BOOK FIVE:

HOW THE SWORDSMAN RETURNED THE SWORD

†

It was the middle of the following morning before Wallie clambered glumly up the rope ladder to Sapphire’s deck. Bare-masted and peaceful, the little blue ship lay at anchor on sunlit water, a haven of sanity after the frenzy of the tryst. Yet he was returning only because he had work to do even there, work on the one problem that he could not possibly delegate—Rotanxi. And it would take more than sparkling ripples and wheeling white birds to soften his nagging black mood this morning.

As he stepped on board, Jja came running forward to greet him. He clasped her hands in his and then recoiled in shock at her puffed and discolored face.

“What happened?” he demanded.

She dropped her gaze. “It was an accident.”

“Who caused this accident?” he roared. A surge of fury rose like bile in this throat. If this was more swordsman work, then there would be blood to spill . . . 

“You did,” she said softly.

He gaped at her, suddenly aware that there were many other people on deck, most pretending to be busy, but all of them—from toddlers to old Lina herself—all certainly watching and listening.

“When you were passing judgment on the two swordsmen, master. I tried to plead for them. It was wrong of me.”

He had struck her? He thought back into that red mist that had enveloped him in the lodge the day before. Yes, perhaps he had.

“My love!” he wailed. “Oh, Jja!” He took her in his arms and kissed her.

Then he backed off again, puzzled. True, his tongue tasted like an old fur insole, and there were no clinical mouth washes in the World. He had not been drunk the night before, but he had taken enough of the vile gut-rotting local wine to give himself a pounding hangover. Doubtless he was an unsavory lover this morning. Even so, there had been much lacking in that kiss. And she had called him “master.”

“I lost my head, Jja. I did not even know I had done this.”

She kept her face down and was silent, but he waited and eventually she spoke.

“I know that, master.”

“Then can you not forgive me?”

Now she looked up and studied him dubiously. “Will you make amends, then?”

“How? Tell me how I can!”

“Come down to the cabin and I will show you.”

He hugged her again. “I don’t dare, my love! I got very little sleep last night and I have work to do.”

Little was an understatement. He had barely slept at all. He had returned Doa to her home not long before dawn—and the door had been slammed in his face. He had gone back to the lodge, to find it still a boiling pot of insanity. Adjutant Linumino had certainly not seen bed that night, being engaged in organizing the barracks and the married quarters and food supplies and work assignments, all at the same time. The shouting and the racket of marching boots had never stopped, nor had the endless string of conflicts being referred to the liege himself. The Sevenths were well-meaning and enthusiastic, but Wallie had given them too much to do too soon. The thought of a bed with Jja in it was a vision of paradise, but one that he must resist. Or was that guilt talking?

She bit her lip. “The two men you sold, master . . . ”

So her offer had been a bribe? “Stay out of that, Jja! How I run the tryst is not your concern!”

“Yes, master.”

“And don’t call me that!”

“No, master.”

Women!

She turned away. He grabbed her shoulder roughly and spun her round to face him.

“Relations between the swordsmen and the town are bad!” he snapped. “It is important that I keep the elders happy. Do you understand?”

She nodded dumbly.

Liar! said his conscience. Whatever else Shonsu did when he was castellan, he terrorized the elders. They groveled to you last night.

“I had to go to that ball!”

Rot! They would much prefer that you stay away and just send Nnanji.

“And they would be grossly insulted if I took a slave as my partner.”

You mean the swordsmen would laugh at you.

“And if I choose to take Lady Doa to a dance, then it is none of your business!”

“Of course not, master.”

Again she began to turn. This time he grabbed both shoulders and almost shook her.

“You have no cause to be jealous of Lady Doa!”

“Jealous!” Now, incredibly, it was Jja who started to shout. “A slave? Jealous? What could possibly make a slave jealous?’

“In this case nothing! I needed an escort to the dance—”

“You think that I care who you take to a stupid dance?”

“And nothing else!”

“You think I care about that, either? Bed whom you like, master. Make no excuses to a slave.”

Wallie was astounded. Never had she raised her voice like that before, to him or anyone. He released her. “Then what is bothering you?”

“You are!” she yelled, stamping her foot. “What are you doing to yourself?”

He was a swordsman of the Seventh. He was liege lord of the tryst, the most powerful man in the World. He stammered and then yelled back, “Watch your tongue, woman! For, yes, you are only a slave, remember!”

“And I was happy as a slave! I did as my mistress bid me, for many men. And very few of them struck me!”

He made an effort and lowered his voice. “I said I was sorry. I shall not do that again.”

“Perhaps you should! To remind me I am only a slave. You have been telling me to think of myself as a real person!”

Never had she behaved like this! For a moment Shonsu’s maniacal temper almost broke loose. Then Wallie forced it down, taking deep breaths and unclenching his fists. He glanced around the deck, seeing the many frightened eyes being hastily averted. Rotanxi, whom he had come to woo and impress, was sitting on the aft hatch cover, impassively listening like the others to this absurd quarrel.

“You said that was what you wanted,” she shouted. “A real woman. Now I am a slave again—”

“Yes!” he roared, to silence her. “Go to the cabin!” He turned away and headed over to the sorcerer, passing a cynical, surly Tomiyano and ignoring him. He made formal salute to Rotanxi.

The sorcerer rose and responded, then sat down again. Wallie settled beside him.

“And how are your catapults this fine day?” Rotanxi inquired with acid politeness.

Wallie laughed bitterly. “Lord Zoariyi is in charge of building catapults. I judged him the shrewdest.”

“Probably,” Rotanxi commented, to show that he knew of the Sevenths.

“He jumped in with all four feet. I stopped by on my way out here; he has a catapult half-built already.”

“Remarkable!”

“Yes, but useless—unless he plans to use it to move the tryst across to the other bank. There isn’t a hatch on the River that could take it. It will have to be scrapped and a new start made.”

Rotanxi made a thin-tipped smile. “I hope he wasted a lot of money on timber.”

He had, of course. “Money is no longer a problem,” Wallie said, and explained about dock fees.

The sorcerer looked skeptical and said nothing.

“You have heard about Chinarama?” Wallie inquired.

The old man nodded, face unreadable.

“Afterward Nnanji searched his quarters. He found a thunder weapon and the supplies for it. Quill and ink and vellum, of course. And this.” Wallie held out a small ivory plaque bearing the image of a girl, wistfully beautiful.

The sorcerer regarded the plaque as it lay on Wallie’s palm, but he made no move to take it and he did not speak.

“He and I were on opposite sides, my lord,” Wallie said, “but I honor his memory. Courage is not confined to swordsmen. Is this his daughter?” Rotanxi and Chinarama had been about the same age. Vul could not be so huge that they would not have known each other.

The sorcerer hesitated, then said, “His wife. She died in childbirth many years ago.”

“Sad!”

“Very. It was not his child. She had been raped by a band of swordsmen.”

Wallie winced, then studied the old man, inscrutable now as a mummy. The story was possible, of course, but it might be a ploy to put him on the defensive. “Of course I do not doubt you, my lord, but our sutras expressly forbid any violence toward women, except in two narrowly defined cases—convicted felons, or in retaliation for bloodshed.”

He saw at once that he had lost.

“Perhaps ‘rape’ is the wrong term, then, Lord Shonsu? There was no direct violence by the swordsmen. It happened on a ship. A First importuned her. When she struggled, of course, his friends came to assist. They did not use force on the woman. They began mutilating the sailors. In self-defense, the sailors held the woman for the swordsmen. That would not be rape as your sutras define it, would it?”

The sorcerer’s parchment face wrinkled in a sneer of triumph and contempt, and Wallie could only believe. He shuddered.

This was the man whose heart he hoped to win? Again he offered the plaque. “Will you take this, then? Give it to his family, if he has any, when you return?”

Rotanxi accepted it. “He had no family. He did have a brother once, but swordsmen got him, too.” He hurled the picture away, and it spun over the rail and vanished.

After a pause, Wallie said, “That is sad also. But there are widows in Sen, my lord, and many orphans on the left bank. The price of power is always others’ blood.”

The sorcerer sneered, but did not reply.

Wallie changed the subject. “You have heard my story? I told the sailors to answer your questions.”

Rotanxi snorted: “Bah! I have accepted that I cannot convince you of magic, Lord Shonsu. Yet you expect me to believe in miracles?”

Wallie was surprised. “Not even the Hand of the Goddess?”

“Not even that. Any time a sorcerer goes on a ship—and that is not rare, as you have guessed—then the ship goes where it is supposed to.”

That was interesting, if true. Had not the demigod said that the Age of Legends came before the Age of Writing? Were the sorcerers miracle-proof, being literate? Wallie made a mental note to think about that, when he had time.

“But I confess that I am curious about the source of your knowledge,” the sorcerer continued. “Obviously one of the other covens has been subverted or penetrated.”

“I am truly from another world, my lord,” Wallie said. “What evidence shall I offer? How about the stirrup? That is new to this one.”

Rotanxi shook his head. “Impressive, but not convincing. Your stirrup is pretty obvious once you think of it.”

“Ah! But all great inventions are like that. Now, take that far-seeing gadget of yours. It inverts the image. That must make it very difficult to use for things like reading lips.”

Hesitation . . . and a flicker of excitement. “A matter of practice. Why, can you make a telescope that does not invert?”

Telescope! It was a new word. “Certainly. There are several ways, depending on what lenses you have. You haven’t invented the glass lathe for making lenses yet, have you? No matter. The easiest way is to put two telescopes in one tube—four lenses. The first telescope inverts and the second puts the image the right way up again. That’s even more obvious than the stirrup, I would say.”

The sorcerer tried to keep a straight face, but the pupils of his eyes dilated. Wallie thought he might be making progress. The sailors had wandered away, mostly, now that the shouting was over. A quiet conversation between a sorcerer and a swordsman might be an epoch-making event, but it had no interest for such practical folk as they.

“There are ways of getting rid of the colored fringes, too, but it involves different types of glass in combination and is beyond my knowledge. Of course you can make a telescope with mirrors and that gives no colored fringes.”

Now there was eagerness. “Yes? Tell me how you do that.”

Wallie produced a piece of charcoal he had brought for just this purpose. “You may have to tell me some terms here.” He started sketching on the hatch cover—Tomiyano would be furious. He outlined conic sections. That got him to the parabola, and he explained the reflecting telescope.

Rotanxi became openly excited. “Almost you convince me, my lord! There are other covens than Vul, but I thought none was ahead of us in our knowledge. I do not know where in the World you can have learned such things.”

“That is the idea.”

‘Tell me more, then.”

The tiger was at the door of the trap. “Alas, I dare not. Telescopes will not do a great deal of harm, but I am worried about the stirrup. In my world it led to horsemen encased in metal from scalp to toenail, and I fear that I may have opened the door to such horrors in this world. There are other things I could tell you that would do worse damage. I shall try to think of other harmless exceptions while preparing my war. But I am truly from another world, Lord Rotanxi.”

He pretended that he was about to leave—and the sorcerer raised a hand to stay him. “That orange thing that flew from your boat?”

Wallie laughed. “Oh, that’s harmless.” He explained about the effects of heat on gases, hinted at molecular theory, described how a hot-air balloon worked. “Jja has nothing much to do; ask her nicely, and she may even make you one to take home with you. You’ll have to get the wax recipe from Swordsman Katanji. He’ll only charge you about a hundred golds, I should think.”

Now he got a long, hard stare. “I wonder if you intend to let me go home, my lord. You are volunteering a great deal of information.”

Wallie smiled innocently. “Trust me,” he said.

Rotanxi shook his head. “There is a hook in your bait. What is it?”

Wallie shrugged. For a few minutes he stared across the blue water to the golden city spread along the River’s edge, vastly older than the pyramids. He tried to imagine one of the sorcerers’ black towers there and mused on what Nnanji had said—sacked and burned many times. If he could win peace with the sorcerers, then he might save many cities from being sacked in the future. If history was only a string of battles, then honor belonged not to those who made history, but to those who prevented it.

“I might trade a few secrets with you. For example, and just out of curiosity, on my world the thunderpower was known for centuries before anyone thought of using it to make weapons. Was that the case here?”

The old man pondered carefully. Finding no trap in the question, he nodded.

Wallie said, “Another question, then: When Katanji managed to sneak into your tower, he reported seeing a big gold ball on a pillar. That sounds to me like something we called . . . ” He could not say electrostatic generator. It would come out as grunts. “Damn! It sort of collects lightning when you turn a handle and make a belt move. Now, I am guessing that you connect this thing to the metal grid in front of the doors, so any uninvited guest gets zapped. Would you care to comment?”

The sorcerer said nothing at all.

“Come on!” Wallie coaxed. “I can’t think it would stop an army, because it would take too long to collect more of the lightning between zaps. But it would make a good burglar trap. All right—you tell me that, and I’ll give you a secret from my world on the same subject.”

Rotanxi glared, but finally admitted that at night the gold ball was connected by a metal rope to the door handles, for the purpose Wallie had guessed. It was a very small concession, but the start of trust.

Wallie told him of the lightning rod—useful to anyone who stored gunpowder in a tall tower.

“You make me nervous,” Rotanxi said. “You tell me these things and all about your plans. I fear that you do not intend to let me go, in spite of your oath.”

Wallie said, “We have many days left on the oath. My army will be ready long before then. Boariyi would have been smashed, I admit, but I shall do the smashing now.”

Cautiously the old man said, “And what will you do if your fancy catapults and horsemen do not succeed?”

Wallie shook his head. “Hope that they do! Else I must tell the swordsmen how to make thunderpowder. I have been very careful, Lord Rotanxi. I have kept many of your secrets from them—the signs you use to send messages, for example.” He did not know the word for writing. “I have made no inquiries about sulfur or saltpeter. Were I to do that, then you are a dead man as soon as your friends catch you. I hope very strongly that I do not have to go to that.

“You see, in my other world the sorcerers invent weapons, but the swordsmen control them; weapons so horrible that I shall not even try to describe them. I am certain that the same thing will happen here. When the first horror wears off, the swordsmen will want those thunderbolt weapons. If I do not give them the secret, then they will get it by other means. Even sorcerers can be overpowered and tortured. You will not long keep the thunderpowder to yourselves, and, when it gets out, then the sorcerers will be servants of the swordsmen, as they were on my world. Think on that, my lord!”

Leaving the sorcerer frowning, Wallie rose and paced away.

His head was still thumping and his eyes still gritty. There was no sign of Jja. Perhaps she had obeyed his peevish command and gone to the cabin. He ought to make up to her—make love to her, even. The tryst would not collapse if he stole a couple of hours’ rest. He trotted down the companionway and went to their cabin.

She was waiting there. When he entered she rose to stand before him in silence, eyes downcast, being a well-trained slave.

He lifted her chin with one finger. “Jja!” he whispered.

Her eyes would not meet his. “Master?”

His temper flared again. Damn her! He was carrying too many burdens to accept another. He needed comfort, companionship, and reassurance; not this stubborn, uninformed reproach. He tried again. He put his arms around her. “Jja?”

“Master?”

“You’re trembling! What are you afraid of?”

He had to wait for her whisper. “You, master.”

“Me? My darling, I have said I am sorry! I need love, Jja!”

“Of course, master!” She slipped hurriedly from his grasp and began to pull off her wrap.

Damn her! She was doing this because she knew it would anger him. It was the only weapon she had.

It was a good one.

He left, slamming the door behind him.

††

Midmorning, warm sunshine; Wallie had been inspecting catapult construction and was marching back to the lodge with his bodyguard.

It was day eight of the reign of Shonsu I—or should that be Shonsu II?—and five days since Boariyi had departed in Griffon. He should be at Wal by now. The expedition had seemed well outfitted, with water-rat swordsmen to run the ship, with enough supplies for two or three weeks, with a plentiful collection of chains and shackles. Boariyi had been disappointed when Wallie had amended his instructions to kidnapping instead of killing, but he had seen the advantage of being able to parade captives through the streets when he returned. “Kill if you must,” Wallie had told him, “but a live captive is more valuable than dead meat, and the more sorcerer gowns you can steal the better.” Wal and Aus were the targets this time. He wished he had another ship to send upriver to Sen and on to Cha.

He had grown to like Boariyi. There was something of Nnanji in the beanpole, plus a certain wry cynicism. Wallie approved of all his Sevenths. The Goddess had chosen well.

Money was still pouring in, but it was also pouring out. Horses were absurdly expensive to buy and equip and maintain. Catapults were going to be worse, and he had to think ahead to the cost of mounting the actual attack. He could sell Griffon, of course—if Boariyi did not lose her. It was crazy to send a Seventh into such danger, but at least he had an equivalent prisoner to exchange if necessary.

Then his parade turned into the wide plaza before the lodge, and he called a halt so that he could stand and watch the cavalry at work. The stirrup had been a glorious success. Now all the swordsmen wanted to join the cavalry—was it not always so? Riding in fencing masks was impossible, and thus foil practice too dangerous, so he had invented polo. Of course polo on a paved court was not quite five card stud either, but these were urban fighters he was training. The swordsmen had decided that polo was the greatest breakthrough since the invention of puberty. It had become the tryst’s biggest entertainment, after wenching, and most of the pay seemed to go into betting on polo matches.

Even to Wallie’s unskilled eye, both men and horses were improving. Now he must think ahead to the next step—mallets were not the best weapons against sorcerers. Polo was good training in horsemanship, but he must start the carpenters making lances. He sent a First off with a luncheon invitation for Tivanixi, and resumed his march.

Closer to the lodge a group of swordsmen was fencing. Wallie did not need to see the green flashes on the shoulder straps to know that they would be Nnanji’s men. And there was Nnanji himself, blue kilt and red ponytail, engaging one of Boariyi’s Sixths. No one else of his rank ever had time for fencing. Wallie watched for a while. Nnanji was improving—of course. He sighed, trying to ignore his apprehension and doubts. Then he gave the order to move again.

The blank stone face of the lodge, which had once worn only a bronze sword, now bore additional decoration. No one but sorcerers could read, but everyone could use an abacus. On either side of the bronze sword, therefore, there now hung a giant abacus of ropes and straw bundles. One read three hundred and thirty; the other sixteen—one captured and fifteen dead, counting Chinarama. The message was obvious, and so was the motivation it provided. Its construction had kept ten men busy for two days. That was the first rule for running an army: keep it busy. Once Wallie Smith had run a petrochemical plant efficiently by matching the workforce to the work. Now his manpower was fixed, so he must find things for it to do.

As he reached the archway a troop of men came out carrying foul-smelling buckets—the losers in the daily inspection, those whose dormitory had been the least acceptable. The lodge sparkled now, inside and out, but each day there had to be losers to carry the nightsoil, and the orange flashes showed that these were some of Zoariyi’s men. The color coding became complicated on a low rank, for each Seventh had his own color, and each of his protégés, also. A Third wore five flashes. Nnanji knew what every combination meant. Wallie did not care.

He wheeled in through the courtyard, filled now with canvas bathhouses and latrines. At the door to the antechamber he dismissed his entourage and sent them off in search of Forarfi, who could be counted on to keep them busy doing something. Then he went in.

The chamber was full of people, as always. At the far end Linumino the adjutant sat at a table because he counted the money. Although Wallie always felt that this room should be full of desks and typewriters and telephones, only Linumino had as much as a table. The money itself stayed in the chest in Wallie’s office, which doubled as the council room, and most nights also his bedroom. Everyone else was sitting on a stool or standing. The sitters rose as he entered and all thumped fists to heart in salute. He had abolished formal saluting within the tryst as a waste of time.

He walked on through, nodding and smiling to faces he recognized, making guesses at their business, giving Katanji a wink, frowning at the sight of two sullen, battered-faced Sixths who stood swordless and guarded. When he reached the adjutant’s table, Linumino smiled also and gestured toward a group of six. He did not need to speak—three young Thirds with Tivanixi shoulder flashes, each accompanied by a naked boy in his early teens, all six looking nervous.

“How many will that make?” Wallie asked.

“Thirteen, my liege.”

Wallie looked over the boys. They all trembled. The Thirds were almost as jumpy, probably all recent promotions. He turned back to the adjutant. “You’ve tested them?”

“Honorable Hiokillino has, my liege. He says they’ll pass. He turned down four others who couldn’t catch a ball if you pushed it in their mouths, he said. Didn’t know their right hand from their feet!”

Wallie laughed. “All right.” He grudged the time, but this justified some ceremony, so he added, “Present them.” Linumino solemnly presented each Third in turn.

“I am Genotei, swordsman of the third rank, and it is my deepest and most humble wish . . . ”

“I am Shonsu . . . Present your candidate, swordsman.”

“My lord, I have the honor . . . ”

“I am Jiulyuio, son of Kiryuio the goldsmith, and it is my deepest . . . ”

All three boys were on the young side, Wallie thought, but he solemnly responded to their salutes. He had to listen as each repeated the swordsmen’s code and then swore the second oath to one of the swordsmen. The liege lord knelt to give them their swords; for the rest of their lives they would brag about that. Finally he shook each by the hand and welcomed him to the craft. Wallie went into his office, and the recruits rushed away with their new mentors in great excitement.

He threw his sword on the bed and flopped down in the chair, releasing a cloud of dust and more feathers. Linumino closed the door and stood waiting. The pudgy, scar-faced swordsman had proved to be a superb adjutant, with endless patience for detail and an excellent memory. Long hours he sat at his table, seeming to increase in girth daily. Soon he would be too absurdly fat to carry a sword, but that would not matter as long as the tryst lasted, and perhaps he planned to retire at the end of it. Meanwhile he made Wallie’s world sane and relatively orderly, not the mad chaos it could so easily have become without him.

“Take a stool,” Wallie said. “Something wrong?”

Linumino was frowning. “My liege, am I right in my suspicions? It always seems to be Lord Tivanixi’s men who find these promising recruits.”

Wallie laughed. “I had noticed. I assumed that you had. And that neither of us had.”

“How does it work—six legs per boy?”

“Ten, I believe. Unless four of them are unusually good.”

Linumino smiled and said no more. Bribery to induct a recruit was not honorable, but the tryst was desperate for good horses. Their asking price had gone from three golds to twenty or thirty, and finances just could not stand those costs. Yet rich families would pay to have a son become a swordsman. As long as the boys had promise, Wallie turned two blind eyes, and Tivanixi got more of his men mounted, more stablehands, more mouths to feed, more horses.

“All right, let’s have it!”

Sitting rigidly on his stool, Linumino closed his eyes as he always did when recalling data. It was an unnerving sight, for the left one did not shut properly, showing a sliver of white. “The holy Lord Honakura replies that what you asked will be possible, up to twelve, and hopes to see you at the masons’ dinner this evening. You have been invited to the traders’ banquet tomorrow night, the butchers’ on the night after, and two balls the following evening, by—”

“Accept the first two on behalf of myself and Lady Doa. Refuse the two that conflict. That sounds like local politics and I won’t get involved.”

Linumino had opened his eyes to listen. He closed them again. “Lords Tivanixi and Zoariyi have both sent Sixths asking about the leather.” The eyes opened.

“Damnation!” Wallie said furiously. “We’re going to have to pay! The old bitch threatened to up anchor and leave, taking the sorcerer with her!” Brota had not merely brought a shipload of fine leather to Casr, she had then bought up all the stock in town and cornered the market. Now she was demanding four hundred golds, and nothing Wallie could say would budge her. The two of them had conducted a roaring, screaming row the previous evening, ending with the children in hysterics and the sailors hovering threateningly near the fire buckets. The liege lord’s fiat ended at the water’s edge.

“Unloading will be tricky,” Wallie said. “The sorcerer might be tempted when she docks; you look after it yourself. You need some fresh air. Take the money and plenty of men. You ought to meet him, anyway. He’s a fascinating old rogue.” And last night he damned nearly got the steam engine out of me.

The adjutant nodded, then closed his eye once more. “Lord Tivanixi reports another collar bone, and a First had his foot trampled. He’ll have the whole tryst in splints soon, my liege. No further cases of belly cramps.”

That was good news! Cramming the whole tryst into one building tempted the god of epidemic, who was a far greater threat to any army than its enemies would ever be.

“The new rules about boiling water are being observed?”

“Apparently, my liege. The water in the west well is down another cubit, and the east well about a hand.”

That was bad news! Well digging was not in any sutra; it was slaves’ work, and Wallie had sold off all the slaves.

“Lord Jansilui reports that he has sent recruiters to Tau and Dri in search of fletchers, falconers, and birds. He asks if he may also send to sorcerer towns and, if so, whether he should seek help from Lord Nnanji.”

“Yes, he may send. Not swordsmen, obviously. Try priests, or traders. Tell him to ask Honakura. Bypass Nnanji’s network. Recruiting can’t be secret.”

“Yes, my liege. That’s all the messages. Outside there’s a deputation . . . of port officers, I suspect.”

“If they won’t state their business, I won’t see them. If they are port officers, tell them to come back in a week. A little more fasting won’t hurt them.”

The adjutant smiled briefly. “The two Sixths accused of brawling . . . Lords Nnanji and Zoariyi have judged the case and sentenced them both to twenty-one lashes with the cat o’ seven tails. The sentence awaits your confirmation.”

“Damnation!” Wallie said again. He sprang up and wandered over to stare out the window. “I want new drapes here and another lamp. Both?”

“Each accuses the other of starting it, I gather.” Linumino had risen also, automatically. “The witnesses disagree. The judges concluded that Ukilio started the fistwork and Unamani drew first.”

Wallie thought for a moment. “You have a herald handy?”

“No, my liege.”

“Call one while I talk with Katanji. Anyone else urgent?”

The adjutant said that the rest could wait. He went out. Wallie strolled back to his chair, glanced at the bed with its brilliant new cover, and sighed. He spent almost all his days and nights in this room. His visits to Sapphire were becoming rarer and briefer; he had not slept on board for four nights now. He slept in this room. Alone.

Then he rose and smiled as Katanji entered. They had been meeting socially, but not speaking business, and now Katanji was certainly business. His two new facemarks were barely healed, but he had a passable ponytail, its curls professionally straightened. The clip was a gold griffon. His brown kilt was crafted from expensive suede, his boots shone. He wore a harness, but it supported his cast, not a scabbard. Katanji was prospering.

He glanced around the room approvingly, lifted one of the bright new hangings to chuckle at the ancient sword-cut in the paneling behind it, then made himself comfortable on a stool. “You sent for me, my lord?”

His look of innocence would melt marble.

“I did. It’s very clever, Katanji, but it’s taking too long. We need them now! I understand you have thirty-seven.”

“Thirty-one after these last three, my lord. I’m trying to speed things up—Honorable Trookro just goes and chooses the ones he wants now. That saves arguments. We’re getting another ten in today, though. Good ones!”

Wallie admired his brazen impudence. “You know you nearly got thrown in jail, don’t you? Tivanixi sent Trookro out to buy horses that first morning, and you’d tripled the price before he saw the first blade of grass. They all assumed that it was Chinarama’s foul work. Then they started a witch hunt among the Sixths who’d overheard me telling Tivanixi to bring a saddler out to the ship. They didn’t know I’d mentioned horses earlier, when you were around. Then they wouldn’t believe that a First—even when he got a sudden promotion—was capable of organizing it. I had to argue that you weren’t sworn to the tryst, and therefore what you were doing was not treason, only good business!”

Katanji smiled tolerantly and said nothing.

“Who’s your partner?”

Without a blush, Katanji said, “Ingioli of the Fifth, my lord. Normally he deals in rugs, but he knew some good horse traders.”

“Obviously! Was he surprised to see you again?”

Katanji grinned and nodded.

“Another thing,” Wallie said. “It’s getting too obvious! To start with you kept it out of sight. Now, I’m told, you just turn up with a bunch of kids, and the swordsmen flock round you like . . . like . . . ” He thought of ice-cream carts, but they would not translate.

“It’s love at first sight!” Katanji protested, swinging his legs. “Very touching!”

“Love?” Wallie echoed in horror.

Katanji’s innocence became even more heart-warming. “Did you not know about the girls, my lord? There were four weddings last night and five the day before . . . ”

Now Wallie could not hold back a roar of laughter. “Horses for dowry? What sort of marriages will they be, Katanji? How long will they last after the tryst is disbanded?”

Katanji’s shrug was a reminder that he never worried other people’s troubles for them. “I ran out of sons.”

“You’re running a slave market!”

Katanji’s eyes narrowed at this intrusion of morals into a business discussion. “The swordsmen want mounts. Tivanixi gets a man mounted and a spare horse. The ranchers get twenty golds, more for something special, like a four-year gelding with good legs. The tryst pays nothing—well below cost! Parents are getting sons in the craft and daughters well married. All those rich folk go creepy at the thought of swordsmen grandsons. Who loses?”

“Not Swordsman Katanji, I’m sure.”

“If you want to speed things up, my lord . . . you’ve been rejecting too many! I admit that Olonimpi is poor material, but I thought that the others would pass.”

“They won’t,” Wallie said firmly.

“Three horses apiece?” Katanji said hopefully. “That would be two dozen of the thirty-odd, right there. I’ll make it four for Olonimpi. He couldn’t be any worse a swordsman than I was.”

The nerve of the kid! Wallie had no idea which candidate this inept Olonimpi had been, but obviously his family was rich.

“No,” he said. “I’m not going to lower our standards. How much just to buy the thirty-one horses?”

“More than you can afford!”

Wallie jumped up—and Katanji did not even flinch. Anyone else would flinch for Wallie nowadays, but Katanji had summed up Lord Shonsu a long time ago.

“You know that Tivanixi wants to go and help himself? A cavalry outing?”

Quietly Katanji said, “Pitch?”

Wallie sat down again. Pitch? He had not even thought about pitch yet, but it would be essential for the catapults.

The boy had read his face and was trying not to look smug. “There are two thousand, four hundred and eighty-one barrels of pitch in Casr, my lord. Brota has eight hundred and twelve of them. The rest are mine.”

“And barrels of pitch are easier to hide than horses?”

Katanji smiled.

“We have a torture chamber under this lodge.”

Katanji shrugged. “You promised the sorcerer . . . do you only torture your friends?” He turned his charm on again. “I didn’t think you would stoop to stealing our horses, but Ingioli was nervous and wanted insurance. Just as well, because that was how we discovered what Brota was doing. We were too late on the leather, but she’s going to burn her fingers on the pitch.” He gloated.

Now Wallie was apprehensive, as he was supposed to be. “How much are you going to charge us for pitch?”

“I’ll throw it in with the horses,” Katanji said generously, “if you’ll take those rejected candidates, and if the elders will grant a certain trader a ten-year monopoly on importing rugs into Casr. Thirty-one horses and sixteen hundred-odd barrels of pitch! And Brota can eat all of hers!”

That was a tempting thought after the previous evening’s battle, as Katanji had known it would be.

“These rejected candidates?” Wallie said thoughtfully. “Would they make priests?”

Katanji’s pupils dilated. “I didn’t know you could—”

“Honakura might manage it. A monopoly on silk rugs for five years wouldn’t hurt the poor.”

A frown came over Katanji’s face as he calculated. Then he said, “The pitch, all forty-one horses, eight priests, six priestesses, all rugs for five years, and Olonimpi a swordsman.”

Honakura had said twelve—he would have to manage fourteen.

“Done!” Wallie said. “Except for one other thing.”

Katanji raised a wary eyebrow.

“You tell me—on your honor—how much Olonimpi’s family will pay you.”

“We have a deal?”

“Yes. I’ve already spoken to Honakura,” Wallie admitted, “and I can certainly bully the elders.”

“You won’t tell Nanj?”

“Gods, no!” That would create a riot . . . or worse?

“It’s more than the others . . . ”

“How much?”

It took longer to get that information than it had to get the horses, but eventually Katanji reluctantly muttered, “Twelve hundred.”

“Get out of here!” Wallie roared, trying not to laugh and not succeeding very well. “Arrange with Trookro to pick up the ponies—and this Olonimpi lunk had better go in the cavalry.”

Katanji understood, and chuckled. He paused at the door. “It would help if you would pull in your scouts, my lord. They drive up prices—the ranchers are whipsawing us.”

“Go! And tell your brother I want to see him.”

Wallie rose and followed Katanji out to the antechamber, feeling as if he’d been wrestling bulls. Twelve hundred! Olonimpi alone had covered the syndicate’s expenses. All the rest would be profit—thousands! But forty-one mounts at no cost to the tryst . . . 

Linumino followed as the liege lord marched along to where a twitchy young herald of the Third was waiting beside the two captive Sixths.

Two Sixths, wearing black eyes and swollen lips and surly expressions. It had very nearly been a murder charge for one or the other of them. Ukilio had led his own troop of frees, a large one. Unamani had been reeve of a big city. Good men both, yet they had reacted with hate at first sight, for no known reason.

Wallie could sense their antagonism, when he looked at one, the other snarled.

He wasted no time on formalities. “Who’s Ukilio? So you’re Unamani? You’ve heard the sentence?” They nodded impassively. How could a man be impassive when facing that sort of demolition? “Do you know what twenty-one lashes will do to you?” Wallie did not, but he could guess. They nodded again.

“I don’t like it,” he said. “You’ll both be useless for a year, perhaps evermore. I’d rather have one whole Sixth than two half Sixths.”

There were still two dozen people waiting in the room. They all stiffened in apprehension.

“What I want from a Sixth is leadership, so I’m going to give you a leadership test, a competition. The winner will get one lash from the loser. The winner may then lay as many strokes on the loser as he chooses, he can flog him to death if he wants.”

The victims were startled. Then they looked at each other. The puffed eyes narrowed, and the swollen lips curled in mirror image.

“Lord Linumino,” Wallie said, “will give you back your swords and two golds apiece as expenses. You’re going to dig wells. Here are the rules. Herald, you will proclaim these at the next two meals. Lord Linumino will chose sites for digging and sites for dumping, all dirt must be removed from the courtyard. You may buy the tools you need and recruit no more than twelve men each. You may take any man below the rank of Sixth. You may not interfere with each other’s teams or excavations, or you will be disqualified and declared the loser. One day’s penalty for every injury. The holes must be shored all the way. I shall appoint one judge and you may appoint two each. The first team to recover a full barrel of water is the winner.” He turned to Linumino, who was grinning—a horrible sight. “What other rules do we need?”

“Incentives or threats?”

“Right!” That was tricky, though. Free swords despised money; some were even refusing the daily pittance they were offered for entertainment. “We need more harlots. The winning team will be sent to Dri as talent scouts to recruit in the brothels and bring back the most enjoyable girls. All expenses paid. Do you think that will do it?”

The adjutant chortled. “That ought to get the blood pounding, my liege! The waiting lines are bad, you know.”

So Wallie had been told. “And you must not threaten, or injure, or punish your men. You are to inspire them to dig for you. If you can do that, you have real leadership. Any questions?”

“When do we start, my liege?” asked Ukilio, the larger.

“Now.”

“At the end, my liege,” Unamani said, “can we have a day off before the flogging? I’d like to be well rested so I can do a good job on him.” The two exchanged glares.

“That’s fair enough. Add that, herald. Their swords, Lord Adjutant?”

I am a god, Wallie thought. I play games with men’s lives. Yet a sporting chance was better than no chance. Being flogged to death was little worse than twenty-one lashes with the cat, and maybe—please, gods!—just maybe, the winner would be merciful. It would entertain all those other bored men out there. The betting would be ferocious.

Unamani and Ukilio took their swords and collided in the doorway with a duet of oaths. Then they were gone, almost running into Thana, who was accompanied by a tall and imposing woman in a richly embroidered blue gown. The two women stared in surprise after the departing Sixths.

Wallie sighed. Obviously today was Family Night, but Thana must be accorded precedence, although other callers were now piling up. She was not a vassal, so she made a formal salute, and he responded. Then she presented the scraggy, white-haired matron . . . Olonanghi, weaver of the seventh rank. Curious, Wallie escorted them along to the office and bade them to be seated, giving Lady Olonanghi the chair.

Thana still brazenly continued to wear her riverfolk bikini, the two yellow sashes, but no male was going to complain about that. With her usual confidence she took charge of the conversation.

“We shall not detain you long, my lord. I happened to hear from Nnanji that you were concerned over winter clothing. Wool cloaks, in particular, I think?”

So now Thana was getting into the graft?

“That is true.”

“Fifteen silvers, I think he mentioned?”

Wallie nodded. Nnanji was his oath brother, so Thana was his oath sister-in-law and—Great Gods!—was Brota his oath mother-in-law?

“Lady Olonanghi believes that she can make a better offer, my lord.”

But why to Thana?

The dowager raised a finger to her right eye. “My father was a swordsman, my lord, so I have a special place in my heart for swordsmen.”

Wallie muttered a politeness, thinking that many women had, although not usually so late in life.

Then revelation! “You are not, by chance, related to young Olonimpi, are you?”

The wrinkled face beamed. “My grandson!”

Now Wallie understood and hastily coughed to cover a smile. “A most promising lad. He is close to the front of our list of recruits, but of course we do have constraints on numbers . . . ”

“Perhaps we should discuss the cloaks, my lord,” Thana said in a cold voice—the intrigue was slipping out of her hands.

“We might be able to go as low as ten silvers per item,” Lady Olonanghi suggested.

“I was hoping to find a place in the cavalry for him,” Wallie mused. “Of course the competition there is outrageous—that is the prestige division, you understand . . . I beg your pardon, my lady, my mind was wandering. Did you say six?”

Lady Olonanghi bit her lip. “Eight, I said, my lord.”

“Then the contract is yours! And I do think we can find a spot for a lad of such obvious ability.”

“In the prestige division?” Lady Olonanghi purred.

“Certainly, I am told that he is well qualified for the work.”

He took them out to Linumino to arrange details, while he wondered who was going to come out best in the resulting confusion. Thana and Katanji had both sold Olonimpi. Probably Katanji. Thana was not in his class when it came to money.

And tomorrow Wallie would meet this maladroit Olonimpi and kneel to the boy to give him his sword. For a First in the prestige division, he ought to make it a shovel.

More petitioners had now arrived, but again there was no doubt who took precedence. He forgot all about Thana as he watched Doa’s stately approach. He followed her into the office and closed the door carefully.

Then she smiled. As usual his loins almost burst into flame.

Today was the long hemline again; it varied. But the neckline fell audaciously low, and the pale-blue silk was as close to transparent as any fabric he had ever seen, clinging like lacquer. She was not wearing her lute, and her only adornment was the sapphire he had given her, dangling on its silver chain.

The finances of the tryst desperately needed that gem now.

Doa sauntered across to close the drapes, and his eyes hung on every movement of that superlative body. Time and failure had not blunted his craving. Almost every night be squired her to some function or other, and always she would be asked to sing during the evening. Her dancing was superb, but intimate encounters like the waltz were unknown, so he rarely had a chance to touch more than her hand. They were a striking couple, he knew, towering over everyone else. She was the recognized prima donna, the star of Casr, a figure of awe to the epic-loving swordsmen. Even the liege lord could boost his prestige by being seen with such a companion.

He told her of the invitations he had accepted earlier.

“Fine,” she said, the first word she had spoken. She went to lean against the fireplace, her favorite spot, to regard him with languorous amusement, her favorite occupation.

“What did you think of Mistress Sola’s exhibition the other night?” Doa said. “Did you notice what her husband . . . ”

She was a scurrilous gossip, and a merciless mimic. Each day she came calling at about this time. She would review the most recent festivities, savaging the high society of Casr and the senior swordsmen. Wallie had very little interest in the topic, but he admired the skill of the performance. Sometimes he was moved to genuine laughter—Doa’s impersonation of Nnanji was unbearably funny—but usually he just sat in silence, smiling politely and dreaming lecherous thoughts.

And her real purpose in coming was to enjoy taunting him, teasing and luring like a hungry harlot.

She was mad, and so was he.

Today he felt no desire to indulge in the usual pretense. Last night he had visited Jja, in their cabin. The encounter had been a disaster, as his visits with Jja always were now. Oh, she had submitted, a slave had no choice. She had even pretended that she was trying to please, but her efforts had been those of a well-trained and skillful night slave. The woman he had known, the friend and lover, had vanished, and his attempts to call her back merely reduced Jja to tears and him to fury. He had no patience with her stubborn, silent recrimination. Doa, now—Doa knew how a senior swordsman must behave.

So he had Doa for social companionship and status, Jja for his physical needs. Why should he complain? Most men would have been more than satisfied with either.

He moved toward Doa, and her voice died away. She regarded him warily, and he stopped, knowing that any closer approach would bring on flashing eyes and claws, threats of violence and of screaming. Screams from Doa would be audible all the way to Vul.

“Why do you come here?” he said.

“I thought you enjoyed our little chats, my lord.”

He shook his head. “Be honest for once.”

She regained confidence and chuckled mockingly. “Because your bodyguard knows where you sleep at night, darling. And whom you sleep with. Or should I say ‘without’? Right now, they believe, you are making up for it. Would you prefer that they knew the truth? The other boys would laugh at you!”

“They might laugh at you, also?”

She smiled. “I think not.”

He thought not, as well. Suddenly his hands were shaking, but how much from anger and how much from frustrated lust, he did not know. “What is the price, my lady? What does it take to buy a kiss? Or more than a kiss?”

“You know your promise, Shonsu.”

She had referred to that before. She had always refused to explain.

“I recall no promise.”

Now the eyes flashed, but before she could speak, he said, “I told you to be honest! You are an acute observer of people, Doa. Even if you won’t admit it, you do know that I am not the other Shonsu.”

She stared at him in angry silence.

“You do know! And I do not know what the other Shonsu promised you. So enlighten me.”

Reluctantly she said, “To make me a queen.”

“A what?”

“A queen, Shonsu! Queen of Vul! You swore upon your sword! That was what you promised, and I expect you to deliver.”

Wallie went back to his chair and sat down, stunned. Queen of Vul? Had that been why Shonsu had attacked the sorcerers? Not to avenge the swordsmen, but to bed this woman? Forty-nine dead?

“Vul is a tall order, my lady. How about a smaller kingdom to start with? Tau, say?”

She smiled her feline smile. “That might suffice, at least for openers . . . ” Then she saw that he was not serious and she flared in rage. “But I think I need a lesser present, to hold my interest in the meantime.”

He had showered her with gifts. “You own half the gems in Casr, Doa. What more?”

“A slave.”

“What slave?”

She stalked to the window and threw open the drapes. “It is well known that Shonsu owns the most beautiful concubine in the city. I saw her on the ship, briefly.”

He jumped up. “Never! You would mutilate her!”

“Maybe a little!” Doa swept to the door. “But I want her. Very soon!” She paused, as if to recover her poise. He had never seen her lose it so obviously. “I must go and practice some new songs. They will think you have been exceptionally speedy today, my lord. A new record!”

And then she was gone.

Wallie stared at the closed door. Queen of Vul? She must have been lying . . . And yet, whatever Shonsu’s motives had been in attacking the sorcerers, he would certainly have thought about making himself king of Vul. What else could he have done with a captured sorcerer city, except just raze it? So he might very well have offered Doa a place on his future throne.

The promise itself would not have got him very far, though. New songs, she had said—a threat. Wallie had fallen into the same trap as Shonsu had. One thing was now certain: Shonsu had never raped Doa. She undoubtedly derived a great, perverted pleasure from skirting the edge of violence with her constant invitations, but any man who attempted further intimacy would be immortalized at once in one of her satirical masterpieces, his reputation ruined forever, a public laughingstock.

He could not even jilt her, or the same thing would happen.

Give her Jja? The idea was unthinkable. But many married men kept concubines. It was one of the advantages of a slave-owning society. Perhaps Doa would settle for being queen of Tau?

And tonight, the masons’ dinner . . . business as usual.

Yes, back to business. Forcing thoughts of Doa to the back of his mind, he stepped forward and opened the door. Outside there was loud laughter. Nnanji was perched on the edge of Linumino’s table, doubled over with mirth. He rose, saluted without losing his grin, and then started laughing again. “Flogged to death by the winner? Our liege knows how to motivate a man, doesn’t he, Lord Adjutant?”

He stepped past Wallie into the office, pausing to inspect his healing facemarks in the mirror. “What can I do for you, brother?” As usual, he was in very good spirits.

Ever since Honakura had told him the true prophecy, Wallie had felt uneasy in Nnanji’s presence. On the face of it, he was a soft-spoken, likable youth, as honorable as his brother was devious, totally without guile. He was good company and an incomparable subordinate. Yet he was also—as Wallie well knew—a completely unscrupulous killer. With the tale of Ikondorina’s brother hanging between them, the combination was disturbing in the extreme.

Closing the door, Wallie pointed to the bruises and scrapes on his ribs. “How does a Seventh get so battered?” he asked.

Nnanji pouted. “A fraudulent Seventh? He takes on thirty-nine Sixths in order, starting at the bottom—they all being his vassals, so they can’t refuse. By the time he gets to twenty-two he’s battered! By the time he gets to thirty-nine, he’s going to be doing the battering, I think.” He grinned hopefully.

The Sixths were butchering him? That was not too surprising. The Boy Wonder was not popular with the older men. “You’re not scared that they’ll do serious injury?”

Nnanji shrugged. “I warn them—bruise all they like, but real hurt to a liege is a capital offense. They’re all terrified of you, brother.” Then he grinned again. “And when they hear about this well-digging contest . . . ”

Wallie sank back in his chair and waved toward a stool, but Nnanji continued to mooch idly around the room.

“How do you have the time?”

Nnanji gave him a hurt look. “I’ve done everything you asked, haven’t I?”

He began to count, raising fingers. Thumb: “I’ve memorized all the skills. Linumino was asking for dowsers just now. I gave him three names. Zoariyi wants wheelwrights; we have none.”

Index finger: “The River is patrolled, night and day, and especially Sapphire, of course. No ship approaches the city without showing swordsmen aboard.”

Middle finger: “Katanji has his irregulars checking the ships when they dock, especially if Fiendori’s collectors are suspicious. So far we’ve located four pigeon fanciers and are watching them. Yes, they do buy vellum, as you suspected.”

Ring finger: “Tomiyano and the other sailors are collecting gossip all the time, and we have offers going out to traders in Sen and elsewhere to be our agents. There hasn’t been time to get replies.”

Little finger: “The streets around the lodge are guarded night and day. Visitors are escorted. All boxes and packages coming in are checked for that thunderpowder that bothers you so much. Any wagon that stops is challenged.”

Thumb: “I have two boats surveying the opposite bank for sorcerer activity. Nothing at Gob or Ag, the two closest hamlets, and we’re working up and down from there.”

Index finger: “I found—Tomiyano found—four men who know the Sen and Wal areas well, and the villages near them. I have all that information when you want it.

“I have to stay by the lodge, brother! They need to be able to find me. Now, is there something I’ve missed?”

Probably Wallie had really wanted only to drag him away from fencing, so he smiled apologetically. “No! I’m just jealous, I think. You’re very good at delegating, better than I am. Well, I was wondering about poisoning pigeons . . . ”

He explained—bribe some sailors to visit the sorcerer towns and scatter poisoned grain around the towers. Nnanji pointed out that civilians were reluctant to approach the towers by night, but he promised to discuss it with Tomiyano.

“By the way, brother,” he added. “I need some expense money! I’m broke.”

Wallie rose and went to the chest in the corner. “You ought to keep your own separate,” he said. Yet it was impossible, in the absence of ledgers and bookkeeping. He himself bought gifts for Doa from the tryst’s funds.

“I suppose so,” Nnanji said. “But Katanji needed some. When he gave me your message just now, he cleaned me out.”

“Katanji?” Then Wallie said no more. He handed Nnanji a bag of coins and slammed the lid of the chest.

Nnanji laughed. “Yes, Katanji! I’m going soft in my old age, aren’t I? He seems to be doing very well, whatever he’s up to.” He paused and turned slightly pink. “He says that some of the boys he’s using as irregulars are good material, brother. I said he could promise to induct them afterward—not more than five, I said. That’s all right, isn’t it?”

Wallie sighed. “Yes, as long as they’re not utter cripples.”

Nnanji started. “You don’t think—he couldn’t be taking money from their parents, could he?”

This was getting tricky. Nnanji himself was very sensitive on this subject.

“We’ll test his recruits, don’t worry!”

Nnanji scowled and turned away. “He might get five or ten golds apiece, mightn’t he? Little blackguard!” Then he chuckled again. “Whatever he’s doing, it’s paying well. And when Thana leaves Sapphire, her share will be thousands, did you know that? Funny, isn’t it, brother? I never cared for money. All I ever wanted from life was cool beer and warm girls, and I’m going to have a rich wife and a rich brother. And if I needed money, Katanji would give me everything he’s got!”

Some of it, Wallie thought. “And your goods are my goods?”

“Of course!” Nnanji said, obviously meaning it.

Then the lunch bugle sounded in the courtyard.

“I’m dining with Tivanixi,” Wallie said. “Care to join us?”

Nnanji looked regretful. “Sorry! This is Masons’ Day, my birthday.”

Wallie had not known that. He bit back the obvious question—nineteen? Maybe twenty. But to ask that question was a gross discourtesy among the People, the reason being that most would not know the answer. Like Nnanji, they would know the day, but only because they must keep it holy, with fasting and an all-night vigil in the temple.

“I wonder what Shonsu’s birthday was? I’ll have to choose one! The day I came to the World, I suppose. That would be three days before we met.”

“Teachers’ Day, then!” Nnanji said with a smile.

Mark it on the calendar, Wallie thought. “In my other life, Nnanji, it was usual to give one’s friends presents on their birthdays. Is there anything you want?”

“Funny custom!” Nnanji said. He thought about it and then laughed. “If you’d asked me that when we first met, brother, I’d have said I needed new boots. My old ones leaked. But now?” He gestured at his blue kilt. “What’s left? What in the World could you possibly give me that you haven’t given me already?”

†††

The days passed.

On Sailors’ Day, Honorable Ukilio’s digging team hit rocks and broke all the picks. Odds were adjusted and bets increased.

The prototype catapult self-destructed on its third shot.

Lord Nnanji, whose ribs were adorned with the colors of all ranks, completed his collection of Sixths and started over on the difficult ones.

On Charcoalburners’ Day, Honorable Unamani’s team had a cave-in and broke both its wheelbarrows. Odds were adjusted and bets increased. On that day, also, the sailor spy network reported that thunderbolts had been heard in Wal by night.

On Minstrels’ Day, a fifth pigeon fancier was identified and placed under surveillance.

Exhausted men tore at rocks with their bare hands and staggered through the night with buckets of dirt. Bets were increased. Cheering and booing were banned during hours of darkness. Four workers collapsed from exhaustion and were taken to the house of healing. Penalties were assessed.

On Cobblers’ Day, Lord Nnanji brazenly ordered Lord Linumino to bring his foil out to the plaza. The portly adjutant poked his head into Lord Shonsu’s office to explain where he was going. Lord Shonsu went out in his stead and drove Lord Nnanji all around the plaza backward, giving him three red welts on the left side of his chest to show that it could be done. But Lord Nnanji put a bruise on Lord Shonsu.

The redesigned catapult went into mass production.

No evidence of sorcerer activity was found on the left bank opposite the city.

Several wealthy matrons married handsome young cavalry officers after whirlwind courtships, presenting them with horses as dowries. Swordsman Katanji was invited to all the weddings.

The elders declared a financial crisis and imposed a hearth tax. The liege lord informed them that no swordsmen were available to accompany the collectors. The tax was canceled.

Shortly before lunch on Lawmakers’ Day, Honorable Unamani’s team reported seepage. During lunch, so did Honorable Ukilio’s. Bets were increased. One hour later a cloudburst ended a three-week drought and put six cubits of water in both holes. The judges declared a draw.

The price of pitch in Casr dropped precipitously.

Lord Jansilui, leaving the lodge after reporting to liege Shonsu on the problems of finding suitable wood for both arrows and bows, was accosted by liege Nnanji and handed a foil. Lord Nnanji won.

Lord Shonsu, even with the aid of large quantities of ensorceled wine and a promise of two talent-scouting teams, could not persuade Ukilio and Unamani to accept the gods’ verdict. Finally he made an exception to the rules and allowed them to fight it out with fists—as he should have done in the first place. They pounded each other to custard and became the best of friends.

The sailors reported that thunderbolts had been heard in Aus.

Lord Shonsu accepted a gift of a magnificent silk rug, emblazoned with silver pelicans.

On Healers’ Day, Griffon returned.

The prisoners were safe in the dungeons, the crowds dispersed, the giant’s abacus suitably adjusted. The tryst had a day off to celebrate. The cheering and the booing were over, the minstrels toiled at their epics—How Boariyi of the Seventh Smote the Sorcerers in Wal and Aus, or some equally catchy title.

The office-bedroom was a council chamber again. The Sevenths were gathered on the circle of stools around the brilliant silk rug in the center. A noisy fire crackled in the fireplace. Wallie stood before it, enjoying the warmth against his legs and pondering his strategy. This meeting would be crucial. Square-jawed Jansilui was expounding at length to Linumino on the shortage of fletchers; Tivanixi was describing to Boariyi the finer points of couching a lance; Nnanji was humped on his stool, scowling truculently at the floor. They were waiting for Zoariyi.

The room had been transformed; Boariyi had recoiled in astonishment on seeing it. The paneling shone with wax, its worst blemishes hidden by brilliant tapestries, matching the drapes. The shabby old stools had been replaced by fine oak, the bed and chair similarly upgraded. But the showpiece was undoubtedly the silk rug given by Ingioli, glowing with resplendent silver pelicans and bronze river-horses.

Tivanixi remarked suddenly, “I have a warning for you, Lord Boariyi. We have seven real Sevenths in the tryst now.”

Nnanji glanced up and grinned.

Boariyi raised his eyebrow, wrinkling the red scar above it. “I had better get back in practice, you feel?”

“Definitely! Lord Jansilui will confirm that—and so will thirty-nine Sixths. You can top them all now, my liege Nnanji?”

Turning faintly pink, Nnanji nodded and grinned again.

“I dread the summons,” Tivanixi said. “I have been expecting it for days.”

“You flatter me, my lord.”

The castellan shook his head. “No, I have been watching you closely. I shall be surprised if I can beat you now, my liege.”

Wallie smiled to himself—flattery, but close to the truth, as good flattery should be. Jansilui was a borderline Seventh, but so now, obviously, was Nnanji. Then Zoariyi came scurrying in, sprinkling apologies, and the meeting came to order, the seven Sevenths of the tryst of Casr.

Wallie passed around goblets for toasts. “Lord Boariyi,” he said, “we have heard of your exploits and inspected your prisoners. We congratulate you again on a magnificent beginning to the tryst. I think we should now bring you up to date on what has been going on in your absence. Brief progress reports, if you please. Nnanji?”

Making himself as comfortable as he could on his stool, he let them do their bragging: Nnanji on his espionage, Zoariyi on his catapults, Tivanixi on his cavalry, Jansilui on his archers and the only two operational falcons he had managed to find. Boariyi’s Sixths, in his absence, had developed his troop into a force of guerrillas, knife-throwing, garrote-wielding assassins, who might sneak ashore black-faced by night and seize a dock.

Wallie could feel a great satisfaction. He had brought the tryst forward a thousand years, from Greek phalanx to the Middle Ages. While the sorcerers would class as early Renaissance, a few centuries ahead still, he had significantly closed the gap. He could concentrate his forces, the sorcerers could not. At odds of fifty to one the outcome seemed certain.

Yet it was all in vain. That was the devastating news he must soon impart. How would they take it? How would Nnanji take it?

Wallie himself was secretly jubilant. The thought of going through with the assault horrified him. The pitch-pitching catapults would inevitably start fires, as would the sorcerers’ cannons. Whichever city was attacked would be left half ruined, the population decimated. Boariyi had captured eight sorcerers alive and killed six, losing only one man. He had brought back ten sorcerer gowns, with a treasury of gadgets that Wallie had not yet had time to study. Yet seven men had died! Add that to the fourteen at Ov and the toll was mounting. Add also Tarru and his renegades, add the pirates . . . Wallie Smith was starting to rank with the great killers. But however these swordsmen might dislike the thought of a treaty, he could show that it was the only hope.

They had done. “Thank you,” he said. But he had not called on Linumino and the adjutant was staring at him, glum and puzzled.

“I congratulate you all,” Wallie continued. “Perhaps we should have invited the sorcerers to attend this meeting and hear all that!” They laughed obediently, little guessing how serious he was. “Now, my lords, how would you proceed?”

Again he sat back and he let them plan. They were not stupid. Now that he had jerked their thinking into unconventional paths, they could design the campaign as well as he could, or better. Of course Tivanixi wanted to emphasize cavalry and the others their own specialties, but after a long discussion they more or less came to an agreement. The guerrillas would land at night, when pigeons could not fly, and take over the closest village to the city, whichever one was chosen. They would round up the entire population. The cavalry would disembark at the jetty, ride into the city, secure the docks, and bottle up the sorcerers in their stronghold before they knew the attack was coming. Then the catapults could be unloaded and the real attack begun.

Wallie rose and brought the wine for refills. He remained standing by the fireplace again, because he was going to need all the dominance he could find.

“That was the good news. Now, Lord Linumino? Tell them about finances.” That was a dirty trick to play on a loyal adjutant.

The pudgy swordsman scowled down at his knees. “Finances are very bad and getting worse, my lords. We can cover our running costs from day to day, but we have no money to mount an attack!”

Five faces registered shock. Six sets of eyes swung to look at Wallie.

“I am afraid that this is true,” he said. “Indeed, things are worse than that. I don’t think we can even continue to cover our day-to-day expenses much longer. I have agreed to reduce our sequestration of dock fees.”

Nnanji said, “Why?” indignantly.

“Because the poor are close to starvation!”

He got six blank stares. Economics was beyond them, and he did not fully understand, himself. “Yes, that money is graft, in the sense that it is not authorized by law and does not go into the city coffers. It goes to the collectors, and some of it under the table to the elders. Yes, they are parasites. But they are rich parasites, my lords. They employ servants, keep slaves, and buy services and goods in the city. We have forced them to cut back, so the poor earn less.”

Still bewilderment showed on six faces.

“Put it another way, then,” he said. “The city of Casr buys food from the countryside, right? It sells the country folk things it manufactures—pots, tools, ropes, and so on. Then the tryst brought thousands of extra mouths to feed, but did not increase production. In fact we have been buying horses and lumber and stuff like that—again from the countryside. Gold has been flowing out of the city and not coming back.”

“What has that to do with the poor?” Zoariyi asked angrily. “They never see gold.”

Wallie sighed. “And silver and tin and copper! The price of food has quadrupled since we arrived.” He looked at the disbelieving Nnanji. “Ask Lina—she knows! Prices of other things are falling as desperate people sell their possessions. I repeat: The poor are going to starve unless we take the tryst away quickly.”

They did not understand and they did not overmuch care. Wallie began to feel exasperated. “That rug that you are snarling at, brother. Yes, it was a gift.”

Nnanji turned red and said nothing.

“But I gave no favors in return and I intend to sell it before we leave. The same is true of most of these things. I accepted them on behalf of the tryst, because the tryst is temporary. They will help our finances in the end. Is that acceptable, brother?”

Nnanji mumbled an apology.

“Perhaps I was foolish,” Wallie said—and here he must be very careful not to bruise Boariyi’s prickly swordsman honor, or be would be storing up a challenge for after the tryst was disbanded. “But I did promise the sailors that we would pay for our transportation. They ought to contribute it as a service to the Goddess, of course, but I know sailors! Our swords would rust away first. And if we anger them, they would leave us stranded in Sen or Wal, or wherever, we would never get to the other six cities. There is the worst problem: We do not have the money to charter ships!”

Five faces stared at him in mingled anger and despair, the sixth face was merely furious; Nnanji was never good at hiding his feelings. “How much would the first assault require, brother?”

Wallie shrugged and looked to Linumino,

“I estimate almost four thousand golds, Lord Nnanji. For supplies and transportation, and of course we shall be cut off from our income as soon as we sail.”

“He said five!”

“Who said five?”

“Katanji.”

“What the hell has Katanji got to do with this?” Wallie barked.

“He’s offered to finance our assault.”

“You didn’t tell me that!”

“You didn’t tell me it would be needed! I wouldn’t believe him!”

“Perhaps I should put your brother on my council?”

“Perhaps you should!”

Wallie took a very deep breath, then returned to his stool as a gesture of appeasement. Certainly the last thing he must do was to quarrel with Nnanji. The other Sevenths were now frowning, worried and uncertain.

“All right, brother,” Wallie said. “I’m sorry, I should have kept you better informed. I just thought you had your own problems. Now, what is your financial genius suggesting?”

“He’ll give us five thousand golds for the assault.” Nnanji was still surly. Money was not a fit subject for swordsmen to worry about. “And the same for each successive assault, as long as we keep winning. All except Ov. He isn’t sure about Ov.”

“And what does he expect in return?”

Nnanji scowled and dropped his glare to the silver pelicans again. “The tower.”

“What?”

“The sorcerers pulled down a lot of buildings to make their towers and leave open spaces around them, right? Katanji wants the land. He’ll sell it and give us money to go on to the next city. He says land in a town is worth more than farmland. Is that right? It seems backward! You can’t grow things on flagstones.”

From rugs, to jewels, to livestock, to real estate? Katanji was making a logical progression to . . . to immense wealth! The Goddess had rewarded all those who had helped him, Wallie knew, and now he saw another example, very plainly. Was the lad himself already worth five thousand golds, or had he put together a syndicate? Did it matter?

What did matter was that the main support for Wallie’s arguments had just collapsed. This was going to be trickier than he had expected.

The other Sevenths were all grinning. They had a right to, Wallie conceded to himself. He had overlooked the possibility of looting the sorcerers. Katanji had not, although he might not have considered the devastation an attack would bring, or what that might do to real estate values.

“Very well,” he said grudgingly. “So we could finance the attacks that way. But there is another problem. Suppose we attack Sen or Wal—or any of the cities on the left bank. Suppose we take the tower. What happens then?”

Honakura had not thought of what happened then. It was unlikely that the swordsman would, even with sutras on strategy to help. They looked blankly at him, so he explained. The sorcerers would return to the hills.

Then they saw.

“Attack Vul?” Zoariyi muttered uneasily.

They talked that over and they did not like it. It would certainly have to wait until spring, perhaps even next summer. Vul—wherever or whatever it was—would be well fortified by then.

When they had all smelled that bad egg, Wallie laid another. “Forarfi has been doing a little research for me.” He avoided looking at Nnanji, who was supposed to be Chief of Intelligence. “He has talked to all the Sixths and many Fifths. We have swordsmen here, my lords, from all over the World, He asked about other sorcerer cities, like Vul. There is one near Plo . . . and others, He compiled a list of eleven. I recited it to Rotanxi. He admitted that there are thirteen in all. Covens, he called them. He says that Vul is the greatest, but he may be bragging.”

The Sevenths scowled at the mention of Rotanxi.

“Are you suggesting that we should have to attack all thirteen?” Zoariyi asked waspishly.

“I am suggesting that they may attack us! So far, apparently, only Vul has these thunderbolt weapons, or only Vul has used them. The others may well be waiting to see what happens here. We may be able to scotch Vul, my lords—although I am not confident—but we can hardly hope to kill all the sorcerers there. The survivors will flee to the other cities . . . ”

The smarter ones nodded—Zoariyi, Tivanixi, Nnanji.

Outside, the day was blustery, even in the courtyard, and the miniature canvas city there flapped and rattled in the wind.

At last Nnanji put the matter into words. “Sometimes when you try to clean a stain you spread it?”

Wallie had been thinking of cancer cells, but that would do. As a child, Nnanji had cleaned rugs for his father.

“Exactly! In truth, my lords, there is no way that the tryst can triumph completely over the sorcerers. The best we can do is drive them away for a year or two. The worst we can do is to make things much worse than they are now.”

“What are you suggesting, brother?” Nnanji demanded, his eyes glinting dangerously.

Here it came: “Try to make a treaty.”

Their hiss of anger faded away into the flapping noises from beyond the windows and the crackling of the fire.

Then they began to exchange glances, and their eyes converged at last on Nnanji. The old suspicions of Shonsu had erupted again. He had a feathermark on his eyelid, he kept a sorcerer on his ship, there was always something strange about him. But Nnanji was the known sorcerer-killer of Ov, and it was impossible to suspect Nnanji of being anything but what he claimed to be, a simple swordsman.

They were bound to obey their liege lord, but the tryst could not last forever. Wallie could force these men to violate their own sense of honor, for they must obey his commands—until the tryst was disbanded. Then they would all be at liberty to challenge him, one after another to exhaustion. Yes, they would obey, but Nnanji was a liege lord, too, and if he were to try to take the tryst away from Wallie—young as he was—the other Sevenths in their present mood would probably not argue.

Nnanji was scarlet with rage. Wallie should have warned him in advance; that had been a stupid oversight.

Finally Nnanji said, “A treaty with assassins?” as if the words burned his mouth.

“We know that they will keep their oaths,” Wallie said quietly.

“Three cities for them and four for us? Or the other way?”

“Seven for us, seven for them. I want to end the quarrel between our two crafts.”

Stunned silence.

“And what does your tame sorcerer say to this?” The older men were all going to leave it to Nnanji.

“I haven’t asked Rotanxi,” Wallie said, “I was hoping to get your agreement first. He may well dislike the idea as much as you do. I just think that it is worth trying—the best thing for both sides. If we do attack Sen, say, we shall kill hundreds of innocent civilians. I don’t think that’s very honorable behavior.”

“I think a treaty is worse!”

Almost imperceptibly, the others were nodding.

Wallie sighed. “It is a novel idea. You need time to think about it. But remember that the sorcerers know about our cavalry and our catapults and our archers; we could not have kept them secret had we tried. They are not fools. They know the odds. They must be worried. Now is the time to to offer terms.”

“What terms?” Nnanji spat the words.

“They get rid of their thunderbolt weapons. We extend to them the same protection we give to all other crafts. The towers remain, but we put garrisons back in the cities.”

Nnanji’s jaw dropped. He glared incredulously at Wallie, then around at the others. Then he slumped forward, staring at the silver pelicans for along time, shaking his head, tugging at his ponytail as he did when he was thinking hard. No one else spoke. No one would meet Wallie’s gaze.

Suddenly a log in the hearth collapsed in a shower of sparks, and Nnanji looked up with a curious gleam in his eye. “What do you propose to do next, Shonsu?”

“I thought I might go—we might go and talk to Rotanxi.”

“I may come, then?”

What was amusing him? Still, that was a very good idea. Nnanji would be representative for the swordsmen. If Wallie could somehow convince him, then the other Sevenths must follow.

“Certainly! Let’s do that, then. Lord Nnanji and I will go and sound out the sorcerer Seventh, my lords, and report back to you. If he turns us down flat, then my proposal is hopeless.”

They took that as a welcome dismissal. They all sprang to their feet, saluted fist on heart, and marched to the door. The last one out was Boariyi. He slammed it behind him deafeningly.

Nnanji chuckled. “I think you upset them, brother!”

“I thought I’d upset you, too.”

Nnanji wrinkled his nose in amusement. “That was when I thought you were serious! You fooled me there for a minute! Now, brother, your secrets are my secrets. What’s your real plan?”

††††

The tryst had established its own loading dock on the waterfront. There were always swordsmen there, but the arrival of the two liege lords with their combined bodyguards made it seem like an armed encampment. An icy wind was whipping in from the River, blowing spray. Lady Olonanghi’s factory had begun delivery of swordsmen cloaks—strange garments that left sword hilt and sword arm free—but Wallie had insisted that the lowranks be outfitted first, for juniors spent more time out in the cold. Thus many white and yellow capes roiled in the wind around him, and a few browns, also, but the highranks and most of the middle-ranks shivered. Wallie was no exception. It was all he could do to keep his teeth from chattering.

Nnanji was managing to combine blue lips and a very black expression. He had finally been convinced that Wallie was serious in wanting a treaty. His disgust was bottomless. Just as the swordsmen arrived, so did Thana, bringing in one of Sapphire’s dingies. She stared in astonishment at Nnanji’s obvious anger and ephemeral kiss. She regarded the baggage with curiosity—bundles and two stools—then offered to take the visitors out. Wallie agreed, to save calling in a patrol boat.

Thana’s questions began as soon as the dinghy was underway. She received no answers. Nnanji was in a speechless sulk, while she and Wallie had been on poor terms since the Olonimpi incident. Apparently Katanji had won the cigar.

The sun was bright enough, but could force no warmth through a white overcast. High above, creating this haze, three long plumes of cloud streamed toward the city from RegiVul. The Fire God was exceedingly enraged. Perhaps he disapproved of Boariyi’s victory, or else he did not want a treaty, either. The River was choppy in the gusty wind, bouncing the boat roughly. The air bore a faint stink of sulfur.

Wallie was very conscious of Nnanji’s anger and was miserably trying not to think about the Ikondorina prophecy: it is your kingdom that I covet. If the sorcerers would accept a treaty and Wallie tried to force it on the swordsmen, then Nnanji might very well be driven to that idea. The other Sevenths had no legal vote, but in practice their views must be considered. They might even encourage him to mutiny.

Then what? Nnanji’s swordsmanship was certainly approaching seventh rank now, and the gods might not allow a fair match. The gods? The gods would not need to intervene! With foils Wallie was still the better man, but if he and Nnanji pulled swords, the result would be a forgone massacre. He had been reluctant to injure even Boariyi, whom he had disliked. He could never exert himself against Nnanji. Where honor was concerned, Nnanji would have no such milksop scruples.

A long tack brought them alongside Sapphire and Wallie scrambled up the rope ladder to the deck. It seemed larger than usual because it was almost deserted. Anchored by the bow, the ship faced toward far-off RegiVul. The old sorcerer in his blue gown was huddled in Brota’s trading chair in the lee of the fo’c’sle. The golden city lay aft. Faint shouts from that direction showed that the children were romping in the deckhouse, out of the wind. Jja was just emerging, swathed in sweater and pants of thick black wool. Tomiyano and Holiyi, on hands and knees amidships, were holystoning the deck, and still defiantly wearing only skimpy breechclouts, to demonstrate macho indifference to cold.

Wallie flashed Jja a brief smile and then turned to catch the stools and bundles as Nnanji tossed them up from the dingy. Jja was a problem. It was two days since he had last been out to Sapphire, so his physical reaction to her would be overwhelming—Shonsu’s glands would roar—but this visit was too important to waste time on mere bodily processes. He must try to find some free time in the near future to deal with such personal trivia.

The last bundle delivered, he turned and found her standing beside him. For an instant her deep, dark eyes searched his face, then she inclined her head and waited in silence.

“We only came to talk with Lord Rotanxi, love,” he said. “You go back inside, out of the wind.”

But Tomiyano was there, also, arms akimbo, blocking Wallie’s path. So we were back to formalities, were we? He began the salute to a superior—and the captain cut him off.

“Never mind that bilge, Shonsu! I want to talk business.”

“Be quick about it!”

“I’m told the tryst is short of cash.”

“What is that to do with you, sailor?”

“I thought a thousand golds might interest you?”

Startled, Wallie paused to think, moving aside as Nnanji and Thana came on board. Tomiyano flashed them a smile and went back to scowling at Wallie. Nnanji was the popular swordsman on Sapphire now. He was one of the family. He slept on board every night, no matter how late the banquets and balls ended; Nnanji seemed able to dispense with sleep for weeks at a time when he wanted to. But what was the sailor after? Wallie did not doubt that the money was available. He was sure that Brota had far more than that hidden away aboard somewhere, the family’s savings. Then he noticed that Brota herself had emerged from the fo’c’sle door and was standing beside it, red robe rippling, watching the exchange with a worried stare. Expecting trouble?

“A thousand golds for what, Captain?”

Tomiyano indicated Jja with a jerk of his head. “Her.”

Jja gasped.

“Been entertaining the crew, have you?” Wallie roared.

She shook her head wildly. “No, master! I know nothing of this!”

Tomiyano had his hand very close to his dagger. “You should know better than that, Shonsu!”

“Then what the hell do you mean?”

“I mean that she’s a desirable property and she isn’t getting the use she deserves. She’s pining. I’ve heard her weeping in her cabin. If you don’t want her, then I’ll take her. A thousand? It’s a fair offer.”

It was an absurd offer. No slave, no matter how attractive, would ever fetch more than twenty. It was also an offer that made murder feel like a very good idea. Wallie’s hand trembled with me conflicting signals it was being sent.

“You stay away from my slave, sailor, or by the gods, I’ll fillet you!”

“Twelve hundred?”

Nnanji grabbed Wallie’s arm just in time. “Easy, brother!”

Wallie jerked free, sending Nnanji staggering backward. “No!” He glared at the horror-struck Jja. “You’re coming ashore with me when I go! Get your things ready!”

She nodded fearfully. “Vixini, master?”

Having Jja underfoot would be bad enough. He certainly did not want a slave baby with a blacksmith fathermark running after him, calling him Daddy in front of the swordsmen. “He stays here!”

Jja paled even more. He had promised her once . . . 

“And stay out of my business, sailor!”

Wallie nodded to Nnanji, grabbed up one of the bundles, and headed forward. Thana had gone to join Brota. The two of them retreated into the fo’c’sle.

Twelve hundred golds! Wallie struggled to drag his mind back to business. The insolence! But Rotanxi was more important at the moment. What game was the sailor playing? He must have known that Wallie would not accept. Had Rotanxi overheard? A supreme trader like Tomiyano would never open negotiations that way . . . 

Nnanji clattered the two stools down in front of the sorcerer. Nnanji was back to scowling. The sorcerer raised his shaggy white eyebrows. Wallie made formal salute, and the old man pushed himself to his feet to respond. Nnanji glowered at Wallie, saluted peremptorily, and barely waited for Rotanxi’s response before sitting down.

“The wind is chill, my lord,” Wallie said. “Would you prefer to go below?”

“This is fine.”

Wallie sat. The old man was better dressed, and that put him about ten points ahead already. On the deck near his feet lay a sheet of vellum, weighted down by a marlinespike. His quill and ink bottle lay beside them. He had asked for those—almost humbly—many days before. Wallie had granted them, trusting him not to send messages. Probably he was recording all the curious knowledge he had extracted from Lord Shonsu.

“We came to give you a progress report on the tryst, my lord.”

“You came to gloat?” Any slight relaxation that had crept into their relationship over the past weeks had vanished now. The sorcerer could smell business, and business at the moment was war. His always-craggy face was stony.

The deck was empty except for the three of them and Tomiyano, who had gone back to his scraping. The others had all gone below. A haze of volcanic dust was sweeping by in the wind.

Ignoring Rotanxi’s question, Wallie began to summarize what had been reported at the meeting—the catapults, the archers, the guerrillas, the cavalry. He described Boariyi’s success—six dead, eight captured. Nnanji ground his teeth in silence. Finally Wallie assured the sorcerer that he could finance his attack. The tryst was almost ready for battle.

“So you want me to go back and tell my friends to give up?” Rotanxi was needle-sharp. Swordsmen won promotion by prowess with their blades. Sorcerers must do so by intelligence test.

“I wanted to show you that we can win.”

“Against our thunder weapons? It will be bloody.”

“We have much more blood available than you do, my lord.”

The sorcerer’s wrinkles writhed, displaying skepticism. “We shall see.”

“I should rather not,” Wallie said. “We shall wreck the cities and kill innocent bystanders.”

“Since when have swordsmen worried about civilians?”

Wallie vowed a silent oath that he was not going to lose his temper. “This tryst was called to restore the honor of the swordsmen’s craft, my lord. Killing civilians is not honorable and never has been. To be quite honest, I am not sure that killing sorcerers is, either. Do you know the origin of the quarrel between our two crafts?”

“No. It goes back even before our records.”

“Then let us two stop it.”

That won a reaction. The sorcerer stared at him unbelievingly.

“I came to suggest a treaty,” Wallie said. “Before the serious killing starts.”

“Bah! Why should we? You cannot win, Shonsu! One tower or even two, perhaps, but then we shall go away! Had you not thought of that? Admit it—the tryst must be disbanded. You cannot hold your superiority in numbers. In five years we shall be back.” He smiled a cruel, thin-lipped smile. “Of course you are welcome to attack Vul again. I hope you try! You may win in the short run, but we win in the end. Admit it, swordsman!”

“I admit nothing!” Wallie lifted the bundle and tipped out twelve pistols—Rotanxi’s own, Chinarama’s, and the ten that Boariyi had brought. Then there was a lull in the conversation, while Sapphire wrestled with her cable and a straggle of geese flew by, far overhead. The sorcerer was frowning at this new threat.

“We win in the short run,” Wallie said. “You may win in the middle run—perhaps. In the end we both lose.”

“How so?”

“The swordsmen now know that your thunderbolts are not spells, that they are weapons. They will seek to obtain such weapons so that they may fight you on equal terms. And swordsmen are much better fighters! If I do not give them the secret, they will gain it by other means. In five years, my lord, you will be facing swordsmen armed with the same weapons you have now. I could make better, if I chose.”

Another pause. Then Wallie added: “Nor will it stop there. Such weapons cannot be kept secret. Civilians will start getting them also. Then any old grandmother is a match for the toughest swordsman. Brigands will keep sorcerers captive in their cellars to manufacture weapons. It will mean ruin for both our crafts, my lord.”

This was his argument-for-sorcerers. He had not presented it to the swordsmen and he wondered what Nnanji was making of it, but he kept his eyes on Rotanxi.

“I have no power to negotiate anything,” the sorcerer said at last, and Wallie knew that he was making progress.

“You could take a message. And I cannot believe that the wizard of Sen is without influence.”

The bitter old man studied him carefully. “What exactly are you proposing, Shonsu?”

“That we end the needless hostility between swordsman and sorcerer. It was always foolish and now it will lead to a growing, spreading struggle . . . ” It was hard to find words to describe an arms race. Eventually he thought the sorcerer understood. “So you must agree to destroy your weapons and make no more. In return we treat your craft as we do all others, and you would be under the protection of the swordsmen.”

Rotanxi laughed scornfully. “The protection of that gang of killers, thieves, and rapists you have in Casr? I had sooner be guarded by rabid wolves!”

Nnanji cursed and half rose from his stool, reaching for his sword. Then he sank back, muttering.

But Wallie managed to control his own temper. “I do not defend what happened when the swordsmen began arriving, my lord. It was shameful. But it was also unusual. There has been no tryst in many centuries to warn us—hundreds of free swords, all expecting to be treated like kings and heroes, all of them with nothing to do! As soon as the tryst was sworn, Lord Boariyi imposed discipline. The elders say that Casr has never been more peaceful than it is now. Maidens walk the streets at midnight unmolested. Thieves and cutpurses have vanished. I offer you this for your seven cities, and all others!”

Rotanxi scoffed. “You think you have such power?”

“I have unlimited power. The swordsmen are sworn to obey me to the death and without question.” All except that angry young man beside me. “If I say that sorcerers are friends, then they will be treated like friends. I can make the swordsmen swear an oath to that effect.”

The sorcerer stared coldly at him, but he was very intent. “ ‘And all others,’ you said?”

Wallie smiled. “I am being optimistic. The fourteen cities of the loop, certainly. The rest of the World will obviously be a little harder, and take time. But I could impose a new sutra on the men we have here. I could make them swear to work for its adoption everywhere. The Goddess brought them, and She will return them to their homes. They can tell the others. We do not have all the World’s swordsmen here, my lord, only a tiny fraction of them. But in time, with goodwill on both sides . . . 

“I believe that you sorcerers have much to offer the World.” He pointed to the vellum and the quill. “That alone is desperately needed, by priests and merchants . . . even by swordsmen!”

The sorcerer was thinking, pulling his lip and not looking at Wallie. After a moment he said, “This is a strange idea, Lord Shonsu! You have surprised me many times, but never like this! Let me ponder awhile.” He rose stiffly and paced off along the deck.

Wallie became aware that he was trembling with the cold. But he was also feeling a stir of hope. He glanced cautiously at Nnanji.

Nnanji was grinning.

Astounded, Wallie said, “What do you think?”

“I think he’s going to go for it, brother!” Nnanji was excited. Nnanji was pleased! His black rage had vanished. So the argument-for-sorcerers had worked on him, also? Wallie would have to try it on the other Sevenths. He was astonished, but he also felt a great surge of relief.

“A new sutra would have to be number eleven forty-five, I suppose,” Wallie said, “although that is at the wrong end of the list. But I can’t meddle with the others.”

Nnanji laughed. “Thirteen?”

Of course! There was no sutra thirteen. Knowing the sutras without ever having learned them, Wallie had not been aware of that—and yet somehow he knew as soon as Nnanji spoke that it was a trick question for Firsts. Twelve was on duties to priests, fourteen on the rights of civilians. Had there once been a sutra thirteen that dealt with sorcerers, a sutra abandoned after the great quarrel?

“Then we shall make a sutra number thirteen!” Wallie said, feeling that he had stumbled on something significant.

Rotanxi returned to his chair without a word and picked up his writing equipment. He pulled his glasses from a pocket, and put them on, causing Nnanji to snicker. He uncorked the ink bottle, laid it carefully on the seat beside him, and began to write. Nnanji watched in astonishment and then turned to look inquiringly at Wallie.

“That is the sorcerers’ greatest magic, Nnanji. Lord Rotanxi is being very trusting in showing you.”

“But what is he doing?” Nnanji whispered.

Wallie tried to explain, and his young companion’s invisible eyebrows rose impossibly high, crumpling the seven swords on his forehead. Storing words?

“What sutra would you impose, Shonsu?” demanded Rotanxi, peering over his glasses. Wallie told him and he wrote it down.

“And on your side?” Wallie asked.

“How about this? ‘Violence is the prerogative of the swordsmen. The sorcerers’ arcane knowledge shall not be used to harm or kill or to make weapons.’ ”

“That would do very well,” Wallie said.

The sorcerer put away his writing equipment and leaned back in thought again, gazing up at the rigging.

“I should go and get some blankets, brother!” Nnanji said through chattering teeth.

Wallie shook his head. To leave now would break the spell. A stench of sulfur filled the air and the unladen ship rocked uneasily, but history was being made on this spot, at this moment. His life as Shonsu would be judged by what happened here.

“Swordsmen have been killing sorcerers for thousands of years,” Rotanxi murmured. “Now that we have the power to retaliate, they want peace?” He was rehearsing an argument.

“More than three hundred swordsmen have died here in the last fifteen years. My side is howling for blood, also.”

The sorcerer nodded, then went still again, as if he had frozen to death.

At long last his vulpine old eyes came back to Wallie. “It might work! I can testify that the leader of the swordsmen is a man of honor, my lord. I admit that you have done well at winning me over, these last few weeks.”

There was praise indeed.

“I speak for the swordsmen,” Wallie said. “Who speaks for the sorcerers? Is there a Grand Wizard of Vul?”

Rotanxi shook his head. “We have a council of thirteen. There are factions, those who wish to drive out the barbarous swordsmen, and those who say that our mission is the quest for knowledge, that government is not our business.”

“The hawks and the doves?”

“Mm? Good metaphor! I admit that I was a hawk, my lord. If I change sides, I may carry some votes—if I am allowed a hearing, that is.” He frowned once more.

“Why should you not be?”

The shrewd old eyes smiled cynically. “I shall have the same problem you had. I shall be regarded as a turncoat.”

“I have been very careful,” Wallie said, “not to reveal anything that I might have learned from you.”

Rotanxi shrugged. “I sneer at your swordsman brutality, my lord, but I admit that we sorcerers are not without a few barbarities of our own. If I fail, then I shall be given to the tormentors.”

“Then . . . your honor shall be the greater,” Wallie stammered.

“Mm? Honor is a fine reward, but a poor consolation. And I can do nothing about the other covens, you understand. Only Vul.”

“But Vul could advise them?”

Rotanxi nodded. “As you say, the World will take time and be harder. But if it worked here, we could hope that the example would encourage others.”

Wallie glanced again at Nnanji. The grin was wider than ever. Apparently sorcerers would listen to reason, as Wallie had hoped, and apparently Rotanxi was going to cooperate. He might, of course, be utterly untrustworthy, seeking only to return to his own side and report on the swordsmen’s plans, but that risk was worth taking. And Nnanji, incredibly, was now in favor. Could Nnanji persuade the other swordsmen?

Happy ending?

“What exactly do you propose, Shonsu?” the sorcerer demanded abruptly, switching from thought to action.

“You and I must swear an oath, I suppose,” Wallie said—he had hardly got this far in his thinking. “We will swear to work for this peace we envisage. I shall return you to the left bank, and you will put it to your council. If they agree, then we shall make a formal treaty. Of course the tryst will need victory parades, with bands, so that they can say they won, but not more than fifty men per town. I shall put garrisons back into the cities, and I shall choose good men, no young hellions—”

“Vul is excluded! No swordsman has ever entered Vul.”

“Certainly! But the sorcerers will remain as honored citizens and will be admitted to the other seven cities of the loop also. Then we shall worry about the rest of the World, working together, sending forth swordsman and sorcerer side by side to spread the word.”

“It is a staggering concept!” the sorcerer muttered. “But worth striving for. To do our best—that is all that we two can swear to.”

“In my other world, a god once said Blessed are the peacemakers.”

Rotanxi nodded. “However . . . ” His tone changed. “I see one immediate problem. You have an army in place. I believe that you are a man of honor, but my comrades will naturally suspect a trap. Many of the city wizards are members of the council. For there to be a meeting, they must travel to Vul.”

Wallie saw what was coming, like a great black bird descending.

“At this time of year the roads may be difficult. We shall need time, at least twenty days, there and back again.”

Winter was near. The longer the swordsmen’s attack could be delayed the better—for the sorcerers.

“How many?” Wallie demanded harshly. “Who?”

Rotanxi looked thoughtfully at Nnanji. “I think one would suffice—a Seventh and co-leader of the tryst, oath brother to Lord Shonsu. He would be ideal.”

Appalled, furious that he had not foreseen this, Wallie turned to Nnanji.

Nnanji shrugged. “I shall wear my sword, though!”

Rotanxi hesitated and then said, “I suppose so. You will be the first swordsman ever to enter Vul, Lord Nnanji—assuming that we are allowed so far.”

Wallie said, “He would not be expected to negotiate?”

“No, merely a hostage for your good faith. He may be asked about you, of course, and how the other swordsmen feel.” The sorcerer smiled faintly. “My colleagues will be surprised by his youth, but by then the meeting will be in session.”

“What guarantees do you give for his safe return?”

“Only my own word, my lord. If my plea is rejected, then he will suffer the same fate as myself. Being younger, he will take longer to die.”

Nnanji seemed unconcerned, even pleased, at the prospect. How Nnanji of the Seventh Went to Vul . . . 

“Come with me!” Wallie said. Grabbing him by the shoulder, he hauled Nnanji off his stool and almost dragged him along the deck, out of earshot. “I can’t allow this!”

Nnanji chuckled. “You can’t stop it.”

“Oh! Can’t I? I’m not going to swear that oath, Nnanji, not on those terms! This council of his may be a gang of mad dogs. Rotanxi himself may be treacherous—as long as all I was gambling was a couple of weeks’ delay, then the wager was worth it! But I’m not going to gamble you, oath brother. You were seen killing sorcerers in Ov—”

“I repeat: You can’t stop it! It is preordained.”

“What?”

“Don’t you see? We always said that I would have a part to play in your mission. This is it, at last! This is why I was made your oath brother, why I became a Seventh! Better than counting pigeons! And I promised Arganari I would wear his hairclip to Vul! Of course I didn’t know I would be going as a hostage . . . ” He laughed. “It’s destiny, Shonsu, the will of the Goddess!” Then he added with relish, “The first swordsman ever to enter Vul!”

He leaned back against the rail and smirked mockingly. “Unless you want to go yourself?”

The idea was enough to make Wallie’s gut heave. He would be thrown into the nearest torture chamber and laid on the rack, producing a secret a day for the sorcerers like a battery hen, a one-man industrial revolution. He could easily imagine that sour old Rotanxi wielding his hot irons—and that thought made him realize how very little he really trusted the sorcerer.

“Nnanji! Your oaths are my oaths! Suppose they make you swear to disband the tryst?”

Even Nnanji could pause at that prospect. Then he said, “I promise you that they will not succeed, brother.”

“You won’t enjoy it while they’re trying!”

Nnanji shrugged, then his smile returned.

“We’ll send two of the other Sevenths!” Wallie insisted.

Nnanji’s smile vanished. “Send vassals into danger? To do my duty?”

Perhaps it was only Wallie’s imagination, but he thought then that he saw something change in Nnanji’s eyes, saw something he had been dreading he might one day see. The killer look? It is your kingdom that I covet? He knew then that Nnanji would not be denied this chance for honor and fame.

Once he had joked that Nnanji was an egg that was going to hatch something extraordinary. Now, suddenly, he saw what it was. Take a lanky, red-haired, jovial young man of courage and honor, add swordsmanship and a few miracles, marinate in all those epics and sagas . . . 

Wallie had always denied being an epic hero. Even Doa’s epic was not named after him. But he knew one when he saw one.

“Right, brother?” Nnanji thumped Wallie’s shoulder and grinned.

“I . . . ” He could not find words.

Chuckling, Nnanji went swaggering back toward the sorcerer. Wallie followed, his mind whirling. Why had he not been more insistent? Was he trying to rid himself of a threat?

Had the gods created Nnanji to be nothing more than a sacrificial martyr, whose death would inspire the tryst?

Rotanxi looked up at them appraisingly. “I have my hostage, Shonsu?”

Wallie nodded. “Twenty days. But if he is harmed in any way, then I swear that I will bring the tryst to Vul and raze it, no matter what the cost! And I have eight sorcerers in my dungeons, remember!”

The sorcerer shrugged. “Of course. Now we need to swear our oaths, we two?”

“I suppose so.” Wallie sat down limply. His brief euphoria was wearing thin. He could see complications springing up like thorns all around him. He felt ashamed and horrified at betraying Nnanji. “I should put this to my own council first, my lord. They must obey, but I would prefer to have willing agreement.”

The sorcerer nodded shrewdly. “Yes. I should have assurance that the liege lord will not meet with an unexpected accident.”

“Let us go and meet them, then.” Wallie glanced around and saw that Tomiyano was still on deck, leaning on the rail, openly watching. Wallie rose and went over to him warily.

“If you have a crew handy, Captain, it would be all right to take the ship in now. I waive dock fees!”

The sailor studied him in silence for a moment. Then he said, “You’re crazy.”

“What now?” Wallie asked angrily.

“Him!” Tomiyano gestured, but which of the two he meant Wallie was not sure: the tall, imposing sorcerer or the lithe, taller, red-haired swordsman. They were deep in conversation already, the bitter enmity of an hour ago apparently discarded. Oh, let that be an omen!

“You were spying, were you?” Wallie had forgotten that sailors could read lips.

“A council of thirteen Rotanxis?” Tomiyano sneered. “Can you imagine it?”

“Barely.”

“And you’re going to send that boy to them? The first thing they’ll ask him is how many sorcerers he’s killed.”

And Nnanji would tell them.

“I don’t think I can stop him.” It sounded weak even to Wallie as he said it, but it was the truth.

Tomiyano was furious, his voice rising. “You know what they’ll see when they look at him? A trained killer! A boy monster! I don’t suppose sorcerers reach seventh rank until they’re sixty at least. They’ll be a bunch of frightened old men, Shonsu, and you’re suggesting something totally new. You want them to trust you—and you send Nnanji? You’re making my sister a widow, damn you! Do you suppose they’ll send some bits of him back to her as souvenirs?”

†††††

The circle of seven had now become a circle of eight. Seven swordsmen sat on stools, the solitary sorcerer in a chair. The fire crackled and sparked, sometimes blowing out clouds of smoke as the wind gusted. Likely the chimney had not been swept in a century.

Yet the group of eight held subgroups. Rotanxi was a conspicuous minority of one in his cowled gown. The old man was understandably wary, a solitary cat in a doghouse, being cautious and courteous.

Wallie himself felt strangely isolated, the other swordsmen’s suspicion walling him in like thick glass. As he described the tentative agreement he had made with the sorcerer, he could feel his words bouncing off it. They did not want to hear.

And Nnanji was another group all to himself. He was staying silent, sinewy arms folded and ankles crossed, gazing at his boots with a secret smile teasing the corners of his mouth. Even the silver pelicans on the rug did not upset him now.

The other five Sevenths were implacable. They had been given time to think about a treaty, and they thought even less of it afterward than they had before. Be nice to sorcerers? Shameful! A twenty-day truce with winter coming? Insanity! Liege Nnanji as hostage? Outrageous! All their war preparations to be thrown away? Treason! They were not saying so, but their opinion was obvious. Rotanxi could not help but notice. He would surely withdraw from the agreement if he felt that Shonsu could not count on the willing support of even his senior officers.

Then Wallie played what he thought was his trump card, his argument-for-sorcerers that had apparently converted Nnanji—if this struggle goes ahead, then swordsmen and even civilians will get hold of the sorcerers’ weapons. It did not work. It was too farfetched and hypothetical for the Sevenths. Their icy disapproval did not thaw in the slightest.

Nnanji caught Wallie’s eye, grinned faintly, and shook his head. Nnanji was being uncharacteristically telepathic this day and he was saying that this was not the argument to use.

But what was? Why had he come around so dramatically? Even Wallie did not know, and the other Sevenths certainly did not. Nnanji had them all baffled—they kept staring at him, trying to understand his inexplicable change of heart.

Finally Wallie asked for comments or questions. A pall of silence fell, like earth on a coffin lid. As it dragged on, Rotanxi turned and gave him a quizzical and cynical glance—this is your support?

Wallie’s temper began to stir. Stupid iron-age barbarians! Ignorant savages! Why had he been given this impossible task? For the first time since his early days in the temple at Hann, he felt a great longing for his old life on Earth come washing over him and a bottomless contempt for this primitive culture and its mule-headed swordsmen. Almost he could want to wash his hands of the whole affair, of the tryst, of the gods’ mission. He could take Jja down to the River and find a ship and sail away to be a water rat for the rest of his days . . . 

Which would be few and nasty, if he defied the Goddess.

“Shonsu,” Nnanji said, “perhaps we should allow the valiant lords a chance to discuss this without the sorcerer present?” He could not portray innocence nearly as well as his duplicitous brother could. He was plotting something. Wallie hesitated and then concluded that he had no choice. He would have to trust Nnanji.

“Very well! My lord?” Wallie rose and escorted Rotanxi to the door. As he had expected, Nnanji stayed where he was. The door closed behind them, Rotanxi turned to say something . . . 

But Wallie had already gone.

There were only a few bodyguards remaining in the long antechamber—and Jja. He had set her on a stool and told her to wait, certain that she would be safe there, after what had happened the last time she had visited the lodge. Safe from swordsmen—but now she was standing with eyes downcast in front of a very tall woman in blue. Wallie hurtled along the room with giant strides.

“Doa!”

“Ah, there you are, my dear!” the minstrel said in a voice that would have swarmed bees.

“I am very busy today, my lady!”

“That’s quite all right, darling. I was just interviewing this slave.”

“Interviewing?”

Doa’s large mouth showed all her teeth in a smile. “This is Jja, is it not? The one you promised to give me?”

For a moment her audacity left Wallie speechless. Jja was being as silent as a rock.

He had never seen them together before—and the glint in Doa’s eye said plainly that he had better choose which one he wanted.

Then Jja looked up at him, and the appeal he saw there would have hauled the sun god down from his heaven.

He stepped between them and put an arm around Jja, wondering what rubbish Doa had been saying. The swordsmen were listening and trying to appear otherwise. He must not lose his temper.

Jja moved against him, seeking contact. He remembered his momentary dream of sailing away into the sunset, and remembered who had been included in that dream. Not Doa.

“Yes, this is Jja. Jja, my love, this is Lady Doa. I am not planning to give you to her. Whatever she told you, she was lying.”

Doa’s face flamed scarlet. The swordsmen were being very quiet.

“Honorable Forarfi!” Wallie was keeping his voice calm only by immense effort. “Escort Lady Doa from the lodge. See that she is not admitted in future. My lady, I shall not be available this evening to escort you to the healers’ banquet.”

He thought for a moment that Doa was going to spring at him. He rather hoped she would.

“I shall go to the banquet anyway! They want me to sing. I have some new songs to try.”

“Watch your tongue, minstrel, or you will sing them to rats in the dungeon.”

Doa gasped, then she wheeled around and stalked toward the door.

Wallie put his other arm around Jja also. “I am sorry, my love, so very sorry! Don’t believe her, whatever she said.”

Jja just stared up at him, searching.

“Wallie?” she whispered.

“Who else?”

The door to the council chamber flew open and Nnanji’s voice sang out. “Brother!”

But Wallie was busy and did not hear. It was Jja who finally broke the embrace. “They are waiting for you, my love,” she whispered.

“Let them!” Wallie said, and kissed her again, for several more minutes. When he eventually released her and headed back to the meeting, he was feeling lightheaded and so aroused that he wondered if he even cared what happened to the tryst.

He had made a dangerous enemy in Doa.

Who cared? He saw at once that the mood of the meeting had changed. The five Sevenths were all beaming. Rotanxi, standing in their midst, was attempting to hide his lack of understanding under an aristocratic sneer.

And Nnanji was grinning from shoulder to shoulder. “I think the valiant lords have come around, brother!”

“It is a noble cause, my liege!” Zoariyi proclaimed. As the oldest, he was the natural spokesman. “Lord Nnanji has indeed persuaded me.”

The others nodded, smiling and apparently excited.

How?

Why?

Who cared? Wallie looked to Rotanxi and shrugged. “Then we can go ahead and swear our oaths, my lord?”

The sorcerer nodded uneasily. “What arguments did you use, Lord Nnanji, exactly?”

Nnanji smirked. “Exactly? Exactly the arguments that Lord Shonsu gave you, my lord, and that you accepted. Word for word, and nothing else, I swear.” He was enjoying himself enormously. Being able to mystify Wallie was a new experience for him. “Shonsu, for an oath like this you ought to summon the priests!”

“I suppose so.”

“Then why not take Lord Rotanxi to the dungeons while we wait?” He sniggered at Wallie’s expression. “To show him how swordsmen treat prisoners? And meanwhile—” He swung around in high glee to the castellan. “—Lord Tivanixi and I have time for our fencing match!”

Dungeons were dungeons—dark, dank, and damp, smelling of urine and rats. Wallie had been insistent that the prisoners were to be well treated. By the standards of the World, he had been obeyed. He let Rotanxi speak to them in private, assuming that the old man would explain that they were now counterhostages and therefore not in immediate danger. It would have been interesting to hear what they thought of the proposed treaty and its chances.

Yet dungeons were dungeons, and it was a relief to emerge once more into fresh air, even the fresh air of the lodge courtyard, tainted by the numerous outhouses and bathhouses now filling it. Their canvas still flapped and thumped, but over that noise Wallie heard a distant cheer.

“We still have some time to kill, my lord,” he suggested. “How about viewing a little fencing? Not your favorite sport, I should imagine, but another interesting tale to take back.”

The sorcerer was still blinking in the bright daylight. “Indeed!” he said. “But first tell me what happened with Lord Nnanji? How did he persuade the others?”

“If he says he used the same arguments, my lord, then I must believe him. I admit I don’t understand.”

Rotanxi frowned, worried. “If it were anyone else—even, with respect, yourself, Lord Shonsu—I should suspect treachery. But him . . . ” He shook his head. During his captivity on Sapphire, he had come to know Nnanji. Even a sorcerer could not expect duplicity from Nnanji. Nnanji would commit murder with a smile, but he would not lie about it.

Wallie led the way, through the tunnel and the archway to the steps before the lodge, evicting a half-dozen middleranks to make room. The polo matches were over, and now the assembled swordsmen were watching fencing. Almost every man seemed to have an arm around a woman as he celebrated this holiday. Few noticed the sinister sorcerer standing with their liege.

In the center of this huge circle of onlookers, Nnanji and Tivanixi were dancing to and fro among the dung heaps, flashing foils.

“Ooo!” said the crowd, and Nnanji capered to show that he had a hit.

“The score?” Wallie demanded of a nearby Third.

“Two nothing, my liege. Best of five.”

Then the fencers closed again, whirling foils too fast to follow, leaping forward and back, impersonally masked, ponytails jumping. The crowd roared at a narrow escape, but neither man claimed a point and the battle continued. Wallie had never watched a match between Sevenths before. High-speed ballet with steel—it was magnificent, the grace of both athletes in motion. He noted how tall Nnanji was, compared to Tivanixi, and how fast. Here and there he recognized some of his own favorite moves, but most were too quick for even him to analyze. Superb experts, inspiring each other . . . 

“Ahh!” That was it, the match point. Nnanji’s mask spun high in the air, his whoop of triumph lost in the roar as the crowd surged forward. Tivanixi’s face appeared, flushed and grinning, and he raised his foil in salute, while Nnanji was swept up on shoulders to be marched around the plaza.

Wallie stared in astonishment. So now Nnanji was a believable Seventh, not a convenient fiction, and a very good Seventh if he could beat Tivanixi. That just did not seem possible! Nnanji was a lightning-fast learner, but to reach such a level so quickly? Four weeks ago, he had barely made Sixth. Surely the castellan had thrown that match, faking it as a tribute to Nnanji’s display of courage in agreeing to go as hostage to Vul? If he had, would Nnanji have been able to detect the fraud?

The display of popularity was even more surprising. The smart-aleck kid had gained acceptance by sheer perseverance, with sweat and innumerable bruises. A short while ago he had won over the Sevenths and now, apparently, the rest of the swordsmen, also.

Wallie turned to speak to the sorcerer and saw satisfaction on his face. A popular hostage was a valuable hostage.

Before they could speak, however, two sedan chairs appeared at the side of the steps. Honakura and Kadywinsi disembarked in a fluster of attendant priests and priestesses.

Wallie’s first reaction to Honakura was delight. A ruddiness had replaced the ominous pallor. Then the old man came creeping up the steps, leaning on a younger priest. At close quarters his skin had a strange transparency to it, and the brightness in his eyes was febrile. Sometimes a candle will flare up momentarily, just before it gutters out?

Wallie saluted and presented Rotanxi, all of them having to shout above the continuing roar of the crowd.

“You are in good health, holy one?”

The old eyes sparkled up at him. “Not especially. But I see that you are—and you have your treaty!”

His face asked a question.

Wallie nodded meaningfully. He is enthusiastic!

Honakura raised an eyebrow. Why?

Wallie shrugged. I don’t know!

“We were just watching some fencing, my lord,” he said. “Lord Nnanji has just beaten Lord Tivanixi, the third best man in the tryst.”

Honakura nodded, understanding. “We priests have a saying. Lord Shonsu: The pupil may be greater than the teacher.”

And Wallie, in turn, understood that. It could only be the epigram from the same sutra as the story of the red-haired brother. The epitome would deal with mentors’ obligations, of course. Well, he did not think Nnanji was quite there yet—but he had no desire to find out, certainly not with blades.

Then Kadywinsi arrived, and the salutes began again. The crowd noise billowed louder. Wallie glanced over heads in time to see Boariyi’s grinning face vanish inside a mask. Nnanji was being borne shoulder-high toward him, waving his foil and laughing. Would Boariyi also throw a match for him?

The liege lord could not stay to watch. He must escort his guests indoors. He did not really want to watch, anyway.

When they reached the council chamber, they found it full of busy swordsmen. Jja was there, also, and Honakura greeted her with warmth and affection, shocking the other priests by demanding a kiss.

Linumino had been efficient, as usual. The bed had gone; chairs had appeared from somewhere for the guests; tables bore white cloths and refreshments. There was even a small brazier by the fireplace so that Rotanxi might swear over fire without setting his gown ablaze.

Important oaths were sworn before priests. Oaths of great significance required seven of them, one of each rank, to combine status and longevity. Wallie had to meet them all. He already knew a few of them, including the surly priestess of the Third who had brought him Honakura’s message on his first day in Casr. Eventually he settled the old man on a chair, fetched him a glass of wine, and had a moment for a private word.

“Nnanji approves?” Honakura whispered.

Wallie told how Nnanji had not merely approved of the treaty, but had also convinced the others.

The old man shook his head in wonder. “We did indeed teach him well, my lord!” But he was as puzzled as Wallie. A treaty with swordsman killers? It was totally out of character.

Then other Sevenths came streaming in—Tivanixi, Zoariyi, Jansilui—and the salutes began again. Eventually Boariyi and Nnanji appeared also, hot and sweaty, grinning like children—and Thana, more catlike than ever.

When Nnanji arrived at Wallie his eyes were dancing.

“You won again?”

“Straight points again!” He was so pleased with himself that he was almost giggling. “Sure you can’t spare a few minutes, Shonsu?”

“Quite sure! We’ll do it when you return!”

Disappointed, Nnanji nodded. “Get lots of practice, then!”

Wallie smiled tolerantly.

“Brother?” Nnanji said softly. “Tell me the exact words you are going to swear?”

“Why?”

“Because I am bound also.”

“True! Sorry!” Wallie told him the oath he had prepared. Nnanji smiled cryptically and nodded again.

“Remember—lots of practice!” he said and moved on.

It had to be a setup, did it not? Tivanixi and Boariyi had cooked it up between them?

Never!

They put too much value on their status as top fencers. They would not throw that away, even for Nnanji. Certainly neither would have faked a straight-points defeat. Three-two, just maybe, but three-nothing was humiliation. So no trickery; Nnanji had trashed them both. Nnanji and Shonsu were the two best.

Which left only one question.

Three-nothing, against Boariyi!

The meeting had come to order. The priests and priestesses were lined up and waiting, all except Honakura, who had stayed in his chair, insisting he had come only to watch. Wallie stepped to the center and drew his sword, glancing around at the company—priests and swordsmen, heralds and minstrels. Jja was there, also, at his insistence, trying to be invisible in one corner, staying close to Thana.

Then Wallie swung back for another look at the cluster of minstrels. Doa! She smirked at him over the others’ heads. How had she managed to return? He had given orders—but he had only given them to Forarfi, who had now been sent to charter a ship. Of course Linumino would have specified that Lady Doa be included with the minstrels. Angrily he turned his back on her, facing toward the priests.

He raised the seventh sword to the oath position, at arm’s length, pointing over the witnesses’ heads. I, Shonsu, swordsman of the seventh rank, liege lord . . . 

History was made then. The senior swordsman of the World swore to work for peace with sorcerers. No miracle intervened. No thunder rolled. No earthquake threw down the lodge on his head. It was almost an anticlimax.

He stepped back, and Rotanxi came forward to extend one hand above the brazier and swear his oath, also.

And still the World did not move.

Wallie shook Rotanxi’s hand. The witnesses cheered and applauded.

That was it? Epochs end so quietly? Wallie had a whirling sensation of unreality. He had expected more, somehow.

He noted that the Sevenths were looking puzzled again, and worried.

“My lords . . . ” He gestured toward the table of refreshments.

“Shonsu?”

Wallie stiffened. “Yes, Nnanji?”

“I also wish to swear an oath.” Nnanji smiled apologetically.

“I trust that you will share it with me first?”

Nnanji nodded, then could no longer restrain a huge and childlike grin. “I have solved the god’s riddle for you, brother! I know how you must return the sword. And I know its destiny!”

The audience waited. Jja, Honakura, Tivanixi seemed startled, the rest only puzzled. Wallie was thinking furiously.

Old Kadywinsi spoke first. “The seventh sword? The sword of the Goddess? She sent it to lead the tryst against die sorcerers, didn’t She?”

“Not really, holiness,” Nnanji said. “The sorcerers have nothing to do with it. The sorcerers are not important at all.”

What in the World was going on under that red hair? What had Nnanji seen that Wallie could have missed? “So how do I return the sword, brother Nnanji?”

“You go to Quo, where it was made.”

Wallie stared at him, apprehensive, totally baffled. “Quo?”

“Perhaps you would like to have a private word, brother?”

Wallie said he thought that would be a very good idea.

††††††

There were swordsmen in the anteroom and swordsmen standing around the door. “Upstairs!” Nnanji said. Wallie trotted up after him; but there were two dormitories on the next floor, and vacationing swordsmen there, also.

“Top floor—race you!” Nnanji sprinted off up the stairs like an excited child. Wallie followed more slowly, worrying his problem as a puppy worries a slipper. Whatever Nnanji was thinking, he was very sure of himself. Always he had deferred to Shonsu, but that had been because Shonsu was the greatest swordsman in the World, thus a hero. Now who was greatest?

And why Quo?

Why Quo?

He reached the top and was surprised to see that the museum door was open, the great bar leaning against the wall. A slim, red-haired swordsman was wandering along beside the tables, studying the wall of swords. He turned at the end and came back on the other side, looking now at the litter on the tables themselves. Wallie stood just inside the room, waiting with folded arms.

“Nothing moved!” Nnanji said, beaming. “Just as we left it, on Merchants’ Day, when you gave me my sword. We forgot to have the bar put back, brother! I forgot!” He snickered. “But no one’s taken a thing. That’s very good!”

Wallie waited.

“Right!” Nnanji folded his arms also. “Now, let’s make sure I understand. We all swear to the new sutra. You put two hundred men or so into the seven cities as garrisons. You make everyone swear to spread the word about sorcerers being nice boys. Then you disband the tryst. Do I have it right?”

Wallie nodded.

Nnanji swung around and began to pace. “And the sorcerers will destroy their fire weapons—but we have to take that on trust, don’t we?”

He took down a sword and hefted it. “That is tricky, isn’t it? The sorcerers won’t be outnumbered any more. They can hold a massacre any time. Splash? Two hundred splashes.”

Wallie found his voice. “But we went over all that this morning. We must have a treaty; and it’s for the good of the sorcerers, too. It’s a risk, yes, but we must trust them, just as they must trust us.”

Still studying the sword, Nnanji said quietly, “The sorcerers are not the problem.”

Wallie gaped. Then it was obvious. Sooner or later some idiot swordsman would pick a fight with a sorcerer—in a bar, over a girl, or just to show how tough he was. The wizard would demand justice from the reeve, and . . . and what?

“Oh, hell!” Wallie said. “Damn! Damn! Damn!”

He leaned against a table and put his hands over his face. He had been judging the swordsmen by their sutras and the Sevenths of his council, who were exceptional. He had overlooked Hardduju and Tarru, the rapists of Yok, the drunks at Wo, the fossil at Tau, even the initial chaos in Casr—all the bad swordsmen he had met and should have remembered. Swordsmen swore their superhuman oaths, and perhaps most of them tried their best, but in reality they were a very mixed bag—often corrupted by power, unsupervised, laws unto themselves—better than anarchy, but far from perfect. It would take near-perfection to make his plan work. Nnanji had always understood the swordsmen better than he, and if Nnanji said it would not work, then it would not. Wallie had promised Rotanxi the World. He could not even deliver the seven cities.

Failure as a bottomless pit! Wishful thinking—he had been so reluctant to fight a war that he had invented an impossible peace. And now he had sworn an oath and thrown away the tryst.

Disaster!

“But why now?” he wailed, looking up. “Why not say so in the council?”

Nnanji replaced the sword and shrugged. “Swordsmen don’t say such things about their own craft. We all know it, but we don’t talk about it.” He continued his wanderings.

“But Rotanxi swore—”

“Ah, yes! But he didn’t bind his friends, did he? They know about the fourth oath, so I go into the first convenient dungeon. He’ll start with my toenails, I expect, as I suggested that approach to him.”

“What! You’re joking!”

“True!” Nnanji admitted. “But we should remove the temptation!”

Wallie shivered. “You’re right! I should have thought of that. So you’re planning to swear that the tryst will not be disbanded, not until the garrisons are in place?”

Nnanji was back in front of him.

“Why then?” he said.

“Huh?”

Nnanji grinned. “It’s funny; you’ve got an odd way of saying things, sometimes, Shonsu. I understand you now, but . . . Rotanxi said, ‘Admit it—the tryst must be disbanded.’ Remember? And you said, ‘I admit nothing.’ What he thought you promised was that you—the liege lord—would make the cities safe for sorcerers. That the tryst would keep order, as it does in Casr. He was willing to accept that, and when I repeated your words to the Sevenths, that was what they understood, too.” He smirked. “Perhaps I changed the emphasis a little, but I used the same words. Then you didn’t put it in your oath; we must keep the tryst in being!”

Relief washed over Wallie like a spring thaw.

“Of course!” he said. “That would work! We keep the garrisons sworn by the third oath!”

Nnanji nodded and grinned again. “And we hold a group of good swordsmen here in Casr. If there is any nonsense in any of the cities, we go and . . . educate them!”

“And it wouldn’t cost much more, just a few extra men!” Now Wallie could smile. “You had me scared, Nnanji! But I think that will work.” He had wondered what he would do after the tryst was disbanded. Now he had job security.

Then his mood went black again.

“But that only solves the problem of the seven cities. I promised the World.”

“Ah!” Nnanji set off on his rambling once more. “The god’s riddle—return the sword. That’s why you have to go to Quo, brother, where Chioxin lived.”

“Why? What’s special about Quo?”

“Think strategy!” Nnanji said from the middle of the room. “Nine ninety-three, ten seventy. The loop is closed, almost. You can’t go upstream from Ov or down from Aus, right? Not easily. Quo is our front door, our door to the World. Not only a permanent tryst, Shonsu, but a universal tryst!” His voice rose with excitement. “Do you see now? We send the Sevenths out from Quo, to every city on the River. They will swear the garrisons to the tryst! By force, if necessary.”

Wallie roared with laughter. “Steady there, laddie!” he said. “We can’t make every swordsman in the World into our vassal!”

Nnanji was not laughing.

“We have to! It’s the only way to make the World safe for sorcerers—which was what you just swore that we would do, oath brother! And it will safeguard the garrisons—we’ll have a huge tryst to call on if the sorcerers play false. Even Vul would be no problem then.”

If you must dream, dream big! Liege lords of all swordsmen?

Nnanji’s eyes gleamed. “More important, at the same time we’ll clean up the whole craft—dispose of the crooks and the bullies and the sadists. Weed out the bad swordsmen and leave the good. Then every city and town can have a decent, honest, honorable garrison!”

Here was the juvenile reformer, shining with enthusiasm, the young idealist set to remake the World. That was why he had seemed so pleased!

“Tell me why it won’t work!” Nnanji said, pacing restlessly, excited by his vision. His boots tapped and the boards squeaked.

There was a ship waiting. This would have to be quick. “Money!”

“Money?” Nnanji echoed scornfully. “The swordsmen ate before—they can eat in future. We’ll find a way.”

“Nnanji!” Wallie spoke very gently, as if talking to a child. “Not all swordsmen will want to be your vassal. What do your henchmen do if a man refuses to swear?”

“Blood needs be shed . . . but the honorable ones will swear quite happily.”

“Courage is the highest honor . . . ”

“Only in a good cause!”

This was more than idealism. This was fanaticism! Wallie felt the beginnings of fear.

“And what if Boariyi, say, runs into a better man? What if it’s your man who gets killed, Nnanji?”

Nnanji was by the door, inspecting a jumble of standards stacked against the wall. He pulled one out and coughed in the dust. Then be grinned at Wallie. “I thought that bit would bother you! You send me. I’m the greatest swordsman in the World—except you. Maybe you? But I’ll look after that job for you, brother!”

So this was the destiny he had seen on the ship: Nnanji the Avenger, terror of the ungodly. No wonder he had looked so pleased! Katanji was being led to great wealth—was this Nnanji’s reward? Chief Enforcer for the Goddess . . . he would like nothing better.

Wallie shivered. He had created a monster.

“What about geography?” he asked, as calmly as he could. “What happens if you try to go to Hither and the Goddess sends you to Yon?”

“She will support us!” Nnanji said, surprised. “Surely you see how the gods have been helping me? I got miracles, too!”

Megalomania!

Nnanji the messiah—he would set up a military dictatorship. Like Caesar. Like Cromwell. It could lead only to tyranny.

Wallie was sweating, wondering if he could bring himself to do whatever would be needed to stop this. “And the free swords?”

But Nnanji had worked out all the answers. “The same with them. If necessary we’ll ride them down with your cavalry. They can keep their jobs, but we’ll assign each group an area, and regional headquarters over them, eventually. Just like the cities—any complaints come back here, to me . . . us, I mean.”

It was not only megalomania. Impossible courage, no scruples—Nnanji was a psychopath, and that should have been obvious from the beginning. He liked to play with babies, and he had wept at Gi. He was a fond husband and brother . . . but he was also a truly remorseless killer. He had enjoyed killing pirates and sorcerers. Wallie had thought that Nnanji had mellowed, from the debaucher of the barracks to the troubadour who had courted Thana so patiently. Not so!

“What about the council?” he asked, playing for time to think.

“They love the idea! Swordplay and honor? Better than building catapults, brother!” He thumped the flagstaff on the floor enthusiastically and was showered by dust again.

The tryst had carried him shoulder high.

“There will be resistance!” Wallie warned. “Refugee swordsmen setting up countertrysts.”

“If it comes to battles, we shall have the numbers—and soon all the best men, too.”

There must be a flaw! Now Wallie started to pace, groping for some logical way to end this madness peacefully, to convince Nnanji before Nnanji convinced him. “Thousands of swordsmen—their performances and histories and reliability—hundreds of cities and garrisons. How do you keep track of it all?”

Nnanji just laughed.

“Communications, then? After a few weeks the distances will become impossible.”

Nnanji spread the flag to look at the faded emblems. “Fast boats, horse posts, and pigeons! The sorcerers will support the tryst because it protects them. I saw what Rotanxi was doing with that feather, remember!”

He was right again. A permanent and universal tryst must seem a mortal threat to the sorcerers. Vul itself would be in jeopardy. Wallie had convinced Rotanxi with an argument he had not even known he was presenting—small wonder that the old man had grabbed at the chance of the treaty! The sorcerers could provide communications and record keeping. They would seek to make themselves indispensable, and in so doing, they would perpetuate the dictatorship.

Wallie had proposed peace between the swordsmen and the sorcerers. He had not seen that the gods might have been keeping them apart for very good reasons.

But it was possible.

Wallie thought: It would work. I will have to do it, or Nnanji will try, and I may not have the power to stop him anymore. Nnanji is an illiterate barbarian, who knows nothing but killing. I am an educated and a peace-loving man, I know the dangers and could avoid them . . . Is this my reward, omnipotence? I can be a benevolent despot, Emperor of the World, with a government and a palace . . . 

His head swam with the vision. He could imagine the court, the honor guards of kilted swordsmen, the courtiers standing on both sides of the great aisle, and the petitioners creeping forward, bowing to the throne, to the Son of Heaven sitting there, holding the sword of the Goddess as symbol of his authority . . . 

It could be done! There was nothing in the World to stop him. Nnanji would happily be chief of the army and Shonsu could be emperor.

And on the other throne, at his side . . . 

The vision was so clear that he could almost turn his head and see her . . . 

Who?

Nnanji leaned on the pole and waited, smiling.

And waited . . . 

And waited . . . 

Wallie looked up sadly. “The last thing the god told me,” he said, “was that the guard on my sword hilt was a griffon, and that the griffon meant Power wisely used. He said that if I remembered that, I would not fail. It was a warning, Nnanji! He foresaw this temptation! The Goddess has given me power. I do not think that using power to gain more power is wise.”

“Well, I do! In a good cause.”

“Then I should have the greater problem of using the greater power wisely. An hour ago I threatened to throw Doa in the dungeons if she made fun of me—I’m not good enough, Nnanji.”

Nnanji frowned. “Then you must step aside and let me do it.”

The prophecy: It is your kingdom that I covet.

Wallie straightened up. Argument was always useless against fanaticism, and there were no words for despot or tyranny or dictatorship anyway.

“No,” he said. “The tryst was called against the sorcerers. You are planning to turn it against the swordsmen! You don’t know what it will lead to, Nnanji. I won’t do it!”

“The tryst was called to restore the honor of the craft. The sorcerers are not important! I told you!”

“No!” Wallie insisted. “Do you remember the first lesson I ever gave you? We sat together on a wall in the temple grounds, in the shade of a tree. I told you then—power corrupts!”

“Not me!”

I am more worthy.

Stalemate.

Nnanji smiled hopefully. “You once said you would like to be reeve of Tau, didn’t you? I will give it to you! And I will keep the tryst away, because I know you will be honorable.”

Tyranny—already he was giving away cities? Wallie shook his head in silence.

Now Nnanji was becoming exasperated. “We agreed that the tryst can only have one leader. I have always deferred to you have I not? Till this. Must we have the combat for leadership, round three, brother? But let’s use foils and swear to abide by that.”

An hour ago Wallie would have jumped at that offer.

They stared at each other, eyes level—black eyes and pale brown eyes and neither would yield.

It was Wallie who turned away. He stalked slowly down the long room, wrestling with the problem. How to stop this? If he could not, then no one could. He could no longer trust his sword against Nnanji. Could he bring himself to commit murder? Throw his knife, say?

He had reached the broken fragment of the Chioxin fifth, another desolate memorial to human stupidity. He stared at it bleakly. Murder?

“No!” he said loudly. “I am leader. You are going to Vul. I shall go down there and swear to disband the tryst as soon as the garrisons are in place. If they provoke a massacre later, it will be their own fault.”

Nnanji slammed the door with a noise like thunder and dropped the flagpole into the brackets across it. Then he went pounding down the stairs. He was almost at the bottom before he heard the door exploding, seven floors above him.

“Jja?” Lord Honakura called in his cracked old voice.

Jja hurried over to him.

“Bring me another cake, would you, my dear?”

She slipped carefully through the munching, sipping guests to the nearest table and managed to capture a plate of cakes without jostling anyone. Thana was there.

“Whatever can they be doing?” Jja whispered.

“No idea!” Thana said with her mouth full. “Not fighting, I shouldn’t think. Not unless Shonsu’s gone crazy.”

Jja did not like the expression on Thana’s face. She went back to Lord Honakura and knelt by his chair. He thanked her and selected the creamiest cake on the dish.

“Stay here!” he commanded when she was about to rise. “Have one yourself!”

Smiling, she obeyed. She was happy to remain; she felt safe beside him. The horrid minstrel woman had been eyeing her ever since Wallie left.

The sorcerer’s voice cut suddenly through the uneasy chatter. “Your divided leadership perplexes me. What do you do if they disagree?”

Jja watched as the swordsmen glanced at one another. Somehow they selected Lord Tivanixi to carry the burden.

“We don’t know, Lord Rotanxi. There are no precedents. In fact, I have never heard of the fourth oath ever being sworn before. I don’t know why the Goddess made that sutra.”

“Perhaps just for this occasion?” Lord Honakura mumbled, wiping cream from his chin. Probably no one but Jja heard.

“Why should a tryst need two leaders anyway?” one of the other lords asked.

“It has three, I think,” Honakura remarked quietly, and now he was certainly speaking to Jja.

“Three, my lord?”

The little bald head nodded. “Shonsu, Nnanji—and Wallie-smith. Would you not say so?”

Jja nodded, surprised. Yet it was not quite true. Wallie had been missing since the day she had been stripped by the two Seconds, here in the lodge. That had been Shonsu who had lost his temper and sold the swordsmen, Shonsu who had struck her. When he returned to Sapphire the next day, he had still been Shonsu. He had been Shonsu on the ship this morning when he almost drew against the captain. She had not seen Wallie until later today, when he had rescued her from the minstrel woman. Wallie had been there then. Her heart had told her.

She thought it had been Wallie swearing that oath before the priests, but she suspected that it had been Shonsu again who had gone off with Lord Nnanji.

There was shouting in the anteroom. The door flew open and men scattered as Nnanji burst in, red-faced and waving his sword. He skidded wildly on the silk rug, recovered his balance, and came to a panting halt. Jja’s heart sank. Where was her master? Nnanji peered around until he located little Lord Kadywinsi, then stretched out his blade in the oath position, facing the priest.

Without preamble he began: “I, Nnanji, swordsman of the seventh—”

Honakura threw a cake at him.

“Young man,” he snapped from his chair, “there are certain rituals that must be observed for oaths. If you wish my holy friends to be witnesses, then the least you could do is to ask their consent.”

Nnanji spluttered and asked if they would witness his oath.

“I suppose we could manage that,” Honakura said. “What do you think, Lord Kadywinsi?”

The priests had to be lined up. Lord Honakura asked Jja to help him rise, then went to join in, telling Lord Kadywinsi that he would like to do this one. He went to the wrong place. Lord Nnanji was twitching with impatience and very red, almost jumping from one foot to the other. The priest of the Fifth tried to help, but only muddled everyone worse than before. In spite of her worry, Jja almost smiled at that.

But at last they were ready. Lord Nnanji raised his sword again.

“I, Nnanji, swordsman . . . ”

There was sound of a major disaster in the anteroom.

“ . . . liege lord of the tryst of—”

Two Fourths came hurtling bodily through the door and rolled. Shonsu was right behind them, stumbling over them, drawing his sword, stopping behind Lord Nnanji, flashing it down on his shoulder—and staying it, steel just touching flesh.

Screams and cries of outrage were stifled. The onlookers froze in horror. Shonsu was scarlet with fury, eyes bulging, the veins on his face swollen, but the seventh sword did not waver, just hung there.

Nor did Lord Nnanji’s sword waver. But his voice died away and his eyes moved to look at that deadly edge alongside his neck, so close to those so-vital tendons. The two Fourths scrambled up and fled, closing the door silently.

“Drop that sword!” the big man growled, in a voice like grinding millstones.

Jja cringed. It was Shonsu, not Wallie. But he should know that Lord Nnanji would never yield to a threat. She could remember Wallie teaching him that principle, and if she remembered . . . 

Turning his eyes straight ahead again, toward the line of petrified priests, Lord Nnanji softly said: “No.”

“Drop it! Or I’ll make you drop it!”

“Holy ones, I shall start over. I, Nnanji, swordsman of the . . . ”

“You’ll never lift that arm again!”

“ . . . seventh rank, liege . . . ”

“I shall count to three.”

Jja whispered a little prayer to the Goddess.

“ . . . lord of the tryst of Casr, do solemnly swear . . . ”

“On three I cut! One!”

Someone in the minstrels’ corner was whimpering quietly.

“ . . . that the tryst of Casr . . . ”

“Two!”

“ . . . shall not be disbanded until . . . ”

Lord Nnanji paused, as if daring his tormentor to act, as if waiting for the deadly “Three.” But Shonsu was silent now, staring at the back of Lord Nnanji’s head. His rage was fading, Jja thought. Her hands hurt. She had dug her nails into her palms.

“ . . . it shall have completed the task for which it was called; and this I swear upon my honor, and in the name of the Goddess.”

Silence.

Lord Nnanji slowly lowered his sword and again he moved his eyes to study the Chioxin blade beside his neck.

Wallie? Jja dug her nails into her palms again. Was it Wallie? He had gone very pale. The rage had vanished; he seemed stunned. He was staring fixedly at Lord Nnanji’s ponytail. She thought it was Wallie.

Lord Nnanji ducked his shoulder a fraction, and the seventh sword did not move. He slid gently out from under it, then slowly turned to look at . . . Yes, it was Wallie back again. What was wrong with him? He was rigid, every muscle knotted, and sweat shone on his face.

“I shall sheath my sword now,” Lord Nnanji said quietly. He did so, moving very slowly and deliberately, not taking his eyes off . . . off Wallie.

And Wallie lowered his sword until the point touched the floor. He stared down at it as if he had never seen it before, or did not know why it was there. The spectators began to relax, very slightly, but no one yet dared speak. He turned his head and gazed toward Jja. She tensed, wondering if he wanted her to go to him, dismayed at the inexplicable pain she could see in his face. Was he asking her something? Before she could move, though, he switched his gaze back down to his sword . . . to her briefly . . . to the sword again . . . almost as if he were comparing them.

Then he raised his head and looked at Nnanji. For a moment he seemed unable to find his voice. He licked his lips.

“You were wrong, brother!”

Obviously as puzzled as any, Lord Nnanji put his fists on his hips. “I waited. You could have stopped me.”

“Not the oath. You were wrong about returning the sword. I must return it, yes. But not to a place. Not to Quo. To a person—to the man who gave it to me.”

“A god gave it to you!”

Wallie shook his head. “Gods do not kneel to mortals. The god made the sword appear on a rock, and I picked it up. He did not dedicate it . . . ”

Lord Nnanji said, “Then . . . ” and was silent.

“I suppose I should have asked the first swordsman I met to dedicate it, to give it to me properly. I didn’t think of it. I didn’t ask you—you were the first swordsman I met. But when I went ashore in Aus, I left the sword in your care. And when I came back to the ship—”

“I said the words! I knelt! But what I meant was—”

“I know what you meant, brother.” Wallie swallowed hard, as if his throat hurt. “And so you gave it to me then—as swordsmen understand giving a sword. You gave me the seventh sword, Nnanji! You! Now I must return it.”

The other swordsmen muttered in amazement as he sank to one knee and held out the Chioxin sword in both hands. “Live by this. Wield it in Her service. Die holding it.”

The onlookers fell silent, and there was a long pause.

“But why, brother?” Nnanji whispered. “The Goddess wanted you to have Her sword!”

“Not anymore. Take it.”

“You’re leader of the tryst . . . ”

“Not anymore. You are. Take it!”

Still Nnanji hesitated, staling as if hypnotized at the weapon being proffered to him.

“Damnation!” Wallie roared, suddenly loud. Everyone jumped. “Do you think this is easy for me? Boariyi! Upon your honor—who is the best swordsman in this room?”

“My liege . . . Lord Nnanji.”

“Oh!” Nnanji smiled. “Well, in that case . . . say it again, brother!”

“Live by this! Wield it in Her service! Die holding it!”

Still Lord Nnanji wavered for a moment. Then he reached out his hand and softly said, “It . . . it shall be . . . my honor and my pride.” And took the seventh sword.

Then he looked at Thana and uttered a great whoop of joy.

†††††††

Wallie leaned back against the wall with Jja leaning back against his chest. She had no choice, for his arms were tight around her. Her head was on his collarbone and he could smell the sweet, familiar scent of her hair. Perhaps he was trying to hide behind her, to hide from the consequences of what he had done. He had assured her that he was all right now, but in truth he was still confused and uncertain about his sudden decision.

He had been ready to cripple Nnanji, to prevent his oath by severing the tendons in his shoulder. Then he had seen the Arganari hairclip, a silver griffon. Power wisely used! He had read it as a message—the gods wanted Nnanji to have the power. So Wallie had given him the tryst.

It is your kingdom that I covet . . . and Ikondorina agreed . . . 

Honakura had said that he had made the right choice. Thana had rushed forward to hug Nnanji and congratulate him; then the swordsmen and priests had added their own congratulations, while casting sideways glances of wonder at Lord Shonsu, for any man who would voluntarily give up the sword of the Goddess must seem strange to them beyond imagining. But it was to Wallie that Honakura had gone to offer his congratulations, and tears of joy had trickled down his wrinkled old cheeks while he did so.

But why? Why would the Goddess turn over control of Her swordsmen to a bloody-minded juvenile like Nnanji? And not just the swordsmen—the World itself! He did not know that, of course, not yet. He was thinking only of reforming substandard city garrisons, he did not see what must follow.

Gradually order was being restored in the council chamber. The priests had been thanked and dismissed. Nnanji had presented his own sword to Wallie in exchange for the Chioxin.

Then, joyfully gathering confidence as he went along, he had issued a proclamation for the heralds and sent them off to tell the swordsmen about the truce—employee relations. He had dismissed the minstrels with a stern warning not to mention any transient disagreement between the two liege lords—press censorship. Tyrants were good at that, Wallie reflected.

That left only the swordsmen and the sorcerer. Nobody sat down in Nnanji’s tryst, apparently. The council chamber was an untidy jumble of chairs and stools, but everyone was standing. It stank of wine and woodsmoke and people; the rumpled silk rug had not been straightened. No one cared. There was a ship waiting, but Nnanji paced restlessly around among the furniture, every now and again glancing warily toward Wallie for signs of approval or disagreement. Whenever he turned his back, Wallie saw the sapphire of the seventh sword glittering beside the red ponytail, and then he wanted to weep.

Now Nnanji was shooting out orders to the Sevenths. He was good at delegating.

He had begun with gray-haired Zoariyi. “Honorable Milinoni is outside. He knows the identities of the spies we have been watching. I want them arrested!”

Rotanxi frowned. “Have we not a truce, Lord Nnanji?”

“Aha!” Nnanji wheeled round to him triumphantly. “Are you testifying that they are sorcerers, my lord? If so, then they are wearing the wrong facemarks and are felons! However, that was not what I had in mind. Lord vassal, you speak to them when they are brought in. Frighten them a little! Make their teeth rattle! Then tell them about the truce and Lord Rotanxi’s return—and let them go!”

Zoariyi looked puzzled, but thumped fist to heart in acknowledgment and headed for the door. Nnanji sneaked a glance at Wallie. He got a nod of approval and grinned. The spies, of course, would report by pigeon. Sen would be warned to prepare a reception, and Vul, also, but there was a hidden message there, too: “I understand your communications and will use them.” Clever! Nnanji was doing all right so far.

Then he beckoned to the wildly happy Thana and put an arm around her when she went to him. “Lord Rotanxi?” he demanded. “How many members of this council-of-thirteen are women?”

The sorcerer blinked. He was finding these violent swordsmen proceedings unnerving. “But two, Lord Nnanji.”

“Then, if you do not object to a second hostage, my wife wishes to accompany me.”

Sensation! Rotanxi choked in astonishment. The swordsmen gasped, and a couple of them looked to Wallie to see if he would move to prevent such an outrage.

But Wallie would not. He understood—and again he was impressed. He wondered whose idea it was. Probably Thana’s, but it might have come from Tomiyano, or even Nnanji himself. Thana could restrain Nnanji’s suicidal tongue. She could charm the eleven men, if not the two women. The council of frightened old people would not see a boy monster, they would see a storybook prince and princess. Nnanji and Thana together were an ideal of young love, handsome youth and beautiful maiden, and it would take a very embittered old sorcerer to send those two to the tormentors. Taking Thana along would be bravado, of course, but probably a very shrewd move. The pupil may indeed be greater than the teacher!

The other Sevenths did not comprehend that and they disapproved. But Nnanji’s next innovation shocked them far more.

“Lord Linumino? Take the eight prisoners down to the dock and buy passage for them, also—on the same ship as myself if possible.”

Boariyi turned fiery red. “You are releasing them, my liege?”

Nnanji looked up at him coldly, unabashed. “You object?”

And of course his vassal could not object, although he had risked his own life and those of his men in collecting those prisoners, had even lost a man. Return the counterhostages: a generous gesture, a clever tactic to throw the enemy off balance, and also more bravado. Wallie had his doubt about this one, but he still stayed silent, hugging Jja tighter.

Undeterred by the reaction, Nnanji told Linumino to summon a sedan chair for Rotanxi, and pulled his sword for formal farewell as the two departed. Then he surveyed the dwindling company with glee, with the air of a man about to enjoy himself very much.

“Lord Boariyi? The next two cities downriver are Ki San and Dri. You have twenty days before I return. Take whatever force you deem necessary. Go and investigate the garrisons. Punish the guilty, if any, and put good men in their place.”

“Yes, my liege!” The tall swordsman’s scowl had already become a broad grin. That sounded like honorable work—better than sneaking around by night with clubs. Free swords rarely got the chance to meddle in the affairs of large cities.

“Swear the garrisons to the tryst and inform the King of Ki San and the elders of Dri that any swordsmen trouble they may have in future should be reported to me, or to Lord Shonsu, here in Casr.”

Boariyi nodded vigorously in approval.

“I do know,” Nnanji continued, baring his teeth, “that the reeve of Ki San, the Honorable Farandako, is a thief. He stole my slave. Depose him! Sell his possessions for the benefit of the tryst. Bring him back to Casr in chains. I will deal with him myself.”

No proper denunciation? No trial? Of course Nnanji would give the man a sword and issue a formal challenge, but it would be as much an execution as if the man’s head were on a block. Wallie’s doubts began rattling the bars of their cage.

“Swordsmen who refuse to swear, my liege?” asked Boariyi.

Nnanji shrugged. “Let them choose—head or thumbs. But leave no able-bodied swordsman unsworn!”

Boariyi saluted, fist on heart. Nnanji was turning away when Thana stepped close and whispered something in his ear. He grinned at her and swung around to Wallie, eyes alight. “How much has Casr contributed to the tryst, brother?”

It took some hard thought before Wallie could say that he thought about five thousand golds, if the dock fees were included.

Nnanji nodded and looked back to Boariyi. “Dri and Ki San are both much larger and richer, but five thousand from each will do for now. We shall assess them more exactly later.”

He smirked triumphantly at Wallie; the swordsmen would eat.

Boariyi was smarter than he looked. “If they refuse to comply, my liege?”

Nnanji bit his lip, then said, “You will carry out your orders within the ways of honor, vassal.”

Horror-struck, Wallie blurted: “Nnanji!”

In all times and places, probably in all worlds, tyrants had found that same escape. Boariyi had been told to be zealous, without limit, but whatever atrocities he might commit in obeying his orders could be disavowed by Nnanji. It was a classic evasion of responsibility, and the very stuff of despotism. Almost Wallie could smell the burning homes already.

Nnanji flinched and looked defensive. “Brother?”

And Wallie shrank back from the confrontation. He had made his decision and must live with it. To dispute the new leader’s orders so soon and in public would be crass disloyalty. Some day he would have to bring up the matter in private and hope to make Nnanji see reason.

“Even a rich city may not be able to raise so much at the flash of a sword, Nnanji,” he said weakly.

Nnanji pouted, but he was obviously relieved that the objection was no more serious than that. “Of course you may give them time to remit the exaction, vassal. Lord Jansilui? Upriver, Wo and Tau are smaller. Swear the swordsmen there, also, but . . . two thousand golds from each will suffice for the present. You will not have time to go on to Shan, I fear.”

Jansilui saluted, and the thought of action had made him grin, also.

Then Nnanji looked to Tivanixi—and he was already grinning.

“Quo, my liege?”

Nnanji nodded.

Inside Wallie, something died. The stirrup he had introduced would have its first taste of warfare in the World—but not against sorcerers. The cavalry would rid against a friendly city and loot in the name of law. He felt sick.

“How big is Quo?” Nnanji asked. “Never mind—use your own judgment about money.”

Wallie choked back another protest. Carte blanche! Tivanixi was a fine man, but no swordsman could be totally trusted to be sympathetic to civilians. Eager to display his enthusiasm and efficiency in this new order, he might well rape the hapless city, pillage it for its own good. Goddess! Forgive me!

Tivanixi saluted and Wallie knew that he was next. He eased Jja away from him, straightening up in more swordsmanlike fashion to hear his fate.

“The catapults have served their purpose, brother, I think,” Nnanji said. “They were enough to scare the sorcerers into your treaty . . . ”

His tone was more gentle than it had been with his vassals, and the words were grouped in requests, but those requests were supposed to be obeyed. Probably that was how Wallie had spoken to him before their positions were reversed, so Wallie should not quibble. Catapult building, archery, knife throwing—all were to be spat out like grape seeds. From now on sutras and swordsmanship were what the tryst would need, Nnanji said. Instruction should not be left to incompetent middleranks . . . there were some variants among the sutras and the tryst should have a uniform canon . . . any man who had not tried for promotion since arriving at Casr must explain . . . any man who had jumped two ranks before Nnanji returned from Vul could become his personal protégé . . . make a start on converting temporary arrangements, like the women’s quarters, into permanent . . . maintain strict discipline at all times . . . 

When he had finished, Wallie thumped fist on heart in silence as the vassals had done. Nnanji had the grace to blush slightly. Then, with the juvenile naïveté that was so much of his charm, he grinned hugely and said, “How’m I doing so far, Shonsu?”

Wallie concealed his despondency, manufactured a smile, and said, “Straight points so far, brother.”

Already? his conscience inquired. Already we are into flattery? Why not tell him that the gods are pleased with him?

The problems would have to wait, Wallie thought; there was a ship standing by. But they would not wait long. The King of Ki San would reportedly pay a hundred golds for a well-rounded concubine. That did not sound like benevolent monarchy. What were these newly immaculate garrisons supposed to do when ordered to administer unjust laws? Or gather gluttonous taxes? Who would do this assessing of tribute? Who collect it? Guard it? Account for it? Distribute it?

Nnanji’s simple view of a perfect World did not include any of those questions. Even Wallie’s did not contain the answers.

“Right! We have a ship to catch, wife,” Nnanji said. He took two steps, stumbled, and regained his balance. Then he looked down at the rumpled rug that had tripped him—silver pelicans and bronze river-horses. He glanced around at the wall hangings, the drapes, the shiny furniture.

No tyrant in any world could have bettered the look he then turned on Wallie. Wallie recoiled before it.

“You will not be needing this trash anymore, will you, Shonsu? As soon as you have disposed of it, issue a proclamation: From now on, any acceptance of bribes by a swordsman will be a capital offense—without exception!”

That was not a request.

Nnanji swung around and marched out with his arm around Thana. Wallie watched the seventh sword depart. His eyes misted, and he quickly gestured for the others to precede him.

Finally return that sword. Finally? Either he had completed his mission for the Goddess, or he had just resigned as Her champion without completing it. Either way, he was finished. The adventure was over.

The sound of boots receded. Only Jja remained, standing with a hand on his arm, studying him, concerned, sensing the dismay he had hidden from everyone else, or hoped he had.

He took her in his arms and hugged her in silent misery.

He could not explain, even to her. There was still no word in the language for “despot.” But there soon would be! Nnanji had taken less than twenty minutes to become one.