Chapter VI

Bili mindspoke Mahvros, "Faster, brother! Be ready to fight."

The huge, black horse quickened his gait and beamed his approval, one of his principal joys being the stamping of the life from anything that got in his way. Raising his head, he voiced a shrill, equine challenge, then bore down on his promised victims.

One man and horse went down in a squealing, screaming, hoof-flailing tangle, while Bili took a ringing swordcut on the side of his helm in passing. Still shrilling his challenge, Mahvros came to a rearing halt, pivoted, and returned to savage the downed horse and rider, while Bili axed the other man out of the saddle with a single, businesslike stroke. The stallion was able to experience the brief elation of feeling manribs splinter under his hooves, before Bili urged him back toward the bridge.

Scores of hooves were pounding close behind him, when he cleared the last of the trees to see Ahndee and Klairuhnz, their blades gleaming, sitting their mounts knee-to-knee, a few paces onto the span. Three yards behind them, the trooper had uncased and strung his short bow, nocked an arrow, and calmly awaited the appearance of a target.

"Bili!" shouted Ahndee exuberantly. "Sun and Wind be thanked! We'd thought you slain." He started to back his gelding, that Bili might have his place.

But Bili signed him to stay, positioning Mahvros a little ahead of the others. "This will be better," he stated shortly, not seeing the smile they exchanged at his automatic assumption of command.

The trooper proved himself an expert archer, putting his shaft cleanly into the eye of the first pursuer to gallop out of the forest. His second arrow pinned an unarmored thigh to a saddletree. He nocked a third, drew . . . and his bowstring snapped! Cursing sulfurously in several languages, he cast away the now useless hornbow, drew his saber, and ranged up close behind Ahndee.

The next four attackers took a brief moment to form up, then launched a charge, apparently expecting their prey to remain in place and wait their pleasure. They did not live long enough to recover from the countercharge!

The leading attacker held up his shield to fend off Bili's axe, while he aimed a hacking cut at Mahvros's thick neck. The stout target crumpled like wet paper and the axeblade bit completely through, deep into the arm beneath, the force of the buffet hurling the man down to a singularly messy death, amid the stamping hooves.

Mahvros roughly shouldered the riderless horse aside, while Bili glanced around, seeking another opponent. At that very moment Ahndee was thrusting the watered-steel blade of his broadsword deep into the vitals of his adversary and Klairuhnz was obviously more than a match for his shaggy opponent. But the Freefighter had troubles aplenty. First his bowstring, and now his saber had broken, leaving him but a bare foot of pointless blade. With this stub, he was fighting a desperate defensive action.

In one mighty leap, Mahvros was alongside the ruffian's mount. Shortening his grip on his axe, Bili jammed the spike into a side made vulnerable by a wide gap between the breast and back plates of an ill-fitting cuirass. Shrieking a curse, the mortally wounded man turned in his saddle to rain a swift succession of swordcuts on Bili's helm and shoulders. While the Pitzburk turned every blow, Bili was unable to retaliate, his axe being almost useless at such breast-to-breast encounters.

Unexpectedly, the man hunched and began to gag and retch, spewing up quantities of frothy-pink blood. At this, the Freefighter reined closer, used his piece of saber to slash the dying man's swordknot, then neatly decapitated the brigand with his own antique blade.

They had almost regained the bridge when the van of the main force caught up to them. First to fall was the rearmed Freefighter, his scaleshirt unable to protect bis back from a nailstudded club.

Bili's better armor turned a determined spearthurst, before he axed an arm from his spearman. Then he turned Mahvros and, straightening his arms, swung his bloody axe in several wide arcs before him. He struck nothing, but did achieve the desired effect of momentarily halting most of the oncoming force and granting Ahndee and Klairuhnz a few precious moments to regain the bridge.

Bili failed to see the man who galloped in from his left, but Mahvros did not.

With the speed of a striking serpent, he swung about and sank his big teeth into the flesh of the smaller horse. The little mare was not a warhorse, and she had no slightest intention of remaining in proximity to a huge, maddened stallion. Taking the bit firmly in her teeth, she raced back into the forest, bearing her shouting, cursing, reinsawing rider only as far as the low-hanging branch, which swept him from her back and stretched him senseless on the sward.

Mahvros's forehooves were already booming on the bridgetimbers when a hardflung throwingaxe caromed off Bili's helm, nearly deafening him and filling his head with a tight red-blackness shot with dazzling-white stars. Only instinct kept him in the saddle; Mahvros, well-trained and intelligent animal that he was, continued on to the proper place, then wheeled about just ahead of Ahndee and Klairuhnz.

Reaching forward, Ahndee grabbed Bill's limp arm and shook him. "Are you all right, Bili? Are you hurt?" he shouted anxiously.

Then he turned to Klairuhnz. "Your help, My Lord, he's all but unconscious. Let's get him behind us, ere those bastards cut him down."

Bili could hear all and could feel movements on either side of him, but neither his lips nor his limbs would obey him. Fuzzily, he pondered on why Vahrohneeskos Ahndee would have addressed a mere roving bard as his lord.

Holding at the bridge where a flank attack was impossible had been a good idea. The blades of Ahndee and Klairuhnz wove a deadly pattern, effectively barring their foemen access to the dazed and helpless Bili, now drooping in his saddle. Thanks to the narrowness of the span, only two men at a time could attack the defenders, thus nullifying their numerical superiority. On a man-to-man basis, the ill-armed crew were no match for experienced warriors. The length of the bridge, from the forest side to the center, was soon goreslimed and littered with dropped weapons and hacked, hoofmarked corpses.

But the repeated assaults had taken other toll. Ahndee sat in agony, his left arm uselessly dangling at his side. He had used its armored surface to ward off a direct blow from a huge and weighty club, while he slashed the clubman's unprotected throat. He was certain that the concussion of that blow had broken the arm. Klairuhnz's horse now lay dead and the Bard stood astride the body. He had hopefully mindspoken Mahvros, but the stallion's refusal had been final. He had been promised dire consequences should he attempt to either unseat Mahvros's hurt brother or take his place on the big black.

Bili regained his senses just in time to see Klairuhnz sustain a vicious cut on the side of his neck and fall, blood spurting over his shoulderplates. Roaring "UP HARZBURK!" through force of habit, Bili kneed Mahvros forward and plugged the gap, admonishing the horse not to step on the fallen man. A swing of his axe crushed both the helmet and the skull of Klairuhnz's killer. As the man pitched from his saddle, Bili belatedly recognized the face. It was that of Hofos, Komees Hari's majordomo!

Then there were two more enemy horsemen on the bridge before him. But this time it was Ahndee who was reeling on his kak, unable to do more than offer a rapidly weakening defense. Bili disliked attacking a horse, but the circumstances left him no option. He rammed his axe spike into the rolling eye of his opponent's mount, and in the brief respite afforded him while the death-agonized beast proceeded to buck its rider over the low railing and into the cold creek, he swung his axe into the unarmored chest of Ahndee's adversary. Deep went that fearsome blade, biting through hide jerkin and shirt and skin and flesh and bone and into the quivering heart itself!

Someone in the decreasing group between the bridge and the forest cast a javelin and Mahvros took it in the thick muscles of his off shoulder. He screamed his pain and shock and would have reared, had Bill's mindspeak not restrained him. Grimly, the young man dismounted and gently withdrew the blessedly unbarbed head. Backing the big horse, he turned him, beaming, "Go back to the hall, Mahvros."

"Mahvros still can fight, Brother!" the black balked stubbornly.

"I know that my brother can still fight." Bili mindspoke with as much patience as he could show. "But that wound is deep. If I stayed on your back, you might be per-manently crippled." Thinking quickly, he added, "Besides, the other man can fight no longer and must be returned to the hall. A horse of your intelligence is needed to keep this stupid gelding moving, yet see that it does not move too fast so that the man falls off."

Bili was not exaggerating. Ahndee had dropped both sword and reins, and nothing save the high cantle and pommel of his war kak were keeping his limp, unconscious body on his horse. Bili grasped the grey's bridle, faced him about, slapped his rump, and shouted. Even so, the grey made to stop at the end of the bridge, but a sharp nip of Mahvros's yellow teeth changed his mind.

Laying down both axe and javelin, Bili grasped Klairuhnz under the arms and dragged him back from the windrow of the dead men and horses, propping him against the rail. Odd, he thought vaguely, I think he's still alive. He should be well dead, by now, considering where the sword caught him....

Striding back, he picked up the short, heavy dart, drew back his brawny arm, then chose a target and made a running cast. One of the men with only a breastplate was adjusting his stirrup when the missile took him in the small of the back, tearing through his guts and far enough out from his belly to prick his horse when he stumbled against its flank. Scream of horse almost drowned out scream of man. The riderless mount galloped for the forest and most of the remaining ruffians made move to follow.

But a big, spikebearded man headed them off and, beating at them with the flat of a broadsword, drove them back and commenced to harangue them. Bili, leaning on his gory axe amid the dead men whom he expected to soon join, could pick out words or detached phrases of the angrily shouted monologue, despite the fact that he had not heard Old Ehleeneekos spoken in ten years.

". . . cowards ... to fear only one, dismounted man . . . creatures of filth . . . gotten on filtheating sows by spineless cur dogs . . . gain your freedom? . . . lead all men to the True Faith? . . . treasure and women? . . . Salvation... killing heathens..."

Bili shook his head, hoping to clear it of the remaining dizziness. A true product of his race and upbringing, he had no fear of death. He was a bit sorry that it was to come so early in his life, but then every warrior faced his last battle sooner or later. He would have liked to have seen his father and his sweet mothers just once more, but it would rejoice them when they learned that he had fallen in honor, his foemen's blood clotting his axe from spikepoint to butt. And his brother Djehf, six months his junior, would certainly make a good Chief and Thoheeks of Morguhn, maybe even a better one than he would have made.

"DIRTMEN!" He shouted derisively at the band of ruffians. "Rapists of ewes and she-goats! Your fellow bastards here are lonely. Are you going to come join them, or are you going home to bugger your own infant sons? That's an old Ehleen custom, isn't it? Along with eating dung?"

He carried on in the same vein, each succeeding insult more repugnant and offensive than its predecessor. Their leader wisely held his tongue, hoping that Bill's sneering contumely would arouse an aggressive spark in his bat-tered band where his own oration had failed.

At length, one of the tatterdemalions was stung to the quick. Shouting maniacally, waving his aged saber, he spurred his horse at the lone figure on the bridge. Bili stood his ground; to the watching men it appeared that he was certain to be ridden down. But Bili had positioned himself cunningly, and he judged the oncoming rider to be something less than an accomplished horseman.

The horse had to jump in order to clear the two dead horses blocking the direct route to the axeman. Before the rider could recover enough of his balance to use his sword, Bili had let his axe go to swing by its wrist thong, grabbed a sandaled foot and a thick, hairy leg, and heaved him over the other side of his mount!

Dropping his sword and squalling in terror, the Ehleen clawed frantically for a grip on the bridgerail. He missed and commenced a despairing howl which was abruptly terminated when his hurtling body struck the swiftflowing water. He had been one of the "lucky ones," arrayed in an almost complete set of threequarter plate. Since he could not swim anyway, he sank like a stone.

But Bili had not watched. No sooner was the man out of the saddle, than he who had unseated him was in it, trying to turn the unsettled and unfamiliar annual in tune to meet the fresh attackers he could hear pounding up. Hear . . . but not see, for once more the sick, tight diz-ziness was attempting to claim his senses. When at last he got the skittish horse facing the forest, it was to dimly perceive the backs of the motley pack of skulkers pound-ing toward the forest, a small shower of arrows falling amongst them, the shafts glinting as they crossed a va-grant beam of moonlight.

Bili's brain told his arm to lift the axe, his legs to urge the new horse on in pursuit of the fleeing ruffians . . . vainly. His legs might have ceased to exist, while his axe now seemed to weigh tons. The weight was just too much and he let it go, then pitched out of the lowcut saddle to land on the narrow railing above the deep, icy water.

Hari and Drehkos caught the senseless body just in time to prevent Bili from joining his latest victim on the bed of the stream. While Komees Djeen led his men on the trail of the fleeing force, the brothers bore the ThoheeK's son to where Vaskos and his orderly, Frahnkos, were tending Ahndee. When Bili's battered helmet was removed, it was found to be filled with both old and fresh blood from a nasty scalp wound. Nor was that the extent of his hurts. Once his body lay prone, a stream of blood crept from the top of his left boot, and exam-ination revealed a deep stab in the side of the calf. Also, as was usual for a man who had fought for any length of time in plate, the skin surfaces of his muscular body from shoulders to knees were one vast bruise, while his clothing dripped of sweat.

Vaskos's gentle probing had early established that Ahndee's left radius was broken. It was a clean break, however, and had been more or less immobilized by the tight-fitting armguard which had encased it. The broken arm did not disturb the Keeleeohstos and his orderly. What did was not visible until more armor was stripped off. Both the left elbow and shoulder had been sprung from their sockets! So employing rough-and-ready battle-field expedients between them, the officer and the soldier snapped the two joints back into place, then set and splintered the forearm.

Poor Ahndee recovered brief, screaming consciousness, but quickly and mercifully lapsed back into insensibility.

Upon Komees Djeen's return, it was decided that since a physician was known to be in residence to attend the ailing Thoheeks, the wounded men would be borne to Morguhn Hall, guarded by him and his troopers, while the remainder of the party returned to Horse Hall with the captured weapons, gear, and horses, most of which Hari recognized as his anyway. The broken, bloody corpses would be fetched in after sunrise.

None of Komees Djeen's faithful Freefighters made mention of the armored man they had found wandering the forest in a daze, nor did the old Strahteegos for he had recognized his prisoner as Komees Hari's valet, Kreestofohros.

It was a long, slow journey, for horse litters could not move so rapidly as riders. Dawn was paling the sky ere the van pounded their saberpommels on the thick, barred gates of Morguhn Hall.

At about the same time, in the town of Morguhnpolis, another nobleman was hearing the report of a spikebearded visitor. The visitor knelt before the lord, still in his hacked and dented armor, a bloodcrusty rag wrapped around his head and another around his right hand.

When he had mumbled the last word of his summary, the nobleman hissed, "You clumsy, witless, bungling fool!"

Jerkily, the armored man crawled a few feet closer and, raising his hands in supplication, stuttered, "Please ... if it please my Lord ... we did all that mortal flesh..."

A chopping motion of the nobleman's head silenced the supplicant. Leaning far back in his chair, he jerked a dark red rose from a silver vase on the table beside him and pressed it to his nostrils, snarling around the stem, "Get away, you pig! Your mortal flesh stinks, and nothing you have done or countenanced this cursed night pleases me!

"What made you think we wanted the Thoheek's son killed, you witless ape? Who gave you leave to think, anyway? Better, far better, for you had you heeded the good Lady's advice!"

"But . . . but, the men . . ." the spikebearded one started.

"Damn you!" growled the nobleman. "You were represented to me as a veteran soldier, who had command experience. If you truly commanded soldiers, why can you not handle a pack of oafish servants and stupid peasants and city gutterscum? Never mind. I don't wish to hear any more of your excuses. You answer my questions, no more!

"Succinctly, then, thanks to your ill-conceived and amateurishly staged little skirmish, the Staheerforeeah has at least twelve members dead and as many more missing or unaccounted for, not to mention the losses of painfully collected arms and equipment. And what did this blood sacrifice buy our Holy Cause? Hah! Two barbarian mercenaries and possibly a traveling bard slain; and two nobles wounded! And one of these nobles is a Kath'ahrohs, to all intents and purposes, whom we still have reason to think we can convert to the True Faith. As for the other . . . what in God's name did you dimwits expect to accomplish in the death of Thoheek's son, Bili?"

Eagerly, the soldier grasped at this straw which might possibly redeem him. "It has worked very well, Lord, in other places. Slay the heir and you put question to the lawful succession, and..."

The nobleman's fleshy lips curled back to expose his even teeth-amazingly white for a man of his middle years. "You ambulatory dungheapl This is not 'other places'!" he snarled. "True, the present Thoheeks is in ill health and, I have been reliably informed, is partially paralyzed and assuredly dying, though slowly. But-and of this matter you might have inquired before you did the irrevocable, the Lady could have told you every bit as easily as I-the death of Bili would lawfully throw the succession to Djehf, his junior by about six months. The death of Djehf would lawfully make Thoheeks of Tchahrlee, Bili's younger by roughly a year. The death of Tchahrlee would see the accession of Gilbuht, and the death of Gilbuht would give the title to Djaikuhb; and so on. Dammit, the Thoheeks has nine living sons! How many do you think the Staheerforeeah could assassinate, ere we all had a Confederation expeditionary force breathing down our necks, eh? You and those fools you presumably lead may have suicidal tendencies, but I, for one, have no wish to adorn a damned cross!

"Not only have you wasted good men on a fool's errand, but this bit of stupidity may well have jeopardized the entire structure of the Staheerforees in this duchy, especially if any of those missing have been taken alive!"

"But . . . but, My Lord," stuttered Spikebeard. "None of ... they are all ... all have taken the Sacred Oaths, they would never betray..."

The noble leaned forward and hissed scornfully. "Have you never heard of torture, then? Oaths, sacred or otherwise, mean nothing to a man whose pain is sufficiently unbearable! Oh, damn you to the lowest reaches. If they have one of ours we may have to strike ere our time is truly ripe, ere our western brothers have done their own work and can join us!"

Spikebeard raised his bloody head, squared his shoulders, fanaticism gleaming from his eyes. "Nonetheless, My Lord, you must know that we will triumph, for God, the one True God, is on our side!"

The noble sighed. "Oh, yes, we'll triumph. But lacking surprise, truly overwhelming forces, and more professionals than this Duchy can presently count, the butcher's bill will be high, very high. One look at your sorry state would tell anyone that!

"Speaking of which, one would hope that you came into the city unseen? Did you scale the wall, come through our tunnel?"

The kneeling soldier crimsoned and fidgeted. Through trembling lips, he at last managed to mumble. "I ... I rode through the ... the gate, My Lord. But ... but I ... I had my cloak so arranged that . . . that none could possibly have seen my armor and .. ."

The noble clenched his fists and his dark eyes flashed fire. "What in hell kind of soldier are you, or were you ever really a soldier at all? Don't you think the mercenaries at the east gate could tell you were wearing armor, cloak or no cloak, you idiot? A man carries his body differently in armor, any fool knows that!

"So you rode through the east gate, bleeding, in armor, and wearing a sword, and, fool that you are, you came directly to my house, eh? Damn your eyes, I should have your life . . . would, were you not so highly connected elsewhere!"

The kneeling man's face had faded from crimson to pasty white, his lord's reputation for cruelty being well known and equally well earned. He opened his mouth to speak, but closed it with a snap when the noble added, "And still may, if I hear one more odious yap from your dog's mouth!"

He struck a small gong on the table at his side. Two brawny, olive-skinned guards opened the door and entered, bowing.

Vahrohnos Myros waved a graceful, manicured hand at

 Spikebeard. "Take him to your barracks and strip off his armor, every scrap of it, mind you. You, Ahngehlos, bundle them well, I want no one to suspect what you're carrying. Bear the armor to Paulos, the smith. Tell him to immediately break up the plates, burn off the leather, and dip the metal in acid, before he scatters it throughout his scrap heap.

"As for Captain Manos here, humm. Feelos, send a man for a physician to tend a man injured in a barracks brawl. By the time the doctor arrives, I will expect his patient to look the part. Take him away!"

Chapter VII

Mahrnee and Behrnees Morguhn, wrapped warmly against the chill morning air, received Komees Djeen and Bard Klairuhnz in the broad foyer of Morguhn Hall. Standing on the main staircase, the ladies were flanked by Vahrohnos Spiros Morguhn and Clan Bard Hail Morguhn.

The trim old warrior marched in, his braided grey hair coiled about the crown of his head to pad the helmet he now bore in the crook of his left arm. He halted and stiffly bowed, his armor clanking.

"Ladies Morguhn, Cousin Spiros, Cousin Hail, greet the Sun. I am sorry to rouse your hall at so early an hour, but midnight last saw a brisk little melee at the Forest Bridge. I've brought a son of this House and another nobleman, both of whom are in urgent need of a physician's care."

The two women paled, but otherwise did credit to their stern upbringing.

Vahrohnos Spiros asked in a tight voice, "Be candid, Djeen. How bad are Bili's wounds?"

A smile flitted across the Komees's thin lips. "Ladies and Kinsmen, we may all be proud of the lad, according to Bard Klairuhnz here. You do not know him, of course, but he is a clanless Kinsman who took part in the action, until his horse was slain and he was rendered senseless.

"He states unequivocally that our Chief-to-be fought like a treecat! Indeed, Bili captained the defense.

"Our boy has suffered a nasty split of his scalp and a deep stab in his leg, but he's now fully awake, obviously experiencing pain, and hungry as a wolf, so I doubt me not that he'll live."

A note of sadness then entered the old man's voice. "The other nobleman is Vahrohneeskos Ahndros. Ahndee is not really conscious and he frequently raves in delirium."

At Komees Djeen's insistence, Master Ahlee saw first to Ahndee. After cursory examination, the physician and his apprentice firmly but courteously ushered all, even Mother Mahrnee, out into the corridor. When at some length he allowed them to reenter, Ahndee appeared to be sleeping peacefully and his color showed a marked improvement.

