going to Nybril will be our best way, my lord. I wonder whether you'd be so good as to excuse me now? It's been a long day and I'm that done up: I'll be back for supper, of course." Taking his hands, she smiled at him no less dazzlingly than she had once smiled at Selperron from her golden jekzha. "I'm very much looking forward to it."

She went out. After a few moments Elleroth crossed to the sideboard, picked up the wine-jug and refilled the cups.

"Well, dear lads, that's certainly put me in my place, hasn't it? And it's rather put paid to the turncoat theory as well, don't you think? Suba: h'm! There's really no accounting for tastes, is there? No offense, Anda-Nokomis, I assure you, but I imagine there's bound to be a certain change in her life-style, to say the least. Er-is all well with you, my dear Katrian comrade?"

Zen-Kurel was staring before him with an expression of agitated and baffled amazement.

"Suba? The girl must have gone out of her mind! They'll tear her limb from limb!"

"Not if I have anything to do with it," said Bayub-Otal.

"Not if you do," said Elleroth. He looked quizzically for a moment from one of them to the other. "Well, now I must be off: there are a few things to be seen to in the camp before we meet again for supper. Do make yourselves comfortable. There's hot water whenever you want it. Just tell one of the orderlies."

He went out, singing to himself just audibly,

"As I roved out-one early-y mor-orning, To view the forest and to take the air, I there did meet with a fair pretty mai-aiden-"

His voice, receding, died away as the servants came in to tidy the room and lay the table for supper.

96: A NIGHT ENCOUNTER

The next morning was again clear-skied and as hot as ever. Almost every available man, including many of the Or-telgans, had been sent across the river to continue cutting the forest-track under Mollo's direction, and there were not a great many, apart from Elleroth himself, Zirek and Ta-Kominion, to wish god-speed to Maia and her two companions. Their escort-none other than Tolis and tryzatt Miarn, with twenty men-assembled outside Maia's shelter to accompany her to Elleroth's headquarters. They had brought a litter for her, but she smilingly declined it.

"I'd rather walk, and that's no more 'n the plain truth," she said to Tolis. "After all, 'tain't as if it was all that far to Nybril. Tell you what, though; if I get tired, I'll jump in the river and swim."

At this there was a general laugh, for naturally her fame as a swimmer was well-known to everyone. It was not more than twenty miles down river to Nybril, but in view of the heat and his wish to be as considerate as possible to his guests, Elleroth had begged them to take two days over it.

"Why don't we make a raft and just float down?" Maia had asked him at supper the night before.

"A raft for twenty-six people?"

"No, just the three of us."

"You're having an escort because of the very real risk of bandits and cut-throats," he answered. "We can't rule out the possibility of some sort of robbers with boats on the river. That's the sort of thing the Leopards have reduced the empire to. Cran only knows how long it's going to take to restore law and order when we've taken Bekla."

They had given her new shoes and a brand-new cloak and tunic. (She couldn't help wondering where they had come from. The truth was Elleroth had sent to Sarkid for them, about twelve miles each way.) Her Beklan cloak and tunic had been ruined in the forest and the river, but fortunately the new tunic, like the old one, had pockets capacious enough to hold her money and valuables.

She felt in good shape and ready for anything. The most

substantial reason for this-even stronger than the idolization of the soldiers and Elleroth's unconcealed regard- was the complete change in Anda-Nokomis's manner towards her. Often, during those days at the farm, she had felt wretchedly certain that nothing could ever alter his aversion and contempt-no, not if she were to call down Lespa to carry him to Melvda-Rain and crown him with stars. Her deed in Suba, with its terrible (and unintended) consequences, had put her beyond the pale, and all she had done since or ever could do was doomed to be regarded as worthless.

Yet at supper last night she had realized that this had changed. Anything that ordinary people would regard as warmth or cordiality was not really, of course, within Anda-Nokomis's capacity; yet she, who knew him so well, could perceive clearly the alteration of his feelings. She could only suppose that he must have been reconsidering one thing with another-the escape from Bekla, the raft, the waterfall and her night excursion to the Ortelgan camp- and had at last decided to forgive her. She was not to know that in fact it was none of these things which had tipped the scale in that proud, obsessed mind. Maia's disclosure that she was his cousin had brought about in him a turmoil of perplexity. For some days he had been quite unable to decide whether it could or should alter his view of her- whether it ought to make any difference to his condemnation of her unspeakable treachery. Yet nevertheless, within the hour and while he was still very much confused, it had been the real though undivulged cause of his persuading Zen-Kurel against killing her. Only much later did he realize the full significance of the fact that when she had betrayed him to Sendekar she had not herself known either that she was Suban or that they were cousins. If she had known that she was Suban, would she have done it? He had concluded not.

And then, following upon her saving of his life at the waterfall-and beyond all question that had been a brave, loyal deed, for no one could have blamed her if she had judged it impossible to attempt-had come Elleroth's very cogent suggestion that from the moment she had discovered that they were kindreds-that she was a Suban and he her liege lord-she could hardly have risked more or shown greater courage on his behalf.

Yet even all this had not been enough for a man like

Bayub-Otal. What had taken him completely by surprise and finally overcome his last reservations, had been Maia's instant and unhesitating reply to Elleroth that she was a Suban and wanted to go back to Suba. And when Elleroth had hinted at what she must already have realized-she had politely snubbed him and put paid to any further discussion of the matter. Until that moment it had never occurred to Bayub-Otal that when it came to the point Maia, Suban or no, would decline reward and honor from Santil-ke-Erketlis in favor of a hazardous journey to return to Suba and live there. Neither at that time nor throughout the evening had he said one word to express his astonishment; yet he had hardly been able to sleep for its effect. And it was this effect, evidenced by all manner of minute changes in that diffident, haughty man, which Maia was well able to sense and appreciate. Anda-Nokomis, she felt, was now more truly her friend than he had ever been. Might she dare hope to recover yet another friend?

Alas! she was soon made sure that there was little enough prospect of that. Zen-Kurel remained all courtesy and detachment. She was still his responsibility: just that. And that, she felt sure, was the only reason why he had gone out to look for her yesterday, when he had learned that she had set out for the Ortelgan camp. He had regarded it as no more than his duty.

It is perfectly possible-indeed it is common-to be delighted and gratified at one level of the spirit while remaining deeply unhappy at another; and so it was now with Maia. Naturally, the acclaim of the soldiers and the change in Anda-Nokomis had pleased her-she would scarcely have been human if they had not-yet she would gladly have given all in exchange for the longing of her heart.

In truth, she thought dismally, it boiled down to something very simple. It was nothing to do with what she had merited in the past or whatever she might merit now. It was nothing to do with the fortress at Dari-Paltesh or the escape from Pokada's prison; with the rafts or the waterfall or the Ortelgan camp. The plain truth was simply that Zen-Kurel was no longer in love with her. Once he had been and now he wasn't. She loved him but he did not love her.

In such a situation both merit and reason are alike immaterial.

Where love cannot fulfill itself through reciprocity, it can do so only through sacrifice. And this, of course, was the real reason why she had instantly told Elleroth that she was going to Suba and then evaded any discussion either of her motives or of the danger. If it was the last thing she did, she was going to play her part in Zen-Kurel's return to Katria. It might very well be the vital part, too, for a boat would cost money. Besides, did either of them know how to handle a boat? She doubted it. She alone had the money to buy a boat and the skill to sail it down the Zhairgen to Katria. What was going to become of her after that was immaterial. This was high itruth. The low truth would keep till later.

This was her melancholy solace as Zen-Kurel politely greeted her that morning. Yet solace it was, sure enough, to see his obvious hopefulness and the eager spirit with which he discussed the final arrangements with Tolis as they prepared to set out.

She kissed Zirek good-bye with tears.

"I only hope you're doing the right thing, lass," said he. "I suppose you know best; but it's not too late t'o change your mind even now, you know."

She shook her head, her eyes brimming.

"No, I can't do that. But I'll miss you, Zirek, very much I will. Don't forget me, will you?"

"That's not likely," answered he. "When I'm a rich man, with my own estate, I'll send for you to come and be my guest; you and your husband, eh?"

"Oh, Zirek-"

"Look, they're starting," he said quickly. "Don't get left behind, my pretty girl: that wouldn't do, would it? Might never get to Kat-I mean to Suba."

He grinned, putting a hand on her shoulder. "It's true what I said in the forest that night, you know. He is still in love with you. You wait and see if I'm not right. Only we never really seemed to get any time to talk, did we, you and me?"

He kissed her once more; then turned aside as Elleroth came up to wish her well. A minute or two later they were on their way.

Two of the soldiers were familiar with the country between the camp and Nybril; a half-wild, little-frequented district, the indeterminate borderland between Sarkid and Lapan. With these as guides they made their way unhur-

riedly downstream. All that morning they met no one, save for three young fellows out hawking and, later, an old man gathering sticks. This seemed encouraging. Local people, at least, were apparently ready to venture out on their normal business. Tolis asked the old man whether he was not afraid of robbers. The old man shrugged.

"One's always afraid. These are rough times. But you have to live, and I haven't much that any robber would want. I scratch a living and trust in the gods. What else can you do?" Maia gave him ten meld and they left him staring after them, shading his eyes with his hand.

After some six hours the guides were sure that they were now at least half-way to Nybril, and Tolis and Zen-Kurel began looking for a place to camp for the night.

Maia, having persuaded one of the soldiers to come with her to carry back her clothes, strolled half a mile upstream and swam down to cool off. Like the Urtans at the Olmen, the lad was disconcerted at her stripping naked, and she could not prevail upon him to walk back along the bank beside her. It was the same when she waded ashore: everyone was busy elsewhere. Yet in her absence they had done enough and more to show her what they felt for her. Camp had been pitched upon the edge of a little grove, and in the center of this they had erected for her an arbor with which Lespa herself might not have been displeased. Leafy boughs had been bent, interlaced and tied down to form a kind of hedge round a central patch of turf, and here they had made her a bed of pliant branches and a mattress of grass covered with cloaks. At its head, strands of scarlet trepsis had been entwined on the hedge-wall to read "Ser-relinda."

Later that evening she danced for them: "Astiguata" and "The Long Reeds," two dances of Tonilda which she'd known from a child; artless stuff-hardly the thing to set the upper city alight. But then she had no Fordil-only their rhythmic clapping and a man who sang "Diddle diddle di-do." Yet she enjoyed it, while to the men it was like water in a desert. After supper enough wood was collected to keep a fire going all night, sentries were posted and most of the men were soon asleep.

Maia lay wakeful. A few stars twinkled through the branches and she could just make out the gentle, continuous lapping of the river fifty yards away. Nearer by sounded the minute rustlings of the thicket in the sultry dark. They had given her

a personal sentry-more as a mark of esteem than from any real need she might have to be guarded-and from time to time she could hear the man quietly moving or clearing his throat a little way off among the trees.

It seemed to her now, in that state of half-dreamlike imagination often induced by silence, night and fatigue, that she herself had been gliding away-yes, a year and longer now-upon a river fully as grim as that which Zirek had evoked in his tarpli for Meris. She thought of all those she had encountered, good and evil, who had gone under in that river-Sencho, Sphelthon, Tharrin, Durakkon, Milvushina, Jarvil, Randronoth, Meris. She thought, too, of those whom likely enough she would never meet again- the three girls she still thought of as her sisters; Sednil, Ogma, Nennaunir, Otavis and above all, Occula. "O Lespa!" she prayed. "Sweet Lespa, that's preserved me through so much, preserve Occula too. Don't suffer that cruel woman to kill her; and let the two of us meet again one day. Le it be part of your dream."

She herself was still adrift on that river which had killed so many. Towards what falls was she drifting now and where would she come ashore? Danger, she thought, always danger, danger. I live in danger like a fish in water. Never a safe bed and a strong, loving arm round me, same as any girl back in Meerzat.

Suddenly she sat up quickly, startled by sounds of movement just outside the entrance to her bower. The sentry was making some slight but deliberate noise to attract her attention. After a moment, his voice said, "Saiyett?"

"What is it?" she said sharply.

"There's one of the gentlemen wants to speak to you, but he says only if you're not too tired."

"Who is it?"

"It's the Suban lord, saiyett: Anda-Nokomis."

Anda-Nokomis, that chilly exemplar of propriety, the last man in the empire to make his way to a girl's bed at night! Her curiosity was aroused. Whatever he might want, it could not be her body: and whatever it was he wished to say, he was giving her the option of refusal. But then he would, wouldn't he?

What could conceivably be at the back of this? She really could not refrain from finding out.

"Very well," she answered. Drawing her cloak around her, she propped herself on her elbows and waited.

After a few moments Bayub-Otal, cloaked like herself, came quietly through the opening and sat down on the ground beside her. She could tell at once that he was agitated.

"Maia," he said, speaking just above a whisper, "thank you for letting me come. I haven't sent the sentry away, so you needn't worry about appearing compromised. I need to talk to you alone, and there seemed no other opportunity."

"Not tomorrow, in Nybril?" She shrugged, putting on a little act of not being particularly interested but nevertheless bearing with his whim, however incorrect.

"I felt-I felt I ought to speak to you before we reach Nybril."

"Ought? Why, what have I-"

"No, no! I only meant-"

He stopped. She had never seen him so hesitant and unsure of himself. This was not the haughty, frigid lord of Suba whom she had come to know so well.

"I-" Then, suddenly, "Maia, what I want to say to you is that I've done you wrong. I've done a very grave wrong to your honor and integrity as a Suban, and I'm extremely sorry for it. May I ask your forgiveness?"

"Why, how's that, then, my lord?" This was disconcerting-embarrassing, too.

"Please don't call me that. Use my name,"

"Well, then, Anda-Nokomis, there's nothing to forgive."

"Oh, yes, there is. If you had treated my honor as a Suban as I've treated yours, I believe it would have driven me to-"

She put her hand on his. "Ah, well, but that's different, in't it? I'm not the Ban of Suba, am I?"

"I've slighted and insulted you on account of what you did before ever you knew yourself to be Suban. I've altogether failed to realize the depth of your loyalty to me or your feeling for Suba."

I can't disabuse him, she thought. What good would it do? It'll be better for both of us if he goes on thinking I've been acting on account of being Suban. Zirek could see the truth, but not Anda-Nokomis, thank the gods.

"Well, dun't matter, Anda-Nokomis, honest. You needn't get so worked up; you're making me feel that awkward. Let's just say n'more about it. Reckon I'd 'a felt the same

as you if I'd bin shut up all that time in that old fortress."

"If only you'd learned earlier that you were Suban-"

"Ah, well, but I didn't, did I? What's gone's gone; and now's now."

"Yes," he said agitatedly, "now's certainly now; very much so. That's the rest of what I felt I had to say."

She waited-truth to tell, with some little apprehension, for she knew her man, and this loss of self-possession was so much unlike him as to be disturbing. He seemed to need time to choose his words; hanging his head, plucking at the grass and once or twice looking up as though making a false start. Finally he said, "To decide'to go back to Suba: that shows exceptional courage, too."

Another silence. "You see, there'll be those who don't know what you and I know. They'll only know about the- about the Valderra."

"Doesn't matter," she answered listlessly, her thoughts already straying.

"It would matter to me if they killed you; it would matter very much, Maia."

But not to me. O Lespa, I believe my heart's breaking! Why do I have to undergo all this talk of Suba and what's going to happen when Zenka's gone? Can't I find some way to get this man to go away?

Just as she was about to thank him for his kindness and ask him to leave her to sleep, he spoke again.

"Your loyalty to Suba-your loyalty to me, too-they do you more credit than I can express, Maia. I've come to realize that you're like me-you're not a person who asks for favors, are you? You prefer to let deeds speak for themselves. But I can't believe that it hadn't already crossed your mind that in choosing to go back to Suba you'd be in danger."

Why can't he go? she thought.

"I felt sure it must have been worrying you, even though you're too courageous to talk about it or let anyone see it. That's why I came to speak to you tonight; to spare you any further worry as quickly as I could."

As she shook her head uncomprehendingly, he took her hand in his.

"Maia, I love you. I've come to admire you and love you more than any woman I've known since my mother died. I've come to ask you to marry me-to be my wife

in Suba. You'll be safe then; and happy, too, I sincerely hope and intend."

She was taken so utterly by surprise that she could only stare at him. The idea of Anda-Nokomis as a lover-as any woman's lover-now seemed so incongruous, so anomalous as to seem totally out of character. It was as though he had said that he had decided to sell himself into slavery or become a priest of Cran. She realized now that she had never-no, not even at the time when Kembri had first put her in his way-thought of Anda-Nokomis as a sexual being; as someone naturally capable of feeling desire. Yet she felt no impulse to laugh, as Nennaunir might have. Whatever else he might or might not be, Anda-Nokomis was a man of the most dutiful responsibility, a man of his word, who never spoke more than he felt, or intended to perform. If he said he loved her, what he meant was that he had formed the purpose of committing himself to being her loyal husband for the rest of his life: and also, as he had made clear, that he had considered the position she was bound to find herself in if she returned to Suba, and was ready to identify himself with it and make it his own personal concern.

The next thought that occurred to her was that, unlike Eud-Ecachlon, he did not stand to gain anything at all from marrying her, apart from herself. From the point of view of his public position she would, initially at all events, be the gravest possible liability. It was an enormous-an overwhelming-compliment; by far the greatest ever paid to her in her life. What he intended was nothing less than to invoke on her behalf the full weight of his authority as Ban of Suba, to reinstate and vindicate her in the eyes of those who would otherwise kill her. Yes, and to put that authority at risk, too, for it would take a fair old bit of carrying off, would that. They might not be so keen on him when he turned up with her and made it clear that he meant it. She could imagine the reaction of Lenkrit, for example, upon learning the news. But if she knew Anda-Nokomis, he had already thought about this. He said he loved her and he meant just that. She had in all actuality won his heart. Well (she couldn't help adding), what there was of it. For his, as she well knew, was a heart incapable either of glowing with warmth or sparkling with humor.

What a lot of strange and different things men meant when they said "love," she thought: Tharrin, Elvair-ka-

Virrion, Randronoth, Anda-Nokomis. Pity they can't boil them all down together-sport, pleasure, generosity, desire, respect. If I had any sense I'd accept this offer from a high-born, honest man who means what he says and won't ever change. But I haven't any sense-either that or else too much. I don't love him-I can't feel anything for him-so what can it matter to me? Once, in Melvda-Rain, Maia, you had a gold crown, studded with diamonds: but it's gone, gone; so what would you prefer now-bronze, lead or copper? What do I care?

She began to cry from sheer mortification, seeing in her mind's eye Zen-Kurel, the way he walked,'the curl of his hair, his trick of opening and closing his hand when he was considering a problem. Oh, don't go through it again! Don't start going through it all again, what the two of us said to each other that night in Melvda-Rain! Don't!

Anda-Nokomis was speaking. "Oh, Maia, I'm sorry to have upset you. I only meant to relieve you of anxiety by speaking as soon as possible."

She was trying to imagine herself as his wife. She could not-even though she respected him, even though it might make all the difference between safety and a death not so very different from Meris's. Such was her distress and confusion that she could only cling to him, sobbing.

"Maia-"

"I can't say anything, Anda-Nokomis. Not now. Leave me, please! Just leave me!"

At this moment, while the poor, perplexed man, who plainly did not know what to make of it, was still holding her silently in his arms, there were sudden sounds of alarm and commotion outside the grove. A voice shouted, "Stand to!" followed by other voices, running footsteps and the clattering of arms hastily snatched up. Then came actual sounds of fighting, angry cries and the clang of weapon on weapon. These, however, ceased quickly, as though a scuffle had broken off short. Tolis's voice called, "Tryzatt Miarn, get everyone on their feet!"

Bayub-Otal, without haste or the least sign of disquiet, gently released Maia and stood up. Having listened for a few moments, he said calmly, "I suppose I'd better go and see what's happening," went over to the gap by which he had entered and stepped outside.

"What is it, sentry?"

"Robbers, sir-something o' that. Tried to rush us, I reckon, but looks like the lads have seen them off."

Bayub-Otal returned. "I'll have to go. I'm sorry to leave you, Maia, but at least I know you're equal to it. I'll come back as quickly as I can."

Left alone, Maia did not take long to decide against remaining where she was. Wrapping her cloak round her, she got up and went outside. Her sentry was standing with his back to her, looking out through the trees,- Beyond, she could make out hurrying figures and firelight. She pushed quickly through the bushes as far as the sentry, who checked her with a movement of his arm. ›

"I wouldn't go out there, saiyett. Don't let them see you. Might just set 'em off again, like."

"Don't worry, I won't show myself," she answered. "I only want to find out what's happening. You can come with me if you like."

They went cautiously forward to the edge of the grove. In the light of the setting half-moon she could see Tolis standing to one side and in front of his men, who were drawn up in extended line. On the ground immediately in front of them lay two bodies: they were without armor and did not look like soldiers. From beyond, out in the dim scrub and fern, came intermittent taunts and cries of defiance.

"Go on, be off with you!" shouted Tolis. His voice, though clear and confident, was somewhat high in tone, and a mocking falsetto echoed, "Be off with you!" followed by jeering laughter.

"You'll get nothing here," cried Tolis again, "unless a few more of you fancy being killed."

At this the hubbub died down, and then a voice shouted, "All right, then; give us food and we'll go."

Tolis made no reply. A few stones came flying out of the darkness, together with a clumsily-made arrow which one of the soldiers turned aside with his shield.

"Kind of an awkward situation, sir," said the tryzatt.

"You'd better get the men back," said Tolis. "They're too exposed. The only reason I put them out there was because I hoped it might frighten the bastards away."

As the men, still maintaining line, came backing in among the trees, the same voice out of the darkness shouted, "If you won't give us food we'll have to come and get it. We've had nothing for two days."

"That's not our fault," called back one of the men. "Think we're going to waste our food on a pack of thieving swine like you?"

"We're not thieving swine," answered the voice. "We're respectable men, give us a chance. We're starving, that's what."

It was the soldiers' turn to jeer in reply to this; but suddenly above the clamor rose a new voice. "Where are you from?"

Maia started. It was Zen-Kurel, somewhere over to her left. Getting no answer, he repeated, "I asked where have you come from?"

After a short pause someone in the dark answered "Be-lishba."

"Why?" asked Zen-Kurel.

"You'd bin there you wouldn't ask why." Another voice added, "They're free men in Sarkid, aren't they?"

"Runaway slaves," said Tolis to the tryzatt. "I thought as much. I dare say they are desperate, poor bleeders."

"You say you're respectable men," called Zen-Kurel. "Well, now's your chance to show it, because I'm going to take you at your word."

Next moment he had stepped out from among the trees and was walking purposefully out into the dark scrubland. Anda-Nokomis's voice called, "Zenka, come back!"

Zen-Kurel turned for a moment and waved his hand; then he continued on his way.

"Silly basting bastard!" muttered one of the soldiers to his mate, a few yards away from Maia. "What's he reckon to do, then?"

She sprang forward, startling the two men, who had not known she was there. "No! No! Zenka, come back!"

She was running, shouting hysterically, when a soldier caught her round the waist and held her fast. She struggled, beating at him with her fists, then dropped her head on her chest, weeping. When Tolis and the tryzatt came up she had fainted and was lying on the ground with the soldier bending over her.

They splashed water in her face. After about half a minute she came to herself to find Tolis holding her by the shoulders.

"I beg you, saiyett, don't make a scene. The men are jumpy enough already."

"O Lespa!" she moaned. "Tolis, can't you stop him? Go and stop him!"

"Too late for that now, saiyett, I'm afraid. He didn't give me the chance. Get back, Dellior!" he called sharply to a man who had left the line, apparently to relieve himself. "No one said anything about standing down!"

There was silence all along the line now, and silence from out in the scrubland also. Maia felt as though she had become a string about to snap. This tension was unendurable, this mute waiting in the yellow elf-light of the setting moon; nothing to be heard but the frogs in the half-dry river pools; nothing to be seen but the! stillness of the arid fern. Once she allowed a low whimper to escape her. Tolis, on one knee close by, looked quickly round and shook his head.

She could not have told how long it was since Zen-Kurel had gone; only that the moon was lower and the suspense worse. She could hear the men whispering to one another, but caught no words.

"Should we give him a shout, sir?" asked Miarn.

"Not yet," answered Tolis.

She realized that Anda-Nokomis was standing behind them, hunched and watchful as a heron in shallows. After a time he murmured almost inaudibly, "Perhaps they've gone."

"With him?" said Tolis.

"Or without him: no telling."

Maia stood up. "I'm going to-"

"Saiyett, please don't compel me to stop you."

Just as she was wondering whether to draw her knife and make a dash for it, she caught sight of something moving out in the gray-yellow dimness. A shape;-one person or more-was approaching. In a low voice Tolis said, "Keep still! No one to speak!"

Within half a minute they could see that in fact three men were coming towards them.

"Is he there?" asked Tolis.

Maia passed her tongue over her dry lips. "Yes."

The men stopped some forty or fifty yards from the edge of the copse. Then Zen-Kurel's voice called, "Tolis, can you hear me?"

Tolis answered and was about to go forward to join them when Zen-Kurel spoke again. "They don't want you to

come any closer. I've just come to tell you what we're going to do."

"Cran's zard!" muttered one of the soldiers. "Basting man don't want to live!"

"These men aren't criminals," said Zen-Kurel. "They've escaped from slavery in Belishba and they've had a very bad time. They're quite ready to join Elleroth and I've assured them he'll be happy to take them on. So I'm going to guide them as far as the camp and act as surety for them. I expect to be back here by a couple of hours after dawn, but if I'm later than that, just go on to Nybril- don't wait for me." '

It was plain that none of this was to Tolis's liking. He appeared not only at a loss but flustered. "What the hell are we going to do?" he asked the tryzatt. "Damned Ka-trian! We're responsible to Elleroth for him!"

"Can't do nothing, sir," replied Miarn. "They've got him out there with them, haven't they?"

"Yes, but when Elleroth-" But before Tolis could say more, Bayub-Otal called out, "Zenka, can I come with you?"

There was a pause, apparently while Zen-Kurel conferred with his companions. Then he answered, "No, they say not."

"Very well," replied Bayub-Otal. "We'll keep you some breakfast."

"Elleroth's going to be glad a bunch of men like these weren't wasted," called Zen-Kurel.

With this he and the other two turned and disappeared once more into the gloom. The frog-croaking silence returned.

"Stand 'em down, sir?" asked Miarn after two or three minutes.

"Oh, yes, any damned thing you like!" replied Tolis petulantly. "You'd wonder who was in command here, wouldn't you?"

"D'you reckon he'll be back, sir?"

"Of course he won't!" said Tolis. "Men like that? They'll cut his throat as sure as the rains are coming! These blasted Katrians-they're all the same-throw their lives away and call it soldiering! Karnat's wildcats! I believe they'd set themselves on fire just to try and show they were braver than anyone else! Why the hell couldn't he do it some time when we weren't responsible for him? Lord Elleroth's going

to play hell! 'Why did we let it happen?' As if we could have had any idea what he was going to do!"

"Going to wait for him, then, sir, or not?"

"I haven't decided yet," said Tolis. "I'll tell you tomorrow."

He was walking away when Maia followed him.

"Can I speak to you?"

Tolis turned to her with the air of a young and harassed man retaining his self-control with difficulty.

"Saiyett, you're the last person to whom I'd want to be discourteous, but I've simply had enough for one night. Please go back to bed. We'll talk in the morning."

Within the hour Maia had become so much demented with fear that she could no longer keep up appearances or conceal her distress. Her thoughts-if thoughts they could be called, that succession of visions and sensations overwhelming her mind like some evil dream-were plunged into a kind of vortex, a vicious circle from which there was no escape save hysteria. It was as though she were running in terror from one room to another, only to find herself fleeing at last back into the first. This first was a sense of panic horror, much like the shock felt by one who suddenly finds herself falling from a height, or wakes to realize that the house is burning. Then followed the images-apprehensions, vivid as flashes of lightning: Zenka surrounded and fighting for his life, Zenka tortured by the fugitive slaves, Zenka's body flung into the river, Zenka bleeding, Zenka murdered. And flying from these she ran full-tilt, as against a wall, into her awareness- like that of one hearing herself sentenced to death-that this was no dream, but reality; and taking place not in the past or the future, but in, that present from which there is no escape. Thence to the weeping, the entreaties to the gods for reassurance-to the gods who could not give it. And so back to the panic, and the horror. The Serrelinda, who had made her way into Pokada's prison and into the Ortelgan camp by night, was not equal to this unremitting torment of inaction.

A common, general misery, such as a flood or some civic calamity, has at least the effect of bringing people together and uniting them in fortitude and mutual succor: "I mustn't let the others down." Perhaps the worst of a private affliction is its effect of isolation. Personal grief, like deafness or a glass prison, sequesters the sufferer and separates her from others, who cannot by the nature of things enter into

her agony. Even so may one see a maimed animal limping on among the indifferent herd.

The near-by soldiers were far away, in a world where people talked together, kept watch, slept or rolled dice by the fire: they were close-as close as sane men standing by the bedside of one who knows he has gone mad.

Maia was aware that Anda-Nokomis was sitting beside her, since from time to time he spoke to her or touched her hand. Yet it was little he said, seeming as he did to find her affliction almost as grievous as she herself; though his recourse, characteristically, was to silence and to that lonely patience which had so long been habitual with him.

She knew that most, if not all, of the soldiers felt sure that Zen-Kurel had thrown his life away for nothing and that they thought him a fool for doing it. If anything they despised him, since his valuation of the risk he had taken was beyond their comprehension, much as the incentive of an explorer seems foolish to those who wonder why he could not have stayed safely at home.

She made no attempt to talk to Anda-Nokomis, simply keeping her lonely suffering, as it were, alight for a lamp which might somehow guide Zenka back. Yet even this flickered and died at last as she fell asleep from exhaustion.

Her sleep was full of dreams; or rather of visitations, without visual images or even any illusion of sequence in time; dreads and forebodings, by their very universality and formlessness more intense and veritable than any to be suffered in real, waking life: like huge, hazy masses driven before a great wind-transcendental sorrow made manifest-towering over and dwarfing all emotion of which mere humanity was capable. She stifled in clouds of anguish, lay buried under mountains of regret, struggled and drowned in cataracts of loss. And she, who had been unable to sleep-she could not wake.

At last, contracting, as it were, in order to enter the finite, visible world, the cloud-dreams crystallized into figments she could apprehend and seem to see-persons, time, even a situation. It seemed that Zenka-her own Zenka, her lover as he had once been-had indeed returned and was standing beside her bed in Melvda-Rain. He was weary and travel-worn, yet full of pride and fulfillment; at which she felt no surprise, for it was once more the night when they had become lovers. Yet now Anda-Nokomis was there also; a strangely two-minded Anda-

Nokomis, at one and the same time glad and despite himself sorry to see Zenka back.

Zenka spoke to him. She seemed to hear his very words. "It was well worth the risk. Good men, some of them- thousand pities if they'd been killed in a pointless scrap."

"Why," she cried gladly, "that's just how I felt, too, that night in Melvda! You understand then, don't you? We understand each other now, Zenka, my darling-"

As she seemed to say this, an enormous relief and happiness filled her, a certainty that now everything would be all right. Yet he appeared not to hear, even though he was looking down at her as Anda-Nokomis laid a hand on his shoulder in congratulation.

"She was very nearly your only casualty," he said. "I've really been afraid for her reason. She's been in a terrible state."

She tried to move, to stretch out her hands, tried to speak again, but it had become one of those dreams in which you couldn't. And now Zenka-it seemed to be his turn to appear two-minded. He frowned, looking down and tapping with one foot on-the ground.

"Then all I can say is, it's been her turn to know what it feels like."

King Karnat's trumpet was sounding for the muster. Zenka went away and she knew she had to go and swim the Valderra again. The soldiers had pulled her out and were bending over her.

She opened her eyes. It was Anda-Nokomis. Slowly, she remembered where they were and what had happened last night. Had she then bees dreaming or awake-or both?

It was broad daylight. She sat up, looking round at the interlaced branches, the drooping, withered trepsis bloom spelling "Serrelinda" and at Anda-Nokomis beside her.

He smiled his restrained, distant smile. "Our friend's back."

,"He's back?"

"He was here just now, while you were still asleep. He got those men to the camp quite successfully and handed them over to Elleroth. I don't think he was gone nine hours altogether." He paused. "Twenty miles and a sleepless night, but more peaceful than some people's, I think, all the same."

Relief surged over her as over an exhausted castaway washed up on a beach. She wanted nothing: the immediate

moment was enough. She lay back, content merely to remain where she was and know that Zenka was alive. So fully did this feeling possess her that for some time she did not even mind that in this woken, real state they were not reconciled and that of course he could not have heard what she had said to him in her dream. No matter. She would still be able to help him to get to Katria; still be able to make her sacrifice. That was enough, for she had thought herself deprived of it and now she had it back, the bitter solace of her integrity.

97: NYBRIL

They brought her some food, and Tolis sent to enquire whether she still wanted to talk to him. Yes, she said, and when he came thanked him graciously and sincerely for looking after her when she'd lost her head the night before: so that he hardly knew what to reply. Well, he'd acted as he thought best: he hoped she didn't mind: decisions weren't always easy: sometimes these things had to be done. Neither of them mentioned Zen-Kurel.

Maia, little though she knew of soldiering, could not help being impressed by the practiced ease with which the Sarkidians cleaned up and cleared the camp site. Having no axes for a pyre or spades for burial, they could only commit the two dead men to the river. Both were young and not ill-looking, though sadly gaunt and famished. One, so Maia thought, a little resembled Sednil. She felt full of pity for them. At her request (she doubted whether it would have been done otherwise), the tryzatt brought her some grain, salt and wine to fling after them into the river. She picked an armful of flowers, too-thy dis and marjoram, bartsia and planella-sprinkled them on the current and as they drifted away offered a prayer that the young men might meet with Sphelthon and share his peace.

"You didn't feel in any danger?" she asked Zen-Kurel as they were setting out. She felt able, now, to address him directly, though still avoiding any suggestion of warmth or particularly friendly feeling. He, for his part, seemed to have eome to regard their relationship as one between two people working with mutual respect towards a common end, without seeking or expecting more.

"No one need have felt in any danger," he replied. "It should never have been allowed to come to blows at all." Then, as Tolis came up, he shrugged and broke off with the air of one refraining from criticism of colleagues, however well justified.

It was no more than nine or ten miles to Nybril, which they reached about noon. Unconsciously, Maia had entertained in her mind a picture of a place something like Meerzat-a little, riparian town, with regular trade and boats coming and going as on Lake Serrelind. The reality was disappointingly-indeed, dauntingly-different. Nybril Point, the rocky bluff rising above the confluence of the Flere and the Zhairgen, possessed no harbor remotely resembling Meerzat's sheltered, south-facing bay. Almost the sole advantage of the place lay in its virtual impregnability, a narrow triangle of which two sides were rivers. Long ago, some baron had built a castle there, but for many years past no baron had wished to live in so uninviting a spot, whose only mercantile value was as a stop-ping-off point for wool- and timber-laden rafts coming down the Flere from Yelda. (There was a depot on the upper Flere about ten miles south of Ikat.) In years to come Sarkid was to develop Nybril, constructing a mole and introducing ferries to either shore, but at this period of the empire's history it was still little more than a windy rock where a largely hereditary community of about two thousand souls were content to eke out a living in the knowledge that they were at least secure from pillage. Strangers, apart from the raft-men and occasional pedlars, were rare and not particularly welcome, since their reasons for coming were suspect.

The arrival of Tolis and his men, whose approach had of course been observed and reported an hour earlier, was watched by a fair-sized crowd from the walls on either side of the gates. His authority from Elleroth having been duly accepted, he was accorded a reserved welcome by the Elder, who nevertheless unbent slightly upon being told that the soldiers were to leave before nightfall.

A man appointed to act as guide escorted Maia, Zen-Ku-rel and Anda-Nokomis half-way down the steep, western slope of the headland to "TheWhite Roses," one of the two or three inns in the town, which was also a fishing-tackle store and a corn chandler's. It hardly measured up to "The Safe Moorings," and although Maia had never had any great

opinion of Frarnli, she was in no doubt that Frarnli would have been able to keep the place a deal cleaner, tackle store or no. She had not sat down for long on the little upstairs balcony before the warmth of her body brought a swarm of ticks out of the woodwork of her chair.

They were eating fish broth with black bread when Tolis came in to tell them, with aloof but self-conscious cor-rectnessr that he was now leaving. If he had been expecting any sort of protest he was disappointed. Zen-Kurel, having ordered up a bottle of wine to drink to Elleroth's fortunes and a speedy heldro victory (which Tolis could hardly decline) thanked him most courteously for all he had done for them and then insisted on accompanying him to the town gates to bid farewell to tryzatt Miarn and the men.

Anda-Nokomis went too but Maia, who felt angry, stayed behind. Having slept until the cool of the evening, she washed in a pail of tepid river water and then went out onto the balcony, taking with her a stool which she hoped would prove to be without inhabitants.

She had a spacious view of the confluence, and for the best part of an hour, with the slowly-setting sun full in her eyes, sat contemplating the scene below her, the converging rivers and the comings and goings on land and water. To her left the Here, boundary between Sarkid and Be-lishba, came flowing down from a blue distance of woods interspersed with cultivated, plain-like country. Far off, she could make out grazing flocks and smoke-crowned villages. A peaceful, fertile country it looked-Sarkid of the Sheaves, the hero Deparioth's land. On her right the upper Zhairgen came swirling round the base of the rocky promontory which cut off her view of the wilder country through which they had just come. She recalled how someone, at a party in Bekla, had once described Nybril to her as being like the stone in a cherry.

Yet it was the water below her-the water and what was on it-which most closely engaged her attention. As we know, Maia was knowledgeable about water, and what principally struck her was its unpleasant choppiness and general look of nasty, unmanageable turbulence. Where the two mainstreams met there was a clearly visible seam and an extensive area of broken water, in which she could see logs, large branches and other flotsam tossing and tumbling. Maia, like everyone else in the empire, was accustomed almost unconsciously to animate impressive places

and natural phenomena, just as she had animated the forest of Pura. Under that water, she felt unreflectingly, dwelt a spirit-demi-god or demon-harshly jealous of his realm, who brooked human beings thereon with an ill grace and hard sufferance.

Nybril, as she could now appreciate, was suitable for a river port only to the extent that from it, during the summer, merchandise could be sent downstream on rough, expendable rafts. The town had not grown up as a port but as a stronghold. The current was too strong for the place to be readily accessible except from upstream. It could never enjoy Meerzat's regular, easy comings and goings of boats. To be sure, there were a few small ones tied up along the little front below, but they did not look at all strongly built or fit for rough water, and she supposed that they were used only for fishing under the lee of the promontory and perhaps for direct crossings into Belishba at seasons, such as this, when the water was low and the current slack enough to permit of it.

The sinking sun turned the whole, receding expanse of the river-the broadest she had ever seen-to a dull crimson, glittering with quick streaks and flashes of gold. By contrast, the great cracks in the dried mud exposed along the banks showed pitch-black-deep, jagged crevices as broad as a man's hand. Even up here, high above the meeting-point of the two rivers, there seemed to be no breeze. The big, palmate leaves on the trees below her hung still as though waxen and nothing stirred the white dust that covered the steep zig-zag of the lane descending to the quay. I ought to feel at peace, she thought: there's no danger and there's a bed for the night. And yet I feel-well, I dunno: it's not right, somehow; it's not what t expected. I'll be glad when we've been able to get fixed up to go.

Hearing a movement behind her, she turned to see Anda-Nokomis standing in the entrance to the balcony. She smiled and gestured to him to join her, but though he came forward to sit beside her he did not smile in reply.

"Soldiers gone?" she asked.

"Oh, yes; some time ago now."

"I ought to have gone to thank them myself. Wish I had, now."

"You can't be blamed," he answered. "That young Tolis fellow should never have taken them away. He did it out

of pure ill-humor. They very nearly mutinied: they'd been looking forward to a night on the town-such as it is."

"You mean he resented what Zenka did last night?"

"I do."

"I wish I was still-well, what I used to be," she said. "I'd 'a seen as he heard some more about it 'fore I'd done."

"But if you were, it would never have happened, would it?"

She laughed, but once again he did not.

"You never laugh, Anda-Nokomis. I could make a beggar laugh easier 'n what I can you."

"I am a beggar, actually. I don't particularly like coming to ask you for money, but I've no alternative. The man insists on a down payment tonight. I don't know where he thinks we might disappear to, I'm sure. I nearly refused, but it would have been more trouble than it's worth."

"How much, Anda-Nokomis?"

"Three hundred meld."

"You'd best take three thousand, and give some of it to Zenka. Then you needn't either of you go short or be caught without. Come on, now-" as he hesitated-"that'll be best for all of us. You don't want to look silly or short of money in front of these people."

"But will that leave you with enough?"

"Did ought!"

"Are you sure?"

"I'll count it out in front of you if you like, Anda-Nokomis."

This time he did smile as he shook his head. She gave him the money and they were silent for a little while, watching the glow fade from the breadth of the river below.

"Did you resent-well, anything that happened last night?"

She looked round at him quickly. "Oh, no, Anda-Nokomis, never!"

Yet evidently he was expecting her-waiting for her- to say more. She sought for something-anything-to smooth over the situation. He deserved all the kindness of which she was capable. "How could I resent it?"

"Why, as I said, because I've treated you badly and insulted you. I misjudged you, Maia."

"And I said, didn't I, as that was all over? No, Anda-Nokomis, of course I didn't resent you asking me to marry you. And I believe you when you say you love me. I reckon

we both understand each other better now than what we ever have, don't you?"

"And yet-I don't have to ask for my answer, do I? If I'd known earlier how you feel, I might not have spoken. But you'd succeeded in keeping your feelings very well concealed until the moment when you actually thought Zenka had gone to his death last night. I had no idea."

Would he ever make a ruler, she wondered; a man capable of perceiving so little?

"But Anda-Nokomis, at that rate why ever did you think I got him out of the gaol in Bekla?" t

"Why, you could have had several reasons: because you'd learned he'd been my closest friend in Dari-Paltesh, because you knew it would please Santil-ke-Erketlis, or simply because you weren't going to leave a man like that to the mercy of Forms."

That was the trouble about Anda-Nokomis, she thought. To himself he made perfectly good sense and you couldn't really argue with it. And it was all rubbish; it missed the only real point. Her feelings had been plain both to Zirek and to Clystis: probably to Meris, too. Fortunately, however, she didn't have to say this. While she was still wondering what she could say, he spoke again.

"But Maia, I'm afraid that at that rate it must be very disappointing for you."

"Unless," she said suddenly, as the idea came into her head "-I've only just thought-unless I wasn't altogether dreaming."

"Dreaming? When?"

"When he said about it being my turn to know what it felt like."

He frowned. "I'm sorry, I'm afraid I don't-'

She dropped on her knees beside him, put her arms round his neck and kissed him-the first time she had ever done so.

"My lord-my cousin-my dear friend: I'll tell you one thing, anyway-I've never been paid a greater compliment in my life, and I'm sure I never shall be again. I mean that with all my heart!"

"There's nothing more to be said, then?" he replied.

"There can't be: I'm so sorry."

"But Suba, Maia-your safety-"

She threw back her head and laughed as gaily as once she had in the fishing-net. "Occula used to say 'Stuff it!'

Look, Anda-Nokomis, we're here, the three of us, something like eighty miles from Katria and Suba, and no real idea yet how we're going to get there. You said-and don't think I don't feel it very kindly-that you wanted to relieve my anxiety. Surely the best way to relieve everybody's anxiety is to put all this by just for now, and stick to the job of getting ourselves down-river. 'Cos tell you the truth, I reckon 'tain't going to be all that easy. If you really want to do something for me, do that."

He was silent for what seemed a long time. "Perhaps you're right," he said at last. "We'll do as you say."

He stood up. "Where's Zenka, do you know?"

"No; I thought you did."

"Let's go and find him-have a drink-order a good supper-anything you like. And then tomorrow we'll see about getting a boat."

98: AN UNEXPECTED MEETING

When Maia woke the following morning-not quite so badly bitten as she had expected-it was to the certainty that the rains were imminent. Since "The White Roses" lay half-way down the western slope of Nybril, there was no view to the east even from its roof, but nevertheless she could sense the oppression, the piling-up of the clouds far away beyond Tonilda, beyond Yelda and Chalcon. Soon the wind would begin and the white mist would come rolling. Everyone would be glad of the rains, glad of the relief s the release; everyone but themselves, stranded on this rock in the Zhairgen. What if they were forced to spend Me-lekrilhere?

She said nothing of her apprehensions, however, either to Anda-Nokomis or to Zenka. It was plain that they had not seen the place and its limitations so clearly as she. They thought they were going to go out, much as they might go to a market, buy a boat and go down the river. Well, possibly they would: she wasn't going to start discouraging them or letting them think she was trying to show how clever she was. She'd come along and see what happened.

After breakfast they set out together, down the steep lane winding between hovels, stone walls and hedges of

gray-leaved keffa-kolma-the only thing that'll grow here, I suppose, thought Maia: back home we used to pull it up and burn it.

At length they emerged on to the quay-side. A few boats were out fishing. As she had expected, they were all anchored-or perhaps foul-anchored-well within the area of calmer water above the meeting-point of the two streams. One or two had masts, but not a sail was hoisted in the still air. None had either deck or cabin or was what you'd call, she thought, a traveling craft.

Anda-Nokomis, seeing a little group of men busy with tackle a short distance away, went up to them and, having greeted them politely, said he wanted to buy a boat stout enough to travel down the river. This, as Maia could have told him, was a mistake. She herself, if she'd been a man, would have passed the time of day, talked about the coming of the rains, asked a few questions about the fishing, repeated a rumor or two of the fighting in Lapan and said nothing at all about boats until someone-either that time or next time-got as far as asking what might have brought her to Nybril.

Oh, ah, they said. A boat? Well. One asked another to chuck him that length of line over there. Did he reckon it could do with a bit more grease rubbed in? Anda-Nokomis, interrupting, asked them whether they knew of anyone who would sell a boat. A boat? Well, now, they couldn't say. There wasn't all that many boats sold, really, not without a man was to die, and not always then. Boats- well, they nearly always got passed on, didn't they?

But might not someone sell one exceptionally, Anda-Nokomis persisted. Well, they hadn't just exactly heard of anything like that; not just lately they hadn't. Every man had his own, you see. Needed it for his living, didn't he?

What was the river like further down, inquired Zen-Kurel. They shook their heads. They didn't really know. None of them had ever been all that far down. It was the getting back, you see, wasn't it? Strong current-well, yes, everyone knew that. Very dangerous for a lot of the year, specially in the rains. Oh, yes, desperate in the rains. Well, and after all, what would anyone be wanting to go down there for? Quickest way to get yourself drowned. Someone else sucked on a hollow tooth, spat in the water and nodded in corroboration.

With them and with others Anda-Nokomis spent nearly

a couple of hours pursuing inquiries. No one was uncivil, though one or two seemed sullen; but always he found himself helpless in the face of that reticent, noncommittal evasiveness which is the reaction of most remote-dwelling people the world over to a brisk, direct approach from a stranger. Maia, who had grown up among such people, understood their feelings very well, though she could not have explained them in words. These people depended for a sense of security on doing what they and their fathers had always done in the only place they had ever known. That much they could feel sure of. Anything new or unusual probably had a catch. in it. They were prone to a kind of cryptic envy, too. This stranger, this gentleman was eager for a boat; they had only to do nothing in order to frustrate him. (And indeed after a time, although he retained his courtesy and self-possession, Anda-Nokomis's frustration began to show fairly clearly.) Towards the end of the morning and at about the tenth inquiry, Maia was left in little doubt that their fame was traveling before them.

Once Zen-Kurel, falling into conversation with a couple of youths who were playing wari with colored pebbles in the shade of a tavern wall, and finding them comparatively forthcoming in response to a few jokes and a little banter, asked whether it might not be possible to obtain a passage on one of the rafts coming down the Here from Yelda. Why, yes, they answered. People often travelled down on the rafts, though usually from higher upstream. There wasn't all that many started from Nybril, though. Yes, it was the Here pretty well all the rafts came down: very few down the upper Zhairgen. Lapan and Tonilda didn't go for the same markets downstream-or so they'd always understood. But very likely the gentleman would know more about that than what they did.

But there wouldn't be any more rafts, coming down the Here now. It was the rains, you see, as'd be starting any day. Oh, yes, both the rivers got fair desperate during Melekril. They'd break any raft to bits like you'd break an egg in a pan. 'Twas like the wrath of Cran to see the water going past the rock. You couldn't sleep in your bed at night for the roaring.

By this time Maia was beginning to feel embarrassed and ill-at-ease. She had grasped the situation clearly enough and disliked looking conspicuous and-she suspected- silly. She could imagine how she herself and Kelsi, only a

year or two back, would have stood giggling to watch Anda-Nokomis striding up and down like a pair of shears. Want the truth, this just wasn't a place where boats were to be bought. Any man who made a boat made it for himself; and any family who owned a boat used it and needed it. If anyone was to buy a boat in Nybril, it would be an altogether exceptional transaction, involving probably a few days of preliminary drinking and talk to get a man out of his shell, followed by suggestion, negotiation and bargaining. Zenka, with a little coaching, might be the man for it, but Anda-Nokomis certainly wasn't.

Acting on impulse-well, what the hell, she said to herself, if she didn't need a drink who did and anyway she was past caring about convention-she unobtrusively left Zen-Kurel (Anda-Nokomis was about two hundred yards away, pursuing some line of his own) and went quickly round the corner to the door of the tavern. Now that she was able to view it up and down, it looked a good deal more inviting than one would have expected. It was called "The Butt Inn" and had a sign depicting, on one side, a goat impelling a customer through the door. On the other side, inevitably, were Shakkarn and Lespa, though portrayed quite decently and even rather attractively, considering that this was Nybril. Both the door, which was standing open, and the shutters had plainly been repainted quite recently and there were boxes of flowers on the window-sills. One or two people were sitting outside on benches. She couldn't hear anything in the way of rowdy noise or low company from inside, and as she paused in the doorway all she could smell was clean sand and baking bread. Nice surprise, she thought: well, here goes.

Maia, of course, was more than used to being stared at. Upon her entry-oops! one step down-she could see very little, her eyes not having adapted from the sunny glare outside. She could sense, however, that a few people were looking at her. At the same time-and this, which was rather puzzling, she perceived distinctly as soon as her sight began to return-they didn't seem particularly bothered or surprised. In the Beklan Empire women seldom went into taverns alone, and if they did were usually either frowned upon or else asked if they would care to step into the back room. Maia had been expecting the latter. On the contrary, however, the atmosphere seemed positively friendly. Two rather prosperous-looking men drinking at

a side table smiled and nodded to her, while a big fellow with untidy hair, a slight limp and a clean sacking apron, who was filling a jug from a barrel in the far corner of the room, put it down, came over and asked her politely what he could have the pleasure of getting for her.

Maia's opinion of Nybril began to improve. This was almost up to Beklan standards-lower city, anyway. Why couldn't they have put up here, she wondered, instead of that moldy old "White Roses?" She ordered a bowl of serrardoes and a good, big jug of Yeldashay. She'd just have a quick cupful herself and then go out and call the others in to join her.

"A big one, saiyett?" said the potman. "Expectin' comp'ny, eh?"

"Why, yes," she smiled. "How did you guess?"

"Oh, I've got second sight," he answered, chuckling in a rather familiar way which slightly annoyed her. "Won't keep you a moment, saiyett. Just let me know if you want any-er-help, won't you?"

The serrardoes were crisp and fresh and the Yeldashay was at any rate passable. She drank half a cupful and leaned back in her chair, feeling distinctly better. At this moment, looking up, her eye met that of another girl, perhaps two or three years older than herself, who was sitting by herself under the window on the far side of the room. She was a pretty girl, with a good complexion and fair hair, neatly if rather flashily dressed, and she was looking at Maia with a not unfriendly but rather puzzled expression.

Maia, not unnaturally, could tell a shearna when she saw one. That explained everything, of course. The Butt Inn, though obviously not a brothel, must be a place of resort for shearnas, who no doubt paid a commission to the house. Naturally, she had heard of such places, but had never actually been in one before. Plainly the first thing to do was to reassure the girl that she was not going to try to move in on her territory.

She refilled her cup, stood up and strolled across to the window. She was just about to speak when the girl spoke first.

"She didn't tell me anything about you."

"Who?" asked Maia.

"Well, Almynis, of course. Still, never mind; why don't you come and sit here, with me? Shirgo!" she called to

the potman, pointing across to Maia's wine-jug and ser-rardoes. "Can you bring-" she turned back to Maia- "What's your name?"

"Maia."

"Oh, yes, everyone calls themselves Maia now, don't they, since the Valderra? What's your real name?"

Maia laughed. "It really is Maia."

The potman brought over her wine-jug and serrardoes and she topped up the girl's cup. She was beginning to have quite a reassuring feeling of old times. Perhaps Nen-naunir and Otavis would be dropping by in a minute.

"I suppose Almynis forgot. Or did you only meet her this morning or something?"

"Look," said Maia, "I'll be straight with you. I'm not working here at all, not for Almynis or anyone else. I only got to Nybril last night and I just happened to drop in here for a drink, that's all."

"In herel By yourself?"

"Well, like I said, I'm strange to Nybril: I've had a rather trying morning and I just fancied a drink."

The girl nodded towards her jug. "What, that lot?"

"Well, you see, I'm with a couple of fellows, and they're still doing a bit of business outside. They'll be here in a minute or two. What's your name?"

"Mesca, I'm called." They both smiled. "Mesca" was not a recognized girl's name. It meant "Twilight," a typical shearna's sobriquet.

"Have you been long with this Almynis?" asked Maia.

"Well, nobody has, actually. We're still building up the business, you see-or she is, anyway. She only came here herself about eight or nine months ago; I'm not sure where from, tell you the truth. I was one of her first girls. I've been married, actually, but poor Lindulel-my husband- he was drowned a couple of years back, and by the time I met Almynis last spring I'd had enough of trying to make ends meet on half of nothings"

Maia nodded sympathetically. "Better 'n mucking out the cows, in't it?"

"Oh, you have done a bit, then?"

"Well, yes; back where I come from; only like I said, I'm not doing anything just now. Tell me how Almynis works-or how you work for her."

Mesca looked at her genially but shrewdly. "Well, great thing about Almynis is, she came here with quite a bit of

money. She told me she'd heard about this house being up for sale on the edge of town-you know, usual thing, old man died and the next of kin in Ikat reckoned they'd rather have the money than the house. Anyway, Almynis bought it and I tell you, she's, really turned it into something. She must have spent a packet on it. There's about half a dozen of us working for her now. She drives a damned hard bargain, but by Cran! she doesn't half know the job. Must have had a lot of experience somewhere. She gets more out of the fellows than ever the likes of you and me could working on our own, and a fair old bit gets passed on, you see, so I reckon it's worth it. 'Sides, she's got a lot of style. Makes you feel better, working in a nice place. Oh, I do just about hate anything squalid, don't you?"

Maia agreed. "But is there really that much-you know- business in a place like Nybril?"

"More than you'd think," answered Mesca. "You see, all summer there's the rafts coming down the Flere, and Almynis's house is right on the water. Those raft fellows are all out on their own, money to spend, and Almynis makes damned sure they've nowhere better to spend it. What she offers is a good supper, a girl all night and breakfast in the morning-that's for those that can afford it. And they pay all right, believe you me. But there's quite a bit of local business too-you'd be surprised. You see, like I said, Almynis knows how to get a bit of style and glamor into it. There's a really nice garden going down to the water, and one or two smart little boats an' that-"

"Boats? Did you say boats?"

Mesca laughed. "There's some fellows like doing it out of doors, and some seem to like doing it in a boat, for some reason. Well, that old High Counselor in Bekla, he was doing it in a boat when they killed him, wasn't he? You must know about that, surely?"

Maia admitted to having heard something about it. "But then," she went on, "if you work at this place of Almynis's, what are you doing here now?"

"Ah! I'm what Almynis calls a flesh-and-blood proclamation; cheese in the mousetrap, dear. Obviously she can't make proclamations through the town crier, so she makes them through displaying us where we can be seen. Only like I was telling you, we're building up the business. It's off-season now for the rafts, you see, so we're up for a bit more local custom, if we can get it interested."

She was about to go on when they looked up to find themselves confronted by the men who had smiled at Maia when she came in. Or to be more accurate, they were confronted by Shirgo, the potman, who asked Mesca whether he might have the pleasure of introducing her and her friend to two very pleasant gentlemen. (Maia noticed him pocketing their ten meld.)

At this moment Maia would have found an excuse to leave, if it had not been for what Mesca had said about Almynis's establishment, which had interested her considerably. She smiled at the men, poured them each a drink from her jug and settled back in her chair as they began the sort of conversation usually pursued in situations of this nature.

After the four of them had been talking and drinking together for no more than a few minutes, one of the men, obviously eager to get in ahead of his companion, asked Maia point-blank how much she wanted for her favors. It was like "The Bow and Quiver" at Khasik over again, only this time there was no Zuno-and no Occula.

There was no timid little Tonildan peasant-girl, either. The Serrelinda, of course, was fully up to handling a contingency of this sort, and was about to do so when Mesca, obviously with the kindly intention of sparing a younger girl embarrassment, weighed in on her behalf. She repeated the joke about being a flesh-and-blood proclamation, and then explained to the men that while there were no facilities on the premises, she was the living proof that if they cared to go a little way upstream to Almynis's house on the riverside they could, at a most reasonable price, have more pleasure than they had ever imagined possible. Thereupon, the first man immediately asked Maia whether she personally would be there.

Maia had no wish to upset Mesca, to whom she had taken rather a liking, or to spoil business for an honest if somewhat rustic shearna. She smiled and said well, she might, she wasn't sure. You see, there was a gentleman as had particularly asked her to visit him that afternoon- she couldn't tell quite how long she'd be. It really was very nice at Almynis's, though, she could assure them.

After a few more minutes the men, having grasped that this was a case of somewhere else and later on, took themselves off, assuring Mesca that she was a fine girl and they'd be seeing her later, and her pretty friend too. As they went

out into the sun-glare, Mesca raised her head and pouted her lips at Maia in a mock kiss.

"Thanks, Maia. That was nice of you and I won't forget it. But now, do tell me why you've come here and what you're doing in Nybril. Two fellows, you said? Lucky old you!"

Maia thought quickly. "Well, yes and no. Funny thing is, neither of them's mine, believe it or not. We-well, we're survivors, really. The fighting's been bad, you know, up in Lapan. We lost everything and a lot of people got killed. I've seen that I couldn't tell you! All same, the three of us got away and managed to get down here."

Mesca gave her another shrewd glance. "Deserters?"

Maia shrugged.

"D'you need money, Maia?"

She shrugged again. "Who doesn't?"

"Have you thought of working for Almynis? You could make a nice little bit-well, just part-time if you wanted- see you through Melekril, wouldn't it? Only like I said, we're out to expand a bit if we can."

"Tell me again where it is," replied Maia. "If I can get away, I'll come out and see your Almynis. P'raps's afternoon."

"Shall I tell her to expect you, then?"

"Yes. Yes, all right, Mesca! But if it's all the same to you, I'll be slipping along now. It's just that I'd rather not let these fellows of mine know-not just for the moment, anyway." She kissed Mesca quickly on the cheek. "You c'n finish what's left in my jug, can't you? Ought I to leave something for Shirgo? Only, I mean, he doesn't know, does he, but what I-?"

"Don't worry; I'll see to that," answered Mesca.

Emerging into the sunshine, Maia almost collided with Anda-Nokomis in the doorway.

"Why, Maia, we've been looking everywhere for you! We couldn't think where you'd got to."

"I only went for a drink, Anda-Nokomis."

"By yourself? In a place like this?"

"Believe me, Anda-Nokomis, it's a lot less dangerous than the upper city. Let's go back to dinner, shall we? P'raps we'll have some better luck later on."

Pleading fatigue and the heat, she had gone to lie down until Zenka and Anda-Nokomis were safely out of the way,

still pursuing their search. She was worrying about what to do with her money and valuables while she went to Almynis's house. Funny, she thought, lying on her bed in the still heat of the afternoon and looking round the bare little room; when she'd set off for the Ortelgan camp by night, she'd carried the lot and never given the matter a thought; and here she was, bothering herself about what to do with them while she paid a visit to a small-town pleasure-house. Weil, she could only suppose that that night the greater danger had driven the lesser one out of her head. That night, she'd reckoned on being killed. She wasn't supposing that she'd be killed at Almynis's, but she did think it was within the bounds of possibility that she might be robbed.

What would Oecula do? She pondered, and suddenly it occurred to her what Oecula probably would do. Having found a couple of inches of unstitched seam along the edge of the mattress, she thrust well into the flock everything except a thousand meld. Three hundred of this she put back into her tunic pocket; the rest, tied up in a towel, she carried downstairs.

The landlord was dozing on a bench. She roused him.

"I'd be very grateful for your help: two things, really."

As usual, it was an advantage to be a pretty girl. He smiled broadly.

"Of course, saiyett."

"When I was up north, I was asked to deliver a letter to a lady in Nybril called Almynis. Do you happen to know where she lives?"

He chuckled. "Oh, ah, yes, saiyett, of course. Very nice lady. Rich lady, too. It's not so far from here, her house. Shall I tell the boy to take the letter for you?"

"No, thank you. I have to talk to her myself. But I'd be grateful if the boy could come along to show me the way."

"Of course, saiyett: Fllcallhim."

"The other thing: I've-er-got rather a large sum of money here: I'd rather not go out with it on me. I was wondering if you'd very kindly look after it until I come back?"

"Certainly, saiyett: but I hope you don't want any of that there writing, saying how much an' that. Only there's no one in this house can write."

"Oh, I know I can trust you," she smiled. "It's only that it isratheralot-all I've got, actually."

"How much, saiyett?"

"Well-seven hundred meld." And she looked at him wide-eyed.

"Oh, yes: that'll be all right, saiyett. It'll be perfectly safe with me."

She counted it into his hand and two minutes later was on her way, escorted by the pot-boy. It was not very likely now, she felt, that her room would be searched.

The lad's dialect was so thick that she couldbarely understand him. He was happy enough, however, for she had given him five meld for himself-more than he saw in a week, very like. As they reached the top of the hill and came over the crest she could see, sure enough, the cloud-banks out to the east, more than a hundred miles away.To her left, below her and beyond the walls, lay the river bank along which they had come with Tolis. On the right, along the nearer bank of the Flere, extended what was evidently the wealthy neighborhood of the little town. There were several stone-built houses; not large by Beklan standards, but trim and quite well-maintained. One, with what seemed from this distance a very pretty, neat little garden extending down to the river, reminded her poignantly of her own house in the upper city. I wonder who's living there now, she thought; and the tears pricked her eyes, for she had loved it dearly, her house.

Shepointed. "Isthat Almynis's?"

"Naw, saiyett. Fu'r 'long: artside o' warls."

It did not take long to reach the walls. They were obviously very old, not mortared, built of rocks and stones piled on a base of natural crags and all of five feet thick. Those who raised them, thought Maia, all those years ago, must have heaved and dragged and carried every rock for miles around. There were no steps, as there were leading up onto the Beklan walls. The boy, like one doing an accustomed thing and seeming to need no permission, disappeared into a near-by shed and came out with a ladder which he set up and climbed. Maia having scrambled after him, he pulled it up and then lowered it for them to descend on the other side.

A track ran parallel with the walls, towards the gates in one direction and down to the Flere in the other. The boy left the ladder lying under the wall and they set off towards the river.

The grasshoppers zipped in the short grass. The heat was intense. There was no one else on the track, but some oxen were gathered in a shady place, watched by a little, ragged girl who begged from the lady as she passed. Maia gave her a

quarter-meld: she took it and ran back to her beasts without a word.

The boy stood still, pointing. "Therr!"

About two hundred feet below them lay a square, white dwelling. It was larger than her house in Bekla, very smooth and clean-looking in the glaring sunshine. On the flat roof bay-trees and laurels were standing in big, terra-cotta pots. She could not see a single stain or crack in the wall facing her. The pale-gray, louvred shutters, like closed eyelids across the windows, suggested the very acme of shadowy coolness and seclusion within. On this nearer side, a lower stone wall projected at right angles from the town walls, then itself turned at a right angle and so ran down to the shore. Within this enclosure lay the garden, entirely surrounding the house. It was profuse with arbors, little groves and bright flowerbeds. A green lawn extended down to the river, where she could see a stone j etty and a small boat-house.

From the baking hillside above, where the stones, flickering in the sun, were too hot to touch, the place looked a veritable sanctuary of verdurous ease. Maia could see two men trudging back and forth from the river, each carrying two buckets on a yoke. Clearly, their j ob must be to water the garden almost continuously throughout the day. Nothing less could possibly keep it looking like that. It shone and guttered, vibrant in contrast to the still, dried-up scrubland. As she stood gazing, a faint scent of lilies came drifting upward.

"Anight, saiyett?" asked the boy. She nodded rather abstractedly. In the light of her twenty-four hours' experience of Nybril she had not been expecting anything quite like this. To say the least, she thought, Mesca had not been guilty of exaggeration. This Almynis obviously had money and knew how to make good use of it, too. Occula ought to come and have a look at this; it might cool her off a bit about the Lily Pool.

Dismissing the boy, she walked on down the hill. Since she could see no gate in the garden wall facing her, she rounded the right angle and followed it down its length to the shore. Still there was no gate, but the wall came to an end some yards short of the water's edge, and she walked round it onto the lawn. Not far off was one of the water-carriers, white-bearded, stooping and gnarled, with a wide, flat straw hat on his head.

"I've come to see the saiyett Almynis. Will it be all right to go up to the house?"

He squinnied up at her, old eyes peering out of a crumbling dwelling-as it were from far away-at youth and beauty which once, perhaps, he might have hoped to attain. Not any more. Not now.

"Whynot?"

She gave him five meld, at which the poor old fellow uttered an exclamation, touched it to his forehead and called down a blessing on her. She went on between the trees and shrubs with their smell of moist greenery. Glittering gnats were darting among them and butterflies fanned their wings on the stones. The double doors giving on the garden were louvred like the shutters, made of sestuaga wood, very light and delicate andfastenedwithabronzechain. Shewasabout, to knock when she saw, standing on a little, round table beside the door, a copper hand-bell. It was made in the form of four naked girls facing outwards and arching their bodies, hands raised above their heads to meet round the handle- an erect zard carved in some dark, smooth wood. Wouldn't Nennaunir just about fancy one of those? she thought; and forthwith picked it up and rang it. Like a sheep-bell it was not resonant, but gave off a hollow, cloppering sound, which somehow went with the hot afternoon. She held it up and looked inside, expecting the tongue to be another zard: however, it turned out to be a boy and girl clasped in each other's arms. She had just replaced it on the table when the chain was drawn and the doors opened by an enormous man-the biggest she had ever seen in her life, exceptfor King Karnat. The chucker-out, she thought: these places always employed a strong fellow.

He certainly was an intimidating sight, bare-armed, barefooted and muscled like an ogre. She only just restrained herself from raising her palm to her forehead.

"I've come to see the saiyett Almynis," she said.

"She's expocting you?" He spoke like Lalloc-like a Deelguy.

" Agirl called Mesca told Almynis I was coming."

"You com in." He stood aside.

She stepped into a big, cool room. There were couches covered with bright rugs and cushions, a long dining-table with benches on either side and a central pool with a fountain; but the fountain was still. All the windows were shuttered against the sun, except for one, a dazzling rectangle on

the far side of a couple of steps leading up into a little colonnade at the other end of the room.

"You waitinghere. Itollher."

She began wandering about the room, admiring the fittings and furniture, most of which looked new. One wall was decorated with a series of licentious pictures, another with a charming painting of swans alighting on a lake.

All of a sudden Maia stopped short. On a small, lacquered table against the wall stood a little cluster of ornaments and pretty artifacts-a pair of candle-snuffers made like a silver dragon, the corn-sheaves of Sarkid carved in Ortelgan zil-tate, a golden filigree sweet-box and so on. Arhong these was a little carving, in greenstone, of two goats mating. One exactly like it, she remembered, had had its place on the edge of the fountain in Sencho's dining-hall. She had once asked where it came from and been told from some foreign land beyond Yelda.

She would never have imagined there could be two such. She stepped forward and was j ust going to pick it up when she realized that the huge bodyguard had returned and was standing at her elbow. Without speaking he gestured towards the unshuttered window behind her;

She looked across the room. The dark shape of a woman, looking out of the window, was outlined against the light. She must have entered without a sound from somewhere along the colonnade. Maia crossed the room, went up the steps and raised her palm to her forehead.

"Saiyett Almynis, thank you very much for letting me-"

The woman turned. "Hallo, Maia."

For a moment Maia stared; then, with a cry, she recoiled, clutching with one hand at the painted column behind her.

"Terebinthia!"

99: A HARD BARGAIN

Maia's fear upon recognizing Terebinthia was, of course, instantaneous and irrational. During her months in Sencho's house it had been second nature to all the girls to regard Terebinthia, even in her moods of relative amiability, as the very embodiment of ruthless cunning, a woman out for her own interests and nothing else. What happened

to girls who did not suit those interests had been exemplified by Meris. Occula, maturing her secret, desperate design day after day, had feared Terebinthia as she had never feared Sencho. Terebinthia's lack of all kindness, warmth or humor, her self-contained vigilance, her minacious domination over the household, the impossibility of ever hearing her coming or of guessing how much she really knew-all these had created an atmosphere which would certainly not have obtained if the saiyett had been someone like Sessendris. Maia had not, of course, seen Terebinthia since the evening when she and Occula had set out with Sencho for the party by the Barb. Small wonder, then, that in the first moment that she recognized her, it did not immediately occur to her that a great deal had happened since they had last been together. The most frightening thing about Terebinthia had always been that you never knew where she would be next; and of that there could scarcely have been a more startling instance than now.

As Maia stood breathing hard, one hand against the column at her back, Terebinthia, all serenity, took two steps forward and, smiling, embraced her. Then she gestured towards a curtained opening a little way up the corridor-the one through which she must have entered.

"We'll go to my room. I hope this is as pleasant a surprise for you, Maia, as it is for me. Somehow, when Mesca told me, I had an idea it might be you."

If Maia could have fled from the house she would: have done so; but somehow it was still not in her power to resist the smooth domination which Terebinthia had always exercised. Having recovered a little from her initial shock, she was doing her best to tell herself that she no longer had any reason to be afraid of Terebinthia. On the contrary, she had cause-yes, of course she had cause-to be glad that the woman she had come to see had turned out to be an old acquaintance with every reason to feel well-disposed towards her. Lespa's stars! Enough of the money she'd made had found its way into Terebinthia's pocket: and she'd always been obedient and cooperative and never done Terebinthia any harm.

And yet she was afraid. The Terebinthia she had known had never been kind or generous to anyone. Always in dealing with her there had been apprehension, an atmosphere of cat-and-mouse; and it had not evaporated-not

as far as Maia was concerned. But she's no longer got the power! thought Maia desperately. She hasn't got the power like she used to. She's no more saiyett now than what I am. Yet even as she tried to impress this on herself her misgiving grew. This acquaintance she had rediscovered was no friend, had never been a friend. " "Well, I certainly never could have guessed that Almynis would turn out to be you," she replied, in a tone as light and genial as she could manage. "Never even entered my head! You've certainly got a nice place here. Gave me a surprise: I mean, in Nybril-well, it's rather out of the way, isn't it?" '

"Perhaps," agreed Terebinthia, "but that has its advantages for me, as I'm sure you must realize."

Opening a door on their left, she gestured to Maia to enter. Maia found herself in a small sitting-room, pleasantly cool, with a floor of pale-green tiles, two couches, a table with benches and a wide window, west-facing and shuttered. The tiles were dappled by sunlight through the louvres.

"Sit down, Maia," said Terebinthia. "You must have had a hot walk from Nybril. We'll have some wine and you Can relax a little."

She had seldom felt less relaxed, thought Maia. Terebinthia went to the door and called. Maia (who had not sat down, but remained standing tensely in the middle of the room) heard a girl's voice responding. Returning, Terebinthia looked at Maia with an air of mild surprise, paused a moment and then, with a slight shrug of her shoulders, sat down herself.

"You're looking well, Maia. Renown evidently suits you. You've done very well for yourself, haven't you? Or ought I perhaps to say you were doing well for yourself? I wonder what may have brought you here?"

Her broad, sleepy-eyed, dark-complexioned face regarded Maia intently, very like a cat indeed, and she leaned back, spreading her arms along the top of the couch as she waited for Maia's answer.

To Maia there seemed no point in beating about the bush.

"I left Bekla because Queen Fornis tried to murder me."

Terebinthia nodded, rather as though Maia had told her that she had decided to travel for her health.

"Are you alone here, then?"

"No: I'm with Bayub-Otal of Urtah and a Katrian officer of King Karnat."

Terebinthia raised her eyebrows. "A Katrian officer? And Bayub-Otal, you say? I thought he'd been killed in the fighting at Rallur."

"No: they were both prisoners in Bekla, but the three of us were able to get away."

There was a tap at the door and a fair, slight girl, who looked no more than eleven, dressed in tawdry finery like Mesca, came in with a tray-a wine-flask and cups, ser-rardoes and a plate of prions. Terebinthia remained silent while she set down the tray and left them. Maia, whom the child had rather reminded of Kelsi, was unable altogether to contain her feelings.

"Isn't she rather young for-for the work here?"

"She is young, of course," replied Terebinthia smoothly, "but she's shaping well, I'm glad to say, and learning quickly."

She poured the wine and handed Maia her cup. Suddenly, Maia was overcome with a terrible conviction that the wine must be poisoned. Don't be silly, she thought; why should she poison you? Well, to please Fornis and reinstate herself. For envy. For what she can get.

"Bayub-Otal knows I've come here today, of course," she said.

"Of course," replied Terebinthia; and drank. Maia sipped too, staring down into the cup. It looked like ordinary wine-she could see no discoloration-and there was no unusual taste. She helped herself to a prion and nibbled it. Her hand was trembling, but perhaps Terebinthia had not noticed.

"And how's dear Occula?" asked Terebinthia suddenly, putting down her cup.

"Occula? Oh-oh, she's fine," answered Maia. "That's to say, she was when I come away."

Terebinthia waited inquiringly, allowing it to be clear that she knew that Maia must know that this was not an adequate reply.

"She was arrested after the High Counselor's murder, of course-"

"You both were, weren't you?" said Terebinthia.

"-only Queen Fornis took a fancy to her, see, and she's been with her ever since."

"Queen Fornis? And yet you say she tried to kill youl"

"Well, thing was, she thought I was out to be Sacred Queen, see; but I wasn't."

"No, of course not; because you and Occula were working for the heldril all along, weren't you? You contrived the murder of the High Counselor between you."

There was no disguising, now, the malice in Terebin-thia's eyes. The Serrelinda, however-now that it was out in the open-was equal to looking steadily back at her.

"I had nothing whatever to do with it, Terebinthia. I didn't know anything about it until it happened."

"Well, of course I must take your word for that, mustn't I?" '

"You can. I'll be perfectly frank with you: I'm not sorry he died, but I had nothing to do with it."

"And Occula?"

"I've no idea."

"Come, come, Maia. You and she were inseparable. You're telling me she told you nothing?"

"She'd nothing to tell, Terebinthia, that's why. Had, she'd 'a told me; I agree with you that far."

"It's important to me, you see," went on Terebinthia. "I've got a lot to thank them for, those who killed Sencho. I was under suspicion of having had to do with it myself; I knew that. As if I could have had any motive for wanting him dead! He was worth a fortune to me. But I wasn't going to wait to be condemned by the Council. So I had to forfeit everything and leave Bekla at once."

"Is that why you left?"

"Of course. But I could never have succeeded if Elvair-ka-Virrion hadn't paid me very generously in return for letting him take Milvushina away the day after the murder. He got me out of the upper city in disguise, with everything valuable I could carry. Why else do you think I'm here with a false name in a place like this, instead of Ikat or Herl-Belishba? So you see I've very little reason indeed to feel friendly towards those who killed Sencho."

Maia, who was now beginning to feel really frightened, gazed back at her silently.

"And now you know, don't you, where I am? You could tell anyone you wanted to. I confess that worries me rather, Maia."

Had there been something in the wine? Maia's head was swimming. The room seemed like a little box, over which was brooding an enormous presence; the forest-giant of

Purn, the gigantic doorman-they were one and the same. She wiped the sweat from her forehead. She must retain an outward appearance of self-possession.

"Poor Milvushina's dead, you know."

"Milvushina? How?"

Maia told her, restraining her tears with some difficulty.

"I see," said Terebinthia. "I heard about Durakkon; and I knew about the battle, of course. News comes down the river with the rafts. But I didn't know about Milvushina. And so Queen Fornis has taken Bekla, has she?"

"That's more than I can tell you, Terebinthia. When we got away, her Palteshis were still fighting it out with the Lapanese."

"So now-you're here," continued Terebinthia ponder-ingly, "and looking for work, so Mesca said. You need money, Maia, do you?"

"No, I didn't come here for money, actually."

But clearly Terebinthia did not mean to permit any interruption to the delicious moment of springing the mousetrap.

"I'm not at all sure-" she stood up, walked slowly across to the window and made some minute adjustment to the louvres "-really-" she returned and sat down again "-whether I ought to allow you to leave this house alive."

"Why ever would that be then, saiyett?" Involuntarily, Maia's voice had risen. "I told you, you've no reason to be revenged on me."

"Perhaps not; but then you know now, don't you, where I'm to be found? And the Leopards would like to learn that."

She wants me to plead for my life. She wants me to go about to convince her there'd be no point in killing me. Reckon I'll have to, an' all.

"But Terebinthia, I'm not going back to Bekla-ever."

"So you say now; but one never knows. And people can still talk, even though they may not actually be in Bekla; and news can travel."

"But everyone reckons Erketlis is sure to beat Kembri and take Bekla."

"Perhaps, Maia, perhaps. And do you think Erketlis is any more likely than Fornis to feel kindly disposed towards Sencho's former saiyett?"

"If you was to kill me, saiyett, that'd be proper bad for you. Bayub-Otal and Zen-Kurel, they both know I'm here,

and so do the folks at 'The White Roses.' But what's more, I'm under the protection of Lord Elleroth of Sarkid. I did him a good turn, see, and only day before yesterday he give us an officer and twenty soldiers to escort us here."

"Oh, it will be an accident, Maia, of course: a most unfortunate accident. You fell in the river. You slipped on the stairs. There'll be witnesses. We shall all be heartbroken." She smiled. "That's why your wine isn't poisoned. You thought it might be, didn't you?"

Somehow, somewhere, Maia could sense the existence of a loophole. A loophole. Terebinthia had some purpose. There was something, something that she was waiting for, hoping to hear. At this moment her threat was half real and half a cruel game. It was up to her victim to tip it one way or the, other. She had to come up with some good reason why the balance of advantage for Terebinthia lay in not stopping her mouth.

"Saiyett" (she couldn't help it now) "there's one thing you're wrong about. I didn't come here to ask you for work, and I don't need your money."

"Really, Maia?" That had caught her attention all right.

"No. My friends and I want to reach Katria by going down the river. That's why we came to Nybril-to buy a boat. But tell you the truth, it's not turning out all that easy."

"Well?"

"Well, Mesca said as you had boats. I come to see whether I could buy one off you."

It was plain that this was something new and unexpected: it had taken Terebinthia by surprise. So Maia was not penniless? There was more to be gained here than the satisfaction of killing her? Terebinthia had always been a great one for money. That was what she lived for.

Her next remark came pat as an echo. "You have money, then?"

"Well, not all that much, but enough to pay a fair price for a boat, I reckon. I haven't got it here, though. It's with my friends in Nybril."

"And what makes you think I'd be likely to part with a boat?"

"The rains are coming, saiyett. I reckon whatever your clients do during Melekril, they don't baste in boats. Turn one of your boats back into money, use that money to

make more and get another boat run down from Yelda in the spring. I'd be doing you a good turn."

"You always were a shrewd little thing, Maia. I had hopes of you once. It's a pity those days are gone."

She was silent, meditating. "You say you're making for Katria?"

"Yes."

"And staying there for good?"

"I'm not coming back, Terebinthia. And I shan't tell anyone that Almynis of Nybril used to be Sencho's saiyett. Why should I? What good would it do me?"

"Well." Terebinthia drummed her fingers lightly on the table. "Well." For the second time she stood up. "We'll go down and look at the boats, Maia, if you like."

The boat-house had a green, watery smell and was full of echoing knocks and wooden scrapings, of the slock of water and bright, elastic reflections shimmering on the under-side of the roof. Maia had not expected so many boats. There were five in all: two rowing boats; a long, rectangular, flat-bottomed affair like a Suban kilyett and two larger, single-masted boats, the masts unstepped and sails furled. The bigger of these was about twenty feet long and had a tiny cabin amidships, most of which was taken up by a big, comfortable-looking feather mattress. The rudder, rowlocks and oars-two pairs-were shipped aboard. There were two bailers, and anchors fore and aft. All in all, thought Maia, as likely a boat as one could well hope to find. She was careful to maintain a straight face and speculative air, but while she was doing so Terebinthia broke in on her pose of deliberation.

"You can take it from me, Maia, that nothing smaller than that boat is going to be any good to you on the lower Zhair-gen. It's either that or drown. Once the rains have set in you'll probably drown anyway, but that's your affair."

Maia was looking into the well of the boat. There was almost no bilge. She was evidently sound enough. She was jammed up against the other boats, of course, but as far as Maia could tell she had no noticeable list. How well she would answer and steer was another matter.

"You needn't stand there poking it about," said Terebinthia. "You can take it out for a few minutes if you want: there's very little current inshore on this side. I'll call the Deelguy to go with you. You'll find there's nothing

wrong with it. If you want it, you can have it for sixteen thousand meld."

Maia looked at her in amazement. "But-but a brand-new boat like that wouldn't cost eight thousand on Ser-relind! Anyway, I haven't got sixteen thousand-"

"Take it or leave it," said Terebinthia sharply. "It strikes me you're in no position to bargain, Maia. The rains are coming. It might cost you more to spend Melekril in Ny-bril, the three of you."

"But I haven't got it, saiyett."

Terebinthia walked out of the boat-house and called to the gardener to come and lock it. As Maia came out, the man threaded in the chain and began putting the bow of the heavy Gelt lock through the links.

"All right, Terebinthia," said Maia. "I'll take it out and try it."

100: MIST AND RAIN

The mist lay everywhere, far and near; filling the savage, desolate miles of the forest of Purn; obliterating the wasteland where Elleroth's camp now stood empty; lying thick upon the two rivers, blotting out rocks and rapids, reed-beds and the silent backwaters where flotsam circled for hour after hour in the rotating eddies. It covered the Nybril confluence, changing it to a seemingly illimitable expanse of featureless, deserted water, whence even the fowl had stolen away to shelter (for water will not run off a duck's back for ever and saturated feathers are fatal).

Nybril lay beneath the mist as though submerged. The whole promontory had disappeared under the silent, gray mass rolling over walls and housetops, creeping down the steep streets until each corner and crevice of the town had been penetrated, as a cavity is filled with putty pressed home. By nightfall those few still on the streets were hurrying either to their own houses or else to some equally welcome destination-for the taverns were doing brisk business as people drank and made merry over the commencement of Melekril and the coming of the rains.

The mist penetrated every room where a fire was not burning, hanging in the air, surrounding each lamp-flame with a dull, foggy nimbus. By its very nature it seemed to

cast a blight, so that honest warmth became thick and close, and shelter constrictive: yet to this the merry-makers paid no heed.

Out of the mist, slowly, grew the rain: at first no more than a moisture suspended in the air, sinking onto roofs, copings and leaves until everything was damp to the touch; then droplets, minute particles like a powder of water, felt by the hurrying home-goers on foreheads, ears and the backs of hands; and at last as a fine mizzle, drifting out of the east on the gentle but ceaseless wind rolling the mist onward into Belishba and beyond to Katria and Tere-kenalt. '

In Maia's upstairs room at "The White Roses," where Anda-Nokomis, Zen-Kurel and she were preparing to leave, the rain, as darkness fell, had become just heavy enough to be heard on the roof above. They had eaten a meal, paid their score and bought from the landlord enough food-mainly bread, cheese and dried fruit-to last for about two days.

"That's going to be enough, you reckon?" asked Maia when Anda-Nokomis brought it upstairs and divided it to be stowed in the packs which Zen-Kurel had persuaded Tolis to leave with them upon his departure.

"I don't know," he replied. "I can only tell you what the landlord said. By the way, here are the seven hundred meld you left with him: I have counted them. According to him, it's about seventy miles down the Zhairgen to the southern border of Katria. During summer the rafts usually take three days over it, stopping off at night. But he says that now the rains have begun we ought not to attempt it at all. He tried to dissuade me, but when he saw that was no good, he said our only hope was to keep going night and day. He said if we didn't do it in a day and a half at the most we'd have no chance, because after only a few hours the river floods and becomes completely unnaviga-ble. No boat can live in it, he said."

He paused, listening as the light rain pattered overhead and dripped down outside the windows. "The eastern provinces have already had this for hours, of course: their rain's coming down both rivers now."

"Why don't you stay here in Nybril, Maia?" asked Zen-Kurel. "I think both Anda-Nokomis and I would rather feel you were safe."

She smiled, and he half-returned it, as though despite

himself. "If that boat's to get to Katria I reckon you're going to need me."

Zen-Kurel seemed about to reply, but she cut him short. "Anda-Nokomis, we ought to be going. The man downstairs is right; sooner the better, else we'll have no chance."

"You want actually to take the boat out tonight?"

"Once the rain's really settled in the mist lifts; you know that. There'll be a bit of a moon most of the night. Even behind clouds that'll give enough light for us to drift a fair old way by morning, long 's we keep a good look-out and stay offshore. We'll have to take it steady, of course, but it might make all the difference."

"Mightn't we run aground or hit something in the dark?"

"Well, that'll be all according," she answered, "but if that landlord was right about one thing, it's that every hour's one less and there aren't all that many."

Bayub-Otal was silent, considering. Standing thus, gawky and pondering, in the middle of the room, he looked so characteristic, so comically typical of the Anda-Nokomis she had come to know and feel affection for, that she burst out laughing, jumped up and took his hands.

"You afraid, Anda-Nokomis? 'Cos I am, tell you that! Come on, let's be going."

He glanced at Zen-Kurel, who shrugged and picked up his pack.

The big room downstairs was crowded and full of babble and laughter. Two groups of drinkers were bellowing different songs, taunting their rivals and trying to drown each other. Maia and her companions edged their way through the crush, reaching the door unhindered. Anda-Nokomis already had his hand on the latch when a big, fair-bearded man with a broken nose caught Maia by the shoulder.

"Don' want to be going out there, lass! Pissing down! Whyn't stay here 'n have nice drink with me?"

"All right," she smiled. "Tomorrow night I will."

"No good t'morrow night: place'll be drunk dry!"

"Then here's your health!" she answered; took his half-empty wine-cup out of his hand, quickly drained it and tossed it into the air above his head. Then, as he made a clumsy grab to catch it, she slipped past him, through the opened door and out into the misty darkness.

The rain was falling more heavily now and the mist, as she had foreseen, was growing gradually less dense. Drawing their cloaks round them and raising the hoods, they

climbed the rocky lane, crossed the market-place and came to the town gates. When Bayub-Otal put his head round the door of their lodge the watchmen were sitting snug by the fire with a jug of mulled wine, playing some game on a board marked out in charcoal on the table. One of them, grumbling, got up and reached for the keys hanging on the wall.

"Off to Almynis, I suppose, are yer, like the rest of 'em? Won't be home till morning if I know anything about it. All right for them as can afford it, eh? Stuffin' good money up some painted shearna's tairth."

Anda-Nokomis made no reply as the man went stumping outside. Stooping over the chain of the gate, he looked back at them over his shoulder. "Come on, then, let's have it! 'Zact money, too: none of your ten-meld pieces; I can't change 'em."

"Have what?" asked Zen-Kurel brusquely.

The man clicked his tongue with impatience. "Two meld each after dark: you know that as well as I do."

"I certainly don't-" Zen-Kurel was beginning, when Maia broke in.

"Here is ten meld, but we don't want any change. Have a drink with us, just to start off Melekril."

"Well, there's a good-hearted lass!" he said, pocketing the coin and drawing the chain. But as she passed him he drew her on one side and muttered, "I'm sorry to see you off to Almynis, a young girl like you: I've a daughter no older. Why don't you find yourself a good husband and forget these tricks? She's hard as stone, that one. You mark my words, she'll cheat you and you'll only wish you'd never seen her."

She would have liked to reassure him, to tell him he needn't worry on her account; but there was not time. Taking his rough hand in both of hers, she bent and kissed it quickly; then turned away and rejoined the others. She never knew whether the man had been within his rights in demanding the money.

The moon gave no more than the dimmest, suffused light from behind the clouds, and they had to pick their way slowly along the track running parallel with the walls. The baked, high-summer earth was slippery with the rain which had not yet turned it to mud, and patches of mist were still hanging on the high ground between the gates and the steep descent towards the Flere. Once they came

over the top, however, and within sight of Terebinthia's house below, the going grew a little easier. The place was blazing with light, which glittered among the veils of rain drifting across the hillside. They could hear the music and laughter half a mile off.

Maia, knowing no other way, led them along the wall, on to the now-soggy lawn beside the river and so up the garden to the door. When she rang the bell the huge Deel-guy opened at once. Looking past him she caught a glimpse of the big room crowded with men, some with girls on their knees, all gazing at something out of sight beyond; probably a kura, she supposed. The giant bowed, spreading his hands.

"You comming in, yoss?"

"No!" she replied firmly. "Tell your saiyett that Maia Serrelinda is here. Say I've brought the money and we want to go straight to the boat."

He was back almost at once. "She say you gowing the money, then I take you."

"No!" she said. "Tell her we'll pay the money when we've got the boat."

This time the Deelguy returned with Terebinthia, who was wearing a very low-cut sleeveless, scarlet dress and a heavy necklace of penapa stones. "Don't be silly, Maia. Come in and have a drink."

"I'm sorry, saiyett, but the river's rising and we're in a hurry. If you'll come down to the boat-house with us-or send your man, I don't mind which-I'll hand over the money once we've got the boat and seen as she's all she should be."

"Then you can go without, you little cow," said Terebinthia.

"That would be a pity, saiyett. I've got all your money here and what's more, I've got two armed men to defend me. So I'd have to go away, wouldn't I? and do all that talking as you were so anxious about this afternoon. I wouldn't want that, would you?"

For fully ten seconds Terebinthia glared at Maia, who returned her stare unwaveringly. Then she snapped, "Very well. Braishdil, fetch my cloak and a pair of clogs. Come with us yourself and bring a torch."

The boat, as far as Maia could see, was as she had been that afternoon. Having checked the oars and all the other equipment, she nodded to her friends to climb in. Then,

carefully turning her back on them, she paid out the money on a bench, the Deelguy holding the smoky, flaring torch as Terebinthia counted it, biting each coin.

"You're going to your death, you know, Maia," said Terebinthia finally, having dropped the last hundred-meld piece into her scrip. "That's your own affair, of course, but in many ways I wish you weren't. You'd much better stay here. You'd soon make a lot more than ever you did at Sencho's, you know."

"I'm sorry, saiyett. We just see things different, that's all."

"Evidently," replied Terebinthia. "But I'm afraid the truth is that you won't be seeing anything at all soon, Maia. I've been perfectly straight with you: that's a good boat. But if it was twice as strong, it wouldn't get to Katria in the rains. So just remember, I told you to think better of it and you wouldn't. Braishdil, push it out."

She watched silently as the great, lumbering fellow dragged the boat free from those against it as easily as he might have pulled a piece of firewood out of a pile, drew it forward and pushed it out into the dark water along the verge. As soon as it was clear of the bank she called, "That'll do!" The man left them and followed her out through the side door of the boat-house. They heard the chain fastened and then saw the torch bobbing back up the garden until it was lost to view. They were alone in the darkness, the river and the falling rain.

Their thick, soldiers' cloaks were drenched. Maia could feel hers wet against her shoulders and the upper part of her back.

"What do you want us to do now, Maia?" asked Anda-Nokomis from the bow.

"We've got to get across to the other bank, without drifting down no more 'n what we can help. If we get into that stew out in the middle below the town, we're finished."

"How's it to be done?"

"Row across as quick as we can and hope the current in the center doesn't turn us downstream too hard."

"I'm afraid rowing isn't my strong point, Maia."

O Lespa! she thought. She'd forgotten that; his hand! Of course she could row, but if they weren't to be swept down in midstream the steering was going to be important and she'd rather have had the doing of that herself. Still, there were no two ways about it, and no sense, either, in

making him feel worse than he must already. She got up and went forward to the rowing-seats amidships.

"Zenka," she said-it had slipped out before she'd thought about it-"give me one of those oars and take the other yourself. You go that side, 'cos you'll pull stronger n' me, and that'll help to keep her head from turning downstream. Anda-Nokomis, you take the tiller and keep her pointing half-upstream as steady as you can."

"The trouble is," he said, having stumbled to his seat in the stern, "I can't see anything out there."

"You'll just have to go best you can, by the light from the house behind. But you'll be able to tell when we've got across, near enough, 'cos the current'll slacken. Anyway, you ought to be able to make out the bank, just about, before we get to it. Here, wait, Zenka! Careful! Let me put that rowlock in for you! If that was to fall overboard we'd really be in trouble. Right; now you pull how you like, only hard: I'll work in with you, don't worry."

It was a heavy boat to get under way, but Zen-Kurel handled his oar better than she'd dared to hope. Pulling her own, she kept her eyes on the light from Terebinthia's house and within half a minute saw it swing over to her right. Good; the bow was heading upstream.

"Fine, Anda-Nokomis!" she panted. "Keep it like that!"

Even as she spoke the port bow began to meet the midstream current. The lights swung back again until they were once more astern; then until they were almost directly on her left. The water gurgled and knocked against the side, racing down in the dark. They were being swept downstream fast.

"Right, Anda-Nokomis, right!" she cried. "Hard over to your right!"

It was very frightening. She had never imagined they would go down so fast. At this rate they would be well below Nybril in a matter of minutes and into the central boil of the confluence. She could see the speckled lights of the town rushing past on her left. The rain was blowing straight into her face from astern.

"Harder, Zenka!" She herself had never pulled so hard. As she well knew, she was pulling for her life.

Ah, but they were gradually forcing their way across the current! She could feel it; and besides, the lights, even as they fell so fast behind, were gradually moving over towards her right until at length she was looking straight at them. Then,

slowly-very slowly it seemed-the current began to slacken and the chattering of the water against the side below her grew less until it had almost died away. They were drifting down, but far more gently and in smooth water.

She slumped over her oar, drawing deep, shuddering breaths. The sweat was pouring off her and her heart was thumping. She retched, but nothing came. Zenka had stopped rowing too, and seemed to be waiting to be told what to do. She wiped the rain out of her eyes and sat up straight.

"Anda-Nokomis, can you-can you see the bank?"

"I'm not sure," he answered, "but there's something ahead; rushes, perhaps."

They took a few more cautious strokes.

"At least it's answering now," said Anda-Nokomis. "It didn't, out there."

"It did, only you couldn't feel it; hadn't, we wouldn't be here."

She thrust her oar straight down into the water and at the full extent of her arm touched bottom. At the same moment the low moon, breaking for a moment through a rift in the clouds, showed them the left bank about twenty yards away. Turning to look astern before the moon disappeared again, she could see-or thought she could see-that they were about four or five hundred yards below Nybril, with the confluence, already become a terrifying, foaming caldron, lying between. Now that she was no longer rowing, she could hear the noise of it; a deep, sullen thunder, not loud but continuous, like the rolling of agreatdrum.

"I'm sorry," she said, "but I got to rest for a bit: I'm tot'lly all in. Anda-Nokomis, try to keep her drifting gently close to the bank. And Zenka, you go up in the bow with that oar and just keep on feeling ahead for rocks or shoals an' that. There's anchors fore and aft: keep them ready to throw out. Give a shout if you want me. I won't be very long, honest."

And with this poor Maia crawled into the cubby-hole and lay down, utterly spent. But the big, soft mattress, on which so many jolly jinks must have been enacted, afforded her little solace. Already the rain, blowing in from astern, had soaked it. Miserably, she crawled as far forward as she could and curled up, knees to chin. It made little difference. She could almost have wrung out her cloak, while her sopping tunic and shift clung round her like warm

slime. She could feel the shape of her diamonds and of Randronoth's casket pressing against her body. After an unavailing wriggle or two she tugged off her tunic and, having felt carefully round the seams of the pockets to make sure they were still holding, dumped it beside her and drew up her wet cloak for a blanket.

She had one consolation, however. They were moving smoothly, without listing or checking. Terebinthia had charged her somewhere between two and three times its value, but at least she had spoken no more than the truth when she had told her the boat was a good one.

Now and then, without distinguishing what was said, she could catch Zenka's voice speaking to Anda-Nokomis and feel the boat slightly changing course. But there were no sudden thuds or alarms and after a while her tension-for she had been fully expecting them to hit something or other in the dark-gradually diminished. She had not meant to sleep, yet soon, lacking all power to resist, she was dead to the world; and for some three or four hours the exhausted girl remained unstirring.

Meanwhile their progress was slow, for both Bayub-Otal and Zen-Kurel were only too well aware of their own lack of skill and experience. Offshore, to their right, the current was swifter-they could hear it and could just make out, too, the froth of broken water in midstream-but they were unwilling either to disturb Maia or to run any risks which they might not be able to handle themselves. The inshore water seemed blessedly free of obstacles and for this they were content to settle. The need for continuous vigilance was strain enough in itself.

At some uncertain time during the long night Bayub-Otal dropped the stern anchor, went forward to Zen-Kurel and suggested a rest and a bite. Having lowered the bow anchor as well, they sat down side by side, legs stretched out, backs against the forward wall of the cubby-little shelter from the relentless rain-and ate a few mouthfuls of bread and cheese.

"How long till morning, do you suppose?" asked Zen-Kurel in a whisper.

"Three hours, perhaps."

"Is Maia still asleep?"

"I think so."

"She deserves it: we ought to let her sleep as long as she can."

For a time they were silent. Bayub-Otal pulled out his flask and they each took a mouthful of djebbah. At length he said, "She's saved us again and again since Bekla. Without her we'd have died in the forest."

"That or been killed by the Ortelgans."

"We wouldn't have this boat, either. And that brothel woman-Maia had to overpay her; I'm certain of that- they took so long over it. First and last, she's spared herself nothing whatever on our account, that's about what it comes to."

"It's like Deparioth and the Silver Flower," said Zen-Kurel.

"Oh, do they know that in Katria, too?"

"Oh, yes, naturally. Well, it was in the Blue Forest that the traitors abandoned Deparioth, of course-left him to die-and the magic girl came to save him. I kept thinking about that while we were in Purn."

"But Zenka, you said you hated her. You wanted to kill her."

For some time Zen-Kurel made no reply. At last he replied, "What I know now is that I've never really stopped loving her: I only thought I had. Oh, yes, I wanted to stop loving her; of course I've hated her for what she did in Suba. I still don't understand it, but now I don't think any more that it was just deliberate, cold-hearted deceit and treachery. There was something-something behind it that I don't understand. O Cran, how I've hated her! But what I've discovered is that you can hate someone like poison and still not be able to stop being in love with them."

Bayub-Otal said nothing and after a few moments Zen-Kurel went on, "Her beauty-her courage-what she is- they're too strong for my hatred, I suppose, if you like to put it that way. I've never known a girl like her-never dreamt there could be one. Whatever she thought she was doing that night in Suba, there must have been some good reason. It's like the gods, really: in my mind, I mean."

"Like the gods? What do you mean?"

"Well, the gods often inflict terrible, even shameful suffering on us, don't they? And there's no accounting for it. But people still go on worshipping them because of things like sunsets and music. She's like that: or I am, whichever way you like to put it. I couldn't stop loving her-I mean, admiring and longing for her-not if she were to cut my throat."

"She still-she still loves you, you know," said Bayub-Otal rather falteringly, after a pause.

"Why, did she say so? I can't believe that."

"No, but the night you took those men back to Elleroth I thought she was going to go out of her mind; and it was entirely on your account. In fact I told you as much when you got back; you remember?"

"But that might not necessarily-" He stopped. "Well, but even if-I mean, how can I-after all that's happened-"

Suddenly they both sprang to their feet, Zen-Kurel nearly falling his length on the drenched, slippery planking. The boat was swinging round in the current, rotating by the bow.

For the next few moments they were at a total loss, with no idea what could have happened or what to do. Then the boat, having turned stem to stern, fetched up with a jerk in the running flood as the bow anchor rope went taut and held.

Maia woke instantly. The first thing of which she was conscious was the wet. She was wet through from head to foot-hair, ears, eyelids, hands, sandals. She was lying in a soaking wet hollow the shape of her body. For some reason, however, the rain no longer seemed to be blowing in upon her, though she could hear it beating on the planking above her head.

Something was wrong. That jerk; she'd felt that all right- that was what had woken her. But they were not aground; they were at the full extent of a rope, as she could feel by the wavering of the boat. What in Cran's name was going on?

Without stopping to put on her tunic or cloak, she elbowed her way out into the little well astern and stood up, facing forward. Immediately she felt the rain full in her face. So they must be pointing upstream.

"Anda-Nokomis, what's happened?"

"We'd stopped for a rest, Maia. We had both anchors down, and I think the stern one must have pulled out."

Quickly she turned, found the stern anchor rope in the dark and pulled on it. At least the anchor had not carried away. It was still on the other end, though not touching bottom.

"How long have I been asleep?"

"I can't say: three or four hours, perhaps."

"And the river's been rising all the time," she said.

"That's why the anchor came adrift: likely it never had a proper grip of the bottom to start with. We must raise the other one and then turn her downstream again."

Yet try as they would, they could not pull up the bow anchor. All three of them hauled until they had actually dragged the heavy boat two or three feet upstream against the current, but still the anchor would not budge.

At length Zen-Kurel stood back, panting, and at once the boat drifted back downstream and fetched up at the full extent of the rope.

"We'll have to cut it, Maia."

"No!" she said. "Not till I've been down to have a go at freeing it."

Zen-Kurel took her by the wrist. "Maia, I won't allow it."

She turned on him with icy anger. "Will you please let me go?" He did so. "Thank you. Now listen. If I know anything about it, it's probably hooked itself under a log or something o' that. If I do manage to clear it, you'll feel the jerk as the boat lifts, 'cos she's down by the bow now: that's on account of the river rising. Then she'll start to drift, and you'll have to pull me back. Not too sharp, though, or you'll catch me with the anchor like a fish on a hook."

"Shouldn't we drop the other anchor first?" asked Anda-Nokomis.

"No," answered Maia decisively. "We're not risking this happening twice. You shouldn't have anchored at all, Anda-Nokomis: not in this current, with the river rising. You should've tied up to the bank."

Without another word she slipped off her sandals, leaned well out over the bow, gripped the taut rope with both hands, took a deep breath and went overside.

At once she felt the strength of the current. It fairly jerked at her arms. Her hair streamed backwards and she could feel the flow over her shoulders and along the length of her back. Lose the rope and you're done for! Hand over hand, down and down. Eyes shut, free hand feeling ahead. Pain across the forehead and under the eyes. I'll get the basting thing up if it kills me! She found the shank of the anchor and felt soft, water-soaked twigs brushing against her face and shoulders like a swarm of long-legged insects. Then-ah! just as she'd supposed-a thick branch; absolutely unyielding, yes, and therefore sticking out from a sunken tree-trunk, probably,

but no need to find out about that. One fluke of the anchor neatly under it, snug as fingers round the handle of a basket. Hadn't even pierced the wood. O Cran, I can't hold my breath any longer! I can't! Push it down by the shank, turn it away from you-I'm drowning, drowning, I can't hold my breath: let it out then, girl, but once you do there's no more-it's clear, it'sfree!

She almost lost hold of the rope as the anchor leapt upward, jerked by the buoyancy of the released boat above. With the last remnant of her consciousness she got both hands to it and felt them pulling her up. Give me air, O Cran, just give me some air and I'll never ask for any least thing else, ever again!

Her head and shoulders came clear of the surface and she drew in her breath. It was over. She could breathe.

They gripped her under the arms and dragged her aboard. For a good half minute she lay prone on the planking, vomiting water and drawing one breath after another.

At length she stood up.

"What's happening? Who's got the tiller?"

"I have," answered Bayub-Otal from the stern. "I've turned us downstream and I'm keeping as near in to the bank as I can."

"You're too brave for your own good, Maia," said Zen-Kurel. "Please don't try anything else like that."

She was about to answer when she became unthinkingly aware that something was still amiss. The boat, though now free, was lower in the water and moving very sluggishly. She made her way aft. She could hear the bilge slopping in the dark. Gods! she thought. No wonder the damned mattress was sodden to pulp!

The well of the boat, astern of the cubby-hole, was awash with the rain. She put one foot into it. It was over her ankle and half-way up her shin.

"Zenka!" she called. "Come and help me bail!"

He was beside her in moments. She felt so angry and harassed by all that had been allowed to go wrong that she simply put one of the wooden bailers into his hand and herself took up the other without a word.

Can't take your eye off them for a minute. Silly bastards sit there for hours in this rain and never even think of bailing! Why the hell did I ever come? They deserve to drown.

The rain was falling yet more heavily now, pouring over

them, rattling on the boat and hissing on the water. Every time she turned to empty the bailer overside it stung her ear and cheek, so that at length she could stand it no longer and asked Zen-Kurel to change places: but soon it felt as bad on the other cheek.

There seemed no end to the bailing. In all seriousness- for there was still very little to be seen-she began to wonder whether the rain could actually be gaining on them and filling the boat. Her right arm grew so tired that she had to change the bailer to her left hand and work that much more clumsily. She knew her pace was slackening, but there was no pause in the steady rhythm with which Zen-Kurel bent and flung. '

"Here, let me take over, Maia," said Bayub-Otal from behind her. "You go and steer for a bit."

At that moment the bow struck full tilt against something hard and unyielding. There was a shuddering thump of wood against wood,.

Zen-Kurel, first to collect himself, stood up and went forward.

"We've hit the bank!"

"But that's impossible! The bank's here on my left," called back Bayub-Otal.

"I can't help it. It can only be the bank. It's revetted with wooden stakes."

Maia felt herself giving way to bewilderment and near-desperation. The darkness and rain were like a curse, destroying whatever they tried to do. The bilge water was inexhaustible. She was aching in every muscle. Now, to crown it all, the bank had apparently become bewitched and altered its position in the dark. Another knock like that would probably stave in the bow. I must keep my head and think straight, else we're going to drown and that bitch Terebinthia'U have been proved right.

"Zenka!" she called. "Is there soft ground behind the stakes?"

"Too soft! It's all mud."

"Hook the anchor in behind the stakes, then, and hitch the rope as short as you can. We'll just have to wait for daylight. We can't risk another bang like that."

Zen-Kurel did as she had said. Once more the boat pivoted, the stern swung over to fetch up against the bank and sure enough Maia found at her left hand a line of thick, wooden stakes, driven side by side into the bed of

the river. Their tops were only an inch or two clear of the surface. She plumbed again with the oar, but this time could find no bottom. So the stakes-which were stout and firm-must be something like ten or twelve feet long at least. Each one was nearly as broad across the top as the width of her hand: a stout structure, whatever it might be.

This was something altogether outside Maia's experience. She could only suppose that they must have run into some sort of mole or jetty projecting into the stream. But why would there be such a thing in this solitude, with no lights, no voices, no signs of a village or even a house? At a loss, she felt afraid. Yet she was still more' afraid of her own fear. Once I lose my head we're finished! Having dug in the stern anchor in the same way that she had told Zenka to secure the other, she went back to bailing, helped by Bayub-Otal.

"Maia," said Zen-Kurel, "I'm going to find out what sort of place this is."

"No, don't, Zenka!" she cried. "You'll never find your way back and anyway, what good can it do when all we want's to get away as soon as we can?"

But as usual there was no stopping Zen-Kurel. Clambering over the side, he vanished into the dark. After a few minutes she shouted, "Zenka! Can you hear me?"

"I'm here," he replied, so close that she jumped. The beating of the rain had prevented them from hearing him returning. A moment later he was back on board and had taken the bailer from her.

"This is an island," he said, "and as far as I can make out, it's no more than eight or nine yards across. There's nothing on it at all, and yet it's revetted right the way round with these stakes."

"I can't believe it!" she said. "We'll wake up in a minute and find ourselves back in-Anda-Nokomis, where would you like to find yourself back in?"

"Melvda-Rain," he answered, still bailing.

He'd never had any basting tact, she thought. Not that this was much of a time or place for it. She said no more.

Little by little, half-light began to creep into the cloud-thick eastern sky, disclosing as dreary a prospect as could well have been found in all the world, and immediate surroundings as strange as any to be imagined.

101: DOWN THE ZHAIRGEN

At this relatively early period in its history, there were throughout the empire very few bridges; none of wide span and only one of any real solidity-that eighteen miles south of Bekla, which carried the Ikat highway. (This was the bridge which the seceding Ta-Kominion had found too strongly held against him.) To transport the stone from Crandor and construct it, some seventy years before, had been an immense labor in which, needless to say, the great Fleitil had been instrumental. There were two wooden bridges across the Serrelind, a relatively small river; one south of Kabin and one north of Thettit; and a similar bridge across a narrow reach of the upper Here, between Ikat and Herl. The Herl-Dari highway, however (where Meris had been so active), was dependent upon a ferry across the Zhairgen.

Had it not been for a most singular exception to this primitive absence of bridges, Belishba could not have formed part of the empire at all, for it could have had neither direct trade communication with Bekla nor any reliance on Beklan military protection against Terekenalt and Ka-tria. At the point equidistant between Bekla and Herl-Belishba, the River Zhairgen was a good hundred and fifty yards wide and all of twelve to fourteen feet deep, with a fairly strong midstream current even in summer. Here, however, lay the phenomenon known as the Narboi, a scattering of islets varying in diameter from a few feet to about ten yards, between which the river ran in channels differing in width to about the same extent.

An irregular, zig-zag chain of these islets had been strengthened and made firm against erosion by stakes driven into the river bed round their circumference. The Renda-Narboi-the Bridge of Islands-consisted of horizontal, traversing lengths of beams and stout planking, some seven or eight feet wide, extending from one islet across to the next. There were thirteen of these in all, so solidly constructed that each could bear the weight of an ox-cart. They were kept in repair and renewed as often as necessary, but each year, before the onset of the rains, were raised by means of block and tackle-no light undertaking-and brought in to the banks, to prevent them being smashed or carried away by the flooded river.

It was the staked side of one of the larger Narboi-that nearest to the left bank-which the boat had rammed in the dark. The slow coming of light revealed the bow dented and splintered, though not dangerously. All around lay a scene to strike dejection into the stoutest heart. The river, beneath the rain pouring from the mass of low cloud overhead, was turbulent and already very high. One or two of the islets had by this time vanished under the spate, while others were only partly visible, covered by a dirty, ochreous foam that lapped about their bushes and long grass. The central current, checked by the islets filling about a third of the total breadth of the river, funnelled at the gaps in midstream, gushing through with the speed of a mill-race. On either bank, as far as eye could see, extended a dismal, flat plain, across which wound the deserted stone-and-mud line of the highway. About a mile away on the southern, Belishban side, the huts of a village were just visible.

There were wooden huts at each end of the bridge also: in summer these were occupied by the toll-collectors, but now they were empty. Downstream theriver, extending still wider, flowed away through a countryside already streaked in the lower ground with broad flashes and seasonal lakes of flood water, their surf aces mottled by the rain.

Maia sat tugging at her soaking tunic, which she had managed with some difficulty to put back on the button. Her long hair clung to her back like weed to a wet rock. She was feeling chilled through and slightly feverish. She had managed to eat some food, but would have given a hundred meld for a hot drink.

"Maia," said Bayub-Otal, "surely this is where we have to decide, isn't it, whether to go on or not? We could leave the boat here and make for Herl, though whether that would be any safer there's no telling. The country's known to be full of fugitives and outlaws,"

"Suppose we're right in thinking it's a matter of fifty or sixty miles down to the Katrian border," said Zen-Kurel, "how long will that take, Maia?"

"Well," she answered, "if the boat'U stand up to it and nothing goes wrong, we might get there by tonight, I suppose, in a current like this. We've got all of twelve hours and more. Just be a matter of staying afloat and keeping going."

"But is it safe?" asked Bayub-Otal, staring out across the seething flood-stream. "It looks-"

"Oh, don't be so damn' silly, Anda-Nokomis," she answered angrily. "Of course it's not safe! Honest, I sometimes wonder whether-"

"I really meant, is it possible?"

"Y-es, I think it just about might be," she said, "but only if we get on now, 'fore the river gets much worse. I can steer the boat ail right, and as long as we keep in midstream and nothing hits us, I reckon we ought to stay afloat. How we come to shore'll be another matter, though, Anda-Nokomis. Have to think about that when we get there."

"What do you want to do, Maia?" asked Zen-Kurel.

"If you still want to go back to.Katria, I'll do what I can to get you there," she said.

"I believe you can and will," replied Zen-Kurel. "The gods are with you. They've been with you al! the way from Bekia."

Before she could reply there came the sound of a voice hailing them from some way off.

"You, there! You in the boat!"

They looked up. Four men were approaching from the direction of the distant village. One, walking by himself slightly ahead, seemed to have a certain air of authority. The others, wearing cloaks and leather helmets and carrying javelins, were evidently soldiers.

The strangers reached the bank of the river about eight yards away from the islet to which the boat was secured. The leader, looking from Bayub-Otal to Zen-Kurel with an unfriendly expression, said sharply, "What are you doing here?"

Bayub-Otal stared haughtily back at the man. He was of average height, sharp-faced and rather slightly built, with the look of a steward or some similar minor official. His manner suggested a kind of energetic, unthinking obstinacy, rather like a good dog which nothing is going to stop doing what it has been told.

"I said, 'What are you doing here?' " repeated this personage impatiently.

"I heard you," replied Bayub-Otal.

"If it comes to that," asked Zen-Kurel, "what are you doing here?"

"I'm the supervisor of this bridge," replied the man, "come to check the river level since last night. That's what I'm doing here. Now will you answer me? Who are you?"

"What's that to you?"

"Well, you've badly damaged three of those stakes, for a start. But what I want to know is why you're trying to take that boat down the river in these conditions. You must be up to no good or you wouldn't be doing it. Either you're fugitive criminals or you've got stolen goods on board-both, very likely. You'll just bring the boat over here to be searched, and give me an account of yourselves."

"Do you know who I am?" asked Bayub-Otal in freezing tones. "I am the Ban of Suba."

"I don't care who you say you are," replied the man. He gestured towards the soldiers standing behind him. "Are you going to do as I tell you or not?"

As he snapped his fingers all three of the men raised their javelins.

Bayub-Otal made no least move. "I've no doubt you're only trying to do what you believe to be your duty, my good man, but I must tell you-"

"And I must tell you to damn' well baste off, you interfering bastard!" cried Zen-Kurel. "Go on, that's the way; over there!"

Maia had never heard him swear before. Evidently the man's manner, following upon the danger and strain of the long, sleepless night, had proved too much for him.

At this one of the soldiers, without waiting for orders, flung his javelin at Zen-Kurel. He swayed aside just in time. It grazed the right side of his neck, drawing an immediate spurt of blood, and stuck in one of the stakes lining the bank behind him. On the instant he turned, pulled it out and hurled it back. It hit the man full in the chest, piercing through his sodden cloak. He fell to the ground, clutching at the protruding shaft and screaming horribly. Zen-Kurel grabbed up his sword-belt from the deck, drew his sword and brandished it above his head.

There was no reason why the other two men should not have flung their javelins and killed him on the spot, but they did not. Probably neither they nor their master had ever before seen someone badly wounded in anger: it is a notoriously demoralizing experience, particularly if the victim is noisy in his agony. As the wretched man continued to writhe and scream in the mud-which was turning bloody round him-they took to their heels, followed a moment after by the supervisor.

"We'd better go across, I suppose," said Zen-Kurel coolly, "and see whether there's anything to be done." The wound in his neck was bleeding freely, though the rain was washing the blood away as fast as it flowed.

He pulled out the forward anchor from behind the stakes of the islet and then, before the current could take the boat, threw it across to catch in the bank as a grapnel. It held, and as Maia released the stern anchor also the two men hauled the boat across the narrow gap.

The soldier, however, was dead: the javelin had pierced his heart. Zen-Kurel drew it out and dropped it in the mud beside him. '

"I'm sorry," he said to Bayub-Otal, "but you must admit he asked for it."

"Well, at least that resolves any remaining doubts we may have had," replied Bayub-Otal. "Obviously we can't stay here now."

They cast off. Maia allowed the boat to drift stern forward through the channel between the shore and the islet and then ported the helm to turn the bow and take them out into midstream.

The swift, turbid current was undulant, suggesting an uneven bed below. Certainly, she thought, in such a flood as this the bed itself might be no danger, but could there be rocks? If they struck anything at this speed there would be no hope for them. Standing precariously up, she scanned the river ahead. She could see no breaking water or any other signs of rocks or shoals. Probably every fixed obstacle was many feet under by now.

Having explained to her companions what to look out for, she left them to take turn and turn about in the bow, equipped with an oar to fend off floating timber or any other heavy debris they might encounter.

The task of steering grew increasingly harrowing; the worst strain she'd ever known, she began at last to feel, for she could never relax or let her attention wander for a moment. The boat veered and yawed continually, thrown this way and that by the current, and she was for ever having to alter course to turn the head back downstream. There was no least abatement of the undulant, rocking swell; and the irregular swoop and pitch of the boat, which jolted every time it fell, began to make her feel giddy and sick.

The rain filled her eyes, her ears and nostrils. She seemed to be breathing as much rain as air. But whereas the rain

desired only their suffering, she thought, the river desired their death. Both the men seemed to be feeling the strain hardly less than herself. Notsurprising, she thought: they'd had no sleep all night. Bailing had to be kept up continuously. All morning the unending scoop and fling, scoop and fling went on in front of her as she sat hugging the tiller between arm and body and clenching her teeth to stop them chattering.

They passed many inflowing tributaries. All were in spate, chattering like apes or roaring like wild beasts. The noise in itself was frightening, but some, entering the river directly at right angles, took and spun the boat uncontrollably, so that she sat terrified.fully expecting it to fill and founder as it rolled and tossed like a dead cat in a weir.

And yet it did not. Terebinthia had been honest that far. It was as sound a boat as ever she'd known. Again and again it righted itself, answered the tiller and resumed its headlong course downstream.

It's the speed, she thought: I'm not used to this rocking speed. Who could be? Usually in a boat, if you see something ahead there's time to think what you're going to do: but this is more like falling. Dear Lespa, I'll never keep it up! If only I could have a rest! But there's nowhere we can hope to pull in and stop. Anyway, we've got to get down to Katria 'fore nightfall, else we're done for.

The sun, of course, was invisible. She wondered whether it was yet afternoon. She had no idea how far they might have come; twenty miles? Thirty miles? The flooded, featureless landscape, the unremitting rain beating from astern, and above all the gray solitude, had a stupefying effect. No landmarks, no people, no birds, no sun in the sky. It was like a ghost world from one of old Drigga's tales.

No time, she thought, there's no time in the ghosts' world. Ghosts got nothing to look forward to, that's why. Stop it, Maia! You're going to get Zenka to Katria, remember? They're relying on you, they mustn't see you feeling down.

I don't mind about my house in the upper city-not really. Or all the people cheering, or the clothes and presents an' that. But I do wish I could sit and listen to old Fordil just once more. I never knew anything could be so beautiful.

A poignant, falling phrase from one of Fordil's Yelda-shay teviasalas came into her head, expressing an infinity

of sorrow, the whole world's beauty dying like a sunset. For all she could do, her tears began to fall. Don't make no odds, she thoughtpjvon't be noticed in the rain.

But she was wrong. Zen-Kurel, a strip from his cloak bound round his wounded neck, looked up, bailer in hand.

"Maia, what's the matter?"

His voice was full of plainly sincere concern.

"I'm all right," she said.

"Are you cold?"

"No; not really. Just don't feel quite myself, that's all; bit feverish. It'll pass off. Has your neck stopped bleeding?"

"It must have. That was hours ago."

"Take that off, then, and give me Anda-Nokomis's flask there. I'll clean it up."

"Your hand's trembling," he said after a few moments.

"It's the steering," she answered. "You know, the going on and on." Even as she spoke she realized that they had yawed off course yet again, and put the helm over just as Bayub-Otal called a warning from the bow.

"Why not let me take over for a bit?"

"If it was Lake Serrelind or the Barb I would, but this is too dangerous. You've got to know what you're doing and be able to act quick."

"But we must be sensible, Maia. You've been steering now for hours, and even you can't go on for ever. You'll collapse or faint, and then we'll all be finished. You'd better teach me: come on."

"But the bailing-"

"I know: but once I've got the idea you can catch up with it, and then keep an eye on me while you bail."

He sat down in the stern, took the tiller from her and grasped it as he had seen her do.

"You've got to keep thinking ahead, Zenka. Only the rate we're going, it all happens so quick: I'd best keep one hand on the helm myself for a bit, so's you can feel what I do. There's only so much I can tell you, see: the rest you've got to learn for yourself.Oh, Cran, look out!"

Talking, they had both failed to notice that they were approaching yet another tributary. As they came with the confluence the bow slewed and the boat listed, the current lashing down the length of the starboard beam. Maia, thrown on top of Zen-Kurel, involuntarily flung her arms round his neck.

They had both lost hold of the helm. She grabbed it, pushed herself upright by pressing with her other hand against his shoulder and turned the bow downstream again. Zen-Kurel picked himself up.

"I must learn to do better than that. I only hope it isn't going to be too expensive. Come on, give it back to me and I'll try again."

They sat side by side, swaying and pressing against each other with the unpredictable and often violent motion of the boat. Maia, tired out and feeling increasingly feverish, grew impatient and once or twice flared up with an exasperation of which she felt ashamed even as she spoke. Yet he accepted every reproof without retort. At length, satisfied that he had acquired a passable proficiency, she felt able, though rather hesitantly, to leave him and set about catching up with the bailing.

The continual danger and need for concentration and action gave them no chance to talk of anything else, yet nonetheless she could feel in his manner a new warmth and friendly solicitude. Since that terrible evening at Clys-tis's farm, when she had heard him curse her and demand her death, he had found himself compelled, in spite of everything, to respect her. She knew that much-had known it ever since Purn. But now, for the first time, he was speaking to her not merely as though he respected her but as though he liked her too. He wanted to help her and to lessen her anxiety and distress. Yet she wasn't just one of his soldiers any more, to be looked after as a responsibility. Whether or not he was aware of it, he was showing that he regarded her as an equal and a friend.

These thoughts, however, passed only very vaguely and indistinctly through her mind, for as the afternoon-it must surely be afternoon now-wore on and the rain continued to beat down until it was difficult to remember what things had been like before it began, before being wet through from head to foot had become the natural condition of life, she began to feel more and more despondent. As everyone knows, a continuous, unrelenting pain-toothache or earache-is hard to endure. So with this peril and instability. It was as though a carpenter's plane were gradually and steadily shaving away her courage and self-control. Always coming nearer was the inevitable moment when she would no longer be able to endure, would break down and become worse than useless. "O Lespa," she

prayed, "let me drown before that happens! Then at least they'll remember me kindly."

By degrees there came stealing upon her that heightened yet distracted sensitivity which often accompanies the early stage of a feverish illness. While her touch and hearing seemed to have become more acute-so that, for example, the bailer in her hand felt grainy and rain-smooth with a palpability more intense than she had hitherto been aware of-her perception of their surroundings and her relationship to them had also changed, growing blurred and indistinct. It appeared now almost dream-like, this watery wasteland, not subject to normal laws of hature and causation. She would not have been altogether surprised to see it break up and crumble in the rain, start revolving like a wheel or simply vanish before her eyes.

She had not been expecting the trees. Although when she first saw them approaching she did not suppose she was imagining them, yet at the same time they did not seem entirely real. As a matter of fact, in her situation and her slightly delirious condition this was a perfectly reasonable-or at any rate understandable-reaction, for the trees-acres of them-seemed growing up through two lakes of brown water extending one on each side of the river. As they drew nearer, she could see this water actually winding among them, through and over the undergrowth, curling round the thicker trunks like streamers of fog round the towers of the Barons' Palace. She'd no sense of danger, though-not yet. It was like an illusion, a kind of cosmic dance of the trees and water; like the Thlela's dance of the Telthearna which had so much delighted her at the Rains banquet.

She caught his arm, pointing, "Look, Zenka, look! The trees-the trees are dancing!"

He stared at them and seemed to be turning it over in his mind, as though she had said something requiring serious consideration. It was she, not he, who first grasped that she had spoken foolishly. With a sense half of pride and half of shame, she understood that he had become so much accustomed to her talking sense-or at any rate not talking nonsense-that he had been wondering what she might have meant by her metaphor.

"I'm sorry," she said. "Silly fancy. Afraid I'm feeling a bit light-headed. Only the trees-they just don't look real, somehow."

"They're real enough," he answered. "I only hope we can get through them, that's all. Well, in one way it's all to the good, I suppose."

"What is?"

"The forest."

"Forest?" Muzzily, she was trying to remember what a forest was. "Is it the Blue Forest?"

"No: that's up north of Keril. This can only be what they call the Border Forest, between Katria and Belishba. We got quite near the other side of it once, about three years ago, when I was first with the king. At the time he was thinking of attacking Belishba, but nothing came of that."

"Are we in Katria, then, once we're in the forest?"

" 'Fraid not. Katria's not far to the north of the forest, though."

"Then why did you-" She screwed up her eyes, blinking in the rain. Whatever had she been going to say? "Why did you-oh, yes: why did you say it was good, then?"

"Well, we've come so fast-faster than ever I thought we would. It can't be all that much further to Katria now. We must make quite certain we're across the border, though, before we take the boat in to shore."

"How can we?"

"I don't know. But most Belishbans hate Katrians, naturally, and the frontier's guarded even in the rains-or it always used to be."

"You'd better go and tell Anda-Nokomis: I'll take the helm back."

A minute later they were among the trees: but this was as different from their water-journey through Purn as a leopard from a cat. That, for Maia at all events, had been- or so it seemed now-a straightforward affair, in slack water and high summer heat. She had felt so strong and capable then, and the water, just as in old days on Ser-relind, had been her friend. This flooded forest, with the river swirling among the trees, and the bushes struggling like drowning animals-oh, gods! and there was a real drowned animal, look, a wretched fox floating on the current-seemed not only malevolent but unnatural, too. Many a rainy season had she seen, yet never a land grotesquely awash as a courtyard where a fountain-basin has given way.

Still concentrating the shreds of her energy and vigilance on keeping the boat in midstream, she saw, as they were swept further into the forest, the water thick with debris-

leaves, sticks, branches, lengths of creeper, fragments of roots and sodden tangles of grass. They were approaching a bend: on its edge, just where the point must once have been before the flood submerged it, the trunk of an ash-tree rose out of the river. It was like her own dear ash-tree on the shore of Serrelind, where she used to go to escape from Morca and the housework; from whose branches she had so often dropped down into the lake. Looking at it, she felt for a moment cheered and encouraged.

Ah! she thought, but her fever must be coming on worse, for before her rain-blurred eyes the tree seemed slowly moving. Now be sensible! It's just another stupid fancy; you're frightened and tired out! Just keep the boat pointing downstream.

But no; the tree really was leaning; listing, slowly tilting, for now she could see another tree behind it remaining upright and still. Then suddenly, shockingly, the tree was keeling over, first quicker and then all in a moment very fast, its tilt become a toppling downfall, as though it had been felled with an axe. The whole ramous structure of branches and drenched leaves was rushing downward. Fifty yards ahead, the surface of the river foamed and whelmed as the trunk hit it and disappeared. Waves tossed the boat, knocking and jouncing under the timbers, then abating, diminishing. Only a tangle of earth-covered roots remained sticking up out of the shallower water along the submerged bank.

Maia, putting the helm hard over and feeling the sluggish response of the bilge-heavy boat, knew with fear that they were already too close. They were not going to be able to round the fallen tree. The boat was turning to port, certainly, but not fast enough: they were going to be caught and enmeshed in the tangle of sunken branches.

Then, before her eyes, the tree began to move again. Just as a minute ago it had begun to move through the vertical, now it was slowly moving through a horizontal plane. Slowly at first and then faster, the topmost branches pivoted downstream with the current, while at the same time the tangle of roots twisted to face her. The boat, itself seeming to drift faster as it approached, came all in an instant abeam of the tree, scraping against one or two of the topmost branches even as the current drew them away to starboard. Before she had time to think, they were past: the tree was gone. Collecting herself as though awakening,

she realized confusedly that they were now too close to the left bank, and brought the boat back into midstream.

Zenka had returned to her side. He was smiling-though largely for her benefit, she rather thought.

"I hope there aren't any more like that, don't you?"

Returning his smile, she took his hand for a moment in her own.

"Just as well you came along with us, isn't it?" he said. "Otherwise we certainly shouldn't have got as far as this. Anda-Nokomis thinks there may be no more than three or four miles to go now."

"He'd best be right," she answered. "Light's going, I reckon."

It was hard to be sure among the trees, under the press of low cloud and heavy rain, but certainly the recesses of the forest seemed dimmer, evanescent in a distant twilight. Some distance behind them another root-dislodged tree subsided into the river. It was not at once dragged clear of the bank, but was still hanging in the current as they floated on and lost sight of it.

"Oh, we mustn't, we mustn't go wrong now!" she cried suddenly. "Not now, not right at the end! Dear Lespa-"

She raised her arms and tried to stand up, but he, laying a finger on her lips, drew her down beside him.

"Steady, Serrelinda! Why don't you go and take over from Anda-Nokomis for a bit? He's been up there long enough now. I'll carry on here."

Anda-Nokomis was hanging intently over the bow, the oar gripped in his good hand, from time to time reaching out to push away logs or floating branches as they drifted alongside. When she touched his shoulder he looked round and gave her one of his rare smiles.

"You got us out of that all right, then? I confess I never thought you would. I should have known you better, Maia."

"If you don't know me by now, Anda-Nokomis-Put the wind up you, did it?"

Still smiling, he shrugged. "Possibly."

"Well, it did me," she said, "tell you that much. Here's your flask: better have some, 'fore I drink the lot."

He shook his head. "We may be glad of it later."

"We'll be in Katria tonight, Anda-Nokomis: think of that! Somebody'll take us in for sure: we've still got a bit of money left. Hot food, dry beds, a fire-oh, a fire, Anda-Nokomis!"

As she spoke they suddenly felt a heavy blow aft. There was a sound of splintering wood and a cry of alarm from Zen-Kurel. The boat turned sideways on to the stream and checked. During the few moments that it took Maia to hasten back astern, it turned yet further and then began drifting stern forward, wavering with every fluctuation of the current.

"Zenka, what's happened?"

Zen-Kurel was standing up, facing the stern and holding the tiller-bar in both hands.

"Rudder's smashed, Maia."

"Smashed? How?"

"I was looking out ahead-I never thought of looking astern as well. We'd just come through that last fast patch into this pool when a log overtook the boat and rammed us from behind. It's still out there, look-see it?"

"Oh, Shakkarn!" she said. "Here, get out of the way! Let's have a look, see how bad it is."

It was as bad as could well have been feared. The log had split the rudder along a jagged line from top to bottom. Almost the whole blade had carried away. The stern-post, though splintered, was still in position, as were the rudder-head and tiller, but naturally, with the rudder-blade gone, these were useless.

Of course, she thought, it would not have occurred to Zenka (as it would unthinkingly to herself) that, having just come down a length of swift water full of heavy flotsam into a relatively still reach, he was in danger of being rammed astern. It was her own fault for having left him alone: she should have known better. One of Zenka's strongest characteristics, she had come to realize, was his unfailing assumption of confidence, which made people implicitly believe in and go along with him, usually without reflecting just how wise it might be to do so. Zenka-and this was no small part of why she had fallen in love with him, why she still loved him and could never love anyone else-believed in all honesty that any gap between what he knew to be possible and what he wanted to achieve could be bridged by sheer courage and determination. It was this buoyant, indomitable serenity in adversity which made him so attractive; ah! and so dangerously easy not to doubt, an' all. By implication he'd convinced her, at a time when she'd been too overwrought not to swallow it, that valor and resolution were enough to steer a boat in

a timber-strewn flood-race. Well, it had probably done for them; there were still plenty of other things to hit, and now the boat was out of control.

"I'm sorry," he said.

"Couldn't be helped," she answered rather absently. She was trying to think what, if anything, could be done. "Much my fault as yours."

The boat was turning all ways at once now; sometimes stern foremost, then spinning in a cross-current only to veer away again on the instant. She felt more horribly in danger than at any time since they had set out.

"Zenka," she said, trying to speak calmly, "bring me an oar, quick, as you can."

There was no time to go looking for a length of rope. She hadn't seen any on board and wouldn't know where to start looking. The stern anchor rope would have to do. At least it was long enough and about the right thickness; and they'd still have the bow anchor.

As Zenka came back with the oar she drew her knife, cut the anchor rope and hitched it round the rudder-head.

"Now lash the oar to the rudder-head, Zenka," she said. "Like this, look; over and under and round and round. Only you'd do it better'n me, 'cos it's got to be real tight, see. I'll support the oar while you lash it; mustn't lower it into the water till you're done."

Despite the continual lurching of the boat he was deft and swift, pulling the lashing tight with his full strength at each turn, trapping it closely and finishing, as she showed him, with another hitch to hold all firm. She had never before used a stern oar for steering and was surprised, when they were done, to find how well it answered. She had not foreseen that oar and lashing together would pivot easily about the rudder-head without working loose: the oar could be turned as far as a right angle to the boat, to check and turn it almost instantly. Its only disadvantage was that its length, together with the force of the current, made the sheer effort of working it for any time more than she could manage.

"You'll have to help me, Zenka," she panted, having righted the boat and recovered the midstream channel. "This'U do fine as long as we're careful, only I just haven't got the strength. See if you can get us round this bend that's coming up."

He could. Hedid. Or rather, she provided the judgment,

leaning this way and that on the handle of the oar, but relying on his greater physical strength to reciprocate and carry out what she wanted. As the boat rounded the bend without mishap, they broke into simultaneous cries of excitement. The trees were less dense and no more than five hundred yards ahead, as near as she could judge in the failing light, lay open water-the further edge of the forest. "Anda-Nokoniis!" she called. "We're through!"

102: THE FRONTIER

Anda-Nokomis, turning in the bow, raised his hand in the traditional Beklan gesture of acknowledgment to the winner of a contest. At this same moment, as they still stood side by side with the oar between them, Zen-Kurel, as naturally as a bird might alight on a branch, put his free arm round Maia, drew her to him and kissed her.

She clung to him, both arms round his neck, now laying her face against his soaking wet hair, now returning his kiss again and yet once more as the rain ran down their faces and mingled between their lips. At last, releasing him, she gasped, "The boat, my darling! We've still got to get to Katria."

"I know. But at least tell me one thing now. I want us to be as we were in Melvda-Rain. I want you to marry me. Will you?"

"Yes, of course! Further to starboard; hard over, quick!"

The river, as it emerged from the forest, was broader, though flowing no less swiftly, for here, as far as they could make out in the falling dusk, it had not yet burst the distant, stony dykes on either side. They were in less danger now, for the trees had gone, there seemed to be no obstacles ahead and for the moment at all events little or no heavy debris in the main channel. The boat, however, had filled with so much rain and grown so heavy that it was actually hanging in the current-moving, certainly, but Maia, looking overside, could see sticks and leaves passing them at twice their speed. They had very little freeboard, too.

"Darling, yes will have to do for now."

"It'll do very well," he answered. "You'd better bail again, I suppose."

"Anda-Nokomis," she called. "Come and help me!"

"Do you think it's safe to leave the bow?"

"Yes: we're moving so slow. Only we got to bail this water out, else we'll never get there 'fore dark."

They both set about bailing, while Zen-Kurel remained at the steering-oar. Maia, in spite of the great flood of joy filling her heart, knew now that she was undoubtedly ill- ill enough to need to go to bed as soon as she could. Her head ached, her throat and ears were horribly painful and she was feeling even more light-headed than when they had entered the forest.

"D'you mind if I have a go at the djebbah, Anda-Nokomis?" she asked, shivering. " 'Fraid I'm took bad: it's the wet and bein' s' tired out. I'll be better once we c'n get warm and dry."

He nodded and passed her the flask, and she took a good, long pull. She could feel the fumes rising consolingly to dull her pain. Leaning forward, she kissed Anda-Nokomis on both cheeks. "You've been the best of friends to me, Anda-Nokomis, that you have! When you're back in Melvda-Rain-when you really are Ban of Suba-can we come and be your guests, Zenka and me?"

"Yes," he answered, "you shall. And no one shall speak a word against you."

Yet as he spoke he looked so downcast and low that she felt ashamed, and very sorry that in her happiness she had spoken with so little consideration for his feelings.

"Dear, dear Anda-Nokomis, I'm so sorry about-you know; honest I am! Oh, sometimes, I just about wish I could split myself in two!"

"It would have to be a thousand and two, I think, Ser-relinda," he answered with a smile. It was the only joke she ever heard him make.

"Anda-Nokomis," she said (bail and fling, bail and fling, oh Cran! don't I feel bad?), "do you know there was one time when I cursed you, and swore that if ever I could harm you I would? Doesn't seem possible now, does it? Live and learn, that's about it. Fools don't know who their friends are, I reckon."

"When was that?"

"After you'd made me dance the senguela at Sarget's party in the Barons' Palace; that was when.'

"But-er-surely you made rather a success of it, didn't you, as far as I recall?"

(As far as I recall. Oh dear, oh dear!) "I know. It was on account of-of something else." The djebbah was really taking effect now: her head was fairly spinning.

"Well, but you did harm him, didn't you?" said Zenka, "and me too, come to that. But it's all dead and done with now."

"My love, I never went to harm you, nor Anda-Nokomis neither."

"What?"

"No, I never! Oh, darling Zenka, I wanted to save you both! Oh, and so many more! Anda-Nokomis, do you remember Gheta at the farm?"

"Gehta at the farm? What farm? Don't you mean Clys-tis?"

"No, no!" He looked blank. "Then surely you remember Sphelthon at the ford? Poor boy, he's at peace now, anyway."

"She's light-headed," said Zenka sympathetically. "It's not surprising. We must take care of her once we-"

"I'm not light-headed!" she cried. "It's men that's lightheaded! All of you, everywhere! If you'd only seen that poor boy at the ford."

She began to cry. "I never meant you to go to that horrible fortress, or be tormented by that wicked woman. I neverl I never meant to betray you! I didn't do it for the Leopards! I didn't do it to be the Serrelinda! I just wanted to stop you all killing each other! I'd seen what fighting did to people! I wanted Sendekar to get to the river in time to stop your king getting across, only it just didn't work out like that."

Anda-Nokomis put his arm round her.

"You'd better tell us everything, Maia-about Gheta and Sphelthon and all the rest. A great deal seems to have happened on our journey to Suba that I failed to see."

By fits and feverish, tipsy starts, she told them everything-how Gehta had told her of her terror of an invasion of western Urtah; how she had knelt by Sphelthon at the ford; how she had been left alone in Melvda-Rain when the armies were assembling, to reflect on Karnat's plan and what it would mean for her own people.

"But I never let on to any of the Leopards, Zenka," she ended. "I never told Sendekar or Kembri or any of them as it was you that told me. I loved you then and I

love you now and that was why I went to the jail that night in Bekla and made them let out the both of you."

Zen-Kurel, leaving the oar to trail in the current, dropped on his knees and kissed her.

"Whether you were right or wrong doesn't matter anymore. What matters is that you didn't do it for yourself or to harm anyone. You did it out of pity, didn't you? I might have guessed that."

"But if you'd known in Melvda-Rain that you were Su-ban-" Bayub-Otal was beginning, when all three of them looked up in surprise, hearing a long, ululating call in the distance. Zen-Kurel, gripping the oar once more, trimmed their course, while Bayub-Otal, helping Maia to her feet, stood looking out over the water.

"Who is it?" asked Zen-Kurel, peering from one bank to the other. "Is it us he's calling to?"

After a moment Maia pointed. Perhaps two hundred yards off and a little astern, in the bare, flat fields stretching away behind the dyke, a man was waving to them and pointing downstream. He was clearly a shepherd, for with him were two dogs and a little group of three or four sheep huddled together. In all the rainswept desolation there was not another soul to be seen.

"Those'll be strays he's been out after," said Anda-Nokomis.

"What's he saying, though?" said Zen-Kurel, cupping his hand to his ear. The man, as best he could, was running after them, plainly agitated. His voice reached them again.

"Boom! Boom!"

"What's he mean?" asked Zen-Kurel. "That's nonsense-boom, boom!"

"I wish it was," said Maia. "he's warning us there's a boom across the river lower down."

"I remember now," said Bayub-Otal. "Some Belishban once told me in Bekla: they keep a boom across the river at the frontier, to stop rafts and boats and make them pay duty. No doubt they stop fugitives, too," he added grimly.

"A boom?" asked Zen-Kurel, "across a river this breadth? What can it be made of, for Cran's sake?"

"There's only one thing it could be made of," said Maia. "Ortelgan rope: probably with bells, to give warning if a boat runs on it at night."

"Can't we cut it, then?"

"They wouldn't have a boom if you could get past it

that easy. It'll be nearly as thick as your arm, and winched up level with the surface. There'll be a frontier post with bowmen, for sure."

"But if we stop they'll recognize us," said Bayub-Otal. "This hand of mine-everyone knows what I look like: you too, Maia, come to that. And they'll be Leopard soldiers, probably warned already to look out for us. Anyone in Bekla would guess that since we escaped I'd be trying to get to Suba. If we're brought ashore in Belishba we'll be seized and held; that's certain."

"Perhaps I could bribe them," said Maia.

Zen-Kurel shook his head. "They all hate Katrians too much, my darling. They'd only take all you'd got and then send us back to Bekla; there or Dari."

No one spoke for more than half a minute, while the boat, rain-heavy again now, drifted on in the dusk. The only sounds were the creak of the steering-oar and the rain on the timbers.

"Here's what we'll do," said Maia suddenly, "and you'd just better listen, the both of you, 'cos there's no time to think of anything else. There's the guard-houses now, look, only just down there. See the lights?"

Zen-Kurel looked where she was pointing. "Gods! One each side! Who'd have thought it? And look, further down still there's a village; can you see? That must be in Katria!"

"Will you only listen?" she said again. "It's ten to one there'll be no one actually outside in all this rain. That means we won't be spotted until we hit the boom. Then I reckon it'll go taut and ring a bell. Each of you get hold of an oar, now. I'll take the boat over towards the left bank and run her on the boom sideways on, best as I can. Then you'll both have to jump for it. The oars'U hold you up, near enough, to go down a hundred yards and get ashore."

"But what about you?" asked Zen-Kurel.

"Soon as you've gone I'll dive in and swim under water far 's I can. I'll be there 'fore you, no danger. Might give you a hand out, even." She gave each of them a quick kiss. "Now grab your oars and get over that side, 'cos here it comes.'

She leant hard on the steering-oar, turning the boat to port as they drifted down towards the guard-huts facing each other on opposite sides of the river. The smoke from their chimneys hung low over the roofs and lamps were

alight inside. She could hear male voices, but there was not a soul to be seen. Good!

On either side, sticking up out of the flood water between the huts and the river, were two stout posts. Their tops were cloven, and in these grooves ran, as she expected, a thick rope. Upon the river side of each hung a bell as big as her head. She couldn't see how the ends of the rope were secured; probably to iron rings, she supposed, but all she was looking at was the river between. About ten feet out on each side the rope, sagging, disappeared into the water. How far would it be under in the middle, then? Could she have hoped to sail over it?" Hardly; they'd have thought of that. It wouldn't have been worth the risk to try: if it had turned out wrong her men would never have been able to reach the bank from midstream. Anyway, it was too late to change now.

Ahead she could see a regular undulation where the river flowed over the rope. With all her strength she shoved the handle of the oar over to starboard. The boat turned and checked broadside on to the stream: then the starboard beam drifted gently against the rope. The boat listed but the rope gave only slightly-less than she'd expected.

"Now!" she cried, and in the same moment heard both the bells ringing. Anda-Nokomis and Zenka, clutching their oars, flung themselves over the starboard side.

Maia remained standing in the tilted stern, clutching the steering-oar to keep her balance. This was the bit she hadn't told them about. She unbuttoned her tunic, letting it hang open, and ripped her shift to the waist.

A voice was shouting "Turn out! Turn out!" Soldiers, one or two with torches, others stringing their bows, were pouring out of both guard-huts, peering into the rain as their eyes adjusted to the almost-gone light.

"Help!" she cried. "Help me! Oh, Cran, I'll drown if you don't help me!"

"What the hell d'you think you're doing, girl?" shouted one of the men; the tryzatt, she supposed. "Where've you come from?"

"I didn't know about the rope!" she shouted. "Oh, please help me!"

"Well, you know now," answered the tryzatt. "You mean you're alone?"

"Yes: I took the boat to run away from home. Please help me!"

"My stars, just look at her!" shouted another of the soldiers.

"Can you swim?"

"A little, yes. Oh, but I'm so frightened!"

No one had spotted her men yet; she mustn't look in their direction for fear of drawing attention to them. By now they might have had almost long enough to get ashore and out of bowshot.

At this point the matter was taken out of her hands. A sudden, sharp impulse of the current tilted the boat yet further, though still it hung against the ropes. Water came pouring over the starboard side. It was going to sink.

Maia plunged forward and under water. Although she kept her eyes open, she could see nothing. The current was swift and full of frightening drags and counterflows in which she was tugged helplessly one way and another. Obviously she was going downstream, but in which direction-right or left-she had no idea. She swam on for as long as her breath would hold, then came up, turned her head and looked quickly behind her.

Her heart sank. She must have gone from side to side, for she was no more than thirty or forty yards down from the rope, if that. On either shore there seemed to be something like twenty men, all gazing intently downstream. At that very moment one of them saw her and pointed.

"There she is, look!"

"Come in to the bank, girl," shouted the tryzatt, "else we'll have to shoot, and I mean it!"

She dived again, trying, in the swirling mirk, to swim to her left. Her head seemed splitting, now, and she felt so feverish and ill that she hardly knew what she was doing. Yet when she came up once more she was much further downstream and closer in to the left bank, where the water was lying almost level with the top of the dyke.

"There she is!" came the cry again. She looked round. Two or three soldiers, their bows in their hands, had run along the bank from the guard-hut and were approaching her. She was utterly spent, yet she turned and swam on. She had not gone ten yards before a swift "Whaup!" sounded close to her ear. A moment later she saw the arrow floating a foot or two ahead.

I can't do any more: I'm drowning: I'll have to come ashore. Lespa be praised, they haven't seen Zenka and Anda-Nokomis: they must have got away. I shan't even

be able to try to escape: I'm as sick as ever I've been in my life. O Zenka, just when we'd found each other again! I'm so sorry, my darling!

With a few last, failing strokes she reached the dyke wall. The top was only a few inches above her. She put her hands on it, pushed feebly upward and got her chin on the coping, but she could do no more. Trying to pull herself up and out she sank back, sobbing with pain, with the grief of loss and the bitterness of defeat. And now, in her delirium, it seemed as though Queen Fornis herself was standing on the bank, her green eyes staring as once in the archery field. "Two of them I did myself!" What cruelty would be devised for her?

Two soldiers were striding towards her through the nightfall. Their footsteps came crunching over the loose shingle and as they drew closer she could see the Leopard cognizances on their shoulders.

"Ah, my lass! Not so clever after all, were you?" said one. "That's the end of that little game, then. Come on, now, up with you!" He stopped, gripping her wrists and dragged her roughly over the wall.

"It's not all that far back, Yellib," said the other. "We can carry her easy enough." They had her between them now, holding her by the arms and legs.

"Stop!"

Both men started and looked round. Anda-Nokomis, soaking wet from head to foot and almost as tall as the splintered oar he was still carrying, was stalking towards them. As he strode up they stood rooted to the spot. Authority surged from every inch of him as menace from a crouching wolf.

"You are violating the frontier!" Without taking his eyes from them, he indicated Maia with a gesture like that of Frella-Tiltheh pointing to the tamarrik seed. "You have no business here! Leave that girl instantly and get back where you belong!"

They obeyed him, laying her down on the soggy, granular shingle. As they straightened up, however, one of them found his voice.

" 'E's only one man, ain't he?"

"That's right," said the other. Then, to Anda-Nokomis, "Who are you, anyway?"

"How dare you question me?" thundered Anda-No-

komis. "I am the Ban of Suba, and if you do not immediately take yourselves back over the frontier-"

In that moment an arrow, flying out of the half-dark, struck him with terrible force just where neck met shoulder, burying itself four inches deep. A great spout of blood gushed out. Anda-Nokomis staggered and fell to the ground as a third soldier came running up, triumphantly waving his bow.

But now, from a little distance away, came cries of anger and attack, running feet and threats uttered in a foreign tongue. The newcomer pulled at his comrades' arms.

"Come on, here's the basting Katriaris! We'd best get the hell out of it, quick! Have to leave the girl, else they'll have us!"

And thereupon all three turned and disappeared upstream.

Maia dragged herself to her hands and knees. Specks of light were floating before her eyes and all manner of water sounds, real and unreal, coming and going in her ears. Slowly she gained her feet. Anda-Nokomis had fallen on one side. His blood was pouring over the gravelly shingle. She staggered across to where he lay, knelt beside him and took his head on her arm.

"Anda-Nokomis."

He stared past her, and she laid one hand against his cheek.

"Anda-Nokomis, it's Maia! It's your Maia here!"

Suddenly his eyes saw her, he recognized her. His terrible, blood-slobbering mouth moved and seemed to smile. He was trying to speak. She bent her head and kissed him.

"Anda-Nokomis-"

He grasped her wrist. Quite clearly, he whispered, "When Suba's free, you and I, we'll-" Then his hand dropped and his head fell sideways on her arm.

Someone was standing beside her. She looked up. It was Zenka. There were others all around-soldiers, some of them, and rough-looking villagers like those she'd seen in Suba, carrying clubs and mattocks, their hair and beards beaded with the rain.

"Maia! I brought them as quick as I could Oh, gods, what's happened? Anda-Nokomis-"

She clutched him round the legs, sobbing hysterically. Then everything grew indistinct, and she fell unconscious across the blood-drenched body of the Ban of Suba.

They carried her up the slope from the river to the houses-Zhithlir, southernmost village of Katria. The women and children crowded at the doors, staring silently as they slipped and staggered along the mud-churned street towards the Elder's house. Zen-Kurel limped beside Maia, himself scarcely able to keep up with the soldiers.

"You'll give her a bed and look after her, won't you?"

"Don't worry, sir," answered the Katrian tryzatt. "She couldn't have struck luckier, as it happens. There's an army doctor here on his rounds of the frontier posts."

"Lucky?" said Zen-Kurel. "Yes, she's always been lucky, tryzatt, you know. The gods are with her, else I wouldn't be here now." He turned and looked back at those carrying the body of Anda-Nokomis, the arrow still embedded above his collar-bone.

"He never had any luck, poor man. Not once."

"Oh, really, sir? That's bad, now," replied the tryzatt stolidly, riot knowing what else to say.

Zen-Kurel looked round him at the pall of wood-smoke, the dripping thatch of the roofs and the muddy alleys channeled with rivulets. Every hut, he now saw, had fastened to its door a wreath of yew or of cypress. The soldiers were wearing black ribbons at their shoulders, and from the roof of the Elder's house, as they approached it, a black flag drooped like a great, dead crow hung on a post.

"What's this, tryzatt? That flag, the wreaths-"

The tryzatt turned to stare.

"You mean you haven't heard, sir?"

"Heard what?"

"The king, sir. King Kamat was killed in battle four days ago, over on the western border. They've brought the body back to Kenalt for burning tomorrow."

Stunned, Zen-Kurel made no reply, halting a moment and then wandering on a few paces apart. Yet by the time they reached the Elder's house he had recovered himself sufficiently to be able to give an account of how the Ban of Suba and himself had escaped from Bekla, thanks to the heroic help of none other than Maia Serrelinda, who had brought them safely through Purn and then down the Zhairgen to the frontier.

They heated water for him, gave him wine and food and prepared him a bed. Throughout the night, however, he sat watching beside Maia. Towards morning she woke, still weak and feverish but clear-headed, spoke to him and wept

bitterly for Anda-Nokomis. She told him, too, how in the misery of her heart she had reflected that if love could not express itself in fulfillment it could do so only in sacrifice. "But it wasn't me," she sobbed, "it wasn't me, in the end, as made that sacrifice!"

At this Zen-Kurel wept too. "He insisted on waiting for

you on the shore. He said I was the one who must go for

help, because they'd take more notice of a Katrian."

"If he hadn't done what he did, they'd 'a come too late."

Maia remained low and grief-stricken for several days.

But she was a strong, healthy girl, the doctor said, and

with rest and care would be right enough in a week or two.

103: REUNION IN KERIL

It was nearly two years later. The summer was proving prosperous, pasture and stock thriving and crops ripening towards harvest. There were some weeks to go until the dog days: trees, grass and flowers were still fresh and verdant, the breezes cool but the streams, even in northern Katria, delightfully warm for splashing and lazing. For a one-year-old it was perfect weather; weather for crawling about in the sunshine and getting into everything, picking things up and stuffing them in the mouth unless or until they were removed; standing up and taking a few triumphant steps before falling flat with a howl to be snatched up and comforted by the Suban nurse; for being bounced up and down by one's joyous mother in the shadows, with screwed-up face and vocal noises interpretable by the affectionate and indulgent (and what other kinds of people might inhabit the world, pray?) as intelligible speech. The gold-and-purple kynat had come, bringing warm days and the gods' blessing, filling fields, woods and the hearts of hearers with its fluting call, "Kynat, Kynat will tell!" The blue-finches sang, black-and-white plovers tumbled headlong from sky to earth and of an evening the trout rose to the gfyon fly.

Keril-Katria was a pleasant enough town, thought Maia, strolling in the cool of the late afternoon along the tree-lined thoroughfare now known as King Karnat Avenue. Of course it was not remotely comparable with Bekla. There was hardly a single stone building, though a few were

of brick. Most, however, were like those in Melvda-Rain- long, one-story houses of wood, painted outside in the bright colors as much favored by Katrians as by Subans. However, it was reasonably clean and safe to walk about in, possessed a number of quite good shops and honest traders once you knew where to look for them, and could even offer a certain amount of entertainment-jugglers, acrobats and dancers-well, passable dancers, if you could contrive to forget what you remembered and do your best to appreciate the Katrian style. In fact it was a nice enough place for a little jaunt, a trip to town; with quite a generous bit of pin-money, too, a couple of serving-men from the estate tor attendants and the Suban girl to look after little Zen-Otal (or Anda-Serrelinda, as most called him at home) and take him off her hands when she wanted a respite from the happy, arduous business of motherhood. It certainly afforded a pleasant break from fulfilling the duties of mistress of the household (to say nothing of those of the dutiful, affectionate daughter-in-law) throughout Melekril and spring on the remote estate. Things had gone well enough, though. In fact, they'd been very happy and enjoyable- better than the first Melekril and spring, the early months of her marriage.

It had not been easy to begin with. She had been heavily dependent upon Zen-Kurel's devotion to build up any true sense of security and confidence in her new country, her new people and surroundings. For a start, there had been the language. Katrian Chistol-to say nothing of the dialect spoken by most people on the estate-bore little resemblance to Beklan: it was in effect another tongue. Zenka had had to find her an interpreter-that same Suban girl who had now become Zen-Otal's nurse. After about a year, however, she could rub along fairly well in Chistol, though the woodmen and the laundry maids still floored her at times. Still, she could joke with them about it now: she'd come to know them all so well.

Then there were the difficulties inseparable from her position as Zenka's wife, and mistress of the estate. Maia had not been born to authority or brought up to expect to have any. The Serrelinda, of course, had had authority, but it had been of an unusual kind-that of a public darling, a talismanic beauty and heroine, with no functions to fulfill beyond those of existing and being seen; a golden meteor, trailing light. (And indeed only last year a far-ranging ped-

lar from the empire, complete with scarlet hat, green shirt and white-striped jerkin-he even looked a bit tike Zirek: it had brought a tear to her eye-had told her that what people in Bekla now said of the comet was that it had presaged the passing of the Serrelinda.) In Bekla she had never had duties to perform or decisions to make on behalf of others. She had had to begin as a complete learner; but the housekeeper, the head cook, the baker, the clarzil- the old beldame who minded their infants for the women out working in the fields-they'd all backed her up loyally and pulled and pushed her here and there while she was getting the hang of things. She suspected that Zen-Kurel had told them to make sure they did, and let him not hear anything to the contrary. But in thinking this she failed to give herself credit for her own likable nature and pleasant manner of dealing with people. Maia possessed natural charm and what are sometimes called "pretty ways." Men will work for advancement or wealth, for a principle or a common cause. Women, by and large, work best for people they like. Little by little Maia began to exercise authority because she came to realize that the others wanted her to. In any society, someone has to give the orders and decide what is going to be done; but most prefer someone else to do this on their behalf. Maia had first to learn that authority was expected of her and then, as it werevto put it on and wear it without tripping over the hem. It had been difficult, and more than once she had lain awake beside Zen-Kurel (with Anda-Serrelinda kicking her from within) having all sorts of second thoughts and hoping to Cran that what she had said was to be done tomorrow would turn out to be all right.

Then, of course, there had been the legend of the Val-derra to be relegated. While she and Zenka had been traveling up to the estate in northern Katria and when they had first arrived there, this had been a haunting nightmare. She was half-expecting to be murdered or at the least persecuted and victimized. But in fact, as she came to realize, these fears existed very largely in her own mind and there alone. A remote community, almost entirely self-supporting-a society of hunters, foresters and husbandmen-concerned during nearly all the hours of daylight with the unchanging, yearly round of subsistence; their art and recreation self-made, their topics and news largely that of local birth and death, good luck and calam-

ity-they took her as they found her; and they found her pretty, sensible and eager to please. There were, of course, a few ex-soldiers about the place, two of whom had actually been in Katria with the king, and certainly, when these men had had a skinful, some black remarks had been passed down in the local tavern at one time and another-remarks about basting treachery and Beklan trollops who'd found gold between their legs while poor fellows died for it in Dari-Paltesh. But the short answer from most had been that that was then and this was now, and wasn't she as nice a lass as you'd hope to come across and anyway who'd suffered more, by all accounts, than the young master and he seemed happy enough, didn't he? Little by little the pot simmered down; but it is always hard to know how to bear yourself when you have a fair notion that hard things are being said behind your back; so this had been another problem.

With her widowed father-in-law relations had, of course, been still more difficult at the outset. Zen-Bharsh-Kraill was an old adherent of King Karnat and had been a famous warrior in his day. His other, younger son, a brave officer, had been killed in the king's army (though not on the Valderra), and his daughter was married to one of the king's most illustrious captains. As a nobleman, his knowledge and outlook went not only as wide as Katria but as wide as Terekenalt itself. He knew Maia's past and her fame well enough. From the outset Zen-Kurel had had to put his foot down in no uncertain manner. There had been one terrible evening when he had hurled his goblet across the room and said that at this rate he would disclaim his inheritance, take his wife to Dari-Paltesh and set up on his own account. Maia had cried herself to sleep and woken crying, protesting that she was nothing but a hindrance and a bad bargain to him-until it came to her that she was only adding to his difficulties and transferring to him her share of the burden, since for days past he had been doing all he could to mediate and to resolve their difficulty. His outburst had been due to strain and entirely exceptional. What he needed was a sane, cool contribution from a strong, balanced partner; not a resourceless, weeping child. This was perhaps the moment when Maia made the discovery that moral may sometimes be even harder to exert than physical courage. Zenka had taken her by the shoulders in the lamplight, kissed her and looked into her

eyes. "Been to any good Ortelgan camps lately?" She had laughed-Cran alive! This fuss, after all they'd been through together!-and hugged him; they had made love and next morning a most sedate, self-possessed Maia had sought out her father-in-law and successfully conducted a long talk ending in mutual, more friendly understanding. After all, his wife had been Beklan. He was secretly delighted that Zenka had come home alive and well to run the estate and was not ignorant, either, as to who was largely responsible for this. Nowadays, so it seemed to her, old Zen-Bharsh-Kraill was coming at last to like her and respect her ideas about things in general. Predictably, the birth of Zen-Otal had altered everything for the better. Grandchildren always do.

Her labor-surprisingly for such a well-built, healthy girl-had not been easy. During her pregnancy she had often felt poorly and run-down-a good sign, the doctor said, for the baby is a parasite on the mother and her malaise shows that the baby is getting all it should. It had been a strain. She was not in the best of spirits and was all-too-much inclined to dwell on Milvushina. As her time approached, Zen-Kurel had effected a masterly surprise. One day, without a trace of fore-warning, she had woken late to find Nasada sitting beside the bed. Actually struck dumb for a few seconds, she had wondered whether he could be real. Then she flung herself into his arms, crying with happiness and relief, already sure that now everything was going to be all right. The old man-still dressed like a Suban marsh-frog in his fish-skin smock and bone amulet- told her how Zen-Kurel had sent to Melvda-Rain and begged Lenkrit, now Ban of Suba, to ask him to come and attend his wife's lying-in. Lenkrit had readily put a kilyett and paddlers at his disposal.

"I hope you'll tell me," he said, when she had recovered herself and they had had breakfast together, "all about your adventures on the Zhairgen. Twenty minutes crossing it was quite enough for me."

That evening, at supper, she had worn her diamonds and, later, shown him once again poor, Randronoth's cabinet of the fishes. It had its place, now, on her dressing-table, and contained her brooches, ornamental pins and the like.

"U-Nasada, do you remember the night when we had supper in Bekla, and you told me as this was made from the bones of fishes bigger than my room?"

"I remember, Serrelinda."

"Do you still think that?"

He laughed. "I don't just think it, now: I know. I've learned a lot in my travels."

Well, let him tease, she thought. U-Nasada ought to be allowed a tall story or two. Just to see him once more sitting at her supper-table in the lamplight-a less luxurious and elegant supper-table these days, but plenty on it all the same-filled her with confidence and reassurance. Everything she'd done, she thought, had been right after all-the heart's commitment, the suffering, the danger- and now she could thank him for his part-no small one- in bringing about this happy outcome.

"Do you remember how you told me I'd do better in Suba than in Bekla?"

"Yes, I do. More truth, I said, didn't I? Something like that."

"I know what you meant now. It just suits me here- I'm happier than I ever dreamt I could be-and it's not so very different from Suba, is it?"

"What a shame," he replied, 'about Anda-Nokomis! They've put up a fine memorial to him, you know, at Melvda. It says he was the steadfast Ban of Suba, who died for his people."

"Oh, he'd have liked that!" She paused. "Might even have made him smile, poor old Anda-Nokomis." Then, "It was me he died for: I never forget it, and neither does Zenka."

He confirmed to her what she had already heard by rumor and report, though it seemed of little importance to her now, in the midst of all the duties and preoccupations of her new life: namely, that Santil-ke-Erketlis had taken Bekla unopposed after a three days' march in the blinding rains; that the Leopards had been displaced and slavery ended in the empire. Kembri was dead, but when she asked about Elleroth Nasada knew little about him. Nor could he tell her anything of Elvair-ka-Virrionorof Form's.

"No one in Suba knows," said he, "what's become of Fornis. She seems completely to have vanished. Very odd."

"Nor they don't know in Paltesh, even?"

He shook his head. "There's something strange about it. I wonder-?" He hesitated. "Such an evil woman-" Then he seemed to check himself. "Well, never mind. Perhaps we should just thank the gods she's no longer in

Bekla and leave it at that. Surely we've got something better to talk about than Fornis."

"Shagreh."

"Great Shakkarn! You said it right!"

"Well, they say it here too, see. Comes in useful and all, U-Nasada; kind of a philosophy, like, in't it?"

"You look very well on it, anyway. You must be doing what you like."

"I am."

"That's the real secret of health, of course. I tried to tell Kembri that once, but he wouldn't have it."

Three days later she went into labor. It was a trying affair, lasting over thirty hours. She was not helped by her memories of Milvushina. Without Nasada, however, it would have been a great deal worse, for the midwife was an old body armed with snakeskins, a rabbit's paw, dirty hands and mumbled charms. Nasada was short with her. He remained completely calm and confident throughout, so that Maia, as she bore down again and again, felt strength pouring out of him into her racked, sweat-drenched body. He was like a glowing brazier at the center of the house that was her labor, seeming to warm and encourage everyone-but particularly the heroine-by his mere presence. He had, his manner suggested, seen it all before and was in no doubt of the outcome. She found herself wondering whether he would have saved Milvushina. Very likely he would.

When at last she had been delivered and was putting Zen-Otal to her breast; when Zenka had come in, kissed his wife and son with tears and gone out to announce the news to the waiting household and then to everyone on the estate (wearing, in accordance with tradition, a wreath of planella; if it had been a girl, the wreath would have been of trepsis), she looked up and said, "I wish I knew how to thank you, U-Nasada. Do you know, when I was still just a banzi on Lake Serrelind I saw you once in a dream? Before ever I was sold as a slave; before ever I'd had a man, even."

He bent forward, stroking the baby's head.

"I hardly could know that, if you come to think of it. Tell me."

She told him the dream-what a long time ago it seemed! How she had found herself the Queen of Bekla, scattering figs as she drove her goat-carriage through the crowds, only

to come at last upon himself, in place of her own reflection, gazing up at her from the green depths of the lake.

"It's all plain enough now," she ended, "but of course I couldn't make head nor tail of it then. I went out and swam in the lake and gave the dream back to Lespa, 'cos I couldn't understand it,"

"Well, she's certainly sorted it out for you, hasn't she? I think you ought to thank her, not me." But she,could see how much pleasure it had given him to be told.

A day or two later he had returned to his water-ways and his devoted marsh-frogs.

That had been more than a year ago. She! had followed his parting instructions to the letter and surely there had never been a finer baby than Zen-Otal.

As a matter of fact this was the reason why she was here now in Keril-Katria. Nasada had sent a message that he wanted to scratch the baby's arm against the fever, as he had (she might recall) for the young Suban Kram. Zen-Kurel, himself no Suban, had been inclined to make light of the matter; but on this occasion Maia, though she had lost nothing of her respect and admiration for her husband (indeed, it had rather grown, if anything, for while he had retained all his endearing cheerfulness and self-assurance he was maturing, becoming less youthfully precipitate), was determined to have her own way. If Nasada thought it ought to be done, then done it was going to be. However, the old man had said that he would prefer to avoid a second journey all the way to northern Katria. Could they, perhaps, meet in Keril? So here, of course, she had come, leaving Zenka to see to the business of the summer cattle-fair, where he expected to make a good profit.

Nasada had now left Keril, having duly scratched Zen-Otal, pronounced him as likely a child as ever he had seen in his life and advised her to wait a few days before returning home, as the scratching might bring on a touch of fever, though nothing to worry about. So here she was, strolling along King Karnat Avenue on a fine summer evening, perfectly happy to be a country girl on a visit to town, with nothing to do for a nice change and all of five hundred meld from a generous husband to lay out on herself.

A little way off was a small ornamental lake, where white cranes were feeding; nothing near so beautiful as the Barb and only about a quarter the size; still, perhaps she might walk there for a while before returning to her inn-"The

Keg and Kynat," a respectable, not-too-expensive house- for supper. After that perhaps she'd ask one of her men to attend her to the dancing. (A lady in Katria was not expected to go about alone. She oughtn't really to be out alone now, but once a Beklan, she thought-well, perhaps not always a Beklan: but not a back-of-beyond provincial, either, to be subject to every hidebound convention while she was out on a bit of a spree.)

All of a sudden she became aware of some sort of stir further up the road. People were running forward in eager excitement. She could hear cries of enthusiasm and admiration-even a cheer or two. A voice was shouting, "Make way! Make way there!" Surely that was a Beklan accent?

Married lady and mother or no married lady and mother, Maia, at eighteen, had not lost her capacity for girlish excitement. What could it be? She could glimpse, above the heads of the gathering people, a tall man in an ornate head-dress, carrying a wand of office. It was he who was shouting, "Make way!" but for whose benefit she could not see. Could it perhaps be Lenkrit, or someone like that, on a state visit from Suba; or just possibly even the new King of Terekenalt? She had heard tell of nothing of the kind, but that was not surprising. Anyway, whatever it was, she wasn't going to miss it. It'd be something to tell Zenka and his father when she got home. "Oh, and I saw the king. What d'you think of that?"

Her matronly dignity (such as it was) cast aside, Maia began to run like the others, her sandaled feet kicking up the soft dust of summer. She slipped sideways past two or three men in sacking smocks, bumped into and apologized to an old market-woman with a basket, managed to get another yard or two closer to the front, stood on tiptoe and looked over the shoulder of a lad with a hinnari on his shoulder.

The tall man in the head-dress was certainly Beklan: now that she could get a good look at him there was no doubt of that. Although he was wearing a silver-and-green uniform he was not a soldier, but evidently some sort of steward or major-domo. Still shouting, "Make way! Make way!" and now and then pushing people back with his staff of office, he was nonetheless making slow progress, for the crowd was thickening. Behind him, dressed in the same uniform, came three equally smartly-dressed men, while

behind these again came two youths pulling a flower-bedecked, red-and-yellow jekzha. Seated in this was the center of attention-a young woman at whom everyone was pointing and staring. She was dressed in a gold-embroidered robe of scarlet silk and flaunting a great fan of peacock feathers, while round her neck, on a gold chain, hung an enormous emerald set in silver. From time to time she raised one hand to the people, showing her very white teeth in a flashing smile. It was not remarkable that they were all wonder-struck, for none of them could ever have seen a girl like this before. Not only was she resplendent in the prime of youth and health, radiant with prosperity and plainly enjoying every moment of the adulation; she was also alert as a leopard and not quite so black as its spots. She was Occula.

In the instant that Maia recognized her the jekzha had passed by. The major-domo having succeeded at last in clearing a way, the boys quickened their pace and entered the side-street opposite.

Maia, frantically pushing and thrusting, burst out of the crowd, tripped, fell, got up again and ran after them shouting, "Occula! Occula!"

People were closing in behind the jekzha, blocking her way. Still shouting, she shoved and pulled them aside, so that several cried out angrily. She only ran on all the harder, calling and stumbling but gradually catching up. Another uniformed attendant, bringing up the rear, turned and stared at her as she came dashing towards him.

"Occula! Occula!"

"Get back, woman!" he cried. "What do you think you're doing? Here!" he called to one of the others in front. "This mad woman! Come and-" He stopped her, striking an ill-aimed blow which glanced off her shoulder. She bit his hand. "Occula! Occula!"

They had her by the arms now, two of them. She was struggling. Then, all of a sudden, they were knocked aside by a swinging cuff apiece.

"You bastin' idiots, doan' you know who it is? Let her alone, damn you! Get over there and wait till I call you!"

The next moment she and Occula were clasped in each other's arms. There was a fragrance of kepris and beneath that the old smell, as of clean coal. The gold-embroidered robe scratched her face, but she hardly felt it.

"Banzi! Oh, banzi, banzi, I doan' believe it!"

They looked at each other with tears.streaming down their cheeks. People were crowding round, chattering like starlings, the liveried servants doing their best to hold them back.

"I thought you were in Terekenalt! They said you'd married your officer fellow and gone to live in Terekenalt!"

"No, it's Katria."

"Oh, Katria, is it? Hell, look at all these bastards! We can' talk here. Banzi, are you busy? Were you goin' somewhere?"

"Oh, Occula, how can you ask? No, of course I'm not!"

"Well, get in the damn' jekzha, then. Quick, too, before this bunch of bumpkins trample us both to buggery! Florio!" she shouted to the major-domo. "You'd better try another street or somethin'! The Serrelinda and I want to get back as quick as we can."

"Where are we going?" asked Maia as she climbed in.

" "The Green Parrot,' " said Occula. "Do you know it?"

It was the most luxurious and expensive hostelry in Keril. The idea of her staying there had not even occurred either to Zenka or herself.

"Well, sort of," she said, "but actually I haven't been to Keril all that often. It's quite a long way up north, see, where Zenka and me live."

"What are you doin' here now?"

Maia explained. "And you?"

"I'm with Shend-Lador. Remember him? He's on a diplomatic mission for Santil. What a bit of luck runnin' into you! We're only stayin' here tonight-off to Terekenalt tomorrow. Shenda's goin' to talk to the new king, you see."

"What about?"

"Oh, banzi, doan' be a fathead! How the hell should I know what about? Some sort of trade agreement-frontiers-politics-that sort of bollocks."

"You always used to be political enough."

"I wasn'; I was the vengeance of the gods, for my own personal reasons. That's different; and anyway it's all over. I'm the bouncy girl; remember? Thousand meld a bounce! But I'm well beyond even that now. I'm the black Beklan knockout, dear. Shend-Lador's mistress, richer than forty sheamas on golden beds."

"Oh, Oceula, I'm so glad! You always said you would be."

"Shenda's talkin' to the High Baron of Katria in private this evenin'," said Occula. "So you can come and have supper with me, can't you? You say no and I'll have you knifed and thrown down a well, banzi; I swear I will."

"My little boy-" she was beginning.

"Yes, where have you left him?"

"We're at 'The Keg and Kynat.' My Suban girl's looking after him."

"I'll send Florro with the jekzha to bring them both round to the 'Parrot.' Then he can suck your deldas all the evenin' if he likes, same as old Piggy used to. What's his name?" !

"Zen-Otal: they all call him Anda-Serrelinda."

"Of course. Poor old Bayub-Otal's dead, though, isn't he?"

"Yes, nearly two years ago now. He died saving my life, Occula! I'll tell you all about it over supper. Oh, Cran, I'm so happy to see you! Who'd ever have expected it?"

"Well, here we are," said the black girl, as they drew up in front of "The Green Parrot." "Kantza-Merada, what a dump! Best you can hope for here, I s'pose. Still, at least we've got a set of private rooms; and you'll get a damn' good supper, banzi, I can promise you that; and a nice drop of Yeldashay. We brought some along with us, just to be on the safe side."

104: AN ACCOUNT SETTLED

Perhaps it was not altogether surprising that Occula had put on weight, thought Maia, herself feeling rather like Sencho as she leaned back against the cushions. During the past two years she had forgotten about suppers like this. The Yeldashay had gone to her head, too, for she was no longer used to it. She felt splendid. They had eaten and drunk and chattered their heads off. At length Occula had dismissed the servants and Maia had recounted all her adventures from the night when her friend had come to her house in Bekla to warn her to get out of the city.

Zen-Otal was fast asleep on another pile of cushions in the corner of the room. Occula had admired him-her unparalleled boy-with polite praise, but was plainly not all that much enraptured. However, Maia had not really

expected that she would be. She realized, now, that motherhood was one of the gods' great tidings to which Occula was simply deaf, and likely to remain so; just as, she remembered, good old Brero, who would never have dreamed of causing her a moment's vexation, had once remarked, "I can tell you all about music, saiyett, in one word: no good." There was no earthly point in letting things like this annoy you: you might as well expect a cat to eat hay. Yet she could remember the time when for her Occula had possessed the wisdom and infallibility of a demi-god-dess. What a shame, she thought, that while Occula had been able to teach her so much, she herself would never be able to communicate to her the first thing about motherhood! She wasn't fool enough to start trying, either. And Occula, she felt sure, must even now be entertaining feelings not unlike her own-what a pity to see her banzi, the one-time Serrelinda, fallen a victim, like all the rest, to the absurd slavery of marriage and maternity!

"I didn' tell you, banzi, did I," said Occula, refilling her goblet and putting her feet up on the supper-table, "that I've got Ogma in my household-have had for over a year? I know she'd want to be remembered to you. I'll give her your love when I get back, shall I?"

"Oh, yes, do! Poor old Ogma-clump! clump! Well, I'll bet she's as happy with you as it's possible for her to be anywhere."

"Of course, I've got more sense than to do what you did, banzi-put her in charge of the place. Nearly cost you your life, didn't it?"

"I suppose you've got some marvelous, charming saiyett, have you?" Maia felt much too replete and happy to take offense.

"Well, yes, I have; but Zuno's the one actually in charge. He'd never dream of leaving me. Well, you never know, of course, but I shouldn' think he would."

"Then Fornis-Fornis didn't take him with her?"

Occula looked up quickly. "Where d'you mean-where to?"

"Wherever she's gone."

For several seconds Occula made no reply. Then, putting her feet down again, she said very quietly and directly, "Banzi, you'd better tell me-how much do you know about-about where Fornis went?"

Maia frowned at her, puzzled. "Well, nothing, I reckon.

We're a bit out of the way here, see. Only old Nasada, that's my doctor from Suba-"

"Yes, I've heard a good deal about Nasada. What did he tell you?"

"Well, he said no one in Suba knew what had become of Fornis; and then he said it seemed strange."

"I'm surprised he hasn' guessed-a man as knowledgeable as that. P'raps he has." She fell silent again, twisting a great gold ring on her finger and apparently deliberating with herself.

"Banzi," she said, looking up suddenly, "if I tell you- everythin'-will you swear by Frella-Tiltheh never to breathe a word-even to your wonderful Katrian husband?"

"Well, of course, dearest, if you ask. But-"

"It's not because I'm afraid of-of anythin' that could come to me from-from livin' men. It's because some things are-well, simply not to be told. But I doan' believe Kantza-Merada would want me not to tell you: not after Tharrin, and not after all we've been through together. When you've heard me out you'll understand. Go on, banzi-swear by Frella-Tiltheh."

"I swear by Frella-Tiltheh the Inscrutable, and by the divine tamarrik seed, never to repeat to anyone what you're going to tell me."

"Good! Listen, then. And you'd better have some more of this Yeldashay, banzi, 'cos you're goin' to need it!"

She refilled Maia's goblet and her own, drank deeply, and began.

"The night you left Bekla, there was fightin' all over the city; the Lapanese, and Fornis's Palteshis. Remember?"

Maia nodded.

"It went on all that night and into the next day. But what finished it was when the Lapanese finally got it through their heads that Randronoth was dead. The news took hours to get round, you see: the fightin' was so confused, all over the place. But once his officers knew for a fact that Fornis and Han-Glat had murdered him, they lost heart. Two of his captains-young Seekron and another man called Mendel-el-Ekna-"

"Ah, he was the one as got us out that night!" said Maia.

"Was he? I'm not surprised: everyone spoke well of him in that business. Well, they got together what was left of the Lapanese and took them back south again. Still, never

mind that for now. I'll come back to that: what I want to tell you about is my part.

"So Form's had the city, and no one to dispute it except Eud-Ecachlon. He was supposed to be holdin' it for Kem-bri, but he was shit-scared, and I doan' blame him, because he hadn' enough men to hope to beat Forms. Those he had he took and shut himself up in the citadel.

"So there was Fornis-and Zuno and Ashaktis and me along with her, of course-in the Barons' Palace, givin' out that she'd restored the rightful dominion of the Sacred Queen in accordance with the will of the gods. And what she meant to do about Kembri and Santil-ke-Erketlis I never knew. Perhaps she didn', either; 'cos matters were taken out of her hands. Andwhod'youthinkdidthat.banzi?"

"You?"

"No; you."

"Mel Occula, whatever d'you mean?"

"I'll tell you. You remember we were talkin' just now about N'Kasit, the leather dealer I sent you to, in the big warehouse? He was one of the best agents the heldril had, you know. He was a heldro agent for five years and no one ever suspected him-not even Sencho. He had a few narrow squeaks after Sencho was killed, though. They searched his warehouse more than once."

"I'm not surprised he wasn't suspected," said Maia. "I remember Zirek calling him a cold fish and that's how he struck me, too: what you'd call imperturbable, like."

"Well, there was another side to him, I can assure you, banzi," said Occula, "as you're about to hear, It must have been next day-yes, it was the next day-after the La-panese had left Bekla, that Fornis sent Ashaktis to tell the chief priest she was comin' down to the temple. I knew what that meant: she was goin' to set about frightenin' him into supportin' her for a third reign as Sacred Queen. I believe she'd have done it, too-she could do anythin', that woman-only it never got that far, you see.

"She set out from the Barons' Palace about an hour later, and she told me and Zuno to attend her. She'd helped herself to your golden jekzha, banzi, and I can tell you it didn' half make me grind my bastin' teeth, comin' along behind, to see her sittin' up in that. Still, it proved a mistake, as you'll hear.

"Soon as we got down to the bottom of the Street of the Armourers, we could see there was somethin' goin' on

in the Caravan Market. Someone was up on the Scales, talkin' and wavin' his arms, and a whole crowd of people were listenin'; and you could see they were on his side, too, whatever it was all about.

"Well, as you know, Fornis was always a great one for confrontin' anyone or anybody. Give her a situation and an adversary and she'd always wade in. Most people prefer to avoid trouble if they can, doan' they? She knew that, and she knew how to make the most of it. She'd tackle anyone face to face."

"I know," said Maia. "I remember her putting down Kembri and the chief priest and the governor of Tonilda, all in one go. I was in a terrible bad way when she came in, but I've never forgotten it. She took me away and they couldn't stop her, that was what it came down to. They couldn't stand up to her at all."

"Only you couldn' do what she wanted, could you? Her funny little games? Well, I doan' blame you, banzi. I couldn' have done it myself if I hadn' had Kantza-Merada with me, and Zai's unavenged ghost as well.

"Anyway, that mornin', as soon as she saw the crowd round the Scales, Fornis told the Palteshis who were pullin' your jekzha to go straight over. And when we got closer, I saw it was N'Kasit who was up there, boomin' away like a cow after a calf. They were all listenin' to him, and no one-no soldiers nor anybody-tryin' to stop him.

" 'So,' he was declaimin' as we came up, 'where is she? That's what I'm askin'. If she hasn' been murdered, where is she? The girl the gods sent to preserve the city-the girl who swam the Valderra! Where is she, the luck of the empire? Her house is empty, her servants are gone. If you doan' believe me, there's a man here from the upper city, and he's seen her empty house with his own eyes!'

"They were all hangin' on every word he said, and he was so wrapped up in it that he never noticed Fornis comin' up behind him.

" 'I'll tell you where she is,' he shouted. 'She's been murdered, for envy of her beauty and her luck-the luck of the gods, which she passed on to all of you! Why are you all standin' there like a bunch of idiots, when you've been robbed of your sacred luck? Where's your Maia Ser-relinda? Why doan' you go to the upper city and demand to know?'

"He was doin' it so convincin'ly that he had me badly

worried. I was wonderin' whether you could ever have reached his warehouse that night, or if you had, whether you'd managed to get out of Bekla alive.

"Well, all of a sudden he looked round and there was Fornis starin' up at him without a word. He hadn't been expectin' that, of course, and he stopped dead in the middle of what he was sayin'.

"She took her time, lookin' him up and down. Everybody was watchin' and waitin' to see what would happen. And at last she said 'Come here.'

"Well, that put him fair and square on the spot, banzi, you see; because either he had to climb dpwn off the Scales and go and stand in front of her, or else he had to refuse to obey the Sacred Queen-and he hadn' quite got himself up to that pitch yet.

"He hesitated for quite a few moments, and Fornis just sat there and waited. And then he climbed down off the Scales-yes, he did: she was incredible, that woman, wasn' she?-and he went and stood in front of her.

" 'Now,' she said, 'what is all this that you've been talkin' about, may I ask?'

"You could see he was frightened, but he still did his best to stand up to her. 'We're talkin' about Maia Serre-linda, esta-saiyett,' he answered. 'We want to know where she is. We believe you've done away with her.'

" 'Oh, really?' says Fornis, noddin' once or twice and fannin' herself-it was scorchin' hot that mornin'. 'I see! Well then, you'd better learn differently, hadn' you? For as it happens I know who killed Maia.'

"That fairly made my blood run cold, banzi, for I believed her. Everyone believed her. You could see it in their faces. They were all paralyzed like rabbits by a stoat. And what she was goin' to say next I doan' know, but if she'd told them all to go up the Sheldad and jump in the Monju I believe they'd have done it.

" 'I think you'd better come along with me to the temple,' she said to N'Kasit, 'so that we can sort this little matter out.'

"And then, banzi, just for once she got a taste of her own medicine; the only person in the whole of Bekla, I suppose, who wasn' afraid of her. Well, you'd have to be mad, wouldn' you, not to be afraid of herV

"Who?" asked Maia, leaning forward and gripping the edge of the table. "Who, Occula? Who?"

"D'you remember old Jejjereth, the crazy prophet-man?" replied the black girl. "It was him. All in a moment he'd leapt out of the crowd and there he was, dancin' and jab-berin' like a great, stinkin' ape alongside your jekzha.

" 'Ah!' he shouted. 'A shadow! A shadow will cover the city! The evil woman who gave me a knife to kill Maia! But I wouldn' do it! And when you shall see a murderess sittin' on the sacred throne, then you shall know that the judgement of the gods is nigh at hand!' And he said a whole lot more like that, banzi. He was wavin' his arms about and hoppin' from one foot to the other, and then he tried to climb up into the jekzha. ›

"Fornis didn' hesitate a second. She drew her knife- she never went anywhere without a knife, you know-and stabbed him straight to the heart. He went down without another word; but he was kickin' and thrashin' about in the dust for quite a bit, and the blood was somethin' to see: I can see it now.

" 'Right, let's get on,' says Fornis to the jekzha-men. 'We've wasted enough time here.' And off they set.

"But N'Kasit wasn't followin' her as she'd told him to.

" 'She's killed poor old Jejjereth!' he yelled to the people. As if they needed any tellin'! 'Poor old Jejjereth, that never harmed anyone! And she's got Maia's jekzha, too!'

"And that was the last I saw, because Fornis jus' went straight on without takin' the slightest notice, and none of them dared to touch her.

"We didn' go to the temple, though. She'd changed her mind about stayin' down in the lower city. As soon as we got down to the bottom of Storks Hill she made them go round by the Slave Market and back to the Peacock Gate without goin' through the Caravan Market again at all.

"Well, that evenin' I was helpin' Ashaktis to wait on her at supper when Zuno came in and said there was an officer outside who wanted to speak to her.

" 'What d'you mean, an officer?' says Fornis. 'Who is it?'

"Well, before Zuno could answer the officer came in, and who d'you reckon it was?"

Maia shook her head.

"It was Shend-Lador," said Occula. "I'd heard he'd come back to Bekla with Elvair, but of course I hadn' actually seen him. He saluted Fornis and then he said, 'Esta-saiyett,

you must excuse this intrusion. Believe me, it may very well save your life and that's my only excuse.'

"Well, you remember Shenda, doan' you? It'd be very difficult for anyone, even Fornis, to get angry with Shenda. He always had a sort of a way with him, didn't he?

" 'You'd better tell me, then,' she said.

" 'It's the chief priest who's sent me, esta-saiyett,' says he.

" 'The chief priest?' answers Fornis. 'Well, you go back and tell the chief priest that if he's got anythin' to say to me he can come up here and say it for himself.'

" 'Well, that's just it, esta-saiyett,' said Shenda. 'He can't.'

" 'What d'you mean, he can't?' she asked.

" 'Well, esta-saiyett, it so happened I was down at the temple this evenin', havin' treatment for this wounded foot of mine from one of the priests. And while I was there, all of a sudden we heard this commotion outside. So the doctor and me, we went out to see what was up, and there was the chief priest and a lot of others; and down in the Tamarrik Court below there was this crowd-all sorts; women, too-and the chief priest was tryin' to calm them down; only he couldn' make himself heard. They just kept on shoutin' "Serrelinda! Serrelinda!" and "Murder! Murder!" and "Jejjereth!" and things like that.'

" 'Well, I'll cut it short, esta-saiyett,' goes on Shenda. 'What it comes to is that the chief priest's sent me to tell you that the whole lower city's in a state close on disorder and riot. He sent me because he thought that as a wounded officer I'd be able to get through the streets without bein' set upon. There's no priest dares put his face outside the temple, you see. What the people are sayin'-and I beg you to bear in mind, esta-saiyett, that I'm only reportin' what the chief priest told me to tell you-is that you've murdered Maia Serrelinda. To be perfectly blunt, esta-saiyett, they're demandin' your life. The chief priest thinks you should leave Bekla at once, and keep out of the way for some time. He hopes you'll send him word where you are, and he'll let you know as soon as things are better.'

"And then, while Fornis was still chewin' on that, Shend-Lador added, "The chief priest particularly asked me to say, esta-saiyett, that if he can' assure the people that you've left the city, he woan' be answerable for anythin' that may happen.'

"Well, the next few hours were like a bastin' madhouse, banzi: you can' imagine it. Fornis insistin' she'd go down to the lower city herself and give them a piece of her mind, and Han-Glat preventin' her more or less by force: and then there were two more frantic messages from the chief priest, one brought by a pedlar and the other by a shearna called Nyllista (and I wonder what she was doin' in the temple, doan' you?). No one else could get through the mob, you see. You never heard such a shine in your life.

"Well, at last, in the middle of the night, above five or six hours after Shend-Lador had first come, Han-Glat told Fornis in so many words that she'd have to get out. And he flatly refused to come with her. He'd got Bekia and he meant to hang on to it. She raged and stormed and cursed, but he wouldn' budge an inch. And at last it began to dawn on Miss Fornis that if she refused he might even go the length of killin' her himself-that or else hand her over to the mob. The riotin' had been goin' on all night and we were half-expectin' them to come over the Peacock Wall any moment. The Pal-teshis were there to stop them, of course, but even they were pretty badly shaken by this time.

"Fornis's plan, when at last she'd been forced to accept the idea of leavin', was to rejoin her army-the army she'd left on the plain after she'd murdered Durakkon. She couldn' make out why they hadn' turned up: she'd been expectin' them every hour. And then, in the middle of that very night, while we were packin' up and gettin' ready to go, a couple of Palteshi soldiers arrived with news that must have shaken even her.

"Sendekar-good old Sendekar, out on the Valderra- he'd heard the rumor that Fornis had murdered you. Well, of course, banzi, if ever you had a friend in the whole empire it was Sendekar. And since he'd found out that Karnat had gone off to western Terekenalt and any sort of attack across the Valderra was unlikely for the time bein', he'd turned half his lads round and gone east. He'd joined up with Kerith-a-Thrain and between them they'd attacked the Palteshis a second time and made quite a mess of them. Just how bad a mess we couldn' make out, but the two soldiers were quite clear that there was no longer any chance of the Palteshis reachin' Bekla. And by the same token Fornis couldn' hope to get to them.

"You had to admit she had courage, the bitch. She heard the messengers out without a tremor; and then she said to

Han-Glat, as cool as you like, 'Very well,' she said, 'since you're so anxious to see the back of me, you cowardly bastard, I'll go to Quiso, and Cran help you when I get back. I shan' need anythin' from you, except half a dozen soldiers. Here are the names of the particular men I want: go and get them yourself, now.' And do you know, banzi, Han-Glat just took the list out of her hand and went off to fetch them? 'And you, Shakti,' she said, 'get my clothes and stuff together, and hurry up about it. I'm takin' you and Zuno and Occula, that's all.'

"So about an hour later, banzi, we were let down a rope over the eastern wall of the upper city, hardly a quarter of a mile from your house. There was no other way out, you see: we couldn' go into the lower city, and as for the Red Gate, Eud-Ecachlon had the citadel and that was that.

"You'd have thought Fornis was off to a festival. Do you know, if I'd been some stranger who didn' know what a cruel, wicked woman she was, I believe I'd have found myself admirin' her that mornin'? You could see how she'd kept herself in power all those years. The Palteshis we had with us would have done anythin' for her, and she-well, she treated them exactly as if she was their officer-checkin' their weapons, givin' them nicknames and encouragin' them and makin' jokes and-well, all the rest of it. I got the notion that above all else she wanted to distract their minds from any idea that she was runnin' away. She spoke several times about 'When we get back' and how they could all look forward to Melekril in Bekla, and a lot more stuff like that. She acted as if she was in the very best of spirits.

" 'Are you reckonin' on walkin' the whole way to Quiso, Folda?' I asked her as we were startin' out.

" 'How else?' she answered. 'It'll do you all good-blow the cobwebs away. It's only a hundred miles: I could be there and back in ten days. Why? Doan' you fancy it?'

" 'But the mountains, esta-saiyett?' asked Zuno. (He wasn' lookin' a bit happy: not his idea of fun at all, of course.)

" 'Never been there?' said she. 'Very beautiful, Zuno: you'll like them, though of course we shall have to hurry through rather, if we're to get to Quiso before the Rains. Step out, my lad! I've got a hundred meld on you to be the first man into Gelt!' They all laughed at that-except Zuno. I believe she really was enjoyin' herself. She felt

quite certain-she had for years-that nothin' could really get the better of her in the long run.

"At firs' we went straight up the Gelt high road. But durin' that mornin' I began to have a very strange feelin'. At the time I thought it mus' be the heat. It was swelterin' hot-you've no idea. Some of the soldiers were close to droppin', and she was carryin' his pack for one of them, if you please. She was carryin' as much weight as any of the other nine of us, and more than some.

"The feelin' was that I had to get Forms to leave the highway. And then I realized it was Kantza-Merada speakin' in my heart. She was tellin' me what to do. Pnly I wasn' to learn everythin', because if I had, I'd have got so frightened that I'd probably have made Fornis suspicious by actin' unnaturally. For that matter, you know, the gods have carried out their purposes through idiots and children before now. Their agents doan' have to understand what they're doin'-not for the purposes of the gods they doan'.

"About noon we spotted a village off to the west, in a patch of trees on the plain. It's very bare country, you know, north of Bekla, before you get up into Urtah. Just the plain one side and the Tonildan Waste the other and the road goin' on for mile after mile, up one slope and down the next. Any trees you see have usually been planted, to make a bit of shade and shelter-near a well, as a rule, for there aren' any rivers-not one.

" 'How about a rest and a bite over there in the shade, Folda?' I said. 'You can' expect everybody to have your kind of stayin' power.'

"Well, at first she said no, but after a bit I managed to persuade her that there was no point in wearin' them all out on the first day; so we went about a mile off the road, down a track to the village, and had some sour wine and a meal in a dirty little tavern. She kept the hood of her cloak up and anyway there was hardly anyone there but us.

"From then on, banzi, I was puttin' everythin' I had into workin' on her the same as I worked on Sencho. I knew what I had to do. Oh, but it was far, far harder than with Sencho, and that was hard enough! And that knife business with the Urtan fellow at the party that night-that was child's play compared to this. A strong, cunnin', powerful woman, still in her prime! You see, I had nothin' to go on at all except what Kantza-Merada was tellin' me. I didn' know myself what my purpose was supposed to be. All

she'd vouchsafed to me was that I must keep Fornis off the high road-away from other travelers-as we went on across the plain.

"When she was ready to go, I suggested that if we were to stay on the open plain there'd be more chance of a bit of sport with her bow. She was always a great one for that, you know. Well, so we went on by cattle-tracks to the next village and the one beyond that, arrows on strings all the time. She shot a couple of kites, both of them busy with carrion, and one of those wild dogs. We came on a pack that apparently didn' know enough to keep out of bowshot- not out of her bowshot, anyway.,

"When we stopped for the night she was still in good heart. She'd been sayin' we were goin' to camp, but as things turned out we lodged in a little sort of hamlet-a very poor, pinched place, where they were only too glad to see the color of our money. She made me sleep with her. She'd told the soldiers she kept me as a sort of personal bodyguard, and she sent Ashaktis off to sleep somewhere else. She enjoyed vexin' Ashaktis from time to time, you know: it was all part of the queer relationship they had with each other.

"Well, I needn' go into all the details, banzi, but by the next night I suppose we must have been thirty or thirty-five miles from Bekla, with about twenty miles to go to the Gelt foothills. And that was when the goddess began speakin' again, and when I began gettin' really frightened.

"I can' explain this, even to you: I couldn' explain it to anyone who didn' know it for themselves. I remember once, back in Silver Tedzhek, when I was no more than about eight, I heard Zai talkin' to an old priestess. An' I understood what they were talkin' about all right, even though I couldn' have explained it. She said 'Great suf-ferin', unendin' longin' and continual prayer: when these trench and water the heart, the goddess will spring up in it at last.'

"Well, she was springin' up now all right, and I hadn' been so frightened since I crossed the Govig-no, not even on the night when we killed Sencho-because what she told me-all she told me-was that we were gettin' closer and closer to a place of terrible dread and power. The dread was like a sort of invisible mist, thickenin' all the time we went on, because we were gettin' nearer and nearer to this place, whatever it might be. And I was the only

person who could feel it, banzi; the only person out of all the ten of us. The soldiers were all cheerful enough, and Ashaktis seemed in better spirits, than when we started. The only person who noticed the state I was in was Zuno: he couldn' imagine the reason, but at least he showed me a bit of consideration; and I was glad of it, I can tell you. I felt as though an invisible thunderstorm was comin' up, darker and closer all round me. Only this wasn' thunder; it was fear; fear in the very air I was breathin', in my lungs and my heart. And all the time Kantza-Merada was sayin' to me, 'This furnace is bein' heated for you: it's your place that is comin', and your hour.' Closer and closer and worse and worse, until I could hardly go on. Once, for about half an hour, I couldn' even breathe properly. My lungs sort of closed up and the air itself seemed thick as blankets: it was like drownin' on dry land. Forms thought I was puttin' it on because I wanted to stop for a rest, and she began teasin' me. I let her go on thinkin' that. The breathless fit passed off after a time, but I was still afraid.

"That second night I couldn' sleep. Fornis had had me do what she wanted and she was sleepin' sound as a child, while I lay sweatin'. At last I slipped out of bed and went outside. It was a bright, clear night full of stars, but that didn' make me feel any better. I had a horrible fancy that the stars were like those studs they fix inside a guard hound's collar, so that you can control it by twistin'. I was the hound, and the goddess had me by the collar, pressin' the studs of the stars against my throat. I remember beggin' her for relief, but all she said in my heart was 'Remember your father. That is why you have been brought here.'

"I wandered down between the huts until I came to the far end of the village. I felt drenched in fear-you could have squeezed it out of me. I scarcely knew what I was doin'. I believe I was goin' to run away-anywhere, just as long as it was away. And then, suddenly, someone near me said, 'Occula!'

"It was a girl's voice and I knew I'd heard it somewhere before. That was all-I was in such a state that I thought it must be a ghost. I looked all round in the starlight and again the voice said, 'Occula' very quietly, sort of quick and low.

"And then I saw her, crouched down in the bushes. I went across to her. She was real all right. D'you know who it was? It was Chia, the girl you hit over the head

with the fryin'-pan at Lalloc's: the girl you bought and sent home, remember?"

"Cran almighty!" said Maia. "Of course I remember her! Yes, of course, she was Urtan, wasn't she?"

"She clutched my wrist. 'Occula!' she said. 'I saw when you came this evenin'. It's her, isn' it? It is her?'

" 'Yes,' I said. 'It's her all right.'

" 'I knew it,' she said. 'I knew I couldn' be wrong. I've told them, Occula.'

" 'Told who?' I said.

" 'Them. Tomorrow you go that way, look.' She pointed across the plain in the dark, and it was exactly where the fear was comin' from. 'It's only a mile or so,' she said. 'Not far at all.'

" 'But how did you know I was goin' to come out here?' I asked.

" 'I knew,' she said. 'I was waitin' for you.'

" 'I'm half mad with fear now,' I said. 'Where are we goin', Chia? What is it I have to do?'

"And do you know what happened then, banzi? She stood up and put her arms round me and she whispered, 'I'm afraid darlin' Shockula's in for a bit of an ock! But I'll pray for you, my dear.'

"And then she was gone. But suddenly I didn' feel afraid any more. Oh, yes, the fear was still there. It was like a great, deep lake, stretchin' all round me, and I was still in it. But before, I hadn' been able to swim, and now I could. That's the only way I can put it.

"I went back to the hut and slept till mornin'.

"We were up about an hour after dawn and I felt as though I'd said good-bye to everythin' and everyone I'd ever known. The men cleared up and packed their kit. Ashaktis paid the Elder and Fornis told me to go and ask our best way. I went off and pretended to ask some of the village people, and then I came back.

" 'They say that's best, Folda,' I said, pointin' where Chia had. You could see now, by daylight, the ground slopin' up out of the village for about a mile; up to the top of a kind of ridge-quite easy goin'. She'd nothin' to say against it and we set out.

"I knew then that all I had to do was listen to the goddess and commit myself completely to obeyin' her, even to the point of layin' down my life. Lay down my life? Oh, that seemed easy, compared with the fear she'd taken away."

Occula paused for a few moments, as though listening. Then she got up, went quietly over to the door and suddenly flung it open. There was no one outside. She shut it, came back, sat down beside Maia and continued in a lower voice.

"We were in Urtah, now, of course. I doan' know how much you know about Urtah, banzi, but it's all grazin' country up there, green and well-watered-the valley of the Olmen. We'd crossed the Beklan plain and now we were comin' into the Urtan cattle country. When we got up to the top of that ridge we could see it all spread out below. The change, after the plain-well, I suppose it struck me all the harder because I hadn' been expectin' it. It was so green: in spite of the time of year it was scarcely dried up at all. It was like a sort of huge cattle-meadow goin' on for miles; an enormous saucer with low hills all round the edge. They've looked after it for generations, of course, and Cran only knows how much cattle-dung and stuff must have gone into it. We could see a good many villages, and I thought I could make out the Olmen-oh, must have been eight or nine miles away; but it was all mixed up with horizon haze, and smoke, too, from the villages on the skyline. And there were these great flocks-sheep as well as cattle-all over the grasslands, with dogs and little boys and girls herdin' them. I s'pose you've done it yourself, haven' you?"

"Well, sort of," answered Maia. "But 'course we never had all that many beasts, you see."

"It certainly was a sight-talk about prosperous! That's what the soldiers thought, too, and Ashaktis and even Zuno. Only he was limpin' already. He'd already told me he didn' know how he was goin' to last out the day. I remember one of the soldiers shadin' his eyes and saying, 'Shakkarn! There's a few thousand meld walkin' about down there!' And Fornis said, 'Well, Taburn, when we get back I'll give you a farm, if you think you can live with the Urtans.' And he said, 'Ah, that's just it, esta-saiyett, isn' it? The bulls'd be all right, but what about the men?' 'Kill them off,' said Fornis. 'Slaughter the men and keep the bulls.' So they went on jokin' like that as we began comin' down off the ridge.

"I'd been doin' my best all along to keep up my act as the Sacred Queen's favorite, but now I could hardly manage it any more. The goddess had risen up erect in my

heart, like a snake that's goin' to strike; and me-I was like a hinnari string-ready tuned, oh yes; but so taut I could have screamed.

" 'You're very quiet this mornin', Occula,' says Fornis. 'Somethin' on your mind?'

"And it was just at that very moment, banzi, as she said that, that I saw-oh, how can I make you understand? Were you ever plagued by wasps in summer, until you went out to find the nest and destroy it? You know-you walk along the edges of the fields, and the banks and patches of trees, and then perhaps you see one or two wasps comin' and goin', and then more, and you get closer until at last you come on a hole or perhaps just a crack in a ditch, and then all of a sudden you realize there they are, crawlin' in and out in hundreds: the place your trouble's been comin' from. This was like that, only a million times worse.

"It wasn' far away-about half a mile below us. There were three very strange-looking rifts-sort of chasms-side by side on the open grassland. They were narrow, and the same distance between each; and they were all the same length, as if someone might actually have made them, a long time ago; only it would have to have been a god or a giant, because they were big-oh, I suppose three or four hundred yards long, each of them. You couldn' see how deep they were, because they were full of trees, and the branches stretched right across like a sort of carpet- they were as narrow as that. The grass and weeds were growin' tall all round them-you could see no flocks ever went there: and there were no paths leadin' to them; nothin'. And this was where the fear was comin' from-tens of thousands of ills and terrors and evils, creepin' out and flyin' off into the air. They were about their own business, and it wasn' men's business; and oh, banzi, I was the only one of us who could feel them or know they were there! I'm a dead girl, I thought: no human bein' can know that and go on livin'. Yet still I wasn' afraid, because it was my death. It was my own death, for Zai and for Kantza-Merada, and I was entirely ready for it.

" 'Oh, no, Folda,' I said-and I felt as though I was in a play, speakin' words through a mask-'No, I was just lookin' at those funny clefts down there and wonderin' what they could be: only I've never seen anythin' quite like them before, have you?'

" 'Where?' she said, and then she caught sight of them for herself. 'Why, no, I haven',' she said. 'You're right; they are funny. Come on, we'll go down and have a look at them; it'll beabit of sport. Iwonder how deep they are.'

"So she led the way down in the sunshine; and I was walkin' beside her while she talked away. And then all of a sudden she stopped and said, 'Ah, here's someone comin' to meet us. He'll tell us, I expect.'

"It was an old man who was comin'; a man who looked a bit like a priest, very grave and dignified, but roughly dressed and shabby-lookin' compared with the priests in Bekla. Although it was so hot, he was wrapped in a cloak and he was walkin' with a long staff; it had symbols cut on it and some sort of letters, too. There were two or three younger men with Mm-just ordinary herdsmen, they looked like. I didn' notice anythin' particular about them.

"The old man bowed to Fornis and greeted her very courteously and then he asked her whether we were strangers travelin' through.

" 'Yes, that's right, my good man,' she said, 'but you needn' think you're goin' to get any sort of toll out of us, though I doan' mind givin' your men the price of a drink. But since you're here,' she went on, before he'd had time to answer, 'perhaps you can tell me somethin' about those queer-lookin' ravines. I want to go and have a closer look at them.'

" 'Can you tell me their name?' he asked her.

" 'Oh,' says she, 'I thought you were goin' to tell me that. You live here, doan' you?'

" 'I do, saiyett,' he said; and now I could see-only she couldn'-that in some way I can' explain he'd taken charge of her, like a priest when an animal's taken to the temple. 'I and my men will walk down there and show them to you, since you wish it.'

"So then Queen Fornis stepped out in front with the old man, and Ashaktis and Zuno and me, we came behind with the herdsmen. But never a word we said to each other-not once. The men said nothin', you see, and it wasn' Ashaktis's way to waste words on people she despised. Zuno was frightened, because he was sure now he wouldn' be able to finish another day and he knew what Fornis had done to the soldier who'd foundered on her march to Bekla after she'd killed Durakkon. As for me, I felt as though I was walkin' to my own execution. I kept

lookin' round at the sun and thinkin', 'I'm seein' that for the last time.' But even now I wasn' afraid. It was all a dream-a trance in the sun, with the grasshoppers zippin' and now and then one of those hollow, flat sheep-bells clopperin' from somewhere along the slope. There were a lot of ant-hills, I remember, and a smell of chamomile and tansy in the air.

"I could hear Fornis laughin' and talkin' to the old man, but he didn' laugh back. He jus' kept up with her, leanin' on his staff and every now and then noddin' as she spoke. I felt-well, I felt we'd become a kind of procession. There was somethin' grave and ceremonial about it, for all Fornis was so glib and so much taken up with the prospect of sport.

"We came to the tall grass surroundin' the ravines, and she led the way straight in, tramplin' it down as she went. We followed her in single file, now, because it was up to your waist and there were a lot of nettles and thistles too: but she didn' mind them; she was so eager to get there.

"So we came up to the lip of the middle ravine. It was very abrupt, like the edge of a cliff, but all overgrown, and the long grass actually tangled up with the leaves of the trees. The trees were growin' out of the sides of the ravine, you see, and their leaves and branches stretched almost right across, as I told you. But now that we were on the very edge, lookin' down, the leaves weren' an unbroken coverin', as they'd seemed when we were up on the ridge. You could see, now, down among the branches and through them. And below them, banzi, below the leaves, there was nothin'-nothin' at all: just bare, stony ground, almost sheer, slopin' down into darkness. Do you remember that day at Sencho's, when we put the two big silver mirrors opposite each other and took it in turns to look in; and you were so frightened? This was far worse. That place went down for ever. It was as though you were lookin' into the night sky from the other side. I tried to imagine it, goin' on and on, down and down, nothin' but stones and rock; not a beetle, not a fly, not a sound since the world began.

"I came back four or five steps from the edge. I felt faint; Zuno actually had to hold me up for a few moments. I knew now what the goddess required of me and why she hadn' told me before: it would have driven me mad and I'd never have got there. I'd thought she only required my

death; but she was requirin' more than that. I remember once in Thettit seein' a condemned man brought out, and he was puttin' on one hell of a good act; until he actually saw the scaffold.

"Fornis had come back a few yards, too. 'Well,' she said-and she actually clapped the old man on the shoulder, as though they'd been in a tavern together-'this'll be a lark, woan' it? How deep is it, do you know?'

" 'I can't tell you that, saiyett,' he answered.

" 'Well, then,' she said, 'we shall just have to find out, shan't we? Shakti, you'll come, woan' you? Remember the herons in Suba?' i

"Ashaktis had looked in and she was white to the lips. 'I'm sorry, saiyett,' she said. 'I'm afraid I'm a little too old for it now. I beg you to excuse me.'

" 'Oh, Cran's teeth!' said Fornis. "The whole damn' place seems to be full of cowards and weaklin's today, what with you and Zuno. I shall have to think what I'm goin' to do about it later, shan't I? Come on then, Occula! Apparently it's just you and me.'

" 'Yes, Folda,' I said. 'Just you and me.'

"So then she went off into the bushes by herself. I suppose the truth was that it had loosened even her bowels, but it hadn' loosened mine. While she was gone I stood and prayed aloud. I didn' care who heard me-to tell you the truth, by this time I was hardly thinkin' about anyone else bein' there at all. I went through the litany of Kantza-Merada for the last time.

"At the word of the dark judges, that word which

tortures the spirit, Kantza-Merada, even the goddess, was turned to a

dead body,

Defiled, polluted, a corpse hangin' from a stake. 'Most strangely, Kantza-Merada, are the laws of the

dark world effected. O Kantza-Merada, do not question the laws of the

nether world.'

The goddess from the great above descended to the

great below.

To the nether world of darkness she descended. The goddess abandoned heaven, abandoned earth, Abandoned dominion, abandoned ladyship, To the nether world of darkness she descended."

Occula was sobbing. After a few moments she dug her nails into her palm, drew a deep breath and went on.

"I was just finishin' when I felt a hand on my shoulder. I stopped and looked round: it was the old priest. I knew now that he was a priest. He was a herdsman, but he was the priest of that place, too: whenever there was anythin' needed to be done, as you might say.

"He stared into my eyes for what seemed a long time. At last he said, 'Those whom I serve have spoken in my heart and told me that you are the one appointed to carry this out. Am I right?'

"'Yes,'I said.

" 'But you have no weapon.'

" 'I'm the weapon,' I answered.

"He stared into my eyes again and then he said, 'Even here there is the frissoor. You have it. Do as you judge best. I will pray for you.'

"And then Form's came back, all stripped and ready. She patted Zuno on the cheek. 'Cheer up, little chap,' she said. 'If I doan' forget, I'll stick a knife in you this afternoon, and then you'll have nothin' more to worry about, will you? Now come on, Occula, if you're ready.'

"And with that, and without a moment's hesitation, she went over the brink of the ravine, and I went after her.

"Now I'll try to explain the way of it, banzi, as best I can. First, at the top, there were the trees. The side wasn' absolutely sheer-not to begin with: it was a steep, earthy slope, with the trees growin' out of it-small oaks and thorn and that sort of thing. They were growin' outwards from the face, so you could catch hold and slither down between them from one to another.

"We pushed through the first branches and leaves, and even there it felt uncanny and threatenin'. Those leaves seemed to be whisperin' all round us, and I had a horrible feelin' that they knew we'd come; or that somethin' did, anyway. The upper leaves were very thick and green- they had the air and light, of course-but then, almost at once, only a few feet down, they got fewer and yellower, as if they were sick or in prison. And then we were down among the trunks, with their gnarled, exposed roots, and the earth and stones. If you'd let go of whatever you were holdin' on to, you'd just have gone slidin' straight down.

"As my eyes began to get used to the light I made myself look down, and I could see that where the trees ended-

they got fewer, you see, and more spindly, until there weren' any more-there was a kind of ledge-a shelf, not regular but more or less level; I suppose it might have been four or five feet wide, but only here and there. Fornis had got down there already, quick as a cat, and she was waitin' for me. I reached it about twenty yards away from where she was standin'. I stopped a moment to get my breath and then I went along towards her.

"I didn' say anythin': it wasn' time yet. I looked up and there was green light above, comin' through the leaves; it wasn' like the light in an honest, decent wood, but sort of thick and waverin', like light under deep water; and it was all criss-crossed by the branches, like the bars of a cage. We were in a cage-a cage with a ceilin' but no floor.

"Before I reached her I went to the edge and peered over. It was sheer from then on. Only there were projections here and there-spurs of rock and so on. It would be just possible to climb down, if you were crazy. What you'd be goin' down into was nothin'; empty darkness. And the goddess was tellin' me I had to go. There was only me, all alone, against the strength and power of that wicked woman. Oh, banzi-"

Occula was clasped in Maia's arms, shuddering and moaning like a child woken from nightmare. Maia stroked and kissed her, murmuring reassurance, and after a little the black girl went on.

"Fornis was standin' with her hands on her hips, smilin' and lookin' sort of exultant. You could see she was pleased with herself. She was always excited by danger-any sort of demandin' exploit. As I stepped back from the edge she called out 'Occula-'

"And then even she was frozen with horror, and worse than horror: for the moment she spoke it was as if the whole place had been set on fire, leapin' with voices like flames. 'Occula! Occula! Occula!' They weren' ordinary, decent echoes. In fact I doan' believe now that they were echoes at all; and if you'd heard them you'd feel the same. They were voices-of creatures, of bein's about whom we know nothin', through the mercy of the gods. How can I call them evil or mad, when words like goodness and sanity had no more meanin' in that place than they have out beyond the furthest star? Hell isn' people torturin' you, banzi: I know that now. Hell's nothin': hell's not-things takin' the place of things. Silence is a natural thing, and

these voices were neither speech nor silence, and that's the only way I can put it. Just to hear them was an agony, and I mean a real agony, like burnin'. They seemed to tear through your head. I fell down, and for all the sense I had left I might have gone over the edge; but I didn'.

"Then Fornis put her hand on my shoulder and shook me; and she stooped and whispered in my ear, not to wake those voices again. She said, 'Do you want to go on, or are you afraid?'

"And still it wasn' time. I wondered how much more the goddess expected I could suffer. I thought, 'Does she want her weapon to break in her hand?'!

"I nodded, but Fornis seemed to be hesitatin', so I went to the edge again and looked down. I had to get her to go on: that was my first task. This time I was tryin' to pick a way of goin' down from one handhold and foothold to the next. As soon as I'd seen what I thought was a possible way-if you could call it that-I jus' caught her eye and then let myself over without a word.

"She was followin' me now: she had to if she was comin', for there was no other way down-not in either direction, as far as you could see. I knew the goddess had put it into her heart that she wasn' goin' to be beaten by me, so it was just a question of whether I could survive long enough. Banzi, I can'-I honestly can' describe to you the terror of climbin' down into that place. It was shiverin'ly cold, and not wet but very smooth, so that everythin' I touched felt slippery-dry and slippery, like a snake's skin. Once a stone I was holdin' pulled out of the sheer face, and I just managed to grab another in time. I needed bare feet. I kicked off my sandals and they fell away, but there was no sound from below to show when they'd reached bottom. And I'll tell you somethin' else. I'd cut my hand, and it was bleedin' green. That's the truth.

"As long as I doan' fall, I thought, it doesn' matter how far down we go: I shall never come back anyway. I was out of my mind by this time, and I felt full of a sort of mad elation, as if I'd drunk a flask full of djebbah. That's why I doan' remember any more. I can' even guess how deep we went: it may not really have been very far-I doan' know. It felt like a mile.

"At last, in a place where you could just see-only there was nothin' to be seen now; not even earth; only the rock- I came to a second ledge, a bit longer than the height of

a man and only a foot or two wide. And there, in the rock face, I caught sight of an almost regular, zig-zag crack that looked a bit like the symbol for 'Zai.' So I knew this was the place, and I stood still and waited for Fornis.

"She was down about a minute later. One of her forearms was bleedin' green, too; and her hair was green. She'd been changed, ready for what I had to do. I gave her my hand onto the ledge and we stood there together while she got her breath. Then she whispered, 'I think this is far enough, doan' you?'

" 'Yes, this is far enough,' I answered.

"I pulled her round by the arm to face me and looked into her eyes, and I knew she couldn' look away. But still she wasn' afraid-not yet.

" 'Why are you lookin' at me like that?' she asked. She was angry.

" 'I want to ask you a question,' I said. 'Where did you get the emeralds in the Sacred Queen's crown?'

"She didn' answer, but I could see now that she knew. My question had fallen into her heart as my sandals had dropped into the abyss.

" 'Do you remember the black jewel-merchant who came to Bekla across the Harridan?' I asked her.

"Now she was frightened all right! You wouldn' think it possible, would you? Water could flow uphill: Queen Fornis was frightened.

" 'Do you remember he had a little girl?' I said. 'No, look at me! Do you remember?'

"She shrank back, but I had her by the arm. 'You? I gave orders for your death!' she cried. She was past re-memberin' the voices, and the whole frightful place rocked and rang in the dark, 'Death! Death! Death!'

"But I'd been changed, too. Those voices were subject to the goddess, and now she'd possessed me entirely. I'd become like a rock in a flood.

"I was still lookin' steadily into Fornis's eyes. As I raised my right hand she did the same, and we stood opposite each other like that. I stepped forward and drew her knife from the sheath at her belt and she never moved. I offered it to her hilt first, and she stretched out her arm and took it. Yes, she took the knife from me, banzi, jus' like Ka-Roton that night in Kembri's hall; and then, as we still stood face to face, she turned the point round and drove it straight into her own heart.

"The green blood came spurtin' out, and as she sank down on her knees I pointed over the edge. 'Your little boys are waitin',' I said, 'and Durakkon, your friend!' And all the voices howled and clucked and cackled, 'Friend- end-end-end!'

"And at that she fell all along, with her head and shoulders across the edge, and I put my foot against her body and pushed, and she screamed and went over, with her own knife still stickin' in her breast. And then I fainted, because the goddess had left me alone with the voices and the screamin'.

"I must have lain unconscious a long time: I doan' know how long. When I came to myself I was lyin' on the ledge with my arms soaked in Fornis's blood. It was only then I realized how narrow it was. It was barely wide enough to lie down. I doan' know why I hadn' fallen.

"The goddess was gone: I was by myself in the dark. I felt cold, and very hungry and thirsty.

"The reason I can' tell how long I was unconscious is because I doan' even know how long it took me to climb back. That was almost as hard as goin' down had been. I'd finished what the goddess required and she had no more use for me. If I could manage to get myself back, that was my business. She wasn' concerned one way or the other; and I certainly hadn' the gall to pray to her to save me. But as I groped and clutched and panted and clambered I felt Zai's peace in my heart, holdin' me up as often as I had to stop and hang on until enough strength came back into my arms to start pullin' up again.

"The evil and the loneliness were worse than the danger; so bad that once or twice I nearly let go, just to bring it all to an end. I went so slowly: I seemed to be climbin' for hours; but I was climbin' towards the light, and that was what saved me. I could see that greenness filterin' down from above, comin' nearer, and after a long time I began to feel more confident of gettin' out.

"At last I pulled myself back up onto the first ledge again, with the stunted trees just above, and there I stood and prayed and gave thanks to the goddess, not for savin' me but for what was accomplished and ended. I stood prayin' until my heart was emptied of prayer, like drainin' a cup. I'd never prayed like that before.

"When I stepped out into the grass it was late afternoon by the sun and the day was coolin'. I waded out by a different

way, and as I left the tall weeds and grass and sank down on the turf-oh, banzi, you can' imagine what that felt like! It wasn't just knowin' you were goin' to live; it was havin' left that place behind-I saw the old priest comin'. He stooped and pulled me to my feet as if I'd been a little girl, and then he tookmeinhisarmswithoutaword.

"I didn' say anythin', either-not for-oh, minutes, I suppose. At last I whispered, 'It's done. Shall I go now?'

"At that he released me and stood back, shakin' his head. We sat down together on the short grass in the beautiful, calm evenin' smellin' of dew and tansy. Seemed as though I'd never seen evenin' before, and the swifts wheelin' and screamin' overhead like blessed spirits. I was cryin'. I said, 'Where are the soldiers?'

" 'Gone,' he answered.

" 'And Ashaktis?'

" 'She is dead.'

"I didn' ask him how. It was nice of him to have tidied up for me.

" 'Zuno?'

" 'He shall stay here with you until-'

"And at that, banzi, I interrupted him. It surprises me now: but I interrupted him because I was frightened. 'You mean I'm to be kept here, sir?' I cried. 'You mean to keep me here?'

"He took my hand again.

" 'My child,' he said very gently, 'you have come alive from the Streels of Urtah, like the Lord Deparioth's own mother. In all the years I have served the Streels this has never happened-no, nor yet in my lifetime, so far as I know. Yet even so, if that were the whole of it, you might perhaps go your way, though I should be sorry, for you would die and you deserve better. But there is more. You have been the instrument of those nameless ones who bring retribution upon crimes beyond mercy or forgiveness: upon those whose lives, continuing defile the very earth. My child, you are deodand. Where you have been and what you have performed have taken you beyond the circle of life.'

" 'I know that,' I said.

" 'If you want to come back; if you want your life to continue and not to be forfeit to the gods, you must undergo purification and the ritual of return. To have come alive from the Streels is to be a livin' phantom, until we have done what is needful for you.'

" 'But will my goddess accept your ritual?' I asked. 'My gods are not yours.'

" 'All gods are the same here,' he said. 'I shall invoke her for you, and she will hear. You need have no fear on that score.'

" 'How long-?' I was beginnin', when he added, 'The rains will begin soon. You are welcome to spend Melekril here with us-you and the young man too.'

"And so I did, banzi. I woan' tell you about all the rites and ceremonies and prayers. I couldn', anyway. They're secret, and I've already told you far more than I ought. It was a long business and a lot of sufferin', for the shock had gone far deeper than ever I realized that evenin'. I stayed all through Melekril, and I found more kindness and peace in that place than anywhere in my life since I left Silver Tedzhek. But when the spring came back-the spring before last-I was as fresh and strong as the leaves, and as ready to return as the kynat.

"One fine mornin' we set out together, Zuno and I. We went east to the high road and traveled back to Bekla with one of the iron caravans comin' in from Gelt. It only took four days."

105: MAIA ANSWERS A QUESTION

"Go on," said Maia, as her friend fell silent. Occula's tale had affected her so deeply that she felt almost as though she herself had been carried into that other world of terror, and now also needed help to recover diurnal reality and mundane things. She wanted-she longed desperately- to hear and chat about living people and their affairs and fortunes. And Occula must need that, too. "Tell me about Bekla. Tell me everything that's happened since I left with Zenka and Anda-Nokomis."

Occula caressed and kissed her, smiling. Her happiness at being once more in Maia's company-at being able actually to see and touch her-was evident enough.

"Homesick, eh?" To all appearances she had resumed her old self, her terrible story cast aside like a black cloak from a brightly-colored robe. But certainly Maia-who if not she?-could sense that this was partly acting; never-

theless it was acting which, given the right response, would soon become reality.

"P'raps. Little bit. Go on, Occula!"

"Well, what shall I tell you?" said the black girl, reaching across for the Yeldashay. "When we got back we found a whole lot had happened. To begin with, Santil had taken Bekla-that was just after the rains began-and Kembri was dead. The way it all came about was like this. Elleroth was forcin' his way up through Purn, and he'd been joined by the Ortelgans-oh, yes, well, of course you know that: I ought to say you did that, oughtn' I? Apparently they only jus' managed to cut through Purn before the rains. What Elleroth wanted was to seize the bridge over the Zhairgen-the road to Ikat-if he could, and cut Kembri off from Bekla. Well, apart from the rains, which put a lot of his men down with fever-"

"Ah!" said Maia. "A few hours of it was enough for me. I was took real bad."

"I'm not surprised. Well, seems Elleroth and Ta-Kom-inion only had about four hundred men between them by the time they actually got to the road. But then they were joined by young Seekron and Mendel-el-Ekna, who were tryin' to get Randronoth's lads back to Lapan after failin' to take Bekla. And that lot, all together, were too much for the men Kembri had left at the bridge. They surrendered to Elleroth.

"Santil had marched north out of Ikat with the idea of attackin' Kembri in Lapan. When he started, he didn' feel there was really much hope of beatin' Kembri and gettin' to Bekla before the rains-he's told me as much himself, actually. Still, he thought he ought at least to try and attack the Chalcon army again as soon as possible, and not just sit around doin' nothin' while Kembri pulled them together. But what actually happened was that with Santil in front of them and Elleroth and the Lapanese behind, they mutinied. There was a commander called Kapparah." Occula grinned. "I've been to bed with him, actually. A real, hardened campaigner if ever there was one."

"I remember Shenda talking about him," said Maia. "He was the one as did so well in the battle on the road, wasn't he?"

"That's the fellow. Well, he led the mutiny. He said that with half a dozen different factions fightin' all over the empire and the whole place in chaos we'd have King Kar-

nat down on us any day-obviously he must know very well what was goin' on-and the time had come to put a stop to it. They killed Kembri, of course; cut him down outside his own tent and sent his head to Santil. I can' honestly say I felt sorry.

"So then Santil joined them and took over the command, and they marched fifty miles to Bekla in the rains- leastways, the ones who got there did. Elleroth wasn' with them, though. Seems he'd got badly cut up in a skirmish. One of his officers, a man called Mollo, saved his life and took him home to Sarkid. D'you know, I've never met Elleroth to this day? I often wish I had. I fancy the sound of him. He's quite a lad, by all accounts."

"Ah, he is that," said Maia. "I liked him very much. I don't think he'd be one to bounce you, though, somehow."

"Oh, no?" said Occula. "Want to bet? He might get the chance yet, you never know. Anyway, where was I? Oh, yes, Santil takin' Bekla. Well, there were plenty of high-up people in the upper city who managed to change sides quite successfully. Santil's a merciful man, you know. In fact, I'd say a very merciful man indeed, as I'll tell you in a minute. But the real genius behind the side-changin' lark was Shenda. It made his fortune-and mine too, I s'pose, really. For that's how I come to be here now, my dear, drinkin' this bowl of Yeldashay."

"Shenda?" said Maia. "But you were saying just now as Han-Glat was holding Bekla, after he'd got rid of Fomis."

"Yes, well, but this was where Shenda came in. You remember, of course, that Shenda was wounded and stayed in Bekla after he'd come back with Elvair. I told you how he came up from the temple that night to give Fornis the chief priest's message. I've often thought it's wonderful how the most unexpected people sometimes rise to an occasion-especially when somethin' has to be done and there's no one else to do it. Those last few days before the rains, that boy really got busy. You could say he revealed a real flair for diplomacy. Well, but he's a likable lad, isn' he? He talks straight and plain, he always seems cheerful and he's got a knack of makin' people think he's not as clever as they are but all the same he's honest; so they find themselves supposin' they've thought up all by themselves what he wanted them to think but never said in so many words. I've seen him do it again and again now.

"Anyway, Shenda told Han-Glat that he wanted to go

up to the citadel to see his father (his father was the castellan, you remember), and Han-Glat said all right. So off goes Shenda like a dutiful son, but when he got there he talked to Eud-Ecachlon. He told him straight out that he thought tryin' to hold the place for Kembri had become a hopeless business. Shenda said why didn' he surrender to Han-Glat and accept a safe-conduct to go home to Ken-dron-Urtah and succeed his father as High Baron, which was what the gods had always meant him to do?

"Well, poor old Eud-Ecachlon never was very bright, was he? I reckon he could have asked fifty thousand meld for handin' over that citadel to Han-Glat. I would have. I mean, it's quite impregnable, it was victualled for about a year and he could have held it against Santil and Han-Glat put together if he'd wanted. But anyway, he didn'. Probably he just wanted to get back home as soon as he could. Shenda got him to agree to come and talk to Han-Glat.

"Well, so then Shenda goes back to Han-Glat, if you please, and they talked for hours. Shenda pointed out that Sendekar was comin' from one direction and Santil from another and surely the best thing Han-Glat could do was to drive a bargain while he still had time-I mean, while he still had Bekla to bargain with. Han-Glat could see the sense of that all right. Apart from anythin' else, he had himself to bargain with, you see. Han-Glat's an engineerin' genius: there's no one to touch him in the whole empire. Bridges, roads, fortifications-you let him alone for those. That fortress at Dari-it's a bastin' miracle! I saw it for the first time a week ago. Any commander who passed up the chance of gettin' Han-Glat as an officer of works would be crazy.

"So the long and short of it was that Shenda made Han-Glat think that he himself had decided which side his bread was buttered; and he sent out envoys to Sendekar and Santil and said he'd hand over the city and the citadel in return for a high command for himself and no revenge or executions against the remainin' Leopards. Well, they both accepted that quick enough. I mean, the alternative was for Han-Glat to sit comfortably in Bekla through the rains, while they didn'. He's Santil's director of fortifications now: rich and powerful, and everybody's happy.

"So most people managed to sit the thing out quite comfortably. They always do, of course. Well, apart from anythin' else, a city like Bekla's got to be run by people

who know it and know how to keep law and order. Santit just took them over, and he's rulin' very well. Everybody likes him. What Shenda's here for now-when he gets to Terekenalt, I mean-is to try to negotiate the return of Suba to the Beklan Empire. Lenkrit's joinin' us in Terekenalt to talk to the new king. I think it'll go well, myself."

"But you were saying something about Santil being a very merciful man indeed," said Maia. "What was all that about, then?"

"Oh, yes, banzi; to be sure! Your friend Elvair-ka-Vir-rion-"

"Oh, what about him?" said Maia, with a quick shudder. She had not forgotten her last meeting with Elvair at the Barons' Palace.

"Well, of course, if there was one man Santil was in honor bound to destroy it was Elvair. As you remember, when Sencho was killed Elvair took poor Milvushina, who'd been betrothed to Santil, and refused to return her. It was common knowledge that he and Kembri meant to make her Sacred Queen if Elvair had beaten Santil. And they'd have done away with you, banzi, doan' you make any mistake about that. Oh, yes, they would!"

"I don't believe Elvair would ever have agreed to harm me," said Maia hotly. "I don't care what anyone says-"

"All right, all right, banzi! Calm down! Anyway, if you' were his friend, one thing's certain: after you left Bekla he hadn' another left in the world, unless perhaps it was Shenda. He was disgraced and ruined beyond all hope of recovery, and he knew it. Well, he'd gone mad, good as, hadn' he? But d'you know who came forward and said she'd always loved him? Who was ready to put herself in danger and plead for him and stick by him? Have a guess!"

Maia pondered. "I've no idea. Never Otavis, surely?"

"Oh, Cran, no! Otavis-she'd much better fish to fry. Give it up? Sessendris!"

"Sessendris?" said Maia, astonished. "Well, who'd ever 'a thought it? What happened, then?"

"The way I see it's like this," said the black girl. "You remember Sessendris was Kembri's saiyett? Well, Kem-bri's household was gone, of course, and all he'd possessed was forfeit, wasn' it? Sessendris had to think what she was goin' to do. Mind you, I always liked her-a nice woman. I mean, if only we'd had her at old Sencho's instead of that bastin' Terebinthia, things'd have been very different,

wouldn' they? I think she was speakin' no more than the truth when she said she'd always been very fond of Elvair. Anyway, she showed it now: either that or else she took a tremendous gamble to save somethin' for herself out of the wreck of Kembri's household. She went to Santil and begged for Elvair's life, and he actually agreed to spare him-I dare say he thought he was hardly worth killin', he was held in such contempt by everyone-provided she took him away somewhere, to the back of beyond.

"And so she did. They raised enough money between them to buy an estate somewhere up by Kabin, and there they are now, as far as I know.",

"Well, I hope they're happy, that's all I've got to say," said Maia. "I always liked Elvair. He was ever so nice to me, and just because he couldn't do that silly fighting-"

"And told everyone he could, and led hundreds of lads to their death," said Occula. "Still, we woan' argue about that, my precious banzi. I'll tell you about another man who's got a nice estate nowadays-Zirek. Santil gave him Enka-Mordet's estate in Chalcon."

"He never!"

"He did. Well, there were no next-of-kin left to inherit, you see, and it needed someone to step in and take over before it all went to pieces. Zirek's married to a Chalcon girl and doin' very nicely, apparently. I can' quite see him runnin' an estate, somehow, can you? But apparently he's thrivin'. He sent me a message-by a pedlar, if you please- sayin' wouldn' I go down there and stay with them? Well, p'raps I will one day, who knows?"

"But what happened when you got back to Bekla?" asked Maia. "To yourself, I mean? Do tell me."

"Oh, to me? Well, it was a bit like you comin' back from the Valderra, only not quite so spectacular, of course. No one knew exactly what had happened, you see. A few people know the name 'Streels'-though it's very unlucky to utter it-but no one really knows what they are, or what happens there. That's why I made you swear, banzi; and I strongly advise you never to break that oath, for your own sake."

"I shan't," said Maia. "Don't worry!"

"Well, anyway: they didn' know what had happened, but they knew I'd put paid to Fornis single-handed, because Zuno told them-that and no more. Santil sent for me and more or less offered me whatever I wanted, within

reason. I said all I wanted were Zai's jewels that Fornis had stolen. The rest I'd do on my own. He gladly gave me all the jewels, every one of them"-Occula touched for a moment the great emerald at her throat-"and then he said that of course I must have a house of my own in the upper city. Well, when I got to thinkin' about it I didn' see why I shouldn'. After all, N'Kasit had got one-and very well-deserved, too, everybody said. Fordil, too, by the way."

"Oh, I'm so glad!" cried Maia. "He was the best of the lot, was old Fordil! If anyone ever deserved honor and glory it was him!" s

"Oh, they come from all over everywhere these days, and pay him thousands to teach them; and he plays for the Thlela, of course. Anyway, Santil did give me a house, and whose d'you think it was? Whose?"

"Never mine?"

Oecuja nodded, smiling. Maia looked at her with tears in her eyes, but whether of joy or sorrow even she herself could not have told.

"You doan' mind, banzi, do you?" asked Occula, with a touch of anxiety.

Maia shook her head. "Does the pantry door still stick? Ogma never could remember to get it fixed. Used to drive me wild, that it did."

"Probably. But tell you the truth, I only lived there until the beginnin' of last Melekril. That was when I joined Shenda and gave up bein' a shearna. We'd both made fortunes, anyway, you see. We're livin' in what used to be Sencho's house: that's a laugh, isn' it? I've changed it completely, of course. You'd hardly recognize it if you went back."

"Oh, do tell me! Every last thing!"

Occula did so, at length and in detail. "Kantza-Merada was still in our old place under the floorboard in the bedroom where we hid her that night-the night of the killin'. Remember?"

Maia nodded. "I'm so glad no one else found her!"

"And I've got Lokris as my saiyett, although, as I said, it's Zuno who really runs the place-specially when we're not there. Only Shenda's been travelin' all over the empire this summer, you see-wherever Santil wants any bar-gainin' or mediatin' done. I rather enjoy it."

"I should just about think you would!" said Maia, re-

calling the triumphant figure riding through the streets that afternoon. "But what about our friends the shearnas, Oc-cula? Do give my love to Nennaunir, won't you? She was always such a good friend to me."

" 'Course I will. She'll be delighted to hear I've seen you again. Well, she's given up bein' a shearna, too, 'cos she married Sednil, you know."

"I always hoped she would. Are they all right?"

"Oh, rather! It was really all along of that four thousand meld you gave the boy for findin' out where your Zen-Kurel had got to. D'you know what he did? He bought himself a share in Sarget's wine business, apd he's never looked back. He's prosperin'."

"Oh, that's just about fine, isn't it? But you mean Sarget really took him-a branded man?"

"Nan told Sarget how unfairly he'd come by the brand: and Sarget said any friend of yours was a friend of his. So you see, banzi, you've gone on doin' good even in your absence. Oh, yes, and that reminds me! Sarget's married Dyphna! What d'you think of that?"

"Dyphna? But Sarget was quite okl-all of forty and more, I reckon! I thought he'd never marry anyone."

"Come right down to it, I think it was the music. Dyphna's got a real feelin' for that, of course. And besides, she's so accomplished and sort of-well, impressive, isn' she? She always put on such a stately sort of act-not like us bouncy girls-you and me, I mean. I think Sarget had come to feel he needed someone classy to match the style of his establishment and do the honors. And I must say she does it very well. Otavis is still in business, though. By Airtha, she's goin' to end up really rich, that girl! She seems to get more beautiful everyday. Theyfairlyfightforher."

"I remember the Belishbans tossing her in a blanket at the barrarz. But Occula, do you know anything about dear old Brero, as used to pull my jekzha? He was always such a good friend."

"You mean senior tryzatt Brero, of the Beklan regiment? Well, do you know, banzi, I never even knew he'd been one of yours! That's because I was shut up in Fornis's house all those months, of course. Never really knew what was goin' on at all; well, only bits here an' there. Everyone who ever made a friend of you ended up lucky, didn'they?"

Suddenly the door opened and Shend-Lador, magnificently dressed in a gold veltron with a scarlet cloak, came

into the room, started to speak to Occula and stopped dead at the sight of Maia.

"Maia! Great Cran, wherever have you sprung from?"

They embraced, Shend-Lador laughing delightedly. He kissed Maia again and again, warmly admired the sleeping Zen-Otal and then inquired after Zen-Kurel (whom he had never met). When he had refilled the goblets and sat down, Maia was obliged to tell her story all over again.

"Poor MerisP'.said Shend-Lador, when she had finished. "But I'm not really surprised. And you say Terebinthia took sixteen thousand meld off you for the boat?"

"Yes, she did. After that I hardly had, anything left, 'cept for my diamonds. But there's no point in getting her into trouble now, Shenda. It's all done and over with."

"Oh, no, Santil wouldn't want to get her into trouble, certainly. But she always was a daylight robber robbing in daylight, and I think it would do her a world of good to have a taste of her own medicine and have to give you back the difference between that and a fair price. What would you say the boat was really worth?"

Maia considered.

"Well, it was a good boat, Shenda. Fact, I'd go so far as to say it was a very good boat. It saved our lives. But it wasn't worth more than eight thousand at the very outside."

Shend-Lador nodded. "Where is your estate-Zen-Kurd's estate? Somewhere up towards the Blue Forest, isn't it?"

Maia told him.

"I'll see you're sent eight thousand meld within the next two months. We won't do anything to Terebinthia, though, so don't worry."

"Eight thousand meld! For me? Oh, Shenda, you are good! Thank you so much! I am grateful!" She kissed him again.

"Sounds as though you could do with it, banzi," said Occula drily.

"Well, 'course I can! What d'you think?"

"What do I think? What do I think?" Occula looked Maia very straight in the eye. "I think, 'Banzi, why doan' you come back?' "

Maia started, looking quickly round at Shend-Lador, who nodded, smiling.

"Come back? Why, whatever d'you mean?"

Occula had risen to her feet and was standing with out-

spread arms. "Bekla's not the same without you, that's what I mean. I'm not the same without you! Lucky, golden Maia! We all miss you; the gods' sweetheart! Your name's still a legend in Bekla and it always will be. They still drink to you and sing songs about you. The Thlela have created one of their sacred dances about your deeds and adventures: did you know that? The best thing that could happen to you and to Bekla would be for you to come back to the city you saved-the city you conquered-the city that's yours by right of the gods!"

Maia stared at her speechlessly. Tears were standing in Occula's eyes.

"Banzi, you doan' look all that well off. D'you think I can't price those clothes you're wearin'-the best clothes you've come up to Keril in? And you're obviously as happy as any steward's wife to be promised eight thousand meld-not that that isn't quite a slice, I'll admit. But the Serrelinda! The sacred luck of the city! A small baron's wife in up-country Katria! You'll end up dull as a cow in afield."

"Why, someone else said that to me once!" said Maia: but she did not say who.

"Is that where you want to live out your life and grow old? Your hands-they look like they did when I first met you in the slave depot at Puhra; when I beat up that bastard Genshed for you. You work along with your women, I'll bet, and more credit to you! But oh, banzi, what a waste! What a terrible waste!"

Still Maia said nothing.

"You could bring your baby, banzi. 'Course you could! And your husband-he was one of Karnat's personal officers, wasn't he? Santil would give him an honorable command and a house in the upper city. He'd be glad to have a man like that. Why doan' you come back?"

Maia took her hands. Every word had sunk into her heart. She recalled Selperron (whose name she had never known) filling her golden jekzha with flowers. She recalled the people cheering, the young armorers jostling for the privilege of helping to pull her up the hill to the Peacock Gate. She saw in her mind's eye the guests crowding forward at the barrarz, and heard again the sound of Fordil's leks and zhuas as she began the senguela in the Barons' Palace. She heard Elvair, yes and Randronoth, crying out So ecstasy in her arms. She saw the Barb glittering in the

summer morning and heard the gongs of the clocks as Ogma prepared her scented bath. She saw, too, her timber manor house in Katria and heard the hands calling to one another in their guttural Chistol as they dispersed after the day's work and Zenka came in to supper.

She put her arms round Occula's neck and kissed her. "Dearest, shall I tell you the truth-the real truth? I honestly and sincerely don't want to come back. It's not the baby, and it's not thinking what Zenka would want. It's truthfully what I want, for my own life. I want to stay as I am. I love it. But don't ask me to explain, 'cos I don't understand myself. Ask Lespa!"

She looked out the window at the sky. "It's late. I'll have to be getting back, dearest. Oh, I have enjoyed it so much! Dear, dear Occula! Cran bless and keep you both! I'll be round early tomorrow to see you again before you leave for Terekenalt."

She picked up Zen-Otal, who stirred, whimpered a moment and then went back to sleep. Occula and Shend-Lador walked downstairs with her, chatting at the door while Florro had the jekzha brought round. In the spring night the town was very quiet. A dog barked, a watchman called from some way off.Maia, gazing up at the clear stars, was already thinking pleasurably of her return home, and of how Zen-Kurel was sure to be looking out for her and would run down to meet her in the lane beside the stream.