Present Tense

40

SMEDLEY CAME DOWN VERY LATE FOR BREAKFAST. HE HAD A SOUR, sandy feeling behind his eyes, and he had cut himself twice while shaving. Worst of all, the underwear he had rinsed out before going to sleep had not dried completely in the night. He would not be able to hire a valet until the war was over. Of more immediate importance were adequate clothing and some fags.

The great Victorian dining table would have seated at least a dozen. Exeter sat alone at it, poring over a thick book propped amid a field of dirty dishes. He looked up wryly.

"Morning,” Smedley grunted.

"Good morning! Beautiful morning! Lovelier now for your presence, of course."

"Put it where the monkey put the nuts. Any tea in the pot?"

Smirking, Exeter removed the cozy and swished the teapot. He removed the lid and peered inside. He pulled a face. “Lots, but I think someone's been washing boots in it."

"Just what I need!” Smedley sat down.

Exeter poured. “The ladies have gone off to shop and call on the erudite Nathaniel Glossop. There's a couple of congealed eggs there and some petrified bacon. I'll warm it up for you—seems there's laws about not wasting food...."

"Just the tea will do, thank you."

Mercifully Exeter said nothing more for a while. He closed his book and carried it out of the room. When he returned without it, though, he was still infernally cheerful. “Looking up Prylis. Not the one I met."

Smedley ended his contemplation of the heap of soggy toast. “Prylis?"

"Chappie who invented the wooden horse. Didn't take out a patent, though, and Odysseus swiped the idea. Probably spoke much better Greek than the one I met. Sure you don't want eggs and bacon?"

"Quite sure."

"We both need our shirts ironed. I'd try it, except I don't know how."

"Me neither,” Smedley lied. To avert further small talk, he said, “Tell me about Olympus."

Exeter crossed his legs and hugged one knee with both hands. He stared for a moment at Smedley with his impossibly blue eyes.

"Told you, old man. It's very much like a station in the colonies somewhere, an outpost of civilization in the bush. The tyikank and entyikank live in nice houses, the natives are the servants. Like Kenya, India, or all those other places. Main difference is the natives are as white as we are. Redheads, most of them. The tyikank are a mixed bunch, but a lot of them are English originally. Recruited here. Some aren't. A couple are from other worlds altogether. Some of them have been on Nextdoor a deuce of a long time, but the Service itself isn't all that old. The guv'nor was one of the founders."

"But what do they do?"

"Argue. Plan. Squabble. Go out on missionary work.” Exeter continued to study Smedley as if watching his brain cells twitch. His own face was illegible as the Sphinx. “One committee's still working on the True Gospel. Another runs an intelligence branch, tracking what's going on—politically and theosophically both. Anything that may help overthrow the Pentatheon."

That steady gaze was starting to get under Smedley's skin. “You make it sound as if you don't approve."

"Oh, it's a wonderful idea. A worthy cause. The strangers are definitely parasites. Some of them do a little bit of good in passing, like Tion and his festivals. A lot of them are ... well, horrors."

Smedley poured another cup of tanning fluid. “I suppose if you're going to live forever you don't rush at the hedges?” He looked up, and the blue eyes were still boring into him. “If it's such a wonderful idea, why are you being so shifty about it?"

Exeter sighed, put his foot back on the floor, and turned to stare out the window. “It's just not that simple, old man. It's not like Dr. Livingstone and the witch doctors. It's not Saint Eggbeater burning down the druids’ grove. These Johnnies have power! Real power. Start blaspheming in their temples and you're liable to drop dead. Nothing like a public thunderbolt to impress the masses—and then the mana just pours in to replace what's been spent."

"So start a new religion, a good one! You mentioned a Church of the Undivided. The Service is behind it?"

"It is the Service. The trouble is that the old gods have cornered the market. Say you find yourself a node—there's still good ones around—and you set up a new god, then you get asked what is he the god of? Anything worthwhile will have its own divinity already, and he or she will be an avatar of one of the Five. The Pentatheon have all bets covered. Even the Undivided tends to get identified with Visek, the Parent, so the mana benefits them ... him? Her? Visek's sort of androgynous.... Visek hasn't taken sides yet. I think the Service does him more good than harm. More good than they want to, certainly."

It was definitely not the right time of day for riddles, but Smedley had started this. And he did want to know more about Olympus and the Service. If he didn't find out from Exeter now, he would probably never have another chance. Who could resist the chance to learn about an alternative world?

Or was he just looking for a cause?

"You said some of the gods—strangers—some of them are all-right types?"

"A few.” Exeter began fiddling with a spoon, drawing lines on the tablecloth. “A few are secretly Service supporters. Lukewarm, mostly. Fence-sitters. One or two have converted, but not many have got away with it."

"Converted?"

"Mm. Like the Irish goddess Bríg, who became Saint Bridget. Or Cybele becoming the Black Madonna—back in the Dark Ages, scores of pagan deities became Christian saints. But in the Vales they're all vassals of the Five. If Tion, say, catches one of his minions consorting with the enemy, then he is seriously peeved."

"If Christianity did it in Europe, then why not try Christianity on Next-door?"

Exeter looked up with a smile. “And where exactly is Jerusalem? Who did you say these Romans were? Egypt? The Red Sea? I've been on the other side of this conversation a few times. What I got told then was that one big advantage Christianity had over the pagan gods was that it had a real historical basis, instead of just myth. But that's in this world. On Next-door it isn't."

"So what is the Church of the Undivided?"

"A hodgepodge. A Unitarian concoction of ethics and morals: Christian, Socratic, Buddhist, et cetera—the Golden Rule plus a universal god too holy to be named. That's an attempt to shut out Visek. As I said, that doesn't seem to work awfully well. It's a frightfully antiseptic sort of religion. No passion, you know?"

Smedley reached for toast and butter. “You're saying there's really nothing you can do, then?"

Exeter sighed. “There's nothing I can do, no. I'm branded as the Liberator and anything I tried to do would be warped by the prophecy and lead to killing Zath. That brings on catastrophe."

"Why?"

Exeter looked irritated. “You'll see if you just think about how it would have to be done. It would need an enormous amount of mana. How do I get that? What would I have to become?"

Yes, Julian should have seen that. If Exeter had invented all of this, he must have spent a lot of time working out the details. It was as logical as whist. “You'd have to start playing by their rules, you mean?"

"Playing their game. That's why I shan't ever go back there. As to whether there's anything you can do, old man ... you want to try?"

Smedley was not ready to face that question yet, but his pulse rate had jumped a fraction. “I'm asking what the Service can do."

"Keep trying and hoping.” Exeter's eyes were gleaming. Was he poking fun at the Service? Or at Smedley, for believing this fantasy? Or was he a supporter, coolly understating his enthusiasm? No way to tell, with him.

"But not praying? How do the faithful pray to a nameless god?"

"The whole point is that they don't. They pray to the apostles to intercede for them, because only the apostles can speak to the god. The apostles are not gods themselves, because he's Undivided; they're just the Chosen. Strangers from Olympus, of course.” Exeter smiled wryly. “The Service doesn't have the manpower to put a missionary in every pot, but they do try to have someone drop by every couple of fortnights. You understand why they have to do it that way?"

"So everybody shares in the mana? Does that work?"

"It works after a fashion. A chicken sacrificed to the Undivided in Joal, say, will not provide the Service with anything like the mana it would give Astina if it died to her glory in her temple there. Mana will flow between nodes, but there's a lot of steam leaks out. No other reason?"

Then he raised a quizzical eyebrow and waited.

Smedley began to feel nettled. “You're three years ahead of me and it's too early in the morning."

Exeter laughed, taking pity on him. “Right-oh! The real problem, my boy, it that we're all human. The reason the apostles are set up as a sort of nameless divine committee is that power corrupts, as Alice said the other night. The Service has had agents go over to the other side. They discover what they can do with mana and they like it. Set a chap up in his own chapel and pretty soon he begins to feel like it's his chapel, and these are his people. Sooner or later one of the Five will send a henchman around. Some of our chaps sell out. There was an Italian named Giovani who became Jovanee Karzon, god of wagons. All the best attributes have been taken, but there's always room for more. Did you know the Romans had a patron goddess of the-light-in-rooms-where-women-are-giving-birth?"

"No,” Smedley said grumpily, thinking that he did not want to. Having buttered the toast, he supposed he had better eat the horrid stuff. “You're saying it's hopeless?"

"No. Here's what I think, on the level: It may work! They may overthrow the Pentatheon. They're not fools, they're dedicated and wellmeaning, all of them. But it's going to be a long, long struggle. Two or three hundred years at the least. Christianity took longer. Islam was faster, but more brutal. If you think of mana as being like money, then the Five are stinking rich and getting richer. The Undivided is scratching for crumbs...."

The doorbell rang.

The two exchanged glances. Then Exeter pushed back his chair and stood up tall. He adjusted his tie and straightened his jacket. “That may just be the Women's Institute soliciting contributions for the church fete. Or it may not be.” He strode out, closing the door.

Smedley continued to masticate long-dead toast. Why was he so fascinated by the idea of Olympus? Was he just trying to flee from reality—the war, his mutilation, lost friends, the changed face of England? If he nurtured secret fancies of magic giving him his hand back, then he was seriously bonkers. Cold logic said he should not make any decisions yet, not for a long time. On the other hand, his nerves were improving. He had not wept since leaving Staffles. Dreaming of Olympus and Exeter's fantasy world was probably a lot healthier for him at the moment than brooding over his own reality. He had always been too prone to introspection.

He heard voices as the door began to open.

"I'll put the kettle on, then. You go in."

In came portly Ginger Jones, attempting to polish his pince-nez with a silk handkerchief and keep hold of a pair of bicycle clips at the same time. He looked hot. “Morning, Captain!"

"Morning, sir. Any news?"

Ginger put his specs on his nose, his handkerchief in one pocket, and his bicycle clips in another. “No. Oh ... thought you might need these.” From yet another pocket, he produced two packets of Player's.

Smedley's heart melted. “May you be blessed with many sons and your herds prosper!” He fumbled for matches.

"Lord, how would I explain that to the Head?” Ginger sat down chuckling. “Thought I'd drop over and hear some more of the Exeter-Through-the-Looking-Glass saga.” He glanced up as the man in question returned. “I posted your letter. Caught the evening collection, too."

"So it should arrive today,” Smedley said, “if it is going to arrive?"

Exeter sat down. “If it's going to arrive, then it has already arrived. It wouldn't even hit the bottom of the pillar-box. It would go straight to somebody's desk."

The others each waited for the other to comment. Eventually Ginger said, “Explain that, would you?"

"I can't. The magic may have been removed, since it does no good now, or it may be still there. But when I was a kid at Fallow and Head Office were keeping an eye on me, then the letters I put in that box went straight to them. I hope there was a spell invoked by that address written in my handwriting. I may be wrong—there may have been a guardian living in the neighborhood, in which case he or she will likely have gone now. I think Creighton would have told me if there had been, but I don't know. Told you it was a long shot.” He shrugged.

"Indeed!” Ginger muttered. “I'm trying to remember if I heard the letter drop."

Smedley did want to believe. “It's rather like the portal idea, two worlds touching at a point."

"Mana can certainly be used to warp space,” Exeter said, “especially on nodes. The inside of Krobidirkin's tent was bigger than the outside."

"Wonderful idea for luggage."

"Or blocks of flats.” He grinned. “Imagine the rent you'd collect! You remember that business with the long strip of paper you give a twist to and then paste...?"

"Möbius strip?"

"Probably. Sounds right. Old Flora-Dora spent half a term trying to get the idea into my skull. All I remember now is that you start at a point and go all the way round, and when you come back you're on the wrong side. It gave me nightmares. Now the chappie Prylis I mentioned last night had a library, a corridor lined with books. At the end you turned right, and there was another corridor lined with books. At the end of that you turned right again. You went around and around in a square—round and round and round, and you never came back to where you started. All the windows had a north view. This was all behind the church, and yet there was nothing there."

"I hadn't thought of the Fallow postbox in quite that way,” Ginger said. “No use taking it apart to look?"

"None. The question is,” Exeter added, “if it works as I hope it does, then whose desk does it lead to? Head Office or the Blighters? I warn you—this may turn out to be a jolly interesting day."

41

GOLBFISH MOVED THE ARMY OUT AT DAWN. HE DID NOT LIKE DOING so, but the Liberator's orders had been explicit. No one demanded to know why he and not D'ward was setting up the order of march; among five thousand men, the commander's absence would not be noticed for a while yet.

Golbfish himself stayed near the front with Kolgan at his side. The big man's sword arm was in a sling, his face haggard with pain. When the inevitable battle came, he would not be able to fight. If the gods were merciful and the army miraculously won its way home to Joal, he would certainly be put on trial before the People's Assembly. The verdict and sentence could never be in doubt. His beard showed more white than red now.

Food supply was becoming critical. Armies usually went marauding in the autumn, when harvests still filled the barns; no sane infantry ever went anywhere without cavalry to support it. Even Golbfish knew that. Plumes of dust in the distance showed where the Thargian scouts were tracking the invaders and watching their progress. The enemy had mobility—if the Joalians turned aside to pillage, the livestock was removed and the stores destroyed long before men on foot could reach them.

"Why don't they attack?” Kolgan demanded more than once. It was all he ever spoke of. “Why don't they harass us? Why not molest our patrols? Why are they letting us go?"

To that paradox there was no answer. At first the enemy had picked off Joalians whenever they could and left Nagians alone. Now they ignored Joalians also, not meddling even with small bands. All they did was ravage their own land, then stand aside to let the invaders pass. No people should behave like that, least of all the proud and warlike Thargians.

Around mid-morning, the road crested a height of land. Golbfish paused a moment or two to look back at the weary multitude trailing behind him. “It shows already,” he muttered.

"What does?” growled Kolgan.

"Yesterday they sang as they marched. Today they're not singing. They're slouching and straggling more than marching."

"They're hungry.” Kolgan turned away. Golbfish stayed to watch a little longer, but then he too resumed the journey. Yes, lack of food was a major problem, but lack of D'ward was a greater one. The army might not be aware yet that he was absent, but it was missing him.

The road curved down into a wide valley, but instead of crossing the river, it turned to the north and headed straight toward Thargwall. Consulting his maps as he marched, Golbfish concluded that the river must be Saltorwater; a conspicuous notch in the peaks probably marked Saltorpass itself. If the army could cross over that and reenter Lemodvale, then there was some hope of Joalian reinforcements coming to the rescue. Unless his slimy half brother had changed sides already, Joalia must still hold Nagvale and probably Siopass.

But Saltorpass was the first problem and a perfect site for an ambush. Thargia was in a much better position to bring up reinforcements than Joalia was. If Golbfish were running the Thargian campaign, he would let the invaders into the pass and then bottle them up from both ends. A few days’ starvation would force complete surrender, which would yield the maximum harvest of slaves. Golbfish was certainly not running the Thargian campaign, and the men who were might prefer a more violent ending, with Saltorwater running red. That would be more Thargian, more traditional.

The valley was wide and relatively treeless, the fields divided by unmortared stone walls. Here and there, ruined farms still smoked, but the people and their livestock had gone. The only consolation Golbfish could find in the situation was that his right flank was now protected by a raging milky torrent. He withdrew the patrols from that side and spread others farther to the left, but he sensed the jaws of a trap closing around him. He was hungrier than he had ever been in his life.

Wherever D'ward was, he would not be able to rejoin the army until darkness shrouded this barren landscape. He had said he would return, and he had meant what he said, but Golbfish could not help but wonder if the Liberator had gone to meet his ordained destiny elsewhere.

About noon, patrols signaled enemy activity to the north. Shortly after that, forces could be seen gathering on the height of land to the west. There was a lot of dust to the south, too.

The herald came in the middle of the afternoon, and he came from the south. By then every man in the army knew it was surrounded. He was a welcome sight, so he was allowed to pass unmolested. Talking would at least put off the battle for a while. Riding a white moa and bearing a flag of truce, he raced along the columns, being waved forward with no worse abuse than jeering and insults. Undoubtedly he was counting and assessing as he came. He would not be much impressed by that footsore, bedraggled array. Joalians had lost their shiny smartness; Nagians were no longer painted savages. They had merged into a hungry, hopeless rabble.

Advised of the herald's coming, Golbfish hurriedly summoned a few of the closer troopleaders to form a retinue. The Liberator's absence was obvious now. They growled mutinously when he refused to explain. He had no time to explain and no explanation that he was willing to give them anyway. Kolgan sneered in the background, saying nothing to help. D'ward had left Golbfish in charge and Kolgan knew that, but Joalians found loyalty an elusive concept. The Thargians would insist on dealing with a Joalian, so Kolgan was going to be battlemaster again by the end of the negotiations.

What was there to negotiate, though?

Shogby?

Centuries ago—according to a legend that the Thargians insisted was vile slander—they had surrounded a Randorian army at Shogby and had offered mercy. If one quarter of the invaders would surrender and go voluntarily as slaves to the silver mines, they had said, the remainder would be allowed to depart unharmed. After long debate, the Randorians had accepted, drawing lots among themselves to select the sacrificial victims. The next day the Thargians had surrounded the departing three quarters and offered the same terms again.

The first ice of winter and the word of a Thargian, said the proverb.

The herald reined in before the leaders. His ceremonial whites were drab with dust, his mount was labored and steaming, but he stared down from its back with predictable arrogance and the traditional sneer of his craft.

"I come in the name of Holy D'ward!"

Not the Liberator—D'ward Tion, god of heralds. His ritual was brief and to the point. He leaned down, holding out a leather bag. Golbfish dropped a silver coin in it. The herald shook it to demonstrate that there were now two coins in there and that he was therefore bound equally to both sides. He straightened up and came right to business.

"I bring terms from the ephors to your commander."

Golbfish held a spear and shield, wore a loincloth. At his side, Kolgan was clad in Joalian armor and helmet. Around them stood the motley retinue of both peoples, most wearing a random assortment of garb and weapons so that their individual races were not immediately evident—but the herald's gaze was fixed on Golbfish alone.

That was odd. No, that was bad. It probably meant that the Liberator had been captured and interrogated. But apparently the envoy wanted to deal with Golbfish, and D'ward had left him in charge. His childhood ambition, he recalled, had been to write great poetry. “I am leader. Speak and be brief."

The herald's grim smile implied that there was very little to argue about. “The noble Ephors Grarknog and Psaamb send these words: They have twice your number at your rear. Your flank is held by an army little smaller. The noble Ephor Gizmok blocks the pass ahead with a force greater than any I have yet named. The ephors would—"

"That's good!” Golbfish barked. “Glad to hear it. We have been getting very bored lately.” His companions laughed on cue. The sound was brittle.

"The ephors would meet with you at sunset. In—"

"The usual Shogby terms, I presume?"

The herald scowled. “Will you hear my message or not?"

"If you will stop insulting my intelligence I will give you a few more minutes.” Being deliberately rude was a new experience and quite enjoyable.

"Then hear. In token of their good faith, the noble ephors have refrained from attacking your men these past several days, as you must know. Moreover, they have now halted all movement of their forces and will not advance farther until after the parley. They point out that you are totally at their mercy. Nevertheless they wish to offer you terms."

"Women chatter, men act. Tell them to write their terms on their swords and deliver them in person.” Golbfish gestured dismissal and started to turn away.

"They will offer safe passage for all your men, back to Joaldom!"

Golbfish returned to his previous orientation. He was ignorant of military matters, but he did know history and he did know politics. He also knew how the haughty Thargians must feel about the presence of invaders within their home vale. Nothing in the world would persuade the ephors to let them escape scot-free.

"Oh, begone!” he shouted. “You foul the air with your lies and posturings."

"You will not even agree to a parley?"

"I have better things to do with my time than talk about Shogby!” Golbfish was amused how airily he threw that mortal insult at a Thargian warrior. Even a lifelong coward could be assertive when he had an army at his back. “Go tell the Milogians of mercy!"

That was worse. The herald's pallor showed even under the road dust. “You may yet suffer the fate of the Milogians!” His voice croaked with fury.

Golbfish had run out of insults. “Begone!” Again he started to turn away.

"Hear me out!” the herald yelled. “The ephors will come in person to your camp. They will bring with them the Most Holy K'tain Highpriest, primate of all Thargia.” He swallowed as if the next part was going to taste ever worse. “In support of the terms they will offer, the ephors will furnish whatever hostages you demand, including their own sons if necessary."

Golbfish realized his mouth was hanging open and closed it quickly. He glanced at his companions and wondered inanely why he had not heard the clatter of jaws dropping all around him. “Ah ... That's all?"

The herald shuddered. “Could there be more? In all our great history, no such offer has ever been made to an enemy of Thargia. I agreed to deliver it only on condition that my tongue will be cut out when I have returned with your answer. This has been promised me."

Golbfish looked at Kolgan, but the Joalian seemed to be too shocked to speak. He felt little better himself. Even if this was all a trick, merely to make such an offer should be suicidal humiliation for the ephors.

"Why?” he demanded of the herald. “Your words are beyond belief. You claim to have us at your mercy and then throw yourselves at our feet? You will have to explain, or I must assume that Thargians have merely discovered humor."

The man wiped his forehead, where sweat had turned the dust to mud. “I have exceeded my mandate. Pray ignore what I said about tongues. Grant me your answer."

"At sunset ... within our camp ... How many?"

"I am to ask for twelve, but accept fewer if necessary."

Either the herald was insane, or Golbfish himself was. He made the stiffest demand he could imagine. “You will deliver fifty fat bullocks to our lines within the hour. Your forces will hold their present positions. At sunset you may send just five suppliants—two ephors with one son apiece, plus the priest. Unarmed, on foot, in civilian clothes."

An army crushed by defeat would have howled at such humiliation, but the herald barely hesitated. “You are leader of the Nagians and you grant them safe conduct upon your personal honor?"

Odder yet! Why had the man been told to make that strange stipulation? Why Nagians, when the Joalians were the real enemy?

Then Golbfish realized what was different this time, what was warping warfare, history, religion, and politics into this nightmare tangle. He licked his lips to hide a sudden smile. “I am leader of the Nagians and the Joalians both, and I grant safe conduct upon my honor."

"Then it is agreed! The curse of Holy D'ward to Eternity upon him who says otherwise."

The herald wheeled his moa and flashed away like a leaf in a whirlwind. He was only a speck on the horizon by the time Golbfish emerged from a screaming, cheering riot of Joalians and Nagians. They were clapping him on the back and pumping his hand; they were hugging him and kissing him.

Nobody, they exulted, had ever humbled a Thargian emissary like that. Never. Fat bullocks within the hour? Ephors unarmed and on foot! Ephors surrendering their sons? In the end he was hoisted shoulder-high and paraded through the army as his feat was shouted from troop to troop. They seemed to believe that he had suddenly become a military genius. He found it amusing. He knew D'ward would, if he were there.

He did not try to explain to them. The herald had spoken with the leader of the Nagians. The Thargians thought they were dealing with the Liberator. What was going to happen when they discovered their error?

42

"THAT'S IT!” EDWARD SAID. “HARROW HILL! WHAT ELSE?” HE jabbed a finger at the map and looked up, beaming triumphantly.

Alice doubted things could be so easy. “They show standing stones there,” she agreed, peering. “Why Harrow?"

"Anglo-Saxon. Hearh meant a hilltop sanctuary."

"Is there any language you can't speak?” Julian demanded.

"Chinese. And I'm not much good in Thargian. You need a sandpaper throat to pronounce it. But this looks right, and here's the village where we met the Gypsies—Vicarsdown. See the meadow by the river? It all fits."

The five of them were gathered around Mrs. Bodgley's dining room table, examining the maps Mr. Glossop had provided. He had also sent a list of half a dozen megalithic sites around Greyfriars, but obviously Edward was already convinced he had found the one he wanted.

Alice distrusted enthusiasm. “Second choice, just in case?” she asked. Harrow Hill was only nine or ten miles from the Dower House, so she could guess what was going to happen this afternoon.

She had had a busy morning, visiting old Glossop with Mrs. Bodgley and then shopping in Greyfriars. The town itself had not changed in three years, but the effects of the war had been depressingly obvious. That a wealthy lady would have to fetch her own groceries instead of having them delivered—that had been one big difference. The eerie scarcity of young men had been another. Not that their absence had been all bad. Buying men's underwear in Wickenden Bros. Gentlemen's Outfitters might have been a lot more embarrassing had the clerk not been a woman.

Edward completed his survey of the list and shook his head. “Looks like Harrow Hill or nothing. We can run over there after lunch. It's a lovely day."

"Is old Elspeth up to another outing?” Smedley asked.

Mrs. Bodgley shook her head. “Better not. Her wind isn't what it used to be. Mr. Glossop allowed us to borrow his bicycle, though. It's a lady's model of unimpeachable antiquity, but if you don't mind being seen on it, Edward, it should take you there and back."

"I don't mind being seen. Being noticed might be sticky. Running into old Inspector Leatherdale, for example."

"Why don't you take my bike?” Ginger suggested. “Miss Prescott will doubtless be pleased to accompany you.” His expression was unreadable, light reflecting off his pince-nez.

About to suggest that Julian go in her place, Alice caught herself in the nick of time. She had not brought any clothes suitable for cycling, but Edward was beaming at the prospect. “I'd love to,” she agreed. “Very kind of you."

"Then that's settled!” Mrs. Bodgley said heartily.

"Ripping!” Then Edward frowned. “One thing, though ... we shall have to take an offering."

The lady blinked. “What sort of offering? Kill a white lamb, you mean? Or a five-bob note?"

"Something significant.” He looked apologetically at Alice. He was flat broke, of course.

"I think I may have something.” Mrs. Bodgley swept from the room.

An awkward silence remained. This was the twentieth century. Pagan gods were a permissible subject for conversation, but actually making sacrifice to one would be behavior beyond the bizarre.

"Blood, of course,” Edward muttered, “but it would be more fitting to have brought something tangible in this case, I think...."

Alice decided that blood sacrifice was out of the question. She could not possibly summon up enough faith ... which was the whole point, presumably. Half a crown in the plate was as far as she would go for a pre-Christian woodland numen.

Mrs. Bodgley sailed back in majestically. “I presume you can deliver an offering from me, on your behalf?” She might have been referring to the church jumble sale.

"Certainly."

"Then take this to your, ah, associate.” She handed Edward a small silver tankard. “Timothy's christening mug. As a token of my gratitude for his helping my son's friend. And this ... I gave you this once, so it is yours, but it still has Timothy's name on the flyleaf and Inspector Leatherdale returned it to me. It has no real value, yet I expect it could be termed significant under the circumstances."

Edward took the book and glanced at the title. Then he blinked several times and swallowed, at a loss for words. Eventually he mumbled, “Thank you very much. It's a wonderful choice."

Alice looked away. Probably they all did, for nobody said any more. The English were never very good at dealing with emotion.

It was indeed a lovely day. Mr. Glossop's bicycle was Jacobean, or even Elizabethan, with a pedal brake and a flint saddle; but it worked. Despite a niggling worry that her skirts would catch in the chain, Alice realized that she was going to enjoy this outing. Three days ago she had believed her cousin dead, and here she was cycling along a country lane with him, under beeches and elms just starting to blush with autumn. Wild roses and chestnut trees were laden with fruit.

In the Grange park, the sheep had been herded aside, and the convalescents were indulging in a strange sort of cricket match. With half the players in bandages or even casts, the rules must have been specially devised. She turned her mind from them; she wanted to forget the war today.

"England!” Edward sighed.

"Are the Vales comparable?"

He pulled a face, as if that was the problem he wanted to forget, but he answered. “Not many. Thargland comes close. The colors! I suppose a blue and purple forest sounds grotesque, but it has its own beauty."

A hill intervened then, and they concentrated on pedaling. As they started downhill, Alice put her doubts into words.

"Edward? This is fun. I am enjoying it, but are you seriously promising to introduce me to a genuine woodland spirit? Human originally but from another world and endowed with magical powers? Centuries old? I must admit—"

"No. Probably not. If we went at night, perhaps, but he's very shy. I don't think he'll appear in ."

That was a relief. “So what are you hoping to achieve? What will you do, actually?"

"Pray,” he said solemnly. “Thank him again for what he did for me three years ago. Leave the offerings, explain that I need to send a message to Head Office. Tell him the message, probably, and just ask him to pass it on. That's all."

Even that sounded weird. With almost anyone else, she would have wondered about sanity; she would have suspected obsessions or just tomfoolery, but Edward had never been a leg-puller. Even as a boy, he had been trustworthy.

"So how will you know if you've been heard?"

"I think I'll know."

And then he would set off to wangle his way into the Army! She did not want to think about that. Why fight for a homeland that wanted to hang you? A hay wagon loomed in the road ahead, rumbling along behind a solitary horse. They pulled out to pass it and started up another slope. On either hand the fields were golden.

"You can't predict strangers,” Edward said. “They don't face early death as we do. Their viewpoint is so different...."

"How many have you met?” she asked. “Just Puck in this world, but how many on Nextdoor?"

"Four or five. That's if you don't count the Service people, of course. Most of them haven't been strangers long enough to lose their humanity. They're communal, too. That helps. The god types are solitary."

"Skulking on their nodes like spiders in a web?"

"Exactly! Well put. Mad as March hares, a lot of ‘em. But charming! They all have charisma, you see, so you can't ever dislike them."

He frowned at some memory or other and fell silent.

She prompted. “Tion and the herder one?"

"Tion and Krobidirkin. Then Prylis—delightful, entertaining, and a thoroughgoing rotter!"

Intrigued, Alice said, “In what way?"

Edward pedaled in sulky silence for a while. “I suppose I shouldn't judge him,” he said—but so reluctantly that he obviously did. “He was just playing the Great Game as he thought it should be played, and he did save my life because of it. A real Zath hater."

More silence.

"Tell me about him."

"Prylis? He's one of Tion's minions, god of learning. Originally he was from somewhere in Macedonia, I think. Don't know exactly when. His ideas of history and geography never seemed to match mine. He was delighted to have a visitor from his old world, more or less. The last one had brought him up to date with current affairs at the time of Charlemagne. We talked in a wild mixture of Greek and Thargian and Joalian, but his Joalian was centuries old, and whenever he got excited his Macedonian and Thargian accents combined to make him completely incomprehensible. He had more books than the British Museum."

It was not like Edward to hold a grudge, and he was not explaining this one.

"He sounds no worse than eccentric."

"Oh, he was personable enough—and knowledgeable, as you'd expect in a god of learning. He showed me maps of the Vales, he talked of the lands outside—deserts to the southeast and Fashranpil, the Great Ice, to the north. There are jungles west and south, with travelers bringing back tantalizing hints of salt water beyond, but even Prylis can't tell if it's an ocean or a closed sea. There's a trickle of trade goods coming across the desert: sapphires and spices, carved onyx and amber, but nobody knows who or where they come from.

"He spilled out centuries of history for me, biographies of gods, legends and beliefs, great poets and great art, politics and customs. I learned more about the Vales in those two days than I had in the previous year. Just about anything I wanted to know he could tell me ... except where Olympus was, oddly enough. The Service wasn't in his books and didn't interest him. Reforms had been tried before, he said, and he quoted some examples, but whenever they became a serious nuisance the Five just took them over or stamped them out. But the quirks of the Vales and the vagaries of its peoples ... anything I wanted to ask he would answer. Thargvale wasn't such a crazy place to put a temple of learning as it seemed. Thargians are Philistines who care about little except war, but they're usually strong enough to keep the war in other people's vales. Prylis had been left undisturbed for centuries. By arriving with an army, I'd earned a spot in the history books already, just out of ignorance. Lovers of learning shouldn't mind the pilgrimage to his digs anyway, he said, which was true enough. He did have humor! We sat up all the first night, talked all day, two days. He charmed me, beguiled me."

Edward scowled darkly. “He kept me from my duty."

Ah! That was the crime he could not forgive.

43

BEING TOUGH HAD ITS LIMITS AND DOSH HAD REACHED THEM. HE HAD reached them once or twice before in his life, but never so convincingly. Dibber Troopleader and his sadists had enjoyed themselves very expertly under the guise of questioning him, and then the ride on the moa had completed the job. He remembered bringing D'ward to the temple, but that fulfillment had released the compulsion the god had put on him. After that, not much registered for a while.

He could recall being carried somewhere and laid on a bed. A wizened old man who must have been the house leech had tended him, strapping up his broken ribs, poulticing his well-kicked knees, salving his abrasions, dosing him with sour-tasting potions to ease the agony in his belly. Mercifully, he had slept after that.

He had awakened in confusion and a great deal of pain. Sunlight trickling through a high grating had revealed rough stone walls, bare floor, and a few dry sticks of furniture. For a long time Dosh had just lain on the boardlike bed, not daring to move a single tortured muscle and unable to hazard a guess as to where he was. Then the old man had come back and insisted on fussing with bandages; but after that he had spooned warm broth into the patient, which had been welcome. The man's yellow robe had reminded Dosh of where he was, but he had asked no questions. He was too weak to do anything about the answers.

He had slept again, wakened in darkness, slept more.

The next time he was conscious, a boy was standing over him, frowning. Good-looking lad, er, lass. It was Ysian in a skimpy tunic, standard male attire in Thargland. Women wore long skirts, which in Ysian's case would be a shame.

"Good morning,” he muttered. His lips hurt. Everything hurt. He was afraid if he moved a finger he would start having cramps, and that would be disaster.

"It's afternoon."

"How long have we been here?"

"All yesterday."

"What's Ksargirk Captain doing?” A good commander always thinks of his men, especially Progyurg Lancer.

"They've all gone. The abbot sent them away."

"What right does he have?"

"He said the god told him to."

"Oh. Where's D'ward?"

"I don't know! He went through that door and disappeared. The abbot says he is with the god and not to worry."

Obviously she was worrying, though. The army would be a long way off by now, and the moas gone. Didn't matter about the army, Dosh thought. Much safer away from the army. His job was to keep watch on the Liberator, not the army.

In a startling flash, he remembered that his job was over. He was no longer bound to report to Tion, that unspeakable ... Words failed him, thoughts failed him, hatred choked him when he tried to think of Tion. Prylis had removed Tion's binding. So Dosh was a free man again, for as long as he could stay out of the god's clutches. He had never been a free man before. Was he free now, for the first time in his life? The Liberator...

"What's wrong?” Ysian demanded.

"Not much, except I'm one big bruise. I have to get up. Don't be alarmed if I scream."

"I'll help you."

"I'd rather do it at my own speed.” He flexed an arm. Ouch! “So are you having fun?"

"What does that mean?” she snapped.

"You're the only woman in the place, aren't you?"

"Sh! I told them my name was Tysian. They think I'm a boy."

He tried the other arm. Worse. “Do they? Do they really?” Could even monks be in doubt about those legs?

"Well, I think one or two suspect, but they're very kind."

"Mm? Found any good-looking young novices?"

Ysian said, “Oh, you're horrible! Don't you ever think of anything else?"

"Not unless I have to. Have you even looked?"

Without a word, she spun around and left. She slammed the door behind her.

Pity. He had been going to ask her to send them his way.

Ironically, the young novice who came to feed the invalid shortly thereafter was a very good-looking youth indeed, which was not unexpected in a devotee of Tion's. He showed no personal interest in Dosh, and while teasing Ysian was possible, Dosh in his present condition dared not venture advances that might be taken seriously. He felt quite disappointed in himself. He dozed off the moment he finished the meal.

The ensuing night was long, broken by sleepy thinking-times into several nights, end to end. He thought a lot about this strange notion of freedom and what it might be good for. He had had many masters before Tion—mortals all, but masters—plus a very few mistresses. He must have been about ten or so when his father sold him to Kramthin Clockmaker. He could still recall his joy when he learned that he would be able to stay in Kramthin's warm, comfortable house, eating fine food, never being hungry. What Kramthin had required of him in return had been much less unpleasant than his father's drunken beatings. Kramthin had been the first. Dosh had been traded a few times and then decided to handle his own affairs thereafter. Whenever he had tired of one master, he had just run away and found another. They had not owned him in law, for only Thargia of all the lands in the Vales permitted slavery, and he had stayed away from Thargland until now. They had not bound him as Tion had. He had bound himself to them voluntarily, for food and shelter and affection.

The last of his masters, Prithose Connoisseur, had gone visiting Suss to enjoy the artistic offerings at Tion's Festival. He had entered Dosh in the contest for the gold rose, much as a breeder might enter livestock in a show. Dosh had been seventeen. He had won the prize easily and apparently that prize had made him Tion's own prize. Three years missing ... What had he been during those three years? Servant? Plaything? Wallpaper?

Prylis had broken Tion's spell. Would he impose one of his own, and turn Dosh into a monk, copying manuscripts to the end of his days? Would he return him to Tion? Or was Dosh now a free man for the first time in his life? Could he survive without a master?

At some later point in the night, his mind returned to the problem. All men but kings served other men, for that was the way of the world. The talent that had supported him until had become a doubtful commodity when Tarion ripped up his face. Copy manuscripts? Dig and reap?

Chastity or monogamy? Fun though lechery undoubtedly was, it had brought him more than his share of grief. D'ward seemed to get by without it at all. That was going too far in the opposite direction, much too far, but perhaps Dosh ought to introduce a little moderation into his life.

Who—him? Honest labor? Nothing like a few aches to bring on repentance, he decided. In a day or two he would be his old self. He went back to sleep.

44

THE NEXT TIME HE AWOKE THERE WAS LIGHT BEHIND THE GRATING and birds were creating a damnable racket outside. Dawn. What morning? It had been Heelday when he first came to the monastery. Had it been Ankleday when Ysian came? This must be Shinday at the least. The army was either well out of Thargland by now or all dead. If the gods dispensed justice, though, ex-troopleader Dibber and his bullyboys were just settling in to a long, hard lifetime in the silver mines.

Dosh stretched. He sat up with a jerk. He fingered his ribs and detected only a trace of soreness under the bandages. He pulled down the blanket and looked at his knees. Not a mark. Not one bruise on him. His fingertips went to his face. It was smooth.

He leaned his chin on his arms and pondered. In among the litter of forgotten dreams, he found vague memories of voices in the night. Two men? He was able to raise no details, but he knew who one of them must have been, and could guess at the other. Well! So what about breakfast?

He swung his feet to the floor and saw that someone had been leaving him presents: on the solitary chair lay a brown Thargian tunic, a sword, sandals, a belt pouch with an intriguing jingle. The sword annoyed him, but he knew that Thargian law required freemen to go armed. He had no skill or experience with a sword. His weapon of choice was the concealed knife. He was quite good with that.

He had just finished counting the money—sixteen silver marks—when the door creaked open and a Thargian stalked in. No, it was D'ward, with his face clean shaven and his hair cut short, wearing a tunic and a sword. He even had the mean Thargian scowl—or at least an icy glitter in his eyes. When he saw that Dosh was awake, it thawed a little.

"Sleep well? Feeling better?"

"Did you come calling in the night?"

"Yes."

"With a friend?"

The angry glint returned. “You could call him that. I ... He paid you for services rendered."

"I'd better go and thank him, I suppose."

"I suppose so too, but don't make an epic of it. Some merchant's just donated a very rare book to the temple, so the god is undoubtedly too engrossed to hear you. We're not wanted in the refectory for the same reason—the abbot's entertaining the wealthy gent, trying to squeeze an endowment out of him to enlarge the scriptorium. There's grub in the kitchens, cold water in the washhouse. You'd better shave off your beard if you want to pass as a local. Prylis removed your scars. I expect you'll want to thank him for that, too.” He turned to the door.

Too much too soon! “Wait a minute!” Dosh caught his breath. It sounded as if D'ward was extremely knowledgeable about the workings of the monastery and the habits of the resident deity. What had been happening? “Where are we going?"

D'ward drummed fingers on the door before he looked around. “I know where I'm going. You can please your own sweet self, as far as I care. Pick a direction and start walking. If you want to come with me, we can chat on the way, but I won't loiter. I plan to eat on the hoof."

Dosh bit back a snappy retort and asked, “Any news of the army?"

"Yes."

"Well?” What was gnawing at the Liberator? Dosh had never known him to be crabby before.

"They're safe."

"Safe!?"

"I'll tell you later. Jump to it!” D'ward pulled the door open.

"Wait!"

He looked back with a glare. “Now what?"

Dosh smiled cherubically. “Has anyone ever told you that you have beautiful legs?"

D'ward could slam a door even louder than Ysian.

Chewing on hard bread and hunks of cheese, three wayfarers strode along the track in the dewy dawn. D'ward was in the middle, setting a murderous pace with his (beautiful) long legs. Despite his considerable handicap in height, Dosh was prepared to take him on at distance sprinting any day, but Ysian was struggling to keep up. To look at, they were a trio of young men, with no packs, one long dagger, two swords, three money pouches. Dosh still had his favorite knife, which didn't show. All in all, Holy Prylis had done them proud.

Apparently the war was over, at least so far as they were concerned. The future shone much brighter without a massacre in it. There seemed no obvious explanation for D'ward's vile mood, unless he was concerned about getting safely out of Thargvale, which certainly might pose problems. By law, strangers were spies unless they could prove otherwise.

"Where are we going?"

"Down to the river,” D'ward said. “Thargwater. There I'm going to catch a boat. It's downhill all the way—I should be in Tharg in a couple of hours."

Tharg itself? “And what are we going to do in that city of celebrated boredom and illustrious ugliness?"

D'ward wrinkled his nose. “You please yourself. Ysian and I are going to the Convent of Ursula."

"We are going where?” Ysian screeched.

"Goddess of justice. I have been assured that her convent is a worthy sanctuary, and the sisters will take you in and care for you. I have a letter from the abbot."

Dosh strode along in silence as the ensuing altercation waxed loud and long.

Seemingly D'ward regarded Ysian as a child and felt responsible for her. Some child!—Dosh had known women who had borne two children by her age, but apparently the Liberator had other standards. He had sacked Lemod. One result of that act had been to brand all women remaining within the walls as ruined, harlots beyond all hope of marriage. For that reason, he had allowed Ysian to accompany the flight and guide the fugitives to Moggpass. He had then accepted her word that her family would put her to death for treason if she went home. Dosh suspected that she had been exaggerating there. But D'ward felt responsible, and now he had decided to hand his burden over to the stern nuns of Ursula. In a few years she would be old enough to make up her own mind what to do with her life, he said.

Ysian's rebuttal began quietly, but his stubborn responses soon had her yelling, interrupting the last of the birds’ dawn chorus in the branches overhead and scaring the leafeater lizards in the ditches. She was a mature woman, she screamed. She would make her own decisions right now. He would have died in Lemod without her help. He was utterly heartless and she hated him. She loved him more than life itself. The nuns of Ursula were notorious sadists. She would follow him to the corners of the world. She would sleep on his doorsteps forever, anywhere he went, and haunt him for the rest of his life, and she was going to kill herself before nightfall and him soon after.

There was more, but suddenly both she and D'ward collapsed in helpless, hysterical mirth. Dosh was shocked to realize that she had been putting on an act and it had fooled him completely. Admittedly she was on the far side of D'ward, so he had not been watching her, nor listening very closely either. Yet he felt peeved at being fooled. He felt like an outsider in the presence of lovers—which was exactly what he must be. Jealous, my lad? He had never really seen these two together except in very public settings. Observing them now—leaning on each other for support, gasping for breath, tears of laughter streaming over their cheeks—no one could ever doubt that they were hopelessly in love. Ysian knew. D'ward was apparently not ready to admit the obvious.

The nervous release did not last long. Soon he returned to his angry urgency, and the three of them resumed their progress. Abandoning the argument, D'ward turned to Dosh. “Where are you headed?"

"I want to stay with you."

"Why?"

Interesting question! Dosh debated several answers, and then decided to tell the truth, just for once. What was the truth, though? The silence dragged out for half a mile before he found it.

"I want to learn from you. You're different."

D'ward said, “Hmm?” The river was in sight in the distance, a line of trees twisting along the valley floor. “How does it feel?"

"How does what feel?"

"Telling the truth."

"Dangerous. Like being naked in a crowd."

Ysian laughed.

"Have you a trade you can take up?” D'ward said. “Or a skill of some kind?"

"I'm good at massage."

He winced, misunderstanding. “Where are you from? Where was your home?"

Dosh decided to push the experiment in veracity a little farther. “Never had one. My people were Tinkerfolk."

"What are Tinkerfolk?” Apparently the query was serious and he really did not know.

"They're nomads. Wanderers. They mostly live in tents or wagons, although every city has a tinkers’ hole somewhere. They do odd jobs, poach, steal. Most people think they're all liars, whores, thieves, and spies."

"What are they really?"

"Spies, thieves, whores, and liars."

The others both laughed at that, which felt good. The road led to a hamlet with a jetty. There were boats there, waiting for hire.

"Listen,” the Liberator said, serious again. “You can't come where I'm going. You've got the same problem Ysian has. I'm sorry, but I can't help either of you. I have a potent sort of charm that I can't control and I really can't explain to you, either. You saw how it worked on the army—I began with a spear and ended up as battlemaster. I had five thousand men all wanting me to scratch them behind the ears. Ysian thinks she's in love with me, and so do you. I like both of you, but I can't return the sort of love you want and I am promised to another woman, so I can't help her, either. I'm truly sorry, but that's the way things are. Viks'n, you're better at this local snarl than we are. See if you can hire a boat to take us to Tharg."

"How many?"

"Two."

"Three,” said Dosh.

Marg'rk Ferryman was not much more than a boy, built of sticks and string as if he had not eaten in several fortnights. His skiff was a smelly, leaky little hulk, and its sail bore innumerable patches. He toadied and groveled for passengers rich enough to pay him a whole silver mark for a half-day's work. He addressed each of them as “Warrior,” which was the correct honorific for Thargian freemen. Had he known Ysian was a woman, he would properly have called her “Mother.” That said a lot about Thargian values.

Propelled much more by the current than the forlorn breeze, his boat drifted out into Thargwater and headed southward. Marg'rk clutched the tiller with a bony hand, smiling obsequiously whenever anyone looked in his direction. Wide, swift, and smooth, the river oiled through a rich countryside. The banks were ornamented with fish traps and jetties, water mills and multicolored trees. High-horned kudus plodded along towpaths, hauling barges. Cargo boats crawled upstream under the muscle power of slaves. The hills beyond were figured with vineyards and orchards, or fields being plowed and sown. Here and there, grand aristocratic mansions graced the landscape.

Ysian sat amidships, being unusually quiet. Even cropped short so barbarically, her hair shone with red-gold highlights. She was brooding ominously. Dosh suspected the convent would have to survive without a new postulant, whatever D'ward might think.

The Liberator sat beside her, the mast between them, crouching to see under the edge of the sail. He scowled, fidgeted, and squirmed. He had not yet explained why he so urgently wanted to reach Tharg. Impatience was out of character for him.

Dosh sprawled in the bow with his feet in a stinking litter of nets and baskets, pots and bilge. After a while he removed his tunic and leaned back in his breechclout to soak up some spring sunshine. His two companions carefully avoided looking at him. Prudes! He had all the essentials covered. They wouldn't care about anyone else; they just knew he would accept any reasonable offer and were frightened to look in case they were caught window-shopping.

"Warrior D'ward?"

"Yes, Warrior Dosh?” D'ward had developed an intense interest in the reflections of windmills.

Dosh peered past Ysian at the boatman, who leered back nervously and mawkishly. That lout would not understand Joalian. “Are you going to Tharg to bring death to Death, as has been prophesied? And when you have that one stuffed and mounted, will you do Tion too, as a favor for me?"

"That's not why I'm going to Tharg.” D'ward straightened his long back, and the sail hid his face.

"You told me our former comrades-in-arms are now safe. You promised to say how."

D'ward sank back into a slouch, and his scowl became visible again. Why was he so edgy? “Prylis told me. The Thargians gave them safe conduct back to Nagvale."

"More miracles? The Thargians did? You're serious?"

"They sent emissaries, a couple of the ephors in person. That alone is unprecedented. Golbfish did the negotiating. He demanded the whole world and they gave it to him: food, hostages, formal oaths sealed with sacrifice. The Thargians will hold back the Lemodians to let the Nagians go by. They groveled, they implored. Anything he wanted."

That ought to be unbelievable or else hilariously funny, and yet D'ward was disconsolate. Obvious question: “Why?"

"Plague,” D'ward said, staring blankly at the left bank. “People are dying by the hundreds all over Thargland. They take ill in the night, and they rot for three days and then die. Funeral pyres bejewel the night and sully the sun by day—Prylis's words, not mine."

"Padlopan's the god of sickness, but—"

"This is Zath. The people think it's an epidemic, but Prylis says Zath's called in his reapers from all over the Vales, brought them here into Thargvale, and he's taught them a new form of sacrifice. A reaper death used to be quick. Now it's slow and even more horrible. And they're working overtime."

Zath was an aspect of Karzon, the patron deity. Why would a god destroy his own people? Dosh caught Ysian's eye; she looked away quickly. She was frightened about something.

"Human sacrifice?” he said with disgust. “You're saying that what reapers do is human sacrifice?"

"What else would you call it?"

"I don't know. I just never thought of it that way. Human sacrifice is something done by the savages in the southern jungles or read about in old, old history. Uncivilized. We don't do that anymore!"

"Reapers do,” D'ward said grimly. “Zath does."

"I suppose you're right. What has this plague of reapers got to do with—Oh, my god!"

"Not your god, I hope. But you've got the idea. Karzon—or Zath—the distinction seems to be getting blurry ... One of them has sent a revelation, telling the priests how to turn aside the divine wrath and end the epidemic."

"Deliver the Liberator's head?” Dosh said.

Ysian's face was sickly pale.

D'ward's mouth twisted in a mirthless grin. “That's not what he said. Gods have pride. Everyone knows what the Filoby Testament prophesies about the Liberator and Death, although most people believe that the Liberator is still a year-old baby somewhere in Sussland. For Zath to name the Liberator would be a confession of weakness. He might have named D'ward, but even that would draw attention to the prophecies. He didn't have to name names. He knew I was responsible for the fall of Lemod. He knew I would be acclaimed leader—that was inevitable, although you won't understand why. So the revelation just demanded the leader of the Nagians, no name mentioned."

"That's why the Thargians stopped killing us?"

"That's why. They didn't want to kill me by mistake. The leader of the Nagians must be brought to the temple and sacrificed there. Death in battle will not suffice. The ephors were willing to let the whole Joalian army go—willing to feed them and escort them home, do anything they asked. They demanded only one thing in return."

Dosh rubbed his oddly smooth cheek—no stubble, no scars. “So Golbfish gave himself up?"

D'ward nodded miserably. “He's on his way to Tharg right now. We should arrive about the same time he does."

"He's going to die by mistake?"

"No. Well, a Thargian mistake, but the prince is quite smart enough to have worked this out for himself by now. He must know that he's the wrong man, but his captors don't. He was in command and he has Nagian merit scars on his ribs—that would be enough for them. Zath may guess when he gets a look at him, but a god can hardly back down at that stage. So Golbfish will die, and the plague will end, and meanwhile his men are on their way home already, escorting enough hostages to make sure they get there."

D'ward licked his lips. “It's a good deal from Golbfish's point of view. He dies, but he would likely have died anyway. This way his entire force gets home safely. No honorable leader would refuse such an offer. I'm sure he didn't even argue."

"You don't seem very satisfied by the arrangement."

"Prylis pulled me out of the trap and put in Golbfish instead.” D'ward bared his teeth.

"You enjoy being bait?"

D'ward did not deign to answer. For a while nobody spoke. Dosh registered vaguely that the boat was tacking and the river had turned to the west already. The city might be coming into view. He did not look around—he was too busy trying to work out why D'ward should be so upset.

Baffled, he finally asked.

The Liberator looked at him oddly. “What don't you understand?"

"He's going to the temple,” Ysian said bitterly, “to give himself up, tell them they got the wrong man!"

"But that would be utterly insane! D'ward...? Really?"

"Aren't you?” she demanded.

"I must, Viks'n.” He was looking at Dosh, not at her, and there was a curious appeal in his cerulean eyes, as if he wanted approval or reassurance. “A man's got to have honor. Right, Warrior?"

"No!” Dosh said. “No! No! Not right! What you're planning won't work, and even if it would, I'd still think you're bloody crazy."

45

"I THINK YOU'RE CRAZY!” ALICE SAID ANGRILY. “IT WON'T JUST BE Boche bullets you'll have to avoid. All those hundreds of boys who knew you at Fallow are all out there now, subalterns, mostly. It will only take one: ‘By Jove! That fellow looks just like that cricketer chappie, Exeter. I say! Wasn't he the one who murdered old Bagpipe Bodgley?’ And then, my lad, you'll be in the—"

"You're nagging,” Edward said.

They were in Ye Olde English Tea Shoppe in Vicarsdown. The village was bigger than he remembered, he said, and she had retorted that it would still fit inside Piccadilly Circus, which was not true. But the tea shoppe was an authentic Elizabethan building and delightful, although it must have had some other purpose originally, because authentic Elizabethans had drunk ale, not tea. It was tiny, cramped, and rather dark—pleasantly cool. They were drinking tea. They were eating homemade scones spread with strawberry jam and cream thick as butter. It was too precious a moment to waste quarreling.

Edward's eyes were cold as a winter sea. “Furthermore, those hundreds of boys are not all out there now. Half of them are dead. And you persist in treating me as your baby brother, which I'm not, anymore."

She lifted her cup. “Yes, you are. You always were my baby brother to me, and you always will be. When we're both a hundred years old, with long white beards, you will still be my baby brother.” She took a sip of tea, watching to see if he would accept the olive branch.

"I don't think I'll like you in a long white beard,” he said reflectively. “Promise me you'll dye it?"

She laid down the cup and reached across for his hand. “I promise I shall stop thinking of you as a baby brother if you'll tell me about Ysian."

"What about her? I didn't take advantage of her. I hope that doesn't surprise you."

"Not in the slightest.” She knew it would surprise most people, though. “Did you love her?"

He pulled his hand away and began heaping cream on a scone like a navvy loading a wheelbarrow. “I've told you everything. She's a very determined young woman—I have rather a weakness for those, you know. She was sixteen and I was a stranger. She fell for me like a ton of bricks, naturally. It wasn't me, just the charisma."

"You haven't answered the question."

"No, I didn't love her."

"What happened to her? When did you last see her?"

"About a year ago. Mrs. Murgatroyd took her on as cook, at Olympus. She's a good cook, although of course she knew only Lemodian recipes."

Romance cracked and shattered into fragments. “But not educated? Just a native wench? Not good enough?"

He stared at her in disbelief, face flaming cruelly red. His knife clattered down on the china plate.

"Oh, Edward, I'm sorry!” she said quickly. “That was abominable of me! I'm sure you behaved like a perfect gentleman. Oh, I mean—"

"I was a stranger,” he said in a very quiet, tight voice. “Strangers never die, except from boredom or violence. I know I don't look any older than I did when I left here. Ysian is eighteen or nineteen now, I suppose. Ten years from now she will be twenty-nine, and ten years after that, thirty-nine. Had I stayed on Nextdoor, I would still be much the same as I am now. Why do you think the Service sends people Home on leave—especially bachelors? One reason is that they have to marry other strangers! Love between stranger and native is unthinkable. It leads to unbearable heartache. It leads to ... to abominations. The Chamber—Never mind."

"I hadn't thought of that. I'm sorry. You didn't let yourself fall in love with her, you mean?"

He went back to destroying scones. “I did not tell her I loved her. I never gave her any encouragement whatsoever. I used you as an excuse, actually. Hope you don't mind. Had I been free to react to Ysian like a normal man, I'd have thrown my heart at her feet and rent my garments and piled ashes on my head and writhed in the dirt until she promised to marry me. That wasn't possible, so nothing was possible. Just friends."

How wonderful the world would be if emotion could be dosed with logic so easily! I am sorry, Sir D'Arcy, but your married status inevitably precludes any further communication between us....

"Look!” Edward pointed out at the sunlit village beyond the little diamond-pained windows. A Gypsy wagon was being hauled along the street by an ancient nag. Dogs barked, small boys ran after it.

He watched as it disappeared around the corner. “Last time I was here, a Gypsy told my fortune. That's a different wagon, though."

"You believe in that stuff?"

He twisted his face. “I didn't used to, but that one hit the mark pretty well. She said I'd have to choose between honor and friendship. Sure enough, I was forced to abandon Eleal when I might have been able to help her."

"Come off it, Edward! That might just as well have applied to Ysian."

His eyes glinted like razors. “I don't rat on my friends very often. Abandoning Ysian, if that's what I did, was the honorable thing to do. You might like to know the rest of the prophecy, though—Mrs. Boswell the Gypsy also said I'd have to choose between honor and duty, that I could only find honor through dishonor. Explain that one, because I can't!"

Was there a chink here to work on? “Well, if your duty is to enlist, but the honorable thing is to avenge your parents’ murder—"

"Never give up, do you?” Even Edward could lose his temper. If that happened she would have lost any hope of making him see reason.

"You haven't seen Ysian in a year?” The girl was the only bait she had to coax him back to Nextdoor and away from the Western Front.

He flashed a look of exasperation at her. “Told you,” he mumbled. “She's at Olympus, working for Polly Murgatroyd. She's very nice—Polly, I mean. I wrote to her before I crossed over—to Ysian, I mean.... “He frowned, dabbing at his mouth with the napkin. “As the man who promised to deliver the note then tried to kill me, she probably never got it."

"You weren't at Olympus?"

He shook his head, chewing. “I took two years to get there and when I did, I didn't stay long. The Committee decided it was too dangerous, both for me and for everybody else—didn't want Zath sacking the place in the hope of catching me. I was packed off to Thovale, which is very small and rural, but not too far away. I helped set up some chapels there. I became a missionary!” He laughed gleefully. “Holy Roly must have turned in his grave! But we all do ... they all do it."

"You'd make a good preacher.” She could just imagine him running his parish like a school dormitory.

"I didn't! I can't ever believe that I know better than everyone else. I don't like telling people what they must think. It's immoral!"

"Doesn't a stranger make a good preacher?"

"Yes,” he admitted glumly. “I could pack in the crowds. I converted heathens to the Church's new and improved heathenism. My heart wasn't in it, though. Jumbo Watson can convert a whole village with a single sermon. I've seen him do it."

Alice abandoned the Ysian campaign. If he could stay away from the girl for a whole year to do something he did not believe in, then thoughts of Ysian were not going to discourage him from enlisting.

"The Liberator?” she said. “It's a noble title—calls up memories of Bolivar, William Tell, Robert the Bruce. Doesn't it tempt you at all?"

He rolled his eyes in exasperation at her persistence. “Not too terribly frightfully, no. There were a couple of times—and the Filoby Testament predicted them both. I almost gave in to Tion, because he said he would cure Eleal's limp. That was a very close-run thing! And then in Tharg, the prince—” He popped a jammy, creamy morsel in his mouth and chewed blissfully.

"What about the prince?"

"That didn't work either, but it came close, too. That particular prophecy ends, but the dead shall rouse him. That's me, rouse me. And that part did work, Alice, because I saw the dead—in Flanders. How many lives has this war cost?"

"No way of knowing. What you read in the papers is all censored."

"Well, the dead speak. They say it's my turn. I have to do my bit, and that's that.” He glanced at his wrist and then at the grandfather clock in the corner.

She sighed. Two more miles to Harrow. Her legs ached already. “Time to go, isn't it?"

Edward nodded. “Wish I hadn't eaten so much.” He surreptitiously slid the last scone into his pocket. He grinned sheepishly when he saw that she had noticed. “Another offering."

Alice shook her head in disbelief. It was Friday afternoon in England and they were on their way to meet a god.

46

SHAME! SHAME! TO THE MAN GOETH D'WARD, SAYING, SLAY ME! THE hammer falls and blood profanes the holy altar. Warriors, where is thine honor? Perceive thy shame.—Verse 266.

The divinely inspired gibberish echoed and reechoed in Dosh's head as he was swept along a milling street in Tharg. Insects droned, people shoved and jostled; heat and noise and stink. That passage made no sense at all at this point in history. How could the prophecy of D'ward's death be fulfilled before all the others about him? The trouble with the Filoby Testament was that too much of it made sense only after it had happened.

What about Verse 1098, then? That was the one that intrigued Tion so much. Something about the Liberator being slow to anger, and then, Eleal shall be the first temptation and the prince shall be the second, but the dead shall rouse him. It certainly referred to the Liberator. It might well apply to this very afternoon. Something was about to happen, something so momentous that it had caught the eye of the seeress all those many years ago.

Tharg was the largest city Dosh had ever seen, bigger even than Joal. It well deserved its reputation as the ugliest. The buildings were of somber stone, with high plain walls and tiny windows, every house a fortress. There was no color, no decoration, not a carving in sight. The men wore tunics of drab brown or khaki, boys yellow or beige, although all had a touch of the sacred colors at the neck. Women were not in evidence. Doors and shutters were tarred, not painted. The streets were narrow trenches, hot and airless, straight as spears.

They were also thronged with huge crowds of impatient, hustling, urgent freemen, all hurrying in the same direction he was heading, and most of them much taller than he. He was having trouble keeping D'ward in sight. Fortunately the Liberator was taller than most, his distinctive black hair bobbing above the tide like a cork. He was gaining. He seemed not to care that every man in the crowd bore a sword and aggressive jostling might be fatal. Very likely he was deliberately trying to lose his unwanted follower.

Gods did not make mistakes. That thought, too, Dosh kept repeating like a mantra. Prylis had extracted the Liberator from the army so that the ephors would abduct the wrong leader. When Prylis had released him this morning, had he not known what D'ward would try to do? Because he had let him go, then he must have been certain that it was now too late—mustn't he? Golbfish must be dead already, mustn't he? Could gods make mistakes?

Maybe a minor god like Prylis could. Everyone was heading for the temple, because there was to be an announcement—Dosh had gathered that much from remarks overheard. He dared not ask questions, lest he be denounced as a foreigner. Thargians were never nice to foreigners, especially Thargians in mobs, and the air stank of dangerous passions already. Angry, armed male mob ... no women, no slaves? The women would all be at home in those narrow-windowed prisons of houses, being mothers.

Now where was D'ward?

Dosh rose on tiptoe as he walked, peering through the jungle of heads. Gone! No! There he was.

He had stepped into an arched doorway, and Dosh was almost past him. He pushed his way across the stream of the crowd, bumping and apologizing, being shoved and cursed and threatened. Thargians never apologized. He reached the wall and was flattened against it by the crush, then began edging his way back to the arch.

A flash of color above it caught his eye, a festoon of faded blue ropes. Blue was the color of the Maiden, and a net was the symbol of justice. He had always thought that was inappropriate. In his experience, the little ones got caught and the big ones got away. That wasn't what it meant, of course.

D'ward was speaking through a grille in the door. Ysian stood at his side, her face pale and rigid. She looked up at Dosh and bared her teeth. D'ward passed the abbot's letter through the grating. Dosh eased nearer in the hope of hearing what was being said. As he squeezed by Ysian, a sharp pain stopped him. He glanced down and confirmed his gut feeling that the problem was her dagger.

"Go!” she whispered.

He stammered and then decided that he had seen that expression in her eyes once before, when she had threatened to club him senseless. D'ward was still talking, pleading for haste. The pain came again. She could puncture Dosh's bowels with one swift jab. He stepped back. She followed, urging him on at knifepoint.

"Go!” she insisted. “Move!"

He turned into the crowd and was swept away. He felt her hand grab hold of his belt, but at least the dagger was making no more holes in his hide. In moments they were being rushed along the street by the sweaty tide.

"What do you think you are doing?” he demanded, twisting around to see her.

She was smirking triumphantly. “I am not entering any flea-infested convent! D'ward will go on to the temple. We are going to catch him before he gets there and stop him making a fool of himself!"

It wasn't a fool he was going to make of himself, it was a corpse. “By the five gods, girl, how do you ever expect—"

"Don't you call me a girl!"

"I call you an idiot! We'll never find him in this—"

The crowd had slowed to a crawl. Dosh stumbled into the man in front of him, and a vicious elbow rammed into his solar plexus, knocking all the breath out of him. He staggered.

"Watch where you're going,” Ysian said, pushing him forward again.

In all cities, the holy places tended to huddle together. Temple Square was just around the corner from the convent. It was now full. Refusing to be balked, the mob in the street continued to press onward.

It occurred to Dosh that women might well be prohibited by law from entering the Man's holy place. If Ysian's deception was discovered, then he would be held responsible. On the other hand, he was more likely to die in the crush. It was already hard to breathe, and the crowd continued to squeeze tighter and tighter. It oozed ahead like a human glacier, a paste of compressed bodies. He wished he were taller.

"This will kill us!” he groaned, feeling the start of panic. Two hands gripped his arms and pulled them behind him. “What in eternity are you doing?"

"Cup your hands!"

"What?"

Ysian pushed his hands together. Somehow she squirmed and struggled and got one foot in them. Then she wriggled up his back and seated herself on his shoulders, her fingers locked in his hair and her weight threatening to buckle his knees.

"There!” she said. “Now I can see. Keep moving!"

The ancient temple of Karzon in Tharg, dating from the days of the kings, had been built of wood. During the Fifth Joalian War, it had been struck by lightning and burned to the ground. This evil omen had caused great despair among the Man's Men on the eve of the final campaign, but the famous Goztikon, thirteen times ephor, had declared the sign to be one of hope. He had publicly pledged his life and the lives of his seven sons that the god was promising renewal for Thargia; the Man's Men would prevail, he swore, and would return to build a new and mightier temple to the glory of their god.

So it had transpired. The armies of the Joalian Coalition had been crushed in the bloody battle of Suddopass. The survivors had worked out their lives in the quarries to further the building of the temple. Artisans and craftsmen from all over the Vales had spent twenty years on it. The indemnities levied on Joalia by the peace treaty had included the greatest artist of the age, K'simbr Sculptor, who had been specifically requisitioned so he might raise fitting images of the god.

Gods. Whereas the Man in his primary aspect had always been god of both creation and destruction, he had hitherto been represented by a single likeness. In the new great temple, he was shown twice. One giant image was plated with copper, which would weather to the green of his color. The other was of silver, to turn black. Officially both were Karzon, but the ignorant multitude soon spoke of the second image as being that of Zath, his aspect of Death. The avatar had been promoted to equality.

Eased forward irresistibly by the bodies pressed in all around him, Dosh shuffled into the southwest corner of the square. Over the shifting oceans of heads he saw the temple towering into the sky, two walls of stupendous pillars running off to east and north. They were so thick and the gaps between them so narrow that from his angle they completely blocked the interior from view. They were oppressive, domineering, overwhelming. The temple of Karzon was a giant gray granite cage, the ugliest structure he had ever set eyes on.

The crowd pushed relentlessly at his back, urging him closer.

"Not yet!” Ysian proclaimed, having to shout over the din. She twisted Dosh's head around. “Wait over there!"

"I can't get out."

She took hold of his ears and pulled. He yelled, causing his nearest neighbors to look at him in surprise. He blinked away tears.

"I shall pull them off!” Ysian said, kicking him with her heels.

She probably meant it. He began to fight his way out of the crowd.

He broke free of the main current after a considerable struggle and reached the shallows at the edge of the square. There were many people there too, but they were mostly not moving, just staring at the temple, fearing to risk their lives in the compacted mob. He leaned back against the wall, gasping and sweating. His shoulders were breaking.

"Get down!” he groaned. “You're crushing me."

"Stop whining! You said you were the toughest man in the army, didn't you?"

"I'm not a fornicating moa!"

Other children in yellow tunics floated above the crowd, riding their fathers’ shoulders. None was anywhere near Ysian's size. He would wager that none was a girl, either. Many older youths had clambered upon the plinths of the columns, and some had scrambled even higher, apparently finding toe-and fingerholds within the carvings, clinging there like human lichen. Every few minutes one would lose his grip and fall, dragging others with him, down into the melee. Whatever screams or oaths resulted were lost in the steady, torrential roar.

Dosh was farther from the corner now. He could see through the closest pair of pillars, and what he saw was the back of the statue of Zath. Silvery black, it stood ten times the height of a man, muffled in a reaper's cloak and ominously stooped, as if to study the multitude huddled around its feet. He was happy not to be there, looking up at the face of Death. Beyond it he could see an edge of the statue of Karzon, mostly just the great hammer he held, his symbol.

Ysian kicked her heels into Dosh's ribs. “Here he comes!"

If he had room to move, he could grab her arms and flip her off him, but in this mob she would fall on top of at least one man, probably two, and then there would be reprisals. As it was, his arms were so tightly crushed against his sides that he could not raise them even to defend himself from her attacks.

"D'ward's coming!” she insisted. “Move. This way.” She took him by the ears again and twisted his head to the left.

He yielded to the inevitable, starting to shoulder himself forward. He would probably have made no progress at all had Ysian not begun using her feet with deliberate savagery on the innocent bystanders. The inevitable retaliation was all directed at him, of course—he was jostled, jabbed, punched, cursed at. Any minute someone would manage to draw a sword and gut him.

"Faster!” she demanded. “We'll lose him."

Of course they would. There was no chance of catching him. D'ward was bigger and taller, and he was the Liberator. He had admitted that he had a special sort of charm. He would charm his way through the crowd. He was not carrying Ysian.

Yet Ysian did add some weight to Dosh's efforts. He discovered he could lean on the men in front of him and they would pull away to avoid being pushed over and trampled. If he lost his footing, that would happen to him.

Ysian yanked at his left ear. “That man in green coming! Catch him!"

In a moment, Dosh saw the man she meant. His green tunic marked him in the drab brown crowd and probably meant that he was some sort of temple flunky—priest or guard. He was very large, very beefy, and obviously very determined to move closer to the temple. That meant closer to D'ward.

Somehow Dosh managed to slip in at his back, and after that they made better progress. The big fellow did not seem to register that he had acquired two hangers-on as he wrestled his way toward the pillars. Dosh leaned on him, urging him forward.

The noise was fading, and now there was another sound, a steady drum-beat. Dosh had no idea what was happening inside the temple, but the ominous boom-boom-boom made his scalp prickle. Was Golbfish being brought in now? Human sacrifice? No god of the Vales had demanded human sacrifice in thousands of years. What would they do to him? Cut off his head? Tear out his heart? Burn him alive?

Poor old Golbfish! He had turned himself from an effete slob into a warrior and a leader. He had made himself worthy to rule the kingdom that was his by right, and now he was dying to save his men. What must he be thinking?

"Almost there!” Ysian bounced a few times with excitement. Dosh shrieked at her. He thought she meant the great pillars now looming over them, but then he saw the familiar black hair just ahead. Perhaps this madness was going to pay off after all. Then what? D'ward had refused to listen to reason on the boat; he was not likely to be amenable to logic now.

But Dosh had not been joking when he told D'ward he knew massage. He also knew a few sneaky tricks of self-defense that had come in handy more than once when the romping had become too rough. If he could actually get within reach of D'ward and if he could then work his arms free and if he could put his hands around D'ward's neck—then he could put D'ward to sleep very easily.

Then ... then D'ward would slump to the ground and be trampled to paste? That part of the plan needed more work. The drums were beating faster. All that was needed was to delay D'ward a few more minutes and it would be too late for him to stop the sacrifice. Now the man in green had caught up with D'ward and was right behind him. He had become a barrier instead of a trailblazer, for Dosh could not get by him.

They were within a few feet of the pillars when the man in green abruptly caught hold of D'ward's arm and jerked him around. He himself twisted to the right. Dosh stumbled to catch his balance, recovering to the left. The crowd surged back in tightly around them again, packing all three men in together, face-to-face, with Ysian's legs between them.

The whole congregation had fallen silent under the surging boom-boom-boom of the drumbeat.

"What?” D'ward demanded angrily, struggling to break free of the grip. He had not even glanced at Dosh or Ysian. “Oh—it's you!"

"Who did you expect?” the man in green demanded, in a voice as thunderous as the drums. “What in creation do you think you're doing here, you young idiot?” He was the taller by two or three inches and considerably huskier. He had a dense black beard and a jutting hooked nose. He seemed young, yet he was the sort of man one instinctively addressed as “sir” ... or “master,” in Dosh's case.

Ysian's fingers were knotting painfully in Dosh's hair. He could hardly breathe in the crush, glancing from the Liberator to the other man and back again. Their faces were directly above his, yet neither of them seemed to know he was there. He did not want to guess who this other man might be.

D'ward smiled, but the effect was grotesque—all eyes and teeth, as if the skin of his face had shrunk. “You've got the wrong man in there!” His voice was hoarse.

"I know that, fool! And tomorrow he dies. You think that's an accident? Have you any idea of the trouble that cost us? What do you think you can achieve, coming here?"

"I can take his place. My place!"

"You won't save his life if you do! Even if Zath chose to spare him, which he wouldn't, the ephors could not forgive the humiliation. He's dead now, dead as surely as he will be when they dash out his brains tomorrow."

D'ward grimaced. “I won't let them!"

"And how are you going to stop them now?"

The drumming was a continuous menacing roll, rising louder, echoing among the pillars.

"I can go there and say who I am! I can tell them they have the wrong man. If I say I'm the Liberator—"

"You would drop dead."

D'ward's face was white with misery or terror or fury—Dosh could not tell which, and perhaps it was all of them. “Then if you helped me, stood beside me—"

"Fool!” The big man roared the word, yet none of the surrounding crowd paid him any heed at all. How could anyone resist his authority? “Zath has more power than all the Five together. You can do nothing here except die as well!"

"There must be something I can do!"

"No, there isn't! Maybe one day, but not today, nor tomorrow.” The massive fingers squeezed harder into D'ward's arm. The man seemed ready to bite him. “Now—will you live or die? Must I force you?"

D'ward's eyes glinted feverishly. “Use mana here and you'll attract his notice, won't you? We're on the node."

"Why are you so anxious to die?” They were bellowing at each other now, yet the mob packed around them seemed oblivious.

"Why should it matter to you if I die?"

"Because we want you to fulfill the prophecy! Your time is not yet, that's all."

D'ward closed his eyes and shuddered. He slumped in despair, as if only the press of the crowd held him upright. “All right! If that's your price, I'll do it. I'll be the bloody Liberator, I'll take your orders, I'll do whatever you want, but you've got to pull the prince out of there. I won't let another man die in my place."

"Sorry. I can't do that."

"Then damn you!” D'ward screamed. “Let me go!"

Before the man in green could answer, the drum roll stopped. A brief silence ... a faint voice making an announcement ... the crowd within the temple screaming in joyful unison ... the crowd outside howling for the news...

The man in green heaved his great shoulders back to free his other arm and cracked his fist upward against the point of D'ward's jaw. D'ward's head jerked back. He went limp, held upright only by the man's hold on his arm and the squash of bodies.

Nobody could move, or the crowd would have been dancing. As it was, they all kept bellowing their lungs out. The news spread: The sacrifice would be made. The plague would end.

The man's eyes came down to Dosh with no surprise or sudden recognition. It was as if he had known all along who Dosh was and that he was right there.

"Bring her and follow me,” he growled.

Then he hoisted D'ward effortlessly onto his shoulder and plowed off through the crowd, parting it like tall grass.

Still unconscious, D'ward dangled head down in a sandwich between the man in green and Dosh, who clung tightly to the man's heavy leather sword belt and let himself be dragged. He was barely supporting himself, sagging under Ysian's weight. As the crush began to slacken, he crumpled to his knees. Ysian broke free and tumbled. The big man turned and hoisted each of them in turn upright. His strength was ... superhuman?

Who was he? Better not to wonder ... but he probably was ... Who else could he be? Why?

"Hang on!” the man commanded, leading the way again.

Dosh was certainly not about to disobey, lest hard experience prove his suspicions correct, and of course Ysian would not let D'ward out of her sight. The crowd was dispersing in jubilation, flowing out along the streets from the temple, cheering and singing. Dosh clung to the man's belt, towing Ysian by the hand. Gradually the mob thinned. South, east, two more blocks south ... the man (the Man?) knew exactly where he was heading.

He turned into a dark opening. “Stairs!” he growled, and headed down them into blackness. Dosh and Ysian descended warily, fumbling at the rough stone wall for guidance. They descended three sides of a square well, into a littered and putrid-smelling hall. A door creaked open, and they followed their guide into a dim crypt, full of people.

The air was heavy with a multitude of scents: the dank rot of the chamber itself and its sweating walls overlain by odors of candles; bodies and unwashed bedding, herbs, and strongly spiced cooking—especially cooking. They brought back a rush of memories that stunned Dosh. He recoiled, cannoning into Ysian.

Men were scrambling to their feet, women hastily covering their heads, small children scampering to the comfort of mothers. There were easily thirty people in that dingy cellar, barely visible in the faint light of a few high ventilation slits. The men crowded forward—stocky men wearing tatters that seemed ready to fall apart, men with golden hair and beards. Their eyes were pale in the gloom, shining like their knives.

As soon as they had formed a cordon between their families and the visitors, they halted, deferring to an elderly man in the background. He stood amid a litter of bedding, bundles, and broken furniture. He was spare, silver haired, and dignified. He alone wore a rich robe, amid this ragged rabble. He bowed stiffly.

"You do us honor, noble Warrior."

It was a tongue Dosh had not heard in a score of years. The lump in his throat was already agony, and it seemed to swell at the sound of those words.

"Call off your panthers, Birfair Spokesman!” the man in green answered in the same speech.

The old man barked a single word. The other men reluctantly sheathed their knives. Their pale eyes moved to inspect Dosh. He knew he was in grave, grave danger now. He edged closer to the big man. The Tinkerfolk were granting him respect, although they obviously did not think he was who Dosh thought he was, or they would all be flat on their faces.

Whoever he was, he slid D'ward loosely to the floor. “This is the one I told you of. He is resting. I suggest the women bleach his hair before he awakens. It will save argument."

The old man smiled and bowed again.

"The others—” The big man gestured to indicate Dosh and Ysian. “That one is a woman. The other is one of your own. Take them also, if you will."

Birfair rubbed his hands. “At the same price, noble Warrior?"

A snort. “Very well. For the woman.” The big man tossed a pouch to him. It struck the floor with a loud clank. “See she is not molested—she may be important. The man can pay his own way."

"Certainly, if he is one of ours, as you said.” The old man's poxy, palsied face was more apparent now, as Dosh's eyes adjusted to the dark. “He is a diseased whelp of a degenerate sow, spawned in a cesspool."

"I shall rip out your stinking guts and thrust them down your throat with your feet,” Dosh retorted. It was only a language test. His accent was rusty.

Karzon shrugged. “How touching to restore a lost son to the loving bosom of his people! I want all three of them out of the city as fast as possible. I don't care how you arrange it. After that, your brother can work for his gruel. He may have some skills you can use, if you're not too fussy. The other two will need your charity."

"The noble warrior has already provided most generously."

"And I expect value! When my muddle-headed young friend awakens, explain to him that he must stay away from Lympus."

"Lympus,” the old man repeated.

"Yes. A place. It is being watched and will not be safe for him to approach for a long time."

"We shall obey."

"You'd better!” The man in green turned to the door.

It closed in Dosh's face as Dosh dived after him. Mysteriously, the door was now locked. It had probably been locked earlier, which would explain why the Tinkerfolk had been taken by surprise.

He spun around to get his back against it, knife in hand. Three young men were moving in on him already, coming cautiously but steadily, eyes and teeth shining. Birfair had made no promises about him. He had gold, a tunic of fine cut, and a valuable sword he did not know how to use. He also had his life. Whether he would be allowed to keep that would depend on how much he charged for the others.