All this gave Bili time to prepare. With the aid of Mother Behrnees and a few servants, he removed his bloody, sweatsmelly clothing, bathed and donned an old, soft lounging tunic. His experience with the practice of the physician's arts had been in the Middle Kingdoms, whose nobles saw scant need to put good gold, which could be better invested in arms, armor, and condottas, into the bottomless pockets of foreigners. Therefore, although he was ravenously hungry, he refrained from eating.

When the two strangely garbed men entered his chamber, he sat on his bed, propped against a mound of pillows and taking long draughts from a leetrah-flagon of wine and brandy, steeling himself to endure the inevitable, and hoping that his body would not betray his honor- that he would neither scream nor befoul himself when the whitehot iron was pressed into his flesh.

He found the physician impressive, though he did not immediately recognize why. His height was average and Bili would have estimated his weight at perhaps eighty Ehleen keelohs, though his loose, flowing garments could easily have concealed a bulkier body. But Bili did not think this the case, for there was little surplus flesh on the dusky face and his hands were fineboned.

The master and his apprentice were dressed almost identically-loosesleeved, anklelength white robe; sleeve-less, kneelength jerkin of softwoven, pale blue cotton; and well-made boots, plain ones on the feet of the apprentice, richly tooled ones on the master. The shaven scalps of both men reflected the lamplight, that of the master furrowed with old scars.

The master physician literally radiated a calm dignity and Bili found himself addressing him as an equal. "Greet the Sun, Lord Ahlee. It is not my wish to try to teach the horse how to eat grass, but I am no longer bleeding much and my pain is bearable, so tend you first to the noble Ahndee. When his hurts are eased, come you then to me."

The physician's voice was deep, rolling, and melodious. "Peace be with you, Lord Bili. We are but come from Lord Ahndee, where we corrected the well-meant damages wrought by those who first treated him. He now sleeps peacefully."

Bili nodded, set down his flagon, and turned to Mother Behrnees. "Please leave us now, Mother."

Behrnees opened her mouth to protest, but a deep look into those blue eyes-so like her loved father's-stilled her voice. And she wanted to cry, to shed tears to mourn the passing of the child and to rejoice the now obvious presence of the man.

"Please, Mother, you must go," Bili insisted in firm tones. "I know what must now be done, for I have suffered it before. And a wound burning is no place for a lady."

As Behrnees departed through the door held open by the apprentice, she thought that her heart would burst of her pride.

When his mother had gone, Bili offered a grim smile. "I await your pleasure, sir." Dubiously, he eyed the two leatherbound chests which the apprentice was opening. "Where is your brazier?"

Master Ahlee seated himself on the edge of Bill's bed and smiled. "I shall close your wounds in due time, Lord Bili, never fear. But first, tell me how you received these hurts and what varieties of weapons inflicted them."

Bili raised a hand to tap at the fresh cloths which Mother Behrnees had wound about his head. "The head wound is not much. My helm was struck and dented and the scalp beneath it split. I was struck from behind, so 7 can't say what kind of missile hit me. But I've suffered such injuries many times ere this. You have too, I'd imag-ine." He smiled, waving at the scars on Master Ahlee's own head.

The physician smiled also, saying softly, "No, I am no stranger to the sight of my own blood, Lord Bili. But to continue, did you swoon at the tune of the injury or at any time since? Did you become dizzy or queasy? Did your vision blur? Did you feel a heaviness or a prickling in your arms and legs?"

Bili shrugged. "At the time I took the blow, it was all I could do to sit my horse, nor do I know for how long it was so. I could hear, but I could not move or speak or even open my eyes. But eventually I came back into control of myself, and then Ahndee, Mahvros, and I fought until both Ahndee and Mahvros were wounded. Then..."

"Wait a moment, please, Lord Bili." The physician looked puzzled. "I was not told of a third casualty. This man, Mahvros, did he return with your party? Do you know how serious is his wound?"

Blankfaced, Bili said, "Yes, Lord Ahlee, Mahvros was beside me for most of the journey. As concerns his wound, he took a javelin in his right shoulder. One of Komees Djeen's troopers is tending him down in the stables."

"Lord Bili," Master Ahlee spoke urgently, "this Mahvros must be removed from the stable as quickly as possible. There are many guest chambers in this hall. Can he not be accommodated in one?"

"No," said Dili flatly. "His kind are not allowed inside the hall."

Master Ahlee's manner cooled noticeably. "If this Mahvros was good enough to fight beside you, surely he deserves better lodgement than a stable! You disappoint me, young sir."

Bili kept his face blank with great effort. "Where else, Lord Ahlee, do the men of your own land lodge their horses?"

The physician regarded Bill's twitching mouth and mirth-filled eyes for a long moment, then grinned broadly, chuckling, "When I am done with you, Lord Bili, I shall be happy to take a look at Mahvros ... in the stable."

Bili sobered. "Now that is most gracious of you, Lord Ahlee. I would much appreciate such generosity, for Mahvros and I are ... well, we're closer than you probably could understand."

The physician nodded. "But I do understand, Lord Bili, and I will certainly see to your friend. Now, back to you. Have you lost consciousness or control since that first time?"

"Only once," answered Bili. "I unseated a man, threw him off his horse into the stream. But when I mounted his horse, I became very dizzy and couldn't lift my axe. Then I fell off the horse and I recall nothing more until I awakened in a horse litter."

Ahlee nodded, then shifted his position and pointed at the bandaged leg. "And how was that wound inflicted, Lord Bili?"

"I don't know," Bili admitted. "Honestly, you know how things are in battle. I can't remember even taking that wound, much less when or where or with what. From the look I got when I bathed though, I'd say a small-bladed spear or a javelin.

"But, Lord Ahlee, let me warn you. I don't think I can remain unmoving whilst you sear these wounds. It might be better if you strapped me down, or called for servants to hold me ... a good dozen men, anyway, for Sacred Sun has given me great strength."

Ahlee smiled again. "Yes, I am sure you are a very strong man, Lord Bili. But wait." He extended his right hand over his shoulder, palm open.

Having been busy arranging the lamps, Eeshmaheel, the apprentice, stepped back to one of the opened chests, took something from it, and laid that something in his master's pink palm.

When the physician opened his hand, Bili saw that it contained a disk of clear, smoothly polished quartz, sus-pended from a thin, golden chain. Ahlee held the ends of the chain, allowing the disk to dangle before Bill's eyes for a moment, then set it to spinning.

In a low, soothing, monotonous voice, he intoned, "Watch the crystal, Lord Bili. Do not take your eyes from it for a moment. Watch it, watch it, see the beauty of the light. You see? Is it not the most beautiful light you have ever seen? See the light, Lord Bili. Sink into the light. . ."

And as the voice murmured on and on, Bili found him-self obeying. He sank into the light, became one with it, and it was good, that oneness was infinitely good. It was the Light of Sacred Sun and he was part of It and It was part of him, It streamed through him and of him. And from Them, worlds and universes received their sub-stances and were born and lived countless eons and died and returned their life gift to Them. And Bili continued to sink, faster and faster and faster, spiraling tightly, bodilessly, through the unbearably beautiful, wondrous light-which-was-one-with-darkness, and Sacred Wind roared in his ears. But it roared steadily and soothingly and reminded him of the sound of that voice-what voice?-and the roar gradually faded and the spiraling went on and still he sank, descending toward the tossing waves of a great, vast, dark-light ocean. Closer to those  dark, lightcrested waves he came, closer and closer and closer.

Bill steeled his light-fllled, bodiless body for the chill of the water, but he eased gently into it and it closed over him and there was no chill. He was enveloped in a moist, nourishing warmth, a warmth which soothed and comforted and lulled. And in the warm, caressing, darklight nothingness, everything vanished-pain, pleasure, worry, fear, pride, desire. And Bili could not bring himself to wish them back, for all of them together could not, he knew, replace one-ten-thousandth part of the exquisite beauty of his newfound but never forgotten nothingness...

"The young lord journeyed quickly, Master," comment-ed Eeshmaheel.

"Both quickly and deeply," Ahlee nodded, handing back the disc. "As I oft have said, some journey more easily than others. It helps if they have no fear, Eeshmaheel, such as this young man.

"Eeshmaheel, there are noblemen and noble men, and a man need not be one to be the other. But this man is that rarity, both together. It is seldom that Ahlah grants long life to such, but, in His wisdom, He allows them to do much good within the short time that they remain amongst men.

"Now, Eeshmaheel, uncover the head and tell me of the wound."

The apprentice first peeled back the lids and minutely examined the eyes. Then he removed the bandages, start-ing a fresh flow of blood. Disregarding this, he tenderly probed about the wound site, then spread the edges and sponged away enough blood to allow him a glimpse of the depths of the injury.

"Master, there is no blood on the eyes and the pupils are of equal size, nor did the patient have difficulty in focusing them before he journeyed. The swelling around the opening is hard and the bleeding had entirely ceased, ere my examination started it afresh. There is no bone visible, nor is the scalp torn, only cleanly split."

Ahlee asked, "Were you the master, what would you do?"

Eeshmaheel's brown eyes never left the wound while he answered. "Master, it has bled copiously, so is certainly cleaned of foreign matter and dirtinesses; nor is there sufficient depth for matter to hide. Since he is a cleanly man, the scalp need not be shaved. I would but place over it a thick cloth well soaked in brandy and tightly bandage it."

Ahlee raised his brows. "You would not, then, suture it? Why not?"

"Master, Ahlali already has begun to heal this wound, so it were impiety to attempt improvement upon His work. But even were the injury fresh, it is very shallow and not quite so long as my thumb. I would do no more than I have said, Master."

Ahlee nodded his approval and ordered, "Then do it, and Ahlah guide your hands." While he watched the sure, quick actions of the apprentice, he thought that very soon now Eeshmaheel would be departing, taking ship to the north. He would bear with him Master Ahlee's letter to the Elder Masters of Kohoz, to whom he would swear his oaths and begin to train his first apprentice. And the Elder Masters would send Ahlee another gangling lad.

When Eeshmaheel had done, he and the Master gently turned the patient facedown on the bed. Ahlee watched while his apprentice removed the bandage from the leg. Removal brought on no such crimson flood as had the lifting of the head bandage. There was but a continuation of the slow, steady ooze and trickle of pale-pinkish water.

"Eeshmaheel. . . ?"

The young physician-young being a relative term, for he was a good ten years older than Bili-scrutinized the wound, leaned close to sniff it, moistened a fingertip in the discharge, touched it lightly to his tonguetip, then gently kneaded the flesh about it.

"Master, it appears a deep stab, I would say at least a fingerlength. Almost did it pierce through, for the flesh opposite shows much discoloration. I would agree with the patient about the weapon involved, for a sword or dirk would have cut cleanly, but here there is some evidence of tearing. The spear was probably not poisoned though, for I can neither smell nor taste any venom. But it should have commenced to close by this time, unless those who washed him damaged it."

"Very good, Eeshmaheel, very good, all save the last. Bring the surgical chest and the brandy and I will show you why the wound continued to weep."

The apprentice never ceased to marvel at the master and had long since despaired of ever being his equal, in any save the simplest ways. Wordlessly, he poured brandy into a shallow pan, then immersed those instruments indicated by the master in the liquid. That done, he poured a generous quantity of the brandy over the master's hands, then his own.

A brief but knowing glance at the pile of clothing as he entered had provided Master Ahlee the answer to the weeping wound. Within a few, short minutes, that answer was clamped betwixt the jaws of a bloodsmeared brass forceps.

"What is it, Eeshmaheel?" He opened the instrument, dropping the gory morsel into the younger man's palm.

"Why, it is a bit of fine leather, Master. But you knew, even before you extracted it, didn't you?"

Extending his bloody hands, that the apprentice might pour over them more brandy, Ahlee admonished, "Observe, Eeshmaheel, observe! A good physician prides himself upon missing nothing. Look at that boot atop the pile near to the door. See the place where the point tore through? There is a piece missing, yes? Now, true, it could be inside the boot, or lying in the horse litter or somewhere on the road, or even back at the battleground.

 But combine the two details, Eeshmaheel, a stab which will not close and a missing bit of boot."

When Bili opened his eyes, the physician still sat before him, but he no longer held the disk pendant.

He moved his leg slightly, then grimaced. "There is now a fierce stinging in both my wounds, Lord Ahlee. Perhaps your apprentice had best fetch your brazier and irons and get on with this unpleasant business. But give me a good burn on the first try, please. It's not the sort of thing I want a second serving of."

"There will be no burning of your flesh, Lord Bili," Ahlee softly boomed, smiling. "Your wounds have both been tended. The scalp will close of itself, if you are con-siderate of it. I have cleaned out the stab and closed it with stitches which I will remove in a week or so, Ahlah willing. The stinging is caused partially by the stitches and partially by the reaction of the raw flesh to the brandy with which the innermost bandages are soaked. It is uncomfortable, true, but it has been observed that wounds heal more easily and quickly when such bandages are employed."

Bill's skin crawled, his neck hairs prickling. "Are . . . are you then a ... a sorcerer, Lord Ahlee, to have accomplished so much in but the twinkling of an eye?"

Again, the warm, comforting smile. "Some might call certain of my skills sorcery, Lord Bili, especially my manner of willing you to sleep. But sleep you did, feeling nought of the pain of my surgery. It was barely dawning when first I came to you. The sun is now above two hours in the sky."

Chapter VIII

At a little past the nooning, Komees Djeen, Vahrohnos Spiros, and a half dozen Freefighters had been laboriously interrogating the luckless Kreestofohros for some hours. They had had no trouble in finding a secluded place to conduct their messy business, for Morguhn Hall was far larger than most halls and its cellars were extensive and multileveled.

Equipment and instruments were another matter, however, for their morn's labor was an activity seldom practiced in the Duchy of Morguhn, in recent years at least On the rare occasions that Thoheeks Hwahruhn had ordered such, the activity had invariably been conducted at the prison in Morguhnpolis, where a qualified professional torturer-executioner maintained a modest shop. But since Komees Djeen wished to conceal his possession of this prisoner, use of the professional or any of his tools was out of the question. Therefore, they had had to improvise.

Thanks to hearty applications of these improvisations, Kreestofohros would never again be whole or hale or handsome. Thus far, however, all that they had wrung from his shredded lips had been screams and moans, pleas and prayers, curses. Now he had again fainted, and the troopers were rinding it harder to revive him this time.

Spiros shook his head, frowning. "I like it not, Djeen."

"What else can we do?" expostulated the old Strahteegos. "I know there's a conspiracy and you know there's a conspiracy, and it's certain sure that Boy-lover Myros and that old gasbag, Skiros, are in it up to their dirty ears. But they're too big to legally touch, without proof."

"Now, I've known Hari and Drehkos all their lives and I don't like to think that one or both is into this sorry cesspool of superstition and anarchy, but ... I told you how all his servants mysteriously disappeared last night. Well, among the scum who attacked the boys, I recognized at least four bodies. They were all Hari's people. One, who bore the mark of young Bill's big axe, was majordomo of Horse Hall!"

Spiros's eyebrows shot up. "Hofos, Djeen?" "None other," growled the Komees. "So it becomes obvious that we have a more serious problem than we thought. If supposedly respectable upper servants of the water of Hofos and this bastard are involved, no one of the Kindred is safe in either city or country! This is another reason why we must know names, Spiros! Getting some answers from the tough nut over there is of utmost importance."

"Admitted, Djeen, admitted," Spiros nodded briskly. "And that's why I so dislike what we're doing. We are trying to perform something that we know very little about. If we're not extremely careful, we're going to take it too far and kill the prisoner. Then where will we be? Who will then give us answers or names, eh?"

Komees Djeen's roar filled the large chamber. "Sacred Wind take it! What else can we do?" he repeated in exasperation. "Even if we could get him into Morguhnpolis and into the prison unrecognized, how do we know that we could trust Master Mahrios? After all, if he's not a Kath'ahrohs, he's damned close to it!"

"Let us send for that physician, Master Ahlee," sug-gested the Vahrohnos. "Allow him to examine the man before we go on. And let us keep him by, that he may keep the Ehleen dog alive until we've broken him."

The trooper sent abovestairs returned with Master Ahlee's flat refusal to take any part in the proceedings, so Vahrohnos Spiros betook himself to the suite occupied by the physician and his retinue. He was greeted courteously; but as soon as he had indicated his errand and uttered his urgent request, the friendly, brown face became devoid of expression and the tone of the deep voice took on the hardness of steel.

"My Lord Baron, I cannot condone torture. It is a bestial practice, whatever the motives of those who employ it. I have never and will never take any role in its commission! Do I make myself clear?"

"I did but request, Physician," grated Spiros, unaccustomed to noncooperation on the parts of persons of inferior rank and status. "This matter is of the gravest importance to the good of the Duchy, and too many lives may well hinge upon the information which this stubborn man can give us to cater to your likes and dislikes and whims. Therefore, I, Spiros, by grace of Sun and Wind, Vahrohnos of Taheerospolis and Subchief of Morguhn, do command your instant obedience to my wishes! Do I make myself clear, Physician?"

Ahlee drew himself up, squaring bis shoulders and setting his jaw. "Perfectly clear, My Lord Baron, you speak your language well. A pity that you cannot understand it so well. But, I will repeat: I-will-not-be-a- party-to-torture!"

Snarling, Spiros loosened his heavy dirk. "Why you impudent barbarian pig! How dare you to disobey my order? Are you then mad? Know you not how quickly I can have your hairless head on a spear?"

Bard Klairuhnz opened the door and strolled into the chamber. With no preamble, he inquired, "Kinsman, are you then unaware that Master Ahlee, like all members of his guild within the boundaries of the Confederation, practices under the auspices and personal protection of the Undying High Lord, Milo? It were senseless to threaten him, and it would be treasonable to harm him."

To protect the Vahrohmos's pride, be had employed mindspeak.

"Kinsman," Spiros answered him silently. "You are unaware yourself, unaware of the extreme gravity of this case. Komees Djeen has told me much of you, and so I know that you fought hard and well to aid my House. For that reason, I'll trust you. Know you the problem." So saying he lowered his mindshield, baring the inmost recesses to Klairuhnz, that he might fully realize what had occurred and was presently occurring in the Duchy and thus better comprehend the dilemma.

And what Bard Klairuhnz learned was serious enough! The attack on Bili's party had not been the first such. Indeed, no less than three poorly armed or virtually unarmed parties of Kindred had been butchered to the last person on the roads. Within the cities, most Kindred went armed and guarded by day and by night, in justified fear of the dagger or the strangling cord. Servants of Ehleen blood were become, with few exceptions, surly and secretive, while Ehleenoee peasants and free-farmers and tradesmen were proving ever harder to deal with. And these troubles were not something which had gradually built to the present intensity, but had sprung up full-grown, just after the Duchy's last harvest.

"All right, Kinsman Spiros," Klairuhnz beamed. "I was not aware that matters had progressed so far here. And I agree that you needs must have Master Ahlee's aid. Your reasoning on that is quite sound. But he is a strongwilled man and quite stubborn on what he considers a matter of principle. Because of his protected status, you cannot physically force him to help you, and circumstances have rendered your patience too short to allow for diplomacy.

"So, it might be best, Kinsman, if you left the chamber and allowed me to attempt to reason with the physician."

"Do you think you can truly bring him around, Kinsman?" Spiros, recognizing hard truth, would now grasp at any straw.

"I think so," the Bard assured him.

Wordless, Spiros bowed stiffly toward the foreigner, nodded at Klairuhnz, spun on his heel, and stalked out.

Klairuhnz waited until the footfalls had faded into the distance, then mindspoke Master Ahlee. "You received both my mindspeak and his, then?"

Ahlee's sudden start would have been imperceptible to one not watching for it. Just as quickly as he had reacted, however, he regained his composure, then frowned, saying, "Sir, I did not bid you enter. Nonetheless, I bid you welcome and peace. What matter brings you to this humble instrument of Ahlah?"

Throwing back his head, Klairuhnz gusted a laugh at the ceiling, then went on, still in mindspeak, "Master Humble Instrument, we are both of us too old to play games and there is no time to dissemble. Your mindspeak is known to be excellent and your receptivity even better. So states the Undying Lady Aldora, and she is never wrong about such talents!"

When it came, Ahlee's mindspeak proved to be almost as strong as the Bard's own. "Who are you?"

Having consumed the second evening meal since the bridge fight, the Kindred nobles all gathered in Bili's spacious bedchamber. Only a few hours earlier had word reached them that Bili's only uncle, Tahneest Bili of Morguhn, had been murdered, along with his wife, two sons, and bodyguards, while journeying to Morguhn Hall. This was a grim-faced aggregation.

Bili sat propped on his greatbed, flanked on the one side by his mothers and on the other by his six months younger brother Djehf, who had ridden in unexpected and unannounced to spend a few weeks before the commence-ment of the spring campaigning in the Middle Kingdoms.

Komees Djeen had drawn a chair close to the hearth and its fire, kindled to dispel the chill of the damp, foggy night, where he sat frowning and ceaselessly cracking his big, scarred knuckles, his stiff leg extended before the blaze. Ever and again, his eye strayed to the portable bed, on which lay Ahndee's unconscious form.

Master Ahlee had permitted his patient to be borne to the conference only on condition that he remain in attendance throughout, promising to awaken the young Vahrohneeskos briefly, if need be. The physician sat at the head of the cot, conversing in low tones with Spiros and the Bard. Clan Bard Hail leaned over the back of Spiros's chair, listening but making no comment.

Geros, clad in a new scaleshirt and abbreviated helm, occupied a low stool at his master's side. He was nervously fingering the hilt of a fine saber and hoping that he looked as hard and businesslike as the two Freefighters occupying the bench which blocked the barred door.

Two more Freefighters guarded the door of the Thoheeks, who had taken a turn for the worse, while Eeshmaheel and Master Ahlee's two servants, all armed, kept watch within.

All horses had been summoned from the pasture to stamp and snort in the crowded hall stables, while as much livestock as possible had been crowded into make-shift pens in the outer courtyard. Forgefire flared where the resident smith and his helpers labored, fashioning old tools and stray scraps of metal into arrowheads and points for dart and javelin, repairing plate from the armory, and straightening scytheblades. The heavy gate was barred and the iron grille which protected it from rams had been lowered into place, for the first time in any man's memory. A weaponsmaster supervised several Freefighters and servants as they assembled a pair of small catapults and a large dart thrower. The remainder of the hall's Freefighters, those of Komees Djeen and a number of armed servants, stood the walls.

A knock on the door of Bili's chamber brought Geros and the other two guards to their feet, hands on swordhilts. When the bench was shifted and the bar removed, the knocker was discovered to be Sami Kahtuhr, majordomo of Morguhn Hall, and now castellan as well. He was an old soldier, and his new role was quite as comfortable as the infantryman's armor he had donned.

Though grey thickly streaked his light brown hair and his face was seamed and wrinkled, he had miraculously regained a youthful appearance since Komees Djeen had had Morguhn Hall put on a war footing and all had begun to prepare for siege and battle. The little man probably had more Kindred blood flowing in his veins than most in the room, and he looked it-slight but wiry frame, flat muscles, fair skin, flashing blue green eyes. As a cadet of Clan Kahtuhr, he was ranked as a petty noble-man, his senior-servant status notwithstanding.

He marched over to stand between Komees Djeen and Bili. Although he rendered his Confederation Army salute to the younger, he rendered his report to the elder.

"My Lord, within the hour the hall will be as ready as it can be for whatever is to transpire. In addition to the noble Kindred, fifty-seven men are available. Of these, forty-five are either Freefighters or former soldiers, and the others are good men who will stand firm for the honor of Morguhn. All prisoners have been so lodged that no guard will be required, so all may man the walls if it comes to that. There is more than ample food in the magazines and near tenscore head of cattle and goats, along with threescore sheep in the main court. The numbers of fowl I know not, but they swarm near everywhere one looks, indoors and out.

"I have set those loyal servants not under arms to drawing water from the spring and the wells to fill all the cisterns. When they are done, they will set about tearing down the storage sheds outside the walls and carting the lumber within-the nearer fences as well-that we shall not lack for fuel.

"The only severe shortage will be grain and hay for the animals and the horse brothers and sisters. I sent a man to fetch back any forage that might be in Hohryos Morguhn, but he has not yet returned."

Komees Djeen's head bobbed a curt nod. "Very well, Feelahks, you have done well. I can but wish we had more fighters. It's a far stretch of wall for fifty-seven men and six noble Kindred to cover."

"Six noble Kindred?" Bili suddenly yelped. "What about me? If you think, Kinsman Djeen, that you're going to deny me a share of the battle, just because of a bump on my head and a nick in my leg..."

Mother Mahrnee's hand over his mouth muffled the rest. "Of course Bili will fight. And both my sister and I are adept with sling and huntingbow; nor are our boar-spears partial to only the blood of beasts."

"Unless this be a private war," Master Ahlee said gravely, "you may include a physician who once was a warrior in your tally. Still can I cast an accurate spear, nor am I inexperienced in matters of the sword."

Komees Djeen grinned wolfishly. "All right, Feelahks Sami, you heard; everyone in this room will fight. You may add four more to your tallyroll." Then, a look of sadness crept over his face and he looked again at the recumbent form on the cot. "Would Sun would allow it to be five."

Dawn saw the Council party in the saddle. After a stirrup cup, they saw the gates close behind them and set out for Morguhnpolis at a brisk trot. In order that the hall might be the better manned, the party had been held to a bare minimum, every man of them armed to the teeth. Three hundred yards ahead of them, a single trooper rode point, his orders to return and warn, rather than fight, in the event of trouble.

Bili and Djehf rode in the van, Bili absorbed at trying to establish a decent rapport with the chestnut gelding who was Mahvros's temporary replacement, Djehf still a little dazed at the rapid and unexpected change in his rank and status. He knew that as soon as the present troubles were resolved, he must send a messenger to Eeree, for now he was never to return. With his father inches from death and his uncle slain, Bili was virtual Thoheeks and Chief, while he was automatically Tahneest. He knew not whether to laugh or weep, so he kept his mouth tightly shut.

The second pair of riders were Komees Djeen and Vahrohnos Spiros, who both rode in silence, each full of his own thoughts and worries. The third pair were Clan Bard Hail and Bard Klairuhnz. Hail's lips moved silently as he composed new verses to the "Song of Morguhn," while Klairuhnz was in mindspeak with Master Ahlee, on a mental level to which few men or women could attain.

Save for the fact that his sash now supported an exot-cally decorated, double-curved saber, Ahlee's outward appearance was but little changed. His flowing white robe still billowed, but now it concealed a longsleeved brigandine and a brace of wavy-bladed daggers, and his head-wrappings covered a steel skullcap.

Although he had both war training and experience, Ahlee basically disliked harming a fellow man under most circumstances. But what these people faced, unbelievers though they assuredly were, was a different and distinctly sinister thing, a true horror; and he was convinced that to aid them in their uneven struggle against such evil would be to strive for Ahlah. When again he thought upon the things-the godless, unclean, monstrous things-which his hypnotism had drawn from the mind and memory of that prisoner, he shuddered from head to foot. For spiritual solace, he began to chant holy verses.

The mercenary who rode beside him, leading a packmule, listened briefly, failed to understand the ancient tongue, but decided that a song was just the thing to help speed this almost-done and boring ride; whereupon he launched into an endless and endlessly obscene soldiers' song. Bili knew the particular ditty and took it up, any- thing to relieve some of the maddening tension. After some score of choruses, Djehf bawled a few original and recent verses from Eeree.

The bawdy old ballad brought fond memories to Komees Djeen and a broad smile to his face, and he joined in as well. Though he knew neither the song itself nor memories of it, Spiros found himself joining in the catchy, nonsensical chorus. And when others' recall failed, Clan bard Hail provided extemporaneous and topical verses.

While his physical being sang with the rest, Klairuhnz mindspoke Ahlee, saying, "These fine men cannot know or even suspect just how incredibly ancient this song really is. Nor do they realize that near twoscore generations of their ancestors have sung it."

"Did my antecedents also sing it, Lord?" queried the physician.

"Oh, yes, Ahlee," replied the Bard. "In those long-ago days, we were all one nation, speaking one language."

"Most remarkable," Ahlee commented, adding, "It is certain that I have then chosen aright, for surely you and your few peers are much loved of Ahlah, that He has vouchsafed you such long life."

The guards at the eastern gate of Morguhnpolis were Freefighters, mostly from the Middle Kingdoms. They laughed and buffeted each other in delight, as the noble lords entered the city singing a song they considered their own, and they enthusiastically added their voices to a chorus, feeling a fierce kinship with these fellow fighting-men.

Thus augmented, the last chorus roared up the all but deserted east-west thoroughfare, "HINKEE DINKEE PAHRLEE VOOOOt"

Chapter IX

Bill's party dismounted before the city palace, more than three hundred years old, dating from the period before his ancestors had crossed the mountains, when Morguhnpolis-then called Eeleeoheepolis-had been the north-western jewel of the Crown of Karaleenos. It was an impressive building, fashioned of native granite and faced with that hauntingly beautiful greygreen limestone from Kehnooryohs Ehlahs. Its main chamber was almost as large as the outer courtyard of Morguhn Hall and was columned and paved with colored and veined marbles; but it was very difficult to heat, so was seldom used for anything. The footfalls of the noblemen echoed as they traversed the length of the huge chamber and mounted the wide marble stairs toward the second floor Council Chamber.

Komees Djeen frowned at sight of the four pikemen ranged before the tall, brass-sheathed doors of the Council's meetingroom. They were not the usual Free-fighter guards, but rather civilian Spearlevymen, Ehleenoee all. A skinny corporal of the same body stood just behind the pikemen, holding his knife-edged thrusting spear as though it were a frog gig.

Eyes fixed dead ahead, Bili and Djehf clanked toward the doors, outwardly unconcerned. After nervously licking his lips, the corporal hissed a whispered order and the levymen sloppily presented their pikes, no two at the same angle. Komees Djeen snorted in disgust and made a decidedly uncomplimentary remark concerning gutter-scum playing at soldier.

Bili and Djehf marched forward until the glittering points were but inches from their breastplates. The brothers stood thus for a moment. Then Djehf suddenly grasped the crossbar of the pike before him and savagely jerked it from the hands of its wielder. The levyman spun half around and, ere he could turn back, Djehf dropped the captured pike and booted the man's rump so hard that he went sprawling, sliding a good way down the slick floor of the side hallway on his breastplate. Grinning, he reached for a second pike, but the levymen hastily grounded their weapons and backed up until the walls ended their retreat, leaving their corporal to guard the portals alone.

"The Council Chamber," began that worthy, in a piping falsetto squeak. He flushed, cleared his throat, presented the long, wide blade of his spear, and started over. "The Council Chamber is forbidden to any save confirmed members of the Thirds!" He spoke in Old Ehleeneekos.

Komees Djeen shouldered between Bili and Djehf, demanding, "What language are you grunting in, you puling shoat?"

Before the unhappy man could frame an answer, Djehf's powerful hand had closed on the shaft of the short spear. In a brittle voice, he announced, "If you don't let go of that piece of junk, dungface, by Sun and Wind, I'll bugger you with it!"

The corporal did let go, but not quickly enough to suit Djehf, who jerked the Ehleen away from the closed door, spun him about, and jabbed a good two inches of the broad spearpoint into his seat. The man screamed, then sped down the side hall, clutching at his bleeding posterior and howling like a moon mad hound. Three pikes fell clattering and three pikemen followed their wounded leader as fast as their legs would carry them.

Jerking wide the brazen doors, the brothers stalked into the Council Chamber, the rest of their party hard on their heels.

The T-shaped Council Table filled the center of the chamber. The places of the Second and Third Thirds were ranged on either side of the shaft, while those of the First Third were along the crossbar. No one, of course, occupied the chairs of the First, but all five of the Third were filled and four of the second had occupants. A bench against the side wall held a flashy fop, a black-bearded man in the robes of a subpriest, and a beefy, balding lout in a stained butcher's apron. At each of the chamber's four corners stood a Spearlevyman with grounded pike, all obviously of near-pure Ehleen blood.

Speaking no word, glancing neither to right nor left, Bili strode to the central chair of the First Third. Before he seated himself, however, he drew his heavy broadsword and laid it near to hand, pointing it down the length of the T's shaft. He imperiously waved his brother to the chair at his right, while Komees Djeen moved to his accustomed place, along with Spiros and Hail. Klairuhnz leaned a hip against the end of the table, near Ahndee's empty seat. Master Ahlee had carefully closed the doors and now loitered close to them.

Bili let his gaze travel down the two rows of faces. Nearest him on either side of the board sat Komees Hari and Feelos Pooleeos, the merchant, and the faces of both men looked deeply troubled. Beyond Hari lounged Vahrohnos Myros, a mocking smile on his fleshy lips, but pure, distilled hatred beaming from the glittering black eyes which briefly locked with Bill's. Beyond him sat Drehkos, who gave Bili a nervous, uncertain smile; and Vahrohneeskos Stehfahnos, slender but supple looking, who stared back levelly and coolly, from eyes as blue as Bill's, despite the Ehleen's black hair.

Across from Ahndee's empty place sat Kooreeos Skiros, apparently oblivious to the highly charged atmosphere. He was talking softly with the wizened, beaknosed little man on his right, Nathos Evrehos, the goldsmith-moneylender. Lastly, Bili gave a hard stare to Paulos, Guildmaster of the duchy's blacksmiths, and bastard half brother of the dying Thoheeks. The insolent, hateful glare that he got in return set the blood to pounding in his temples. Some of his anger must have been visible, for Komees Djeen hastily laid a hand on Bill's armguard, then hastened to speak before Bili might.

"Why," he demanded in clipped tones, "have our well-paid Freefighters been replaced with piketoting amateurs, Myros? I'm certain sure it's your idea. Sun and Wind, man, you come up with more harebrained schemes than a full troop of village idiots could concoct! Since we're paying good gold to professional swords, why deprive the fields and streets of ploughboys and dungscoopers?"

Myros grinned. "There are less than twoscore mercenaries left, and they remain only because some fool hired them to a contract of twenty-six, rather than twenty-four moons. As fast as the barbarians' contracts expired, I have let them go. Almost all the city guards are now men who bear their arms for their homes and their lands." The Vahrohnos's grin had metamorphosed into a twisted grimace. His features were empurpling with his passion and his eyes gleamed the feral fire of fanaticism. "Not for mere gold do these men bear arms, but for their Faith and their long lost heritage!"

To Bili, it seemed obvious that his mothers had erred in their judgment of Myros's case, for the rebellious dog appeared to believe every word churned out by his sewer-mouth.

Count Djeen crashed his gauntleted fist against the tabletop, grating, "That cuts it, you boyloving dungwallower! Such abuse of your authority cannot be tolerated! You are hereby relieved as governor of this city. Depart this chamber and await Council's censure."

Myros's laugh was cold and sharp as midwinter icicles.

  Lounging back in his chair, he exchanged a knowing glance with Kooreeos Skiros, whose teeth flashed through his thick black beard. Then the Vahrohnos stared insolently into the Komees's one blue eye, drawling, "I think not, you old fool, I think not."

The elderly nobleman snapped to the nearest pikeman, "Guard, escort the Vahrohnos Myros from this chamber!"

The levyman only sneered. The Kooreeos's smile broadened, Guildmaster Paulos smirked, and the gold-smith snickered, echoed by the three interlopers on the bench.

"He has stopped taking orders from your ilk, you heathen squatter," said Paulos, through his smirk. "We all have. This city of Eeleeoheepolis is back in the hands of its rightful owners and soon all the duchy will be!"

'This city," answered Bili, in a hard voice, "is called Morguhnpolis and is the property of Clan Morguhn, as is the Duchy. That is the established order of things. But the borders of this my Duchy are not closed, as well you know, smith! Any free man who likes not my overlord-ship has my leave to quit these lands!"

Paulos stood and leaned down the table toward Bili. "Keep barking, you arrogant young puppy, sitting in the chair which should be mine! I, Paulos Morguhn, am rightful owner of Morguhn Hall, and you are all usurpers of my properties and titles and ..."

Both Myros and the Kooreeos snapped, "Enough, Paulos!"

But there was no stopping the raving man. White patches of froth had formed at the corners of his mouth, his face was working, and his eyes were become wide and wild. ". . . when I am in my own, you'll whine and whimper, not bark! I'll have your nuts out, damn you, I'll have the nuts of all of you what was sired by that boar-hog, Hwahruhn! And I'll sell your brothers for poosteesee, and I'll keep you to be my own loveboy, after I get tired of plowing the butterhaired bitches what whelped you! And I'll. . ."

Bili and Hail were a fraction of a second too late in at-tempting to restrain Djehf. The weight of his armor not-withstanding, he leapt onto the table. In the twinkling of an eye, he was down its length and the steelshod toe of his hardswung boot had smashed Paulos's mouth to a pulpy red ruin! The Guildmaster's chunky body went back into his chair with such force that the wood cracked, splintered, collapsed, and dumped him on the floor. He lay halfconscious, moaning and making gurgling noises.

Myros jumped to his feet, drawing his sword. Waving it at Djehf, he shouted at the pikemen, "Kill the heathen!"

As the first levyman to obey stepped abreast of Master Ahlee, he abruptly voiced a keening wail and let go his pike to clutch at his left side. Ahlee pushed his victim away and, half turning, threw the bloody dagger at an-other pikeman. All six inches of wavy blade disappeared into that man's belly, just below his breastplate. His scream sounded unearthly.

Myros, too, screamed, at the top of his lungs. "GUARDS! GUARDS! TO ME!"

A multitude of feet pounded along the side corridors, but Ahlee snatched up the pike at his feet and ran the thick ash shaft through the gilded-bronze door rings. He turned back and drew his silver-hilted yataghan barely in time to counter the vicious downswing of Myros's saber. But a twist of the brown wrist all but spun the weapon from Myros's grasp and Ahlee's lightening-fast riposte would have hamstrung the Vahrohnos, had he not hastily hopped backward. And speedily as the Ehleen moved, his opponent's blade still managed to slice into the upper cuff of his boot, bringing blood from the flesh it covered.

Knifing the first pikeman, Bili had kicked over his chair, grasped his naked broadsword, and bounded over to cut down the closest levyman. The last pikeman did manage to reach the table, but as he made shift to jab at young Djehf, the straps of his breastplate were grabbed by Komees Hari, who jerked him backward while running the full length of his dress dirk between the short ribs. Freeing his blade with a cruel twist, he snatched up the falling pike and backed to stand beside Spiros Morguhn.

The merchant, Feelos Pooleeos, hastily armed himself with the pike, sword, and helm of Bili's victim and took his place with the Kindred nobles.

Although Myros had always been accounted one of the best swordsmen of the duchy, he found himself fighting for his very life! Since his initial downswing, he had been constantly on the defensive, never having the opportunity to attack, all his skill and strength directed to keep the flickering, steel blur which was his adversary's cursive blade out of his flesh. Nor had his best efforts been entirely successful, for he showed blood in three places and was being driven back across the room.

"Stehfahnos!" he finally panted. "Help me!"

But Stehfahnos' sword stayed in its scabbard and Stehfahnos himself was dead on the marble floor. The youngest Morguhn left the tabletop to engage the butcher and the fop, who were trying to unbar the doors.

Cursing, the fop left the butcher to tug at the tightly wedged pikeshaft alone. Drawing a slender, ornate thrustingsword, he extended his arm to jab at the armored man's unprotected face. Djehf's powerful upswing shattered the fop's brittle weapon and his downstroke severed the swordarm, just above the wrist. The fop fell to his knees, staring in horrified fascination at his hand lying before him on the floor, slowly releasing its grip on the hilt of the broken sword.

Djehf stalked purposefully toward the butcher. Unarmed, that man backed along the wall, his hands held before him. His fear-filled eyes locked on that broad, bloody blade.

Kooreeos Skiros stood at the table, alternately calling for the guards and vainly shouting a command for all combat to cease. Klairuhnz stood close by the cleric, watching his every move. All at once, he leaned close and spoke a few words. Bili failed to hear the Bard's words, for they came at the same time as the butcher's death cries, and also because someone in the corridor had collected his wits and brought up something to use as a ram. The doors were groaning and the two-inch pikeshaft beginning to crack.

Whatever was said, it clearly startled the Kooreeos. His bushy black eyebrows shot up and his right hand dived under his robes, to reemerge holding what Bili assumed was a throwing club-a thick, L-shaped piece of greyish metal. Grasping one arm of it, he pointed the other at Klairuhnz's middle.

But Klairuhnz clamped both hands around the club and twisted it out of the Kooreeos's hands, then slammed the side of it against its owner's temple. Skiros's boneless collapse set the subpriest to shrieking in harmony with the moneylender, who shared his haven under the table.

Shoulderblades pressed to the wall, Myros could retreat no further. He had not again been blooded, but his right arm, from shoulder to fingertips, was a tingling, fiery agony, bespeaking the force of the blows his blade had turned. He knew that he could not turn another, so he opened his trembling hand and the saber clattered to the floor.

"Mercy, please, mercy," he gasped. "Spare my life, sir, I... I beg you."

Hardly had the words left his lips, when the much-abused pikeshaft finally snapped and the doors burst open before a wave of pikemen. Behind them were ranged a half-dozen archers with arrows nocked; behind the archers were two Ehleenoee officers, another subpriest, and Djaimos the carter, who had arrived too late to "partici-pate" in this Council meeting.

"Heathen barbarians," shouted the subpriest. "Surrender!"

"Yes, surrender!" echoed one of the officers. "Surrender or we'll slay you all!"

Fast as a snake, Ahlee dropped his yataghan, jerked Myros close, and gave him a good look of the wavy blade of his second dagger, before poising it at the Vahrohnos's throat.

"Cowardly dog," he hissed. "As you see, this blade is envenomed. If but a single bow is drawn or one spearman advances, I shall inflict the tiniest of cuts in your flesh, following which you will die slowly and in unimaginable agony. Now, speak to your hounds!"

Drehkos flatly refused to accompany them, answering his brother's entreaties with words which staggered the master of Horse Hall. So they left him in the gory Council Chamber, along with the dead and the wounded, the disarmed soldiers and officers, the two subpriests and the moneylender, who had swooned of fright. Myros and the unconscious Kooreeos they took with them.

The heavy manacles, brought by one of the officers, had been intended to chain such of them as were taken alive. Now they were adapted to secure the battered doors. The Council Chamber had no windows, the visitors' bench was bolted to the floor, and the table could not have been lifted by twice the number of Ehleens present. Consequently, the Kindred hoped to be out of the city ere the prisoners could break out and spread the alarm.

The stairs seemed endless, but the little party finally reached the foot and hurried, almost at a jogtrot, through the huge, dim expanse of the main chamber. When they were nearly at the gaping entrance, they spied armored men beyond it, between them and safety. Coming to a halt, they drew their steel and formed a wedge, with Klairuhnz, Ahlee, and the two hostages at its core. Resolutely, they paced forward, out into the sunlight.

But the knot of men on the broad verandah were scaleshirted Freefighters, not levymen. A thick-limbed, broken-nosed man of middle years stepped out and approached them. His open hands held well away from his swordbelt, he respectfully addressed Komees Djeen.

"Lord Strahteegos, we gave our Sword-Oaths to you. Please release us of them, sir. Only two-and-thirty of us Freefighters remain in Morguhnpolis and . . . and, sir, the city has . . . has changed. We fear for our very lives. If . . . it you will release us, well . . . well just forget the back pay."

Bili had instantly recognized in the man's speech the slightly nasal accent of one who had grown up speaking the Harzburk dialect and he now bespoke him in that tongue, saying, "Two-and-thirty, you say? I see but a score of you."

"This one speaks for all, My Lord." The grizzled man answered, with a shy smile, in his native speech. "Twelve of ours are on guard at the east gate. Your .. . your par-don, My Lord, but ... you serve King Gilbuht?" He had, of course, recognized the distinctive style of Bili's armor.

Komees Djeen answered, "He did, soldier, but no more. This is Bili, the new Thoheeks and Chief of Morguhn, your employer."

"How are you called, Freefighter?" snapped Bill "And have you mounts?"

"Aye. My Lord, most of us have either a horse or a mule, though some had to be sold to keep us fed and housed and clothed, when Baron Myros there refused us our pay," replied the speaker, adding humbly, "This one is called Pawl, sir, Pawl Raikuh. Will.. . please, will My Lord absolve us of our Swordoaths?"

Bili shook his head. "Certainly not. I have need of your swords, though not as city guards. You and your men will ride with me, Captain Raikuh."

"With a right good will, My Lord, sir." Raikuh's head bobbed assent. "But, My Lord, this one is not a captain, only a common Freefighter."

"Not if you speak for over thirty men, you're not," said Bili curtly. Then he raised his voice, addressing the group of bravos. "What say you, Freefighters? You chose him to speak for you. Would you have him to command you, if he can assure you continued employment and," he added shrewdly, "your back pay?"

Almost as one, the men smiled and nodded. A much scarred little man stepped forward. "My Lord, Pawl, be noble born, and ain't none but respects him. He'll be a good captain, he will."

"Who is the man who speaks, Captain?" Bili demanded.

The new-made officer did not need to look. "Stanlee Krahndahl, My Lord, a Klahkzburker."

"Will he make a decent lieutenant for your condotta, Captain?"

"Indeed yes, Duke Bili!"

"So be it, then." Bili strode off toward the horses, adding, "Get your men in the saddle, all of them. And bring along spare horses for your men at the gate, plus a few more. I care not where or how you obtain them, Captain, just get them. After all, I own everything in this city, if I choose to lay claim to it!"

"Sacred Sun!" swore Spiros, in a hushed, awed aside to Djeen as they mounted. "Young, he may be, but by Wind our Bili is a Thoheeks to reckon with! He's the kind of chief we've needed . . . well, since the death of his grandfather, anyway. Did you see the way that that Raikuh looked at him, when he bade him commandeer horses? I think that man'd willingly die for Bill, and he'd never seen or heard of him two minutes ago!"

The old man nodded, showing every tooth in an opposum grin. "Aye, Spiros, Bili has it all-brains, guts, weapons skill, and a rare ability to handle men, to command loyalty and respect. He'll be a good chief right enough, but wasted in that capacity all the same. What an officer he'd make for the Confederation!"

While the two troopers were getting the bound and unconscious bulk of the Kooreeos lashed behind his saddle, Klairuhnz listened in on Djeen's comments and found himself in heartfelt agreement.

Myros, tied facedown behind Komees Djeen's saddle, had recovered his breath as well as his supercilious manner. "Listen to me, Komees Djeen. Despite the crimes to which you were a party upstairs, if you and the others will surrender to me now, I give you my word that you'll have an impartial hearing and a quick, painless death."

Djeen snorted scornfully. "Your word, Myros? Your word pledged your loyalty to Bili and his father, when you were confirmed to your title and lands. Today has proven your precious word to not be worth a scant measure of turkey dung!"

"The House of Morguhn," snarled Myros, "is and has always been usurping squatters, old man! My ancestors held this land when yours were scratching fleas on the Sea of Grass! The very first King of Karaleenos ..."

"The very last King of Karaleenos," the one-eyed Komees coldly interrupted, "is generations dead! You are a rebel, a traitor, a liar, a murderer, and, I doubt me not, much more and worse besides. In the Middle Kingdoms, such a one as you would be slowly whipped to death or impaled. When your mind runs to quick, painless deaths, you had best pray your obscene god for one. For do not forget, you forsworn pig, Bill's upbringing was in the Middle Kingdoms!"

"Ha!" exclaimed Myros. "Dream on, dream on. You barbarians will never leave my city alive! You . . . gaaaagh!"

He broke off in a strangled scream, as the Komees sunk the needle point of his hook deep into the prisoner's thigh. As he jerked out the brass hook, he grimly admonished, "Another word out of you, overassumptive degenerate, and I'll jam my hook up your arse, and don't think I won't!"

But it began to appear that Myros might have been correct, for a growing rabble of Morguhnpolisee were beginning to mill about the foot of the formal garden which fronted the city palace. Few were armed at all and most of those ill armed, though more than a few pikepoints glittered above them. However, there were already several hundred there being harangued by priests, and the side streets and alleys were debouching more.

Slapping down his half visor, Bili uncased his axe, wishing for the umpteenth time that it was reliable Mahvros he bestrode, rather than this green, less than intelligent gelding. The others ranged out on his flanks, most now bearing one of the twelve-foot pikes, as well as the swords and light axes they had brought into the city.

Djehf hefted the heavy shaft, eyeing the wicked, two-foot blade. "I've never before used one of these for a lance, Lord Brother, and it's not really weighted properly for that purpose, but," he chuckled, "I trow I'll spit me a few fat Ehleenoee ganders on it!"

Bili nodded shortly. "Aye, we must make do with the weapons to hand. Be sure that you ride well clear of me, youngster. I'd hate to axe you in error."

Djehf laughed merrily. "Never you fear, Lord Brother, I've ridden the battle line with axemen, ere this. Besides, I've an odd aversion to being axed-in error or other-wise."

Toeing his gelding forward of the line, Bili reined him about and visually inspected his minuscule force. Klairuhnz, having had second thoughts, had transferred Kooreeos Skiros's limp body to the withers, where he could more easily keep an eye on him. As Bili watched, the Bard drew the saber that had served so well at the bridge fight and the sunlight flashed along its polished blade. Master Ahlee, like Djehf, bore a pike, as did all the others save for Komees Djeen. His troopers had helped him replace his hook with another, larger one with a cleaverlike blade welded to its flat side, while his one hand held his military broadsword. Most of the baggage had been unceremoniously dumped, that Feelos Pooleeos -wearing a too small cuirass and an infantry helm- might be mounted on the sumpter mule.

The Thoheeks's oldest son addressed them soberly. "We must strive to remain together, but any man who is separated must fight free as best he can. Against so many, all must depend upon shock and speed. If we halt for any reason, we are lost. We..."

But Komees Djeen interrupted him, pointing with his sword at something behind the young leader. "Bili . . . look you yonder."

Struck as much by the old nobleman's paling face as by the tightness of his voice, Bili reined around to gaze in the direction indicated. A knot of armored horsemen had crested the next slope of the hilly city and were extending lines to completely block the street behind the mob. Nothing about their appearance was clear; they were just black figures against the blaze of the morning sun; but there seemed a goodly number of them, at least three times the number of Bill's party.

"Well," the young axeman remarked to no one in particular, "I suppose this is as good a place to die as any."

Chapter X

When first Lord Myros had appointed him Warder of the East, Hahrteeos Kahrahmahnlees had had carpenters and stonemasons make certain alterations in the two rooms which were the second and third levels of the gate tower, where he would have to spend so much time. Then he had brought from his family mansion the furniture and appointments to allow him to, in his words, "live as an Ehleen gentleman should." The sparsely furnished, dimly lit, stonewalled chambers above and below his rooms he deemed fit only for his gaunt, ragged barbarian mercenaries.

The moment the heathen devils had clattered in through his gate, he had dispatched his Ehleen sergeant, Toorkos, to Lord Myros, alerting the Vahrohnos of the imminent arrival of his victims-to-be at the city palace. Shortly thereafter, he had carefully locked his second-level sitting room-office-well aware that the long-unpaid mercenaries were not above theft of small valuables, as he had had the pleasure of watching two of them beheaded for that very offense on a recent occasion-then repaired to his luxurious bedroom on the third level, having in mind an hour's diversion with Peeos, his well-trained catamite.

Despite the Undying High Lord's abolishment of the institution of slavery nearly a hundred years before, some Ehleenoee still risked the ruinous fines and held one or two. Lord Drehkos was one such and Lord Myros owned an even dozen. Therefore, one of Hahrteeos's first actions after the death of his father was to journey to the port city of Sahrahspolis and buy this boy from a ship captain with whom Myros had done much business over the years.

Naturally, the bootlegger did not say where or how he had come by the lad, but it was certain that the twelve- or thirteen-year-old had seen his birth in none of the Ehleen lands, for his skin was darker even than the skins of the folk of the Black Kingdoms, and his speech, to his new master, was a totally incomprehensible babble. Hahrteeos had brought his acquisition back to Morguhnpolis and had had his servants teach it at least a smattering of Ehleeneekos. It had been Hahrteeos's personal pleasure to teach the slaveboy other things, breaking his will to resist by denial of food and application of pain.

But it seemed he had scarcely commenced his enjoyments in the tower bedchamber when several pairs of heavy feet clumped up the stairs beyond the door, then stamped thunderously about the guardroom above, their owners all the while chattering in the decidedly unlovely barbarian languages, of which Hahrteeos took pride in knowing not a word. Next, feet descended the stairs to the second level and a pounding on the door of his office ensued. Then one set of the feet reascended to the third level and knuckles rapped boomingly on his bedchamber portal.

Furious at this unwonted and unwanted invasion on his privacy, Hahrteeos pulled a tunic over his nakedness and threw open the door.

"Well?" he angrily demanded of the mercenary who had knocked. "What is it, you barbarian ape?"

It was Pawl Raikuh who stood before him, though this fact was unknown to Hahrteeos, who had not bothered to learn the names of any of "his" troops, other than Toorkos who was, after all, an Ehleen.

After saluting, the mercenary humbly requested permission to exchange some of the off-duty men for those presently on gate watch. Hahrteeos snorted his leave and, promising dire doom to the next man who saw fit to disturb him, slammed the door.

But less than a quarter hour later, another pair of feet sped up the steps. This time it sounded as if someone were attempting to split the door with a battleaxe! Hahrteeos was in a towering rage when he opened the door.

But this caller was not a mercenary. He was, rather, Stavros Klahreedees, Warder of the South and Hahrteeos's military, if not exactly social, equal, so there was nothing to do but invite him in and proffer wine. While the Warder of the East was filling his associate's goblet, more sets of big feet stomped up and past his door, but he ignored them.

The short, skinny, pockfaced visitor removed his gilded helm and laid it on a marbletopped table before he accepted, tasted, and savored a goblet of the wine. "Ahhh," he sighed. "You certainly know how to live, my dear. Would that I could afford such a home away from home, such civilized delights, such fine wines . .."

"You will," Hahrteeos assured him, smilingly. "You will yet, once we've cleared the heathen from these lands of ours. Why, Lord Myros says .. ."

"Your pardon, please, love." The caller, with a wrinkling of his brows, set down his silver goblet. "Your pardon, but that brings me to my reason for being here. I received word, a few minutes agone, that the Lord Drehkos has commanded all gates closed immediately. That farce at the palace is done. The pigs got away from the guards by seizing and holding the Holy Skiros and Lord Myros and they must not be allowed to escape the city.

"Would you like for me to issue the necessary orders?" he asked considerately. "After all, darling, you are hardly garbed for a stroll on the walls."

Hahrteeos smiled. "How thoughtful, dear Stavros. I appreciate such kindness."

Setting his helm back on his head, Stavros turned to open the door. Taking the pullring in hand, he pulled, but the door failed to budge. Several more pulls and the addition of his other hand produced no better results. Then his bigger, heftier host took his place, but the stubborn portal failed to yield to him either.

Stavros stamped his small foot in exasperation. "What's wrong with the cursed thing? We've got to do something, you know. Those pet pigs you command are stupid enough to let the butterhaired heathens ride out of our city without a by-your-leave!"

"Patience, patience." Hahrteeos patted his guest on the shoulder. "With all of the damp weather we've had, the door or the frame has probably just developed a warp, that's all. Not that I'll not have a few larcenous carpenters well striped for it. But there is another way to reach the guardroom. Here, I'll need your help."

Between them, the two warders managed to get an old, heavy wooden ladder from behind the wall hanging which had concealed it; then wrestled it across to the center of the room, raised it, and wedged the upper tips of its up-rights into ceiling grooves provided for the purpose.

Hahrteeos stepped back, breathing heavily. "These ladder and trapdoor arrangements are how they got from one level to another in the ancient days, before the outside stairway was built. See those two round holes up there? Put your fingers in them and slide the panel to the right and you'll be in the middle of the guardroom."

The boy Peeos had pulled a satin sheet over his nakedness when the caller had been admitted, turning his face to the wall and lying absolutely motionless. His master's temper was hair-triggered and terrifyingly unpredictable. The tiniest word or gesture could draw down his wrath and savage cruelties. Peeos wanted no more scars, so he took no chances. But the sounds of the raising of the ladder piqued his curiosity. He slyly turned his head and watched from beneath lowered lids.

Stavros mounted the ladder until he could reach the fingerholes and followed Hahrteeos's instructions. The long-unused panel was difficult at first, but he finally managed to get it out of the way. Then he climbed a couple of more rungs and his head, arms, and shoulders were in the guardroom.

Peeos and Hahrteeos heard him give his order; next he shouted something, then started a scream which suddenly ended in an odd gurgle. His legs commenced kicking and his arms came back into view, twitching strangely; it appeared that he was suspended by his head alone. It was so for but a brief moment, then legs and arms and body crashed down onto Hahrteeos's fine carpet, soaking it with fantastic quantities of blood.

Shrieking mindlessly, Hahrteeos dashed to the door and frantically ripped at it, heedless of the ruination of his soft hands and carefully tended nails. But the door remained closed and the Warder of the East backed into the corner, as far as he could get from that bloody, still-twitching horror at the foot of the ladder.

Pawl Raikuh came down that ladder agilely, his gory sword in hand, followed by three of his men, all four of them generously splashed with fresh blood. At his shout, the "jammed" door swung open easily and several more Freefighters trooped in. When they had drained the last of the wine from the silver ewer, they began a hot argument over to whom it now belonged, but Pawl ended it.

"Henree, bundle the ewer and the goblets into that fancy cloak yonder. Plunder will be property of all the condotta. And get the rings and armlets and all else of value off this dead pig. But don't kill that one behind the door. If I think aright, there's one here has more claim on his worthless life than do any of us."

Peeos did not fear death; indeed, only the strictest supervision by Hahrteeos and his servants had prevented the boy from taking his own life, after he came to realize for just what uses his master had purchased him. So as the huge, hard-looking soldier approached, Peeos bared his bony chest, pointed first at the naked sword, then at the area above his heart.

Captain Raikuh smiled and shook his head. "I don't mean to slay you, lad. Do you want your freedom?"

Peeos stared at the figure looming over him and shook his blue black head with its covering of tight ebon curls.

Raikuh had spoken in Mereekuhn, or the Confederation dialect of that ancient tongue; now he repeated himself in Ehleeneekos.

Hesitantly, his lips painfully shaping the words, Peeos spoke. "Free-dom? Mean when ... no, what? Mean What, Lord Master? Peeos not under . . . not... ?"

Pawl whirled and strode purposefully over to the corner that held the trembling, pasty-faced Hahrteeos. Grabbing a handful of the Ehleen's perfumed hair, he dragged him to the center of the room and demanded, "What language does yonder lad speak, you sad excuse for a man?"

Hahrteeos moved his well-chewed lips, but no sounds issued from them. Pawl tried raising his sword threateningly, but his captive's only reactions were to start screaming again and to explosively befoul himself. Pawl dropped the Warder of the East disgustedly and paced back over to the bed. One after another, he tried the many languages and dialects he had learned in his nearly thirty years of Freefighting. Tune was very short, and he was getting desperate, when he asked his question in Kweebehkyuhn. He nearly dropped his sword when the black-skinned boy answered him, not in that far-northern tongue, but in one which sounded much like it.

Over his shoulder, Pawl called urgently, "Frahnswah? Where is Frahnswah?"

"Here. Pawl... uh, Captain, I mean."

The situation was quickly explained and, in his own native tongue, Frahnswah stated, "We are leaving this city, little man. If you would leave with us and be free of your master and his vice contre natur, speak now."

But once the boy was clad, it was discovered that none of the spare jazerans were small enough to fit him.

Pawl declared, "There's like to be some hard fighting, an' our new lord is what he seems. The lad will be dead meat, and quickly, if ... wait, that pig we had the head from, his is a damned small body. Let's have off his cuirass and see if that won't fit our new comrade here."

The gilded corselet proved only a little too big, while the greaved boots and the flashy helm fitted perfectly. A few more holes were punched in the swordbelt and it was buckled around the boy's waist. Pawl found the late Stavros's swordblade to be inferior and its hilt nought but gilded copper. He threw it in a corner, saying to one of his men, "Buhk, you, Henree, and Frehd take our dear commander's keys and see what's worth taking from his office, and one of you be sure to bring his small target and his shortsword for the lad."

Lastly, the Captain drew Stavros's dirk and tested its edge and point on a callused thumb, then handed it back to its new owner, commenting to his departing men, "You can at least trust these damned Ehleenee for that. Their swords may be all glitter and show, but then: backstabbers will be fine steel every time!"

Hahrteeos had been lashed, hand and foot, to the sturdy uprights of the ladder, and Pawl led the armored boy over to the blubbering captive. With Frahnswah translating his words, he said, "Son, we all know of the odious bondage in which this degenerate has held you. If any man owns the right to exact the suffering and death of Lord Hahrteeos, it is you. Your dirk there is a good weapon. Use it on him in any way you wish, but whatever you do do it quickly, for we all now have horses and our new lord awaits us."

Bili shook his head sadly. They might have had a slim chance to hack through the ill-armed mob, but an uphill charge against so many mounted warriors could have but the one certain outcome.

Then, above the tumult of the rabble, came first the clatter of galloping hooves, then a swelling roar of deep voices bellowing the traditional battlecry of Freefighters:

"BLOODBLOODBLOODBLOODr It changed, as the charging horsemen neared the rear of the mob, to "MORGUHN! DUKE BILI! MORGUHNl MORGUHN!"

In a tight column of fours, Pawl Raikuh's veterans struck with the irresistible force of a tidal wave! The mob gave way before those flashing sabers, surging up into the lower reaches of the formal gardens, where they were met by the furious charge of Bili and the gentry. At that juncture, the mob ceased to be, dissolving into a broil of panic-stricken men and women, running, scuttling, clawing at whomever blocked their way, scurrying up sidestreets and narrow alleys, the Ehleenoee officers and priests in the van!

Komees Djeen cursed all the way back to Morguhn Hall. For in the hoorah of the charge his prisoner had either fallen or been dragged from off his horse, and they had been able to find neither hide nor hair of the traitorous Vahrohnos. Kooreeos Skiros was still captive however. He had regained consciousness  and was loudly damning each and every one of them, promising dire and despicable deaths and afterlives of unspeakable torment if he was not immediately set free and returned to the city. When the subbishop's outbursts lost their amusement value, a couple of Raikuh's men helped Klairuhnz to gag his prisoner with a bloodcaked bandage rag and an old bowstring. Then they lashed him into the saddle of a spare horse, face to tail!

Poor Hari rode slumped in his saddle, world-heavy with his sorrows and suddenly appearing older than even Djeen. It was not so much that his wife was now definitely known to be an important member of the rebellion conspiracy, for she had always despised anything which smacked of the Kindred and hated her husband for his Horseclans blood and ways. Nor was it the defection of his younger brother, for Drehkos had ever been unpredictable in his behavior and a frequent champion of questionable people and causes. That his three unmarried daughters were probably in the thing as well was of no real importance, for since they had ceased to be children, they had been but relative strangers who happened to share his hall, board, and name.

All of these smaller sorrows of course added their own less significant weights to the burden on Hari's laden soul, but what truly crushed the very marrow of his spirit were the last words he had had of Drehkos, ere they had left him locked in the Council Chamber with his comrades.

"It's possible that our cause will be defeated, brother mine. But if indeed it is, you'll have to follow your heathenish custom of succession and pass Horse Hall on to your eldest daughter's son. Even if I die, at least I'll have seen to it that your by-blow never profanes our fa-ther's place. That's right, dear loving brother, I ordered the execution of your precious Vaskos to be performed the moment we were out of sight of the hall!"

Each of them accompanied by a brace of Raikuh's men, Spiros and Hail had cut off crosscountry to alert Kindred families in the villages and smaller halls and to get them armed and headed toward Morguhn Hall. The rest rode the road in a tight military formation, preceded by vanguards and trailed by a strong rearguard, the flanks scouted by ranging outriders. But the return trip proved uneventful. Though they rode an important thoroughfare, bathed in the sunlight of a perfect spring day, they spied not another human, either on the road or in the fields. And that in itself was significant... and ominous.

As Bili and the vanguard cleared the entry tunnel and rode into the outer courtyard, every sword within sight was raised in formal salute, such a salute as was rendered only to a highranking nobleman. He did not need to be told that his father had died during his absence and that, barring only the formality of Council approval, he was Thoheeks and Chief, in fact.

Old Sami hastened to hold his new master's stirrup, then bowed low, saying, "He went to Wind at the highest blaze of Sacred Sun, My Lord. The bards say that that is a most blessed tune, if a chief cannot go to Wind in battle. We have clothed his husk appropriately and laid him in the great chamber, where your Lady Mothers bide with him. Shall I now conduct you there, Chief Bili?"

Bili shook his head curtly. "Later, Kinsman, I've much to do. For now, I want a fresh horse, one that can mind-speak better than this one. Komees Hari and Kinsman Feelos Pooleeos will be guesting with us. Also, as you can see, I've brought more Freefighters. There are two officers and twenty-seven men. Their commander is Captain Pawl Raikuh, a Harzburker and a gentleman. Lodge him in the Hall.

"Bard Klairuhnz has an important prisoner. Best let him be the judge of proper confinement. I'll want six of our own Freefighters who know the country roundabouts to ride with me on an immediate scout. See first to that and to having my gear transferred to the fresh horse. And have someone fetch me a big beaker of cool wine and a bucket of water. I'm all dust, inside and out."

Turning, he called over his brother. "Djehf, our father is gone to Wind; he lies in the great chamber. I think that I should scout the villages and the general vicinity before dark. You will be Chief until I return, but let Komees Djeen and Sami handle defense preparations. Sami knows this place from top to bottom and Komees Djeen has both besieged and been besieged, so he knows what to prepare for and against

"See to the preparation of the pyre in the rear courtyard. It's just too crowded out here. For now, go in and render our respects to our mothers."

When answering Bill's summons, Djeen found himself saluting! Though less than a third his years, this boy was suddenly radiating authority, and it just seemed natural to accept that authority. "Your orders, My Lord?"

Bili acknowledged the salute, saying, "Lord Komees, shortly I will be taking a half-dozen troopers on a patrol of the surrounding area. My brother will be Chief in my absence. However, as I have just informed him, you and Kinsman Sami will share exclusive command of the troops, the Hall, and preparations for its defense, as well as arrangements for such Kindred as come here for refuge."

"It might be well that you closet with Bard Klairuhnz for as long a time as he needs to take the 'Lament of Clan Morguhn' from your memory. We will give Chief Hwahruhn's smoke to Wind at the return of Sun, tomorrow; and if Clan Bard Hail is not back by that time, Bard Klairuhnz's services will be needed.

"Also, please have wagons and teams and guards for them ready. Choose the guards from among Captain Raikuh's men; they appear to be experienced looters. If there are no hostile forces in the hall village, Til send back a messenger, and the wagons and men can come down and strip it of anything we can use."

At the time of the conquest of Northern Karaleenos by the Confederation, all land had belonged either to the king or the great nobles, who had resided only in the cities. Those who had lived on and worked the land had been accounted as much a part of it as the animals and crops; nor had their lives and well-being been considered of much importance by their owners, save as a source of revenue. Even then, over a hundred years agone, had they been a people of mixed antecedents-part Ehleen, part indigenous native.

With the settlements of the Horseclansmen, the old order had been drastically changed. The Kindred had been nomadic herdsmen for hundreds of years, and though in Karaleenos then- felt-and-leather lodges were become stone halls, farming was to them an alien and despised oc-cupation. They remained herdsmen, breeders of horses, cattle, goats, and sheep, taking what lands they needed for pasturage or for the sites of their halls. What was left was freely given to those who wished to farm as their own property, to use or dispose of as they should desire.

What few of the Ehleen nobility as were left slavishly copied this practice-indeed, copied any practice, no mat-ter how barbaric in their own eyes, that would allow them to retain the remainder of their much reduced lands and stations. Things were more or less chaotic for a decade or two, until the former land slaves became adapted to the new order and their unaccustomed role of landowners, responsible only to themselves.

So had it been for over a hundred years. And as generations of the younger sons of Kindred Houses had wed the daughters of merchants, tradesmen, and farmers, while their titled brethren were blending their own blood and genes with scionesses of the houses of the surviving Ehleenoee nobility, there became less and ever less distinction between Kindred herder and Ehleenoe farmer stocks.

To Komees Djeen and most of the other so-called Kindred Nobles, it seemed incomprehensible-and smacked strongly of sorcery-that so large a proportion of the nonnoble classes should be involved in what had become an open revolt supposedly directed against the Kindred, for many of these very rebels had fully as much or even more Kindred blood than did the bulk of the nobles!

One did not, of course, have to sympathize with Vahrohnos Myros of Kehnooryos Deskati to understand at least some of the reasoning which underlay his treason. Before the defeat of Karaleenos and its forced merger with the Confederation, his ancestors had been overlords of three cities and three-quarters of the lands which now made up the Duchy of Morguhn, as well as parts of the neighboring Duchy of Vawn. This was not the first revolt spawned by the broodings of Ehleenoee minor nobility on past grandeurs, but it was the first in this part of Karaleenos in nearly a hundred years, as well as but the second in all of the Confederation to have such wide backing of the common sorts.

While the House of Deskatios had produced many highly intelligent men of rare talents and value to the Duchy and Confederation, it had also produced more than its share of scions who had been considered at least "odd" by their contemporaries. Indeed, Myros himself had once been a brilliant and promising officer in the Army of the Confederation until after over ten years of exemplary service, he had been suddenly relieved of his command, stripped of his military rank, and forbidden ever again to display his Fourth Class Silver Cat.

No one in all the Duchy ever admitted to knowing the truth in the matter, but there were rumors . . . one of them that had he not already succeeded to and been confirmed in his title, his neck would surely have made the short, sharp acquaintance of an Army executioner's sword, so grave had been his offense.

So Myros had scant reason to love the Confederation and at least some reason to envy the Thoheeks of Morguhn and Strahteegos Komees Djeen and even Substrahteegos-to-be Vaskos Daiviz, since all three held titles of which he felt himself to have been cheated. A return to the ancient order would therefore place him squarely in the very lap of his dreams.

But for the humbler sorts, a return to the ancient order-the bad old days-would be a return to the status of dumb, enslaved beast of burden. So none of the noble Kindred could fathom any gain these common folk might hope to secure in turning on their present rulers.

Chapter XI

The village of Hohryos Morguhn-service and garden village of Morguhn Hall-lay not quite two Ehleen kaiee from the Hall. Beyond it, a few hours by horse and half a day by wagon, lay the city of Kehnooryos Deskati, squarely athwart the north-south Traderoad and consequently the main commercial center of the Duchy.

The village was deserted, as Bili had felt it would be. But the evacuation had been very recent, for the blacksmith's forgefire still was very hot and a scytheblade, which had snapped while being straightened, was yet warm to the touch. All wagons and carts, all mules and oxen were missing, along with their owners, which meant that the villagers must have gone by road, and since the patrol had encountered not a single person on their ride down from the Hall, the people must have fled to Kehnooryos Deskati.

The young Thoheeks sent one of the troopers galloping back to the Hall to fetch the wagons and guards. It was a safe bet, considering the amount of loot they had appropriated along with the horses, that most of Pawl Raikuh's men were old hands at pillaging and could go through the outbuildings and the village's twenty-odd homes like the proverbial dose of salts.

By the roadside, just beyond the village, they found a savagely mutilated corpse. From its general build and masculature, they assumed it to be a man's body. There was no remaining way to tell the sex, much less the identity of the hacked, charred, incomplete carcass. Bili could only hope that the poor creature had been dead before the dreadful mutilations had been done.

Leaving the grisly discovery where it lay, Bili led his five troopers in a wide crosscountry sweep to the south and west. At the crest of the first hill, they spied a mounted party laboring up its south slope-half a dozen appeared to be women and twice that number well-armed men. As the party neared Bill's concealed position, he recognized the leader and trotted downslope to meet him.

"Thoheek's son Bili, you are a welcome sight to clap eyes to!" Vaskos reined up knee-to-knee and gripped Bill's hand with fierce geniality. The thick-thewed man had a few fresh cuts on his face, a bulky wad of bandage protruded from under his helm, and he rode somewhat stiffly, as if his armor might conceal other wounds, but he greeted Bili with a smile. "And how fares my father? Have you seen aught of him?"

The smile was infectious and Bili found himself sharing it. "Komees Hari is at Morguhn Hall, Vaskos, and he's well enough, physically; but sight of you will do wonders for his spirit. Your loving uncle, Drehkos, swore that he'd had you murdered, you know."

"Aye!" Vaskos's grin faded and his dark eyes clouded with anger. "His dogs and those of Hehrah-the-bitch very nearly did slay me, would have, but for the warning of my half sisters, bless them. My poor Frahnkos gave his life that the four of us might get away. We arrived at Komees Djeen's hall just after the Clan Bard had left. Lady Ahnah and her women bandaged our hurts and provided me with armor, then they took over the care of my sisters and I took command of the mercen ... uh, Freefighters."

After formally greeting the ladies of the party-Lady Ahnah, Komees Djeen's vivacious wife, her daughter, and the three Daiviz girls-Bili detached one of his troopers to guide Vaskos on the quickest route to the Hall, com mandeering a brace of Vaskos's Freefighters to fill out the patrol.

When he had seen the refugees on their way, Bill instructed the troopers in the location of their rendezvous point, then all set out in a wide-spreading crescent. They rode on and on through the deserted fields, meadows, and woodlands. At the beginning, the westering sun bore upon their right, then directly into their faces, finally bathing their left sides. Bili allowed the new horse his head in walking across a freshly plowed field, then warily traversed a narrow strip of woods. He mounted grassy knolls at the trot, galloped over the rolling leas, leaping lichened fences and the deep-cut brooks which chuckled amongst rounded stones.

Then, all at once, the cold prickling began in Bili's far-gathering mind and he knew that he was approaching a danger. Though it seemed imminent, it lacked the strength of human minds, so he did not uncase his axe, unslinging his boarspear instead.

He never had an opportunity to use that spear, however. Beneath the spread of a thick-foliaged old tree, a heavy form hurled itself down upon Bili, driving him from the saddle, smashing him to earth. The last sound he heard, ere darkness claimed him, was the terrified screaming of his horse.

It was with a sense of mild satisfaction that Hwahltuh Sanderz of Sanderz withdrew his hand from inside the waistband of his loose, filthy trousers. That pestersome flea would never again taste of blood. Absently, he wiped his thumbnail on a grimy shirtsleeve and ruminated on the journey so far.

True, the lands lay fair enough, but there were far too many people on them. It virtually teemed with people, and almost all of them were Dirtmen too, living-if such a life could be truly called living-in immovable lodges amid their own stink from birth to death. And the way that all of them stared and stared at him and his clanmen, especially at the Cat Brothers. Why, one might think that they had never before even seen Prairie Cats!

Even those who claimed the ancient Kinship with him-claimed descent from the Horseclansmen of Ehlai-dwelt in stonewalled lodges. Of course, he ruminated, he was not sure but that some of these had lied in their teeth, for only two of them had even looked like Kindred. One of these two, who had represented himself as the Kahrtuh of Kahrtuh, had had so little mindspeak that it would have been a great compliment to call his talents marginal-and what clan would have for Chief a man who could not mindspeak Cat and Horse and other Chiefs? As for the other, he had been fat, his hands as soft as a woman's breast.

But, Hwahltuh thought on, so much soaking in water the temperature of fresh blood might very well make a man that soft. And that was yet another thing that set the Sanderz's teeth edge-to-edge, the washings and scrubbings and senseless-and certainly unhealthful-bathings which seemed to so obsess these strange people. Although all the clanspeople made use of a sweatlodge on occasion, they seldom immersed their bodies in water more than a couple of times a year, and then it was in a river or lake. But the odd people of this weird land sometimes bathed twice in one day, and in heated water at that!

Hwahltuh had been born with a better than average nose-thank Sacred Sun for that gift! With eyes and ears hooded and stopped, he could identify each of his warriors by smell, alone. So it made him distinctly uneasy when he was confronted by persons who bore so little odor that he could rarely even distinguish the women from the men, without seeing or hearing them.

One of the clansmen riding behind him suddenly guffawed and it was picked up by several of the others; then came a snarled curse. He glanced back over his shoulder in time to see his sister's youngest son, Rik, leap from his kak, his hands working frantically at the drawstring of his trousers and his snubnosed face twisted in distress.

Hwahltuh halted the column, for it was not good to leave a Kinsman alone in unknown territory. Rik squatted beneath a tree, glaring at his Kinsmen from under his thick, reddish blond brows and grunting insulting comments on their appearances and personal habits, while they serenaded him with a chorus of jeers, laughter, and ribald suggestions.

The Sanderz shook his graying head in sympathy, for he too had suffered from that violent griping of the guts, as had they all, many times since they began to traverse this land. After discussion of the matter, they had decided that the problem was the dearth of decent food and the overabundance of wine. All their lives, they had been nurtured principally on the produce of their herds-milk and its products, flesh of cattle and sheep and goats. Although they sometimes traded (or raided) for dried beans or grain and the occasional pig, most of their accustomed plant foods had been wild, hunted as a matter of course, like game. The Chief could have counted upon the fingers of one hand the number of times he had tasted of wine, ere they had come to this land. Not that he and his did not like the stuff, but, Sun and Wind, it roiled the guts!

Rik had finished his business and was about to remount when Hwahltuh received the mindspeak of one of the three Cat Kindred who had been ranging ahead.

"Keep cased your bows, Brothers-of-Cats, for Whitetip comes with another Brother, a Chief!"

Bili was bereft of consciousness for but a moment, but his vision remained blurred longer, and he could not immediately tell just who or what had unhorsed him and was presently pinning him down with its considerable weight. He could hear points of some description rasping on his armor and there was a hot, acrid smell close to his face.

 Abruptly, his vision cleared to disclose a cavernous red pink expanse of open mouth, equipped with a rough-looking tongue of incredible width and a full complement of big white teeth, crowned by a pair of glistening fangs at least three inches in length. Bili had never seen the like, but he knew from the very presence of those fangs that it could be no other animal but that one described in the ancient bardsongs.

Confidently, he mindspoke. "You would slay your Kinsman, Cat-brother?"

The heavy body started in surprise. "You mindspeak, then, Dirtman-who-wears-steel? This is truly a land of wonders."

"I must have erred," retorted Bili. "I had supposed yon of the Cat Clan. A one of the true Clan of Cats would not seek the life of a Morguhn. So you most certainly are just an animal!"

The attacker rippled a snarl and the claws rasped again across Bili's breastplate. "Whitetip is no animal, Dirrman! He is a Cat of the Sept of Sanderz. But how is he to know that you are a Cat-brother?"

After a long moment of cudgeling his memory, Bili beamed, "I will care for your kittens and nursing females, and vouchsafe you a clean death when your teeth have dulled and the pains of age rest upon you."

The crushing weight lifted from Bili, while a four-inch width of sandpaper tongue gently scraped over his sweaty face. Stiffly, he sat up and stared at this creature of bard-song and legend.

The Cat's paws were large, as was the head, and intelligence sparkled in the amber depths of the eyes. The pelt was shortfurred, of a golden chestnut hue, with the ghosts of slightly darker rosettes speckling the graceful, muscle-rippling body. Whitetip stood a good nine hands at the withers and Bili estimated the weight at possibly three hundred pounds, for the Cat was bigboned, with a deep chest and forelegs much more thickly muscled than those of Treecats or lynxes. The white-tipped tail was short, its two feet or so giving him an overall length of some seven feet.

Seating himself nearby, Whitetip raised a paw to his fearsome mouth, licked it, and commenced leisurely washing his face, mindspeaking the while. "Ah, Kinsman, ever is it heartening to find a new Brother-of-Cats, especially so in such a new, strange land. But you are certainly the biggest Kinsman Whitetip has ever mindspoken . . . near nineteen hands, anyway. Are all of your Clan so large? How big is your Chief?"

"I am Chief," Bili informed the curious Cat. "I am Chief Bili, Morguhn of Morguhn."

Bili readily agreed to allow Whitetip to conduct him to his Chief, but pointed out that thanks to the big cat, he no longer had a horse. Contritely, the feline offered to find Chief Morguhn's mount and bring him back. Bili consented, though he doubted that such would come to pass, suspecting the gelding to be halfway to Kehnooryos Deskati by that time.

Therefore, he was rather surprised to see his horse trot placidly over the nearest hill less than ten minutes later, with Whitetip crouched awkwardly on the kak and two similar Cats loping along behind.

On introduction, the newcomers were disclosed to be: Lover-Of-Water, a female and three years older than Whitetip, though only some two-thirds of his size and weight; and Steelclaws, two years old and already nearly adult-size, a son out of the first litter sired by Whitetip.

After Bili had opened his mind to Clan Bard Gil Sanderz, that middleaged warrior solemnly informed his Chief and clansmen, "All that has been mindspoken is true, Brothers. He is Morguhn of Morguhn of the Tribe of Ehlai and ruler of this land through which we now ride. But it is not so peaceful a land as we had thought. Chief Bili's stonelodge must soon be attacked by Dirtmen; he has need of every arm that can pull a bow!"

 This last delighted the bored clansmen and the decision to ride with and fight for Chief Bili was unanimous. The whole of the ride to the tiny village of Geertohnee, at which the patrol had arranged to rendezvous, they laughed and joked and boasted and roared out warsongs, keeping time by clanging their saberblades against their targetbosses and twanging bowstrings over helms.

Not knowing who might choose to tap his thoughts, Bili sought to bury certain of them deeply-as deeply as possible-for he knew well that he needed the help these men offered; the addition of more than a dozen expert archers was indeed a gift of Sun. But he was appalled, shocked to the very core of his being, at the appearance of these latter-day Kindred Horseclansmen! He had known, of course, that his ancestors had been short men, but he had always supposed them to have been short as Komees Hari and the treacherous Duhkos were short- very broad and bigboned and thickthewed. Everything about the Sanderz men was small though-hands, feet, even heads-and he doubted if even the heaviest of them could possibly weigh more than sixty Ehleen kilohee. Furthermore, his new allies were undoubtedly the filthiest men he had ever seen-or smelled!

However, regardless of their heights or weights or degrees of cleanliness, they all handled and exuberantly tossed their well-kept weapons like men who had cut their teeth on such hardware. Their sabers were wide, single edged, thickbladed, and averaged some two-and-a-half feet around the slight curve. All bore the short, powerful, composite hornbows which were a hallmark of Horse-clansmen; several had light axes dangling from the pommels of their beautifully worked and highly decorated kaks, and about half of them carried odd, almost uniform pole arms a seven or eight-foot shaft, mounting a knife-edged blade like the point of a boarspear at both ends. All the Sanderz's cuirasses were wrought of boiled leather, reinforced with strips of horn and metal, and lacquered. The helms of a few of the younger men were also of reinforced leather, but most wore steel helms of various shapes and patterns.

As for the "horses" of the clansmen, Bili thought that "ponies" would be a more accurate description of the ugly, shaggy, big headed little steeds. The very tallest was no more than thirteen-two and some of them stood a full hand less! But their mindspeak talents were the best Bili had ever encountered and most seemed even more intelligent than Mahvros. And their size notwithstanding, they could clear any obstruction as easily as Bili's big bay hunter; nor did they indicate strain at maintaining the stiff pace.

The kaks were works of art. The wood and bone trees, covered with the finest leather, were set atop cured sheep-skins and gorgeous blankets. Every visible inch of the leather was tooled and tinted and lacquered, the outside surfaces of the high, flaring cantles and pommels set with strips, studs and hooks of brass, silver, and polished steel. Bridles were nonexistent, since the mounts were guided solely by mindspeak and knee pressure.

The heel of Sacred Sun had sunk into the line of bluish haze which was the foothills of the Kahpneezon Mountains, when Bili had Hwahltuh and his clansmen halt within the concealment afforded by the woods which flanked the ploughlands of Geertohnee. At the older Chiefs command, the three Cats set out to reconnoiter the village and its environs.

Presently, Whitetip was beaming back to both Chiefs, "Five men in this place. They wear steel, but it is not the same as Chief Bili's, being small pieces on leather shirts, like the scales of a fish. Whitetip thinks they have seen or smelled you, for they have hidden their horses and strung their bows and now face you across the open space. Shall we stampede their mounts and take the men in the rear, while you attack?"

"No!" Bili hastily mindspoke. "For they are almost certainly my fighters, Cat-brother, though there should be six, not five." Then to Hwahltuh, "They are watching for me alone, so let me ride in first. I will signal you." With that, he rode out into the open.

Only the tiniest, copperhued arc of Sacred Sun still showed above the western mountain haze when the Thoheeks and his band came within sight of Morguhn Hall. The stout little bastion lay already invested by the rebellious rabble, whose broad track the three cats and eighteen horsemen had cautiously paralleled for near two hours.

Forty yards from the main gate sat a wagon-mounted ram blazing merrily, while the slope roundabout the front and the west side of the hall was randomly littered with discarded shields, weapons, scaling ladders, and some twoscore arrowquilled bodies, very few of these within fifty yards of their objective. And Bili breathed a sigh of relief. At least the initial assault had been rebuffed . . . bloodily rebuffed.

Just beyond bowshot of the walls and towers, mounted nobles were slowly and painfully reforming their heterogeneous mob for a second attack. That it was a difficult job was attested by the shouted obscenities, screams of profane rage, and the thwacks of ridingwhips and sword flats which were clearly audible to the watchers.

The rebels were an army in name only. They had just seen friends and neighbors and relatives suffer or die on the now gory path to those forbidding walls, and their priests and officers had yet to convince them that another sally against those bristling fortifications would result in aught save ever more wounds and deaths. Those who had for so long secretly drilled them and taught them weapons usage, they now felt, had unjustly kept from them the hard facts of warfare-the utter exhaustion and dry-mouthed terror which so weighted a man's limbs when he saw of what horrors arrows and darts and catapult stones were capable.

Thick black smoke roiled up from within the walls and the lowing of cattle could be plainly heard, along with the creaking of ropes and groaning of timbers as a catapult was wound and set. After a brief pause, there was a wheee-WHUNNK and a headsized blob of burning pitch traced a high, smoketrailing parabola across the darken-ing sky, to fall squarely into the milling midst of the rebel 'formation'! It was all that the priests and nobles could then do to prevent an outright rout. Wisely, they elected to form several hundred yards farther away.

Bili, Hwahltuh, Gil, and one of the Freefighters slid down from their observation point at the brushy summit of a hill. The Sanderz snorted his disgust at the quality of the men opposing them.

"Kinsman Bili, a stand of prairiegrass would slow us more than cowards like those. Let us ride through them now."

But Bili shook his shaven head. "No, we are too many to just ride up to the walls, especially since it is now almost dark. My clansmen and Freefighters are expecting no more than seven riders. When they spied a party of this size, they surely would bring us under their bows. We must find a way to let them know that we are friends. Are any of your clansmen far-speakers, by chance?"

"Ask anything but that, Kinsman," groaned Hwahltuh. "I heard that that talent is common amongst the folk of some clans, but our last far-speaker went to Wind when I was yet a lad. Whitetip can farspeak, to a limited extent, but only, alas, if he knows the mind to which he is to beam."

Gil spoke up. "If there are mindspeakers in the stone-lodge, why not wait until full dark and let a Cat-brother go close enough to range them?"

Atop the front wall, amidst the archers and catapult crews, old Komees Djeen limped stiffly up and down, snapping and snarling at all and sundry out of his worry over the fate of Thoheeks Bili. The wagons were long since returned before even the van of the rebel host had appeared. Since Vaskos was the last man to have clapped eyes on Bili, he had suffered questioning and requestioning by the retired Strahteegos, until at length the Keeleeohstos-grumpy anyway at being bedridden by order of Master Ahlee-had bluntly inquired as to which his questioner was actually losing, his hearing or his memory. And the Lady Ahnah and Komees Hari had had to be fetched, ere the shouting and insults were done, to persuade the two officers to keep their steel cased!

His threequarter armor clanking, the grizzled nobleman stalked up to a group of fledgling engineers being put through a crash course in catapult service. "You!" he barked at a tall Freefighter who was lowering a fifty-pound stone into the basket. "Don't you know better than to wear a crested helm when you're serving an engine? If the lip of that basket hooks that crest, it'll take the empty head off your shoulders. I've seen it happen, soldier!"

Not awaiting an answer, he swung off to confront an archer seated in a crenel. "Behind a merlon, fool! Keep sitting between them and you'll have an arrow up your arse or in your back! And replace that bowstring immedi-ately. It's beginning to fray at the lower curve."

"If Bili's not back soon," muttered Spiros to Bard Klairuhnz, "we'll have to give Djeen a horse and let him go searching for that patrol, ere he rides these men into mutiny! Next, he'll be ordering them to polish all the fornicating spearpoints, or having them down there aligning all the cattle by height, sex, and age!"

"There'll be no mutiny here, My Lord," stated Captain Raikuh, who was standing with them near the gate tower. "As is Duke Bili, so is Count Djeen. Both are born war-leaders, and all the professionals can sense the fact. His words may ring harsh, but his criticisms are both sound and constructive, and we all know it."

A thousand yards from the west wall on the creekbank, wagons and wains were unloading tents and gear amid a twinkling of torches and new-kindled fires. At long last, the priests and nobles had despaired of whipping their cowed aggregation of commoners into mounting another assault. . . not this night, at least. Even to those at the hall it was clear that the rebels had had enough for one day and were going into camp.

Spiros was still worried and annoyed by Djeen's ceaseless nitpicking at the men, so he sought to distract the old soldier, calling, "Komees Djeen, if you please? Djeen, come over here and tell us, do you think they'll come for us again tonight?"

Yellow teeth glinting, the old man cackled harshly. "I only wish that they would, Kinsman! You would then see what disastrous effects flaming pitchballs and firearrows have on the morale of undisciplined troops at night. Heh, heh. That piss-poor excuse for an army wouldn't stop running until they reached the Sea of Grass, most likely. But no, Spiros, they'll not attack tonight, for men who lack the grit to fight in broad day will murder their officers before they'll mount a night offensive."

His lobstertail neckguard grated on his backplate as he slowly shook his head. "That damned boylover Myros . . . d'you know, he was a middling-good officer, once upon a time? But did you see the inexcusable way he marshaled that abortion of an assault? Clear it is, he's long since forgot every principle of tactics he ever learned!"

Winking slyly at Raikuh and Klairuhnz, Spiros inno-cently asked, "Your pardon, Djeen, but I thought they came up that hill in pretty fair form ... of course, I'm no professional soldier . . ."

"True enough, Kinsman!" snapped the Komees. "Were you, you'd have been painfully aware of the glaring errors of judgment of which the Vahrohnos of Pederasty was guilty. He'd no need to lose either his engine or half the men we slew, you know? Here, let me show you what I mean..."

Drawing a short dagger from the top of his boot, he stumped over to a section of tower wall between two torches, and commenced to scratch a rough sketch on the surface of the stones, talking all the while. Spiros, his purpose now achieved, was careful to ape meticulous attention to each detail of the aged Strahteegos's discourse. Raikuh on the other hand hung on every word, feeling personal instruction from so famous and respected a strategist and tactician to be a rare privilege.

Klairuhnz wandered away from the absorbed nobleman and bis little audience to stand beside young Djehf, who leaned between a pair of merlons, staring at the bright, bustling camp of the besiegers.

"Didn't you hear Komees Djeen's admonition to that archer, Kinsman?"

Half turning, the Tahneest clanked the side of his gauntlet against his breastplate. "This be good, honest Pitzburk plate, and princegrade, at that! Good Bard, the bowman's unspawned who can put a shaft through such metal."

Klairuhnz smiled thinly. "Be not too sure, Kinsman. I've seen Horseclansmen stipple an armored man until he looked like a porcupine! Why, on the Prairie, once ..."

.A note of eagerness entered the young warrior's voice, and out of that eagerness peeped the small boy of recent memory. "You've really ridden with real Horseclansmen then, Kinsman? On the Prairie? The Sea of Grass? Truly? Tell me, please, tell me of them."

"Yes," stated the Bard. "Yes, I rode the Prairie with Horseclansmen, Kinsman Djehf, but it was long, long years ago, and I..."

His voice stopped as the unexpected and quite powerful mindspeak burst in. "I know your mind, Cat-brother-of-Cat-brothers, who these men know as Bard Klairuhnz. This one is Whitetip, Subchief of the Cat Sept of Sanderz. We mindspoke in the south, in the hot land."

In the rear courtyard of Morguhn Hall, Bili lifted his cased axe from his weary mount, before an armed servant led the gelding away. Silent but for the clank of his armor, he paced over to Mother Behrnees and kissed her freckled forehead, then took her hand, saying, "Come, Mother, I wish you to meet our new friends."

He led her over to the knot of curiously staring clans-men and halted before Gil and the Chief. "Chief Hwahltuh of Sanderz, allow me to present one of my Lady Mothers. This is My Lady Behrnees of Morguhn, widow of my late father, Hwahruhn Morguhn of Morguhn, and presently cochatelaine of Morguhn Hall."

Hwahltuh immediately knew that this tall, blond beauty was the loveliest woman he had ever before seen. Everything about her was perfect, he thought, and no dream that he could recall had produced even a vision like to that now before him. He knew that he should speak, acknowledge the introduction, introduce Gil and the others, but with his mind awhirl with thoughts totally removed from the torchlit courtyard, he was experiencing difficulty in framing words.

Before he could regain his control, Behrnees stepped forward, took his callused, grubby hand, and bore it to her seemingly perfect pink lips, saying gravely, "My sincere thanks, Lord Hwahltuh, for bringing my son safely back to us. We all are in your debt. Come, you and your Kinsmen must sup with us ere you leave. But leave you must, for this hall lies invested by a great host, with no hope of reinforcement or aid."

When the clan had decided to leave the high plains and rejoin their Kindred who had trekked east, Hwahltuh had had three wives. But over the course of the long, difficult, dangerous journey, all these had gone to Wind, one by one. For three years now had he relied on the widows of his sons to see to the Chiefs lodge, taking such pleasures as he desired of borrowed concubines, for the Couplets of the Law forbade marriage within the clan and custom forbade an unmarried man to hold ownership of concubines. And he was a lonely man. Until that moment, he had not realized just how lonely.

"I'll be more than happy to share milk and meat with you, Kinswoman, and so too will my Kindred. But why this talk of leaving, before we've even bloodied our sabers? My Clan-brothers and I, we were promised a good fight by your son, Chief Bili, and . . . What is this, Kins-woman? Are you ill?"

Behrnees had dropped to her knees before him, once more pressing her shellpink lips to his scarred, filthy knuckles.

Bili enlightened the mystified, and more than a little perturbed Chief. "In my Lady Mother's homeland, homage is so rendered, Hwahltuh."

Behrnees, taller and with bigger bones, probably weighed as much as did the Sanderz, but the little man grasped her shoulders and lifted her slowly and without apparent strain, saying gruffly, "It is I who am guesting in your lodge, Kinswoman. Nor am I your Chief. You owe me no homage."

Behrnees met his eyes with her limpid blue ones and he felt his heart beating very fast under his cuirass, felt his weatherbrowned face flushing, found his breath as short as if he had been fighting all day . . . and found his hands very loath to release those well-muscled but so pleasant-to-hold shoulders.

Humbly Behrnees said, "I would do homage to your courage, My Lord. Your wives and your sons know much pride in so strong and valiant a husband and father."

Now Gil had been slyly prying into the unshielded minds of both his chief and the woman. He recognized the utter sincerity of her admiration of Hwahltuh, as well as the Sanderz's quite different admiration of her. She certainly was not an old woman-he estimated her age at no more than thirty-four summers-was a more than handsome female, threw good get if Chief Bili was any indication, and was the widow of a Chief. He thought that the Clan might go far and far without finding any better wife for their Chief. So he stepped forward.

"Chief's mother, I am Gil, Clan Bard of Sanderz, and I am indeed proud of my Chief, as are all his Clan-Brothers. But as you are a widow, so is he a widower. He has had no wife for near three summers, and all his strong sons went to Wind in honor and to the glory of their Clan."

Behrnees's eyes misted. She drew closer to Hwahltuh, and when he tilted back his head to keep sight of her face, she laid a hand alongside one of his stubbled, dust-grimy cheeks and softly lipbrushed the other, saying gently, "I grieve with and for you, Kinsman. When time and the enemy allow, we must try to comfort each other."

And from that moment, Hwahltuh Sanderz of Sanderz was hers, heart and soul! With her by his side, he moved as in a blissful dream, greeting Chief Bili's brother and his father's other widow and the remaining notables. Her delicate, subtly feminine odor was, he knew, the sweetest scent to which his keen nose had ever attained.

Even when he was conducted to another of those cursed washingplaces and the herbed and spiced bathwater-steaming like a bucket of fresh milk on a whiter morning-enveloped him and the servants began to scrub him, did he keep his peace, his mind too filled with Behrnees to even think the curses and threats which he had heretofore blasted at bathservants. For the first time in his nearly fifty years of life, Hwahltuh was in love.

Only one good had come out of the day, so far as Myros was concerned. Thoroughly trounced and resultantly cowed as they were, his ill-disciplined mob at least obeyed orders and followed instructions with unaccustomed alacrity. Therefore, as soon as the tents were up and the rabble fed on jerked meat, hard bread, strong cheese, and weak, vinegary wine, he had them set to assembling the six big catapults, making pitchballs and scaling ladders and collecting stones from up and down the streambed. He had hoped to capture Morguhn Hall without too much structural damage to the place with that loudmouthed fool, Paulos, choked to death on his own blood and teeth back in the Council Chamber, there would now be no questions concerning the new ownership of the hall. He felt a slight gratitude to the hulking Djehf Morguhn-but now realized that he would probably have to burn or batter down a fair stretch of those walls, ere he could use his large but unwieldy and very undependable force to any advantage.

While whip-snapping overseers kept the commoners at their assigned tasks, Myros retired to his spacious pavilion, there to dine and confer with his fellow concilmen, his military subordinates, and the higher ranking clergy. Of the Council, there were but three remaining to sit with him-Drehkos, Djaimos, and Nathos Evrehos, now recovered from his morning funk and hysterics and prating loudly of bloody deeds to be wreaked upon the persons of any Kindred taken alive.

As each of his guests came under his roof of golden silk, Myros's servants helped them out of their hot armor and sweatsoaked clothing, sponged their sweaty bodies, and proffered soft tunics and big mugs of chilled wine, a soothing balm to shouted-raw throats and a strong soporific for jangled nerves. By the time the viands-juicy roasts, savory vegetables, crisp salads, breads, and delicate pastries-were served, most of the guests were at least a bit tiddly.

Half through the meal, Myros was called to his headquarters tent that he might receive a messenger. He returned wreathed in smiles, to announce:

"Gentlemen, three days ago did the True Faith triumph in what the heathens call the Duchy of Vawn!" He allowed the drunken cheering and hubbub to continue for a few minutes, then raised a hand for silence. "Wait, Brothers-in-God, there is more. The Army of the Faithful saw a miracle in Vawn. As our brethren held the cities and countryside, the sinful pagans fled to a very strong hall built into the side of a steep cliff. Only one side could be attacked, and it was protected by a wall so high and thick than an entire week of hurling stones against it did no real damage. Then did the men of weak faith talk most shamefully of forsaking the Holy Cause.

"But the Most Holy Kooreeos Marios did pray mightily that our loving Father might deliver into his hands the cursed heathens. And the Lord answered the Blessed Marios, sending an Angel to instruct him. Then were certain Sacred objects placed in a casket of iron, laid in the basket of the largest engine and hurled against that unholy wall. The very moment that the hallowed missile touched the wall of the place of sinfulness, did all the land tremble to God's awful Voice. Though the Lord allowed no man to see the bolt, His lightning did shatter the wall of the unbelievers, did rend stone from huge stone and crumble them to dust. And all of those heathen within were slain in a moment, most with no wound upon their bodies, yet with blood having gushed from every orifice.

"And that victorious army, led by the Most Blessed Kooreeos Marios, is marching to our aid. Even now is the bulk of their force crossing our western border, while the Holy Marios and their cavalry will be amongst us within the hour!"

Within Morguhn Hall, however, the evening meal was a most subdued one. At the lengthened high table were most of the loyal Kindred still alive in the Duchy. Bili, in the center chair, was flanked by his mothers. Djehf was on the walls, along with old Komees Djeen, Feelahks Sami, and Lieutenant Krahndahl. Beyond Mother Behrnees, who sat at the young Thoheeks's right, Chief Hwahltuh happily applied himself to a shoulder of mutton and a brimming flagon of fresh, creamy milk. At his right, Eeyohahnah Daiviz sipped watered wine, toyed with her food, and pouted, since the handsome young Rik Sanderz seemed more interested in his disgusting dish of chopped meat and curds than he did in her. Actually, Hwahltuh's nephew was mindspeaking with Spiros and Pawl Raikuh, regaling them with gory anecdotes of the trek from the high plains.

On Rik's right were the other Daivizes-Komees Hari, the two younger girls, and the heavily bandaged Vaskos, on whom all three were lavishing so much attention that the Keeleeohs was embarrassed.

At Mother Mahrnee's left was Vahrohnos Spiros, and beside him the Lady Ahnah Morguhn. Between her and her daughter, Sairuh, sat Clan Bard Gil Sanderz, patiently answering questions of mother and child, both evincing interest in every facet of the lives of the females of his clan. On the left of the girl, Captain Raikuh wolfed roast mutton and pickled cabbage, gulped wine, and occasionally chuckled at young Rik's stories.

Dark, dour Komos Morguhn, Bili's second cousin and though Kindred not really a nobleman, hulked between Bard Klairuhnz and Master Ahlee. That day, Komos had seen a pack of his neighbors, some of them related to him, senselessly butcher his wife, his children, and his aged, crippled father. Only the fortuitous arrival of Clan Bard Hail and his two troopers in the village had saved the farmer; and the fact that he had been able to get to his grandfather's sword and fight off his attackers until his rescue. He had spoken to no one throughout the meal, nor had aught save wine passed his lips. He sat staring at his winecup, clenching and unclenching his big, work-roughened hands.

Trestle tables had been arranged around the walls of the large chamber and thereon dined the off-duty troops, serving themselves as did the very nobles, since all the servants were either in armor among them or chained in the cellars. So because the surroundings were so noisy, Bili attempted to mindspeak his scarcely known cousin.

But Bard Klairuhnz beamed. "Apparently, Kinsman Komos is not a mindspeaker, Thoheeks Bili. However, I took the liberty of scanning his mind earlier, and he knows not one whit more than he has recounted. He and the trooper who escorted him rode directly here; Hail and the other trooper rode for the hall of Lord Bahr Morguhn.

"My Lord, Clan Bard Hail is presently either dead, captured, or safe. In any case, there's nothing that you or any of us can do for him, and Wind knows, you've more than sufficient worry material, without taking on that as well!"

"But it was my order sent him out, Kinsman," Bili silently replied. "Perhaps I should have sent a younger man ... or gone myself."

"Nonsense, Lord Thoheeks! It was your duty to command and his duty to obey." Bard Klairuhnz seemed about to add more when he was interrupted.

Lieutenant Krahndahl had hurried into the room, helm under his arm and unease wrinkling his seamed face. The scales of his plain hauberk clashed as he rapidly rounded the high table and first bowed to Bili, then bent and whispered a brief message into the young lord's ear. His message spoken, he stepped back and assumed the posture of attention.

Bili did not need to call for silence, for all noise had ceased upon the appearance of the officer. He stood and announced, "My people, Komees Djeen reports a spate of activity within the lines of the enemy. Such could presage an attack, so we had best to the walls."

An immediate clatter and bustle ensued at the high and lower tables, a metallic din that commenced as armor doffed for the meal was redonned and adjusted, swordcases were snapped to belt or baldric, and helms were dragged from beneath the tables.

All at the high table had arisen. Bili caught Lieutenant Krahndahl's eye and gestured at the armor rack which held his scarred Pitzburk. "Please help me to arm, Krahndahl." Then he turned back to the table and its group.

"Chief Hwahltuh, you and your clansmen will report to my Subchief, Komees Djeen. He commands the walls and will place you all where your bows will do the most good." The wiry little man nodded once, slapped on his helm, and stepped briskly toward the door, mindcalling his kinsmen.

Bili strode down the length of the table to where Ahlee and Klairuhnz, having despaired of locating a cuirass big enough, were buckling an outsize brigandine, a pair of greaves, and a set of oldfashioned armlets over the powerfully convex chest and the rolling-muscled limbs of Cousin Komos.

"Kinsman Klairuhnz, you know that I well know your value as a warrior, so I beg you not take offense at the post I would have you fill. I had intended said post for Kinsman Vaskos, he being wounded, ere I was informed of his training and skills in use of engines, of which our garrison owns little enough. I charge you with the magazines, the dungeons, and their occupants. Two of our older servingmen will assist you. Should our foes enter the hall itself, you must strongly secure the cellar entry, slay every prisoner, and set fire the stores. Do you understand?"

At the Bard's curt nod, he turned to Komos. "Cousin, you are not trained to arms, but Sun has granted you great strength. Therefore, report you to Kinsman Vaskos and say that you are to help serve the engines. I doubt that a sixty-pound boulder will be any unchancy burden for your thews.

 "Master Ahlee, summon your people and take your place on the walls."

He continued to issue crisp orders. Ahnah Morguhn was set to supervising those women and girls who were stoking the fires under great cauldrons of oil, water, and iron trays of sand in the outer courtyard. Mother Mahrnee took charge of a half-dozen more women, putting them to fetching and heading arrows, while Mother Behrnees formed a similar group to melt lead and cast sling bullets.

Within ten minutes of the lieutenant's entry, the dining hall lay deserted.

Klairuhnz unlocked the heavy door, stepped into the tiny cell, and thrust the butt of his torch into the wall bracket. Kooreeos Skiros awkwardly struggled to a sitting posture, his movements painfully hampered by the weight and placement of his iron fetters and chains. His black silken robes were dust stained and his hair and beard were matted; but his black eyes still shot out their message of defiance and bottomless hatred.

Leaning his saber against the wall, well out of the prisoner's reach, the Bard put his back to the door and sank onto his haunches, then thrust a hand under his brigandine and withdrew the weapon he had taken from Skiros. Depression of a stud on one arm of the "club" caused a steel box to slide smoothly out of that arm and plop into his hand. At one end of the box was a fat brass cylinder, flat on one end and dully pointed on the other. He regarded box, cylinder, and "club" for several moments, then slid the box back into place.

Speaking in the language of the Confederation, he asked, "What is your name? Your real name, that is."

"All men here know me, heathen." The Kooreeof deep, rich baritone boomed hollowly in the narrow, high-ceilinged cubicle. "I am Skiros, Kooreeos of ..."

"Cut the crap, chum!" Klairuhnz had not spoken the language he now used in many years, except in his dreams, so his speech was slightly halting. Nevertheless, its effect on Skiros was instantaneous. Paling visibly, the cleric recoiled, as if from a buffet.

But he recovered quite rapidly, replying in Old Ehleeneekos, "I cannot understand you, heathen dog. Try barking in a civilized tongue!"

The Bard vented a humorless laugh. "Oh, you understand me, right enough, witchman. Just as the late Titus Backstrom understood, as the late Lillian Landor would have understood, as Doctor Manuel Kornblau understands!" He grasped the small "club" by the arm which contained the small box and squinted down the other arm at the prisoner, his thumb pulling back a grooved protrusion of metal with a sharp click.

"How many of these little toys have you scattered about this Duchy, witchman? Or are they reserved as a last resort for your kind only?"

"I'd appreciate it if you'd not point that gun at me. It's a twelve-point-five millimeter magnum, you know, one of the Center's developments, and powerful enough to punch through plate armor or stop a charging bison bull. The shock alone would stop the heart of this body, no matter where it was struck." Skiros's manner was relaxed, conversational. His language however, would have been meaningless to anyone in the duchy save his listener, since he spoke a cultured, nondialectal twentieth-century American English!

Klairuhnz smiled broadly. "So, Reverend Bishop, you really are a witchman, eh? Now, once again, what's your name?"

"Gold," the blackbeard answered easily. "William Gold. And you? You must be one of the mutants. Which one, may I ask?"

The Bard nodded. "Yes, Mr. Gold, you may ask. I'm Milo Moray."

Gold's eyes widened. "Well I'll be damned! The Undying God of the Horseclans himself. Then I'll not ask why you're here. I'll just assume that Manny was one of the 'lucky ones' who made it to Kehnooryos Atheenahs alive. But, tell me, is he still alive or have you killed him, too?"

Mile's head bobbed again. "When last I saw him, he lived. Of course, he wasn't any too comfortable. In addition to the alterations which were performed on him in Gafnee, because of his mindshield and his stubbornness- which latter quality I am glad to see you don't share-my persuasion specialists were required to perform some rather extreme exercises upon his body."

"Damn!" spat Gold. "You're as much a barbarian as the swine you root among!"

"Barbarism is a survival trait in this world," Milo smiled. "It has been for several hundred years ... or didn't you ivory tower boys know? Yes, Father Gold, I am a barbarian, but before you throw any more such epithets my way, be damned sure your own conscience is clean. This Old Time Religion you clowns have dreamed up is far more bloodthirsty and barbaric than anything these people have developed on their own!"

A hint of his sanctimonious facade crept back into the prisoner's tone. "We are simply striving to reestablish the faith which you so ruthlessly suppressed in the course of the last century, Moray."

"In a pig's ass!" snapped Milo. "For all that its fat-cat hierarchy were secretly engaged in such little sidelines as slavetrading, whoremongering, and smuggling-not to mention oppressing the humbler Ehleenoee with a quasi-military, quasi-religious masked force of bravos who would have made the sixteenth-century Spanish Garduna look like a troop of Boy Scouts-their religion was basically Eastern rite Christianity. Yours sounds more like Satanism, what with the carving up of helpless children on your altars, the mixing of their lifeblood with the wine for your so-called Communion, and all the other obscene parodies of worship you engage in."

The chained man shrugged, his face expressionless. "If a pack of hounds serve you well, you endeavor to keep them contented. Most of our worshipers are well pleased with this kind of religion."

"I suspect," said Milo wryly, "that those fools are less enchanted by your sanguinary religion than they are by the Utopian promises with which you've been deluding them. Need I ask what the hell you and your fellow ghouls are up to?"

In lieu of answers, the prisoner abruptly asked, "How old are you, Moray? When were you born, was it before the War?"

Milo did not need to ask which war, because for the few who had survived it, there could be but the one that three-day holocaust which had irrevocably wrecked the civilization of their world and the worldwide plagues which had almost extirpated all the races of mankind. He shrugged. "I think I was born sometime around the turn of the century ... the twentieth century, that is. That would put my age at a bit less than nine hundred years. Why?"

The manacles clanked as Gold steepled his fingers. "That means, Moray, that you were alive at the very apogee of man's culture and scientific achievements. Wouldn't you like to see the reestablishment of that culture and most of its appurtenances and civilized comforts?"

He leaned as far forward as his chains would permit, his black eyes gleaming, his voice now husky with his fervor. "Can't you understand, Moray? We at the J. and R. Kennedy Memorial Center are all that's left of The United States of America. We are simply trying to perform the patriotic duty of any good citizens: to bring about the recovery of our country. Our country, Moray, yours and mine! As it was before the War. Cities-real cities, man-research facilities, laboratories, universities, hospitals, electricity, flush toilets, automobiles, theatres, television, telephones, newspapers. Think of it, Moray!"

Milo cracked a knuckle aimlessly. "No sale, Gold. I've heard that spiel before from your director, when I spoke with him on the Landor woman's radio a hundred years ago. He told me all about your plans to establish a dictatorship and call it by the name of a long dead republic. I want no part of such infamy! I warned him at that time to keep his parasites out of my lands. For your sake and for the sakes of those others he sent to trespass and agitate, I'm sorry he chose not to listen to me."

"I cannot, just cannot understand you, Moray," sighed Gold. "Why on earth are you so antagonistic toward us? We should be allies, should be working together, since we're so much alike, have so much in common."

Milo's expression became ugly. "I have nothing in common with you, Gold!"

The prisoner smiled warmly. "Of course you have, my good Moray. After all we are both of us immortal. In that way, at least, you are like me and I am like you."

A strong shudder coursed the length of Milo's body and utter loathing weighted his voice, reflected on his face as well. "No, Gold, not like me, never like me! I did nothing to bring about my longevity, nor did those who truly are like me. Our differences from ordinary humans are the gifts of Nature. The long lives of you and your ilk could not be less natural! You really deserve the appellation 'witchmen,' you know. Although I think that 'vampires' might be a better term.

"Yes, you've lived as long as I have, maybe longer, but in those seven or eight hundred years, how many vibrant young bodies have you personally usurped, Gold? In even one hundred years' time, how much human flesh and blood is needed to keep a warped, demonic thing like you alive?"

"Two, sometimes three transfers are necessary for survival of the mind, barring illness or accident. In the early days, it was a more frequent process, of course; but since we commenced selective breeding for strength, health and longevity . . . and also, we strive to take exceedingly good care of our bodies, Moray.

"You see, the process of mind displacement and transference is not a pleasant experience. Generally, it requires hours to days of suffering to accomplish, so naturally we don't look forward to repeating it any more often than is absolutely necessary."

"You're lying, Gold," snapped Milo. "I saw Titus Backstrom effect a transfer within minutes! And God knows how many times Lillian Landor switched back and forth from King Zastros's body to her own. If you're going to start trying to get cute, buster, I might be smart to drug your next meal. . . and keep you semiconscious until I get you back to Kehnooryos Atheenahs."

The fetters jangled as the prisoner raised his hands conciliatorily. "Wait just wait a minute, Moray, you don't fully comprehend."

Milo, on the point of arising, settled back against the door. "Okay, so tell me, Reverend Father."

Gold held out his arms, painfully working back the wide iron cuffs to expose the raw, bleeding flesh beneath. "First of all, Moray, why don't you take these things off me. Can't you see what they're doing to this body? Tetanus can kill just as surely as a sword, and I could tell you damned little if I contract lockjaw. I'll not try to escape, you have my word on it. Besides, you have my pistol."

Milo's shoulders rose and fell in a shrug. "As it happens, I can't. The castellan has the keys and he's on the walls. But even if I could, I wouldn't. You see, I've had sufficient experience with your kind to recognize just how slippery you are. As for your word, I'd not trust you any farther than I could throw my warhorse!"

The prisoner grinned ruefully. "Well, I did try. But it doesn't really matter. I'll be free soon enough. Do you think your fellow mutants would trade Manny-assuming that he is still alive-for you?"

"Anything is possible, Gold," Milo chuckled. "But aren't you counting your chickens before they're hatched? I've seen weaker fortifications than these, manned by less well armed and less experienced fighters, stand off forces far superior to that ragtag horde of cannonfodder you and the Vahrohnos Myros have scraped up for your little Djeehahd. Til be charitable and say only that they are not firstclass troops ... or second-, or even third-. Their only assault so far was smashed a full fifty yards from the walls, and nothing the officers and priests could do or say persuaded them to mount another, so they've gone into camp.

"Saddled with amateur officers and without you to harangue them into a religious frenzy, your troops are impotent against this stout little garrison. No, your peasant crusaders will be good for no more than one more full-scale assault. Then the bulk of the survivors will desert and the diehards will hole up in Morguhnpolis or, possibly, Deskati. Whichever city they choose, the Confederation siege train will have its gates down and its walls breached in short order."

Gold threw back his head and chortled merrily. "Not quite, my good Moray, not quite! Now it is you who are counting chickens. The walls of this pitiful dungheap will be flat to the ground and its gates blown to smithereens before noon tomorrow, and there's not a damned thing you can do to prevent it either! And don't hold your breath until your precious Confederation Army gets here, for we've not been letting a living soul out of this Duchy for weeks, so you couldn't have gotten any message to them... not without a radio, anyway."

Milo replaced the pistol under his brigandine, stood erect, and locked his saber into the frog of his baldric. "You obviously know far less than you think you do about me and my people, Gold. When I get you back to Kehnooryos Atheenahs, we'll resume our little chat, unless a streak of stubbornness arises, in which case I’ll see that you make the acquaintance of the artisans who cured the mulishness of your friend Manny."

He jerked the torch from the bracket and left the dank cell, slamming the heavy door and securing the thick bar in place, leaving Gold alone in the unrelieved darkness.

Under the travel-stained canvas of an officer-model campaign tent, on a narrow folding cot, lay a woman. She was strikingly lovely, with the red-gold flame of the watchlantern casting highlights throughout the glossy mane of blue black hair which framed her fine-boned face. Her lips were full and dark red, and although her long, sooty lashes lay upon her light olive cheeks and the proud swell of her firm breasts rose and fell rhythmically, she was not sleeping.

On the farspeak level of her infinitely complex and highly trained mind, she asked, "Where have you been? I knew not but that you'd drowned or smothered. If the men and cats and horses hadn't been so done in, we'd have marched on tonight. I thought you said you'd contact me at least once each day."

"Sorry, Aldora, but it couldn't be helped," beamed Milo's thought. "You know my farspeak won't range more than ten or twelve miles, even under optimum conditions. So without the use of Major Ahndros's fine mind. .."

The woman's thought then became halting and tinged with pain. "Ahndee? He ... he's dead, then? So ... so young and vital and... and sweet."

"No, Aldora, not dead, not yet, but according to Master Ahlee, it's still touch-and-go. There was a nasty little skirmish the evening I last spoke with you. He wasn't really hurt too badly, but he went into shock before Ahlee got to him and the good doctor is now afraid to let him stay conscious for very long at one time."

"Whom are we speaking through then?" she inquired.

"The handsome, young heir to old Hwahruhn you mentioned? He truly does have farspeak, then?"

"Bili is now Thoheeks, my dear. Hwahruhn is gone to Wind. And I feel sure he has much, much more than just farspeak. Even without training, he may well be a very valuable man, though I've had no chance to make certain. You see," he went on, "a great deal has happened here in a very short time; things are moving much faster than we'd anticipated, much faster than they'd been planned to go, unless that bastard, Kornblau, misled us ... and there's always that possibility. Actually, I'm contacting you through the mind of one of the Sanderz Sept Prairie Cats, Whitetip."

"Thank Sun and Wind!" Aldora mindspoke vociferously. "There's been too much inbreeding in recent years and more and more kittens are being born dead or retarded or crippled. And breeding in Treecats just isn't the answer. Oh, sweet Sun be praised, not only new blood, but farspeak blood at that!"

Mile's exasperation was transmitted with his thought. "That's all very well, Aldora, but it will wait, there are other matters which will not! First of all, I managed to take one of the witchmen alive. Tell Mara that he says his name is William Gold and that he was working under the name of Kooreeos Skiros. I want her to learn as much as she can about him from Kornblau, especially whether or not he customarily works with a partner. I need that information quickly too.

"Second, Gold appears to have some deviltry up his sleeve. I took a pistol-you know what that is, remember I described it to you once-away from him and who knows what else he has in circulation around here. In fact, I think that he was hinting that this hall was going to be reduced with explosives tomorrow!"

Beneath her warm blankets, Aldora's shapely body shuddered. "Sun grant not, Milo! What you have told me of those ancient terrors sounds horrible beyond imagining .. . and what the Song of Prophecy tells of that long-ago time, the gods' monstrous death arrows, which obliterated whole, huge cities in fire and invisible death ..."

"Now don't panic, girl!" Milo reproved. "I hardly think the whoresons would go so far as to use nuclear weapons, not with one or more of their own well within range and unprotected. But as I've often said before, I don't want to see the ancient technology reintroduced. I want this new world to develop its own.

"At any rate, I want you here as soon as possible, you and the troops. Knowing you, you've probably ridden ahead with most of the cavalry. Just how close are you? How much of a force is with you? And how far back is the main body?"

Beaming, "Just a moment," she threw off the blankets and padded the few steps to the small folding table. Dis-regarding the night chill which prickled every square inch of her bare skin, she extracted a map from a tooled leather case, unrolled it, and anchoring one end with the watch lantern, pored over it for a few moments. "About sixty-three kaiee, Milo, a little less than forty clanmiles. If I break camp at dawn, I can have my immediate force there by midafternoon. I've got only a little over twenty-seven hundred horsemen with me-two thousand kahtahfrahktoee, five hundred lancers, and two hundred of my bodyguard. The rest of the cavalry is with the infantry and the trains, and they're on the Traderoad, maybe two days behind us."

"Does your map show Morguhn Hall, Aldora?"

After a brief pause, "Yes, near a tributary to the river we just forded. Roughly nine kaiee north of Morguhnpolis and a little east, perhaps an hour less marching time . .. say we'll be there by early afternoon, then."

"No, not good enough," Milo retorted. "That still might be too late. Break camp now and be on the march within the hour."

She protested, "But Milo, both the men and the horses are worn very thin, and many of the cats have had to be mounted. The entire force needs one good night's rest, if they're to be in any decent shape to fight tomorrow."

"It just can't be helped," he brusquely replied. "I want you here as soon as possible, for we're under siege even now-several thousands of them against a garrison of perhaps a hundred. True, most of the rebels are poorly armed rabble at best, but with the suspicion of Gold's wild card in the game . . . besides, I doubt your force will have to do any fighting when they get here. The mob we're facing have damn-all discipline and were very nearly routed when we beat off the first attack. Show them two-and-a-half thousand mounted Regulars, and chances are they'll scatter to every point of the compass."

Grudgingly, she acquiesced. "All right, all right, Milo, we'll march tonight. Can we use the roads?"

"It doesn't really matter, Aldora. Most of the rebels are here, and so too are most of the loyalists. A small party of Kindred, led by Clan Bard Hail Morguhn is missing, but I've scant hope for them.

"It will have to be the Gafnee Drill, I suppose. Individuals or groups will be considered hostile until definitely proven to be friendly. Any who refuse to surrender immediately are to be slain. When you're within my farspeak range, let me know. Questions?"

"Yes. Should I send a galloper to the main column? Do you want them to force their marches as well?"

"It might not be a bad idea," he assented. "Tell Lukos to secure Kehnooryos Deskati-since it's the home city of that bastard Myros, it's probably rotten to the core with this rebellion. He's to kill or lock up everyone with even a soupson of authority. As for those damned priests, it might be well if they all die while trying to escape. Then he's to camp there until sent for."

Aldora was an old campaigner and wasted no time. While she was donning her thick, soft cotton undergarments, she mindspoke the two squadron commanders of her kahtahfrahktoee (Bili would have called such troops "dragoons"), the Subkeeleeohstos of the lancers, and the captain of her bodyguard. While still she was lacing leather shirt to leatherfaced canvas breeches, bugles commenced to blare. Then two of her horse archers entered the tent. Without a word, one began to repack her saddlebags and roll her blankets, while the other assisted her into boots and cuirass. He cinched the dirk belt with its depending skirt of mail round her slender waist, then thrust the heavy dirk into its frog, buckled the brassarts about her upper arms and the shoulder pieces above them. When the palettes protecting her armpits were in place, he deftly arranged the long ebon hair into two thick braids and lapped them over the crown of her small head, Horseclans-fashion, to provide helmet padding. Once her neck and throat were wound with several thicknesses of absorbent cotton cloth, a gorget of Pitzburk was buckled on.

She drew on her gold-stitched gauntlets while the spearman was adjusting her wide baldric from which was suspended her ancient Horseclans saber.

Then the archer spoke his first words. "Which helm, My Lady?"

She shrugged. "The Cat, I suppose."

The first archer was securing the last of her gear to her charger's saddle as she strode from her tent. She was barely in that saddle before the tent had been struck. Thirty minutes after the cessation of the farspeak conversation, her squadrons were on the move, light cavalry and Prairie Cats screening van and flanks.

Arrived upon the walls, Bili did not wonder that Komees Djeen had called out the garrison, for all the watchfires down by the creek were blazing, throwing clouds of red, winking sparks high into the black moonless sky. Countless dark forms scurried in and out of the rings of firelight, while a medley of shouts, the roll of drums, neighs of horses, ceaseless hammerings, and the occasional creakings of ungreased axles all blended into waves of sound which rolled up the hill and lapped against the walls.

When Bili joined the Komees and Captain Raikuh atop the corner tower closest to the enemy camp, the old man shook his hehneted head. "I don't know now. Possibly I erred in taking you all from your food, but when those bastards started milling about like flies on a dungheap, my first thought was that somehow or other that mob had been persuaded to launch a night assault, but they appear to be making no efforts to form up, so ..."

"Ho, Chief Bili," Hwahltuh Sanderz clambered up to the aerie, armed with dirk, saber, light axe, hornbow, and no less than three cases of arrows. Grinning happily he said, "My kin are all in the places Subchief Djeen said was best. Now when do we fight? Will it be soon, Kinsman?"

The old Komees frowned and shrugged. "Maybe yes, maybe no, Chief Hwahltuh. All we can be certain of is that something unusual is going on down there. It can't be the arrival of the rebels' siege tram, for their engines—such as the slapdash, jerry-built contraptions are-rolled in at twilight, along with their tents and baggage. I'll tell you all, it sounds to me like reinforcements coming into camp, which would also account for all the hubbub round about the commander's pavilion."

"But where, My Lords," asked Captain Raikuh, "would Lord Myros get more troops? Not in this Duchy certainly. Now were this the Middle Kingdoms, any one or more of your neighbor lords could well be bringing his men in to augment whichever side offered the most in the way of land or loot, but..."

"Your pardon, Captain," Bili interrupted. "There's but one way to find out the truth of what's causing the rebels to so bestir themselves, when they should be licking their wounds and getting ready to die tomorrow."

"Now, hold!" snapped Komees Djeen. "I agree, a sortie may be just the thing, especially if we can capture an officer or priest alive. But I'll not see you leading that sortie, Thoheeks Biji! If that's what you had in mind, think you you've not yet fully recovered from your wounds of that affray at the bridge. Besides, you're Chief now. It's not your place to lead attacks. You're the clan's strategist, to use army terminology; the Tahneest and the Subchiefs are the tacticians. Tahneest Djehf may not own your skill with that overgrown axe you fancy, but he's a stark warrior for all that, and he's a sound head on his shoulders. I've conversed with him-I know!"

Bill's left hand, gripping his swordhilt, was the only visible strain in his demeanor; its knuckles shone white as snow. However, when he spoke his voice was controlled, though steely-cold as a drawn blade. "Komees Djeen, I've deferred to your wisdom and experience in most aspects of warfare, as should all men here, for your knowledge of combats and sieges and weapons is truly encyclopedic. But if you think that on your word alone I'm going to climb up on the shelf and allow my brother or other men to do my fighting for me, you have seriously misjudged both my mettle and your own importance!"

Hwahltuh Sanderz laid his hand on Bili's rigid forearm. "Kinsman Chief, your words make my heart warm. From what I had seen riding through the lands south of here, I had thought that courage and honor and love of fighting had been bred out of all the eastern Kindred. But in you, I see I was mistaken. You eat Dirtman food and you wash too much, true, but for all that you live to the Law."

Then the wiry little Chief turned to the Komees, saying reprovingly, "Subchief Djeen, you give shameful advice to your Chief. He is Chief and son of a Chief. As such, his duty under The Law is to lead his clan, while your duty under The Law is to follow him. The Couplets of The Law say:

    For it is meet the old should teach the young
    Of how the bow be drawn, the saber swung.

"You are far older than Chief Bili, even older than am I. So why is it that you needs must be instructed in your proper duty?"

Komees Djeen gritted his teeth, painfully swallowing the rejoinder he would have loved to but dared not make. These wild Horseclansmen were well known both for inordinate pride and the quick tempers of stud bulls. One wrong word from him, he knew, and the feisty little bastard's steel would be out and the fat would be in the fire for fair. So he chose his words, framing his answer with exacting care.

"Chief Hwahltuh, the Law which was given the Sacred Ancestors by the Undying God Milo was formulated centuries ago for a race of man. They were for long the very salvation of that race. But, Chief Hwahltuh, they were drafted to fit the needs of a specific lifestyle. Clan Morguhn and the other forty-one clans trekked and fought their way to the sea under that Law. Their swords and their Courage and the Law sustained them through thousands of kaiee of hostile country, filled with savage beasts and bloodthirsty peoples.

"But look about you, Chief Hwahltuh, the descendants of those Horseclansmen are no longer nomads. They still breed horses and cattle, sheep and goats, some still mindspeak and hunt game, but they have adapted to a settled way of life. They have interbred with the Ehleenoee, who were the previous lords of these lands, with mountain folk and with men and women from the northern principalities.

"Over the generations since the Coming of the Horseclans, we are become a different race from those whose swords hacked their marks of ownership onto duchies such as this one. As we changed racially, so too did our laws and our customs. They had to, else we would have remained but a host of barbarians, squatting amidst the charred ruins of a once civilized land.

"The number of these changes of the Law is legion, but the change which here affects us is this: Our Clan Chief is expected to be ruler, administrator, judge. It is thought good for him to be an experienced warrior, aggressive and unafraid to see blood spilled or to have swords drawn when such be necessary, and to know warfare well. But it is frowned upon, and highly unusual, for a Chief to lead into actual combat, for the loss of a good Chief would be crushing. So while the Chief plans the movements of his forces, it is the function of the Tahneest to see that those plans are carried out-it is almost the only function of the Clan Tahneest, in our society.

"Bili has been Chief for less than a day, Chief Hwahltuh. Further, for the last ten years he dwelt in a distant and alien land. That he now recalls as much as he does of our laws and customs is in itself amazing and indicative of his rare mental abilities and the priceless value of his Chieftainship in years to come. I feel sure that he will prove the best Morguhn of Morguhn within memory, if I and the others can keep him alive.

"Now Bili's uncle, who was Tahneest under his father, is dead, murdered by those would-be soldiers down there. Djehf Morguhn, who as Bili's oldest brother is now Tahneest, lacks our Bili's phenomenal memory, so remembers less than he. Under these conditions, it should be the function of Clan Bard Hail to cleave to the new Chiefs side, instructing and counseling him until he is conversant with all aspects of his new position, but I fear that poor Hail too has gone to Wind, so the Clan Bard's task is fallen upon Komees Hari, Vahrohnos Spiros, and me, who are the senior Subchiefs.

"Chief Hwahltuh, Chief Bili's youthful impetuosity must be curbed, and the sooner the better. For a Chief who is ruled by his emotions, rather than by law and custom and considered judgment, is dangerous to the wellbeing of his clan!"

They left by way of rope ladders, down one of the darkest sections of wall, all except the two Cats, who simply jumped **to them, piddling-fifteen feet. Djehf and Pawl Raikuh led a dozen hardboiled Freefighters, while Chief Hwahltuh and Subchief Mak Sanderz headed six of their best bowmen, Komees Djeen having flatly refused to permit any more of the valuable Horseclans archers to be risked-and Hwahltuh's temper be damned.

Several minutes later, Milo landed on the balls of his feet, his knees flexed to absorb the impact. After a deliberate roll, he came to a stop beside Whitetip, who had preceded him down the slope. In his own ears, the muted clashing of his armor had sounded loud as an alarum bell, but so tumultuous was the hurrah from the siege lines, that he doubted any had remarked upon his noise.

Gliding into a patch of more Stygian darkness, he stood up and brushed at the ankle-length, black cassock which covered his armor. Dropping his helm but retaining the steel skullcap, he donned a flatcrowned, brimless hat of fine black felt. He gingerly patted and tugged at the false beard-full and black and square-cut-to see that it had not loosened during his descent from Morguhn Hall. After another pat to be sure that the jewelled, pectoral cross of Skiros/Gold still hung from his neck, he again crouched and trotted down toward the camp, paced by Whitetip.

They halted just beyond the light of a watchfire and Milo rapidly took in the scene spread before him. Far to his left, perhaps a hundred yards away, lay the pavilions of the officers and priests with several scores of figures clustered about the largest. Some of these figures held horses, some stood in groups talking earnestly, some scurried to and fro. Just as a party emerged from the big pavilion, Milo's attention was distracted by happenings nearer to hand.

A huge wain, drawn by two span of brawny white mules, trundled into the circle of red yellow light, conveyance and draft animals still wet and muddy from the ford. Two bawling, whip-wielding horsemen preceded it, mercilessly clearing a right of way by dint of pain and curses. Four mounted subpriests flanked the high-wheeled cart, a full priest drove the team, and a big man in the rich robes of a Kooreeos bestrode a fine, white-stockinged chestnut behind. On this last cleric's broad chest, the firelight was reflected in the jewels of a cross identical to that now worn by Milo.

Absently, the High Lord fingered the cross, and under a finger, one of the jewels sank smoothly into its setting. The cross commenced a low, persistent buzzing then, and from its right arm, a rounded plastic cone popped out to dangle from a slender wire.

The mounted Kooreeos suddenly raised his cross to his lips, at the same time placing his right hand to his ear. His bearded lips moved and from a seemingly vast distance Milo heard a tinny voice, though he could make out no words.

Wonderingly, he brought his own big cross near his mouth. A tentative pull at the cone caused a bit more wire to emerge, just enough to allow him to insert the cone in his ear.

". . . dy? Where in hell are you?" The voice came in clearly. "These damned transceivers never have worked consistently. Those five-thumbed apes that Dumb-dumb Bob May has in Electronics Engineering-I doubt if any one of them can wipe their butts properly! Goldy? Goldy, can you hear me?"

Slurring his words, Milo answered, "Loud and clear."

"Have they still got you chained up in that cellar, Goldy?" demanded the voice, adding, "There's some sort of distortion in my reception, you sound odd."



Milo thought fast, then slurred his transmission even more. "No, ish not your shet. Get hit in mouf. Shwollen."

"Sadistic bastards!" snarled the other. "Well, we'll have you out of there soon, Goldy, just hold on. I've brought enough impact bombs to level a city, much less that mole-hill up there!"

Face still puffy and discolored from the beating cheerfully given him by the bodyguards of Vahrohnos Myros, a spike-bearded man Bili would have recognized as the enemy leader at the bridge fight sat in a small, ill-equpped tent with a couple of his subordinates, circulating a skin of inferior wine. Their minuscule condotta of professionals constituted the only reliable troops in the "army" and said professionals knew it, even if their employers affected to not know.

During the months that the three officers, their sergeants, and men had devoted to almost uniformly vain attempts to make soldiers of rabble, they had come to hate their students almost as much as they despised their mealy-mouthed, pennypinching employers. Now all of them-the officers in the sole tent they had been allowed, and the sergeants and men squatting about the fires- were softly chortling over various aspects of the late after-noon's abortive assault and trading gallows-humorous speculations on exactly what would transpire when next their "comrades in arms" could be beaten or chivvied up the hill to once more face the tough little band within Morguhn Hall.

"If I thought for even one moment-" the captain moved his lips as little as possible and his words hissed through the void created by the recent loss of a couple of front teeth. "-that those feisty bastards up there stood even an outside chance of winning, of holding off this stinking mob ..."

The younger of the two lieutenants slowly nodded. "I think that most of us feel just that way too. The Thoheeks is all man and he commands men. We're here surrounded by a vast herd of rooting swine!"

"We'll be smart not to talk what-all we feels," put in the older lieutenant brusquely. "How do we know who's a-listnin'? And I sure-lord don't wanta be the one as is caught plottin' against the Vahrohnos! 'Sides, the rein-forcements what come in tonight and the others what'll be here t'morra from Thoheekseen Vawn, they all knows what it is to win, so they'll really fight. And the half a hunnerd the Thoheeks is got jest ain't enough to hol' thet place aginst no real assault."

The younger lieutenant assumed an exaggeratedly sanctimonious pose and expression, while his .voice mocked the emoting tones of a priest. "And forget you not, Brothers in God, we fight not for base gold, but for The True Faith; not for crass loot, but for our souls' salvation!"

The captain made a rude noise and instantly regretted the pain it brought to his battered face.

"Mebbe!" snorted the other lieutenant. "But me, I don't give a cowpat fer them furfaces and alia this here religious hogwash!" He slapped his wellworn hilt. "You guys is Ehleenee. Well I ain't, and Uncle Sharptooth here. He's the onlies' deesunt god fer a soljer. And when I fights, by cracky I fights for loot!"

"Yes," agreed the younger. "Loot is the reason most soldiers fight. But there is honor, as well. The Steel God of you barbarians demands that, above all."

The spikebeard took another long draught of the foul wine, then commented, "Well, it's scant honor any of us will bear from this campaign. I thought this was to be an honest civil war when I took gold and swore my oath and set about recruiting most of you. Fah! And here we are, helping a lunatic pervert and a gaggle of fanatic priests and a gang of gallows-bait commoners murder their rightful lords. We . . . Now what in thunder has got into the horses?"

Although theirs was but a small picketline, a certain amount of noise was a normal occurrence throughout any night, for these were all high-spirited warhorses, many of them uncut stallions and all bred and trained to fight. Of course, it was standard operating procedure in any war-camp that mares were picketed well away from full horses, but even so random bites and the occasional shrill combat were not uncommon. So the veteran cavalrymen had ignored the stampings and snortings and whinnyings, and even the first scream or two.

But now there had erupted a veritable chorus of high-pitched screams, screams not of rage but fear! The entire length of the horselines were vocalizing unmistakable terror. Nostrils dilated and eyes rolling whitely, they reared and jerked at the restraints without visible cause.

Abruptly, a picketline went down and twoscore of the fear-mad chargers fled mindlessly through the crowded camp, trampling or savaging all who sought to halt them! And unseen in the darkness and confusion, Lover-Of-Water and young Steelclaws loped away toward their next assignment, leaving Myros's tiny cavalry-arm in utter chaos.

But the cavalry encampment was concealed from the sight of the headquarters area by an undulation of the terrain. The tumult was effectively swallowed by distance and the general racket of the intervening camps. It was not until screams of mortal agony smote their ears that some score of officers and priests came boiling out of Myros's pavilion, the men of Vawn tired and worn by their long, forced march and those of Morguhn all in some measure tiddly of a surfeit of the Vahrohnos's strong wines.

By then it was too late. Dozens of Sanderz firearrows had set the wagons and the stores and most of the newly assembled war engines ablaze. Out of the darkness, swarms of black-lacquered shafts buzzed, bearing the sting of death to any and all who sought to subdue the blazes. A cask of strong cordial in one of the wagons exploded with a dull boom, showering glowing sparks and bits of flaming wood onto the fringes of the closely grouped officers' tents. The blue and green flames from the waterproofed canvas were soon rising higher and hotter than the red and yellow conflagration of the siege train.

While the knot of temporal and spiritual leaders reeled in exhausted or drunken confusion, shouting meaningless or contradictory orders to servants or horseholders or empty air, a volley of heavy, well-aimed darts thudded in among them. A second volley took out most of the horse-holders. Then a horde of coal black, demonic figures were among the terrified survivors, their swords and sabers and light axes hacking a wide swath of bloody ruin.

Myros had donned his ornate dress armor for the purpose of meeting his incoming allies, but the armor of his officers still lay within his pavilion; so they and the unarmed priests had suffered most heavily from the darts. The armed and armored officers of Vawn valiantly drew their steel and at least slowed the attackers. The Vahrohnos tore a target from the deathgrip of an officer whose eyesocket sprouted two feet of dartshaft, then trotted over with naked sword to take his place amongst the dwindling ranks of the Vawnee.

Those officers and priests not dead or dying fled in every direction, their terrified shrieks lost in the cacaphony of the burning camps. For his own part, "Captain" Nathos Evrehos, the goldsmith-moneylender, ran sobbing into the inky void, his face streaked with his tears and his legs streaked with his dung.

"But, 'm not inna hall," slurred Milo into the pectoral cross. "Shcaped."

"Capital, Goldy!" crowed the mounted Kooreeos, his broad grin distinct from where Milo stood. "Capital! Where are you, now?"

Whitetip's farspeak had reached first the familiar mind of Rik Sanderz, and it was that young clansman and one of his kin who opened the rear gates that Milo might drive the mules and the heavy burden they drew-now increased by the weight of the unconscious Kooreeos of Vawn. The handsome chestnut, captivated by Milo's mindspeak, trotted along behind the warn. The faces of the two clansmen were wreathed in grins at the Bard's successful exploit

But there was no hint of a smile on the hard face of the Thoheeks, only restrained ferocity. Not even the warm glow of the torches could thaw the icy stare which bored into the blackrobed back, as Milo descended from the lofty driver's seat and ripped off the hot, itchy "beard."

Bili's words were clipped and cold rage was in his voice. "Bard Klairuhnz, I assigned you to a critically important post. You saw fit to desert that post. There is but one fitting punishment for such an action at so grave a time as the present." His huge axe was gripped in his right hand and with his left he drew his dirk, saying, "You once fought well and faithfully for me, Kinsman, so I now allow you a choice. Will I take your head with my axe or heart-thrust you with the dirk?"

The corner of Milo's eye caught a stiff flickering of a white-tipped tail, as the great feline crouched and tensed to spring. "No!" he beamed urgently. "Let be, Cat-brother. This is as quick a way as any to confirm to the lad my true identity."

"The dirk, I think, Lord Bili," answered Milo, gravely. "But, for that, I must remove my brigandine."

At that, he doffed the robe and cross, loosened the crotch strap, grasped the hem of the steel-lined garment, and started to pull it over his head. In a blur of movement, Bili tossed axe to left and dirk to right hand, and his hard, true, straight-armed thrust thudded home between Milo's ribs, the force of the blow slamming him back against the high wheel of the warn.

Rik and the other Sanderz man gripped their sun medallions, but took in the deed with impassive faces. For Bill was a Chief and Bard Klairuhnz apparently had been his oathman. He had not attempted to dissuade his Chief, nor to stave off the execution, so obviously had he deemed death his just punishment. Their own Chief had admonished them that they must all bide by the ways of this land. Besides, they recognized their unpleasant affair to be none of Clan Sanderz's business.

Komees Djeen's limping run brought him to his young lord's side just as the dirk came free with ah obscene, sucking pop, and blood, glistening black in the torchlight, gushed forth to soak the shut above the wound.

"You damned thick-skulled young fool!" snarled the old man, furiously jerking Bili about. "You're not in Harzburk, dammit, what you've just done is murder! You . . . Sun and Wind!" His contorted, livid features suddenly slackened and blanched to the hue of curds, while his faded-blue eye seemed about to spring from its socket.

Bili whirled around, then unconsciously stepped back, his own eyes flitting back and forth between his blood-slimed dirk and his "victim."

Milo finished pulling the brigandine over his head and with it the blue black wig which had covered his own, close-cropped grey-and-black hair. He smiled fleetingly at the stunned Thoheeks, then inserted a forefinger into first one cheek, then the other, wincing as he tore loose lumpy strips of some substance which had served to alter the shape of his face.

Then the "dead man" pulled off his shirt and Bili could see that the wide wound his blade had inflicted had almost ceased to bleed. His confused brain spun frenetically, registering what it saw, yet knowing that such could not be ... unless ...

Komees Djeen's sword came from its case in one smooth movement; then its hilt crashed against his breast-plate in a stiff, military salute, as he croaked, "My Lord, My Dear Lord...!"

Almost simultaneously did two Sanderz sabers come out to render Horseclan honors, while two awestruck voices murmured, "God Milo!"

It was nearly an hour more before the sortiers straggled back to the hall. Although they had failed to capture any officer or priest, they had retired in good order, bearing with them both their wounded and their dead. But even when the last of them were sprawled gasping within the walls, the clash of arms still sounded from the creekside camps, as leaderless bands of hopelessly bewildered men took similar bands for the enemy in the darkness between fires. And the murderous chaos went on until the first roseate streaks of dawn were tinting the eastern sky.

When the coppery vanguard of Sacred Sun breasted the horizon, most of the garrison of the beleaguered hall gathered in the rear courtyard. While Clan Bard Gil sang first The Lament of Morguhn, then The Lament of Sanderz, the bodies were borne from indoors**in  stately procession, laid upon the enlarged pyre, and torches were set to its four corners by Bili, Spiros, Hwahltuh, and Raikuh.

Slowly at first, then ever more rapidly, the tongues of flame took hold and crept higher and higher, then began to nibble at the pitch-soaked boards whereon lay the seven corpses. Bili gazed woodenly but once more upon the faces of his kin and those who had fought for him, and stepped back as the heat became uncomfortable.

The column of smoke rose up and up and up, high into the pale-blue dawning sky, until a high-altitude current struck it powerfully and sent its tendrils roiling away to the west.

Hwahltuh and his clansmen stood bunched together, touching one another for comfort, whilst unashamed tears streaked their faces-tears not only for the losses of two loved kinsmen, but for pride that the smoke of Sanderz men should be borne to the Home of Sacred Wind in company with that of a Chief and his brave son. The Freefighters stood at attention behind their captain, with no need to force the appearance of emotionlessness, for-like eating, drinking, wenching, gambling, and fighting-death was but another facet of the existence of a professional soldier.

Despite himself, old Komees Djeen, standing ramrod-stiff at Milo's left rear, felt moisture creeping from his eye and down the folds and puckers and wrinkles of his leathery cheek. For his part Vahrohnos Spiros wept as openly as the Sanderz men.

Bili was the first upon the walls when the tower watch winded the alarm bugle. But he could see nothing other than individuals and small groups shuffling about the charred and bloody wreckage of the rebel encampments. So he quickly ascended the nearest tower. And there he did not need the guard's pointing spear to show him.

When the leading elements of Confederation cavalry were reported by the Vawnee scouts, the few remaining officers betook themselves to the commander's pavilion, but it stood empty and stripped of all small valuables. Vahrohnos Myros, the senior subpriest, Rikos, and their guards were nowhere to be found! As the highest ranking noble remaining, Vahrohneeskos Drehkos Daiviz found himself in command of the self-battered siege forces.

If no soldier, Drehkos was at least a good administrator; so after sending the scouts back to their posts with orders to keep him informed of the progress of the leading force and the approximate size of the main element, he assembled such staff as was available and commenced a riding tour of the wrecked, wretched camps to assess just what he was in command of. Within the hour, he had ordered and was supervising immediate and rapid withdrawal to Morguhnpolis!

Leaning between the merlons, Bili shouted down to the Freefighter bugler, "You, trooper! Sound first the Officers' Call, then the Assembly!"

The Freefighter had not completed the first call ere the young Thoheeks was down from the tower and racing along the wallwalk toward the hall. The large central chamber was still filling up when he arrived, buckling on his gorget, the straps of his hastily donned cuirass dangling loose. As he gained the dais and strode to his place at the high table, Komees Djeen stumped up to confront him, angrily demanding:

"Now just what in hell do you think you're up to? Have you no respect for the rites due your father and the honors for your poor, brave brother?"

"Who would not be dead, remember, had I not, against my better judgment, heeded your overly cautious advice and given into his leadership the raid I planned and should have led!" Ice crackled in Dili's voice and stare, and his tone brooked no argument. "Now you heed me, Lord Djeen, and heed me well, for I shall not repeat my words! You are a man grown old in war and there is much I may learn from you, but I will learn when and as I wish to learn, not at your pleasure!

"Sacred Sun has made of me your rightful lord, not the reverse. Do not delude yourself into the belief that I will longer tolerate your browbeating. In the future, you will either obey my orders, or you have my leave to forthwith depart my presence! I tell you this before the face of Him who is the Ancient God of our ancestors and present overlord of us all.

"I know that you have meant well and that command is become habitual with you, but you have left me no choice, Lord Djeen. You must realize that although you are a Count and have been a General, I am a Duke and, my age notwithstanding, your temporal superior!

"Am I understood, Lord Djeen?"

"Perfectly, My Lord Thoheeks." The Komees's, words came as stiff as his military posture, but his eye showed grudging respect. "I await your orders."

"Very good," Bili nodded, then signed Raikuh's lieutenant to do up the loose straps of his armor while he spoke on. "Our erstwhile besiegers are breaking camp and withdrawing in some haste. Even as I quitted the watch-tower, a large body of cavalry forded the creek and rode west, toward Morguhnpolis, I assume. Without horsemen to protect them, those rebel foot will be ripe for the slaughter and I mean to butcher me as many as I can lay axe to.

"You and Kinsman Sami will again have command of the hall. I will leave you Kinsman Vaskos, the six walking wounded, and your personal Freefighters."

Wordlessly, the old Strahteegos saluted, turned about, and stumped off, trailed by Vaskos and the castellan.

"Chief Hwahltuh, Captain Raikuh, get your men armed and mounted. Ill expect the column to be formed up and ready in fifteen minutes."

The little Chief whooped delightedly, vaulted the table, and sped toward the door, his shouting, laughing clansmen close behind him. Raikuh nodded his acknowledgment and saluted, but even he could not repress a grin.

Komees Hari stepped forward. "Bili . . . uh, My Lord Thoheeks, I may be old, but.. ."

Bili smiled warmly. "But you're not too old to swing a sword, eh? I had no thought of leaving you and our other Kinsmen behind, Lord Hari. It is only because he is wounded that I ordered your son to remain. But all of you hurry and get armed, for I want no unnecessary delay. I want to rout those bastards!"

When the nobles were gone, only Milo and Master Ahlee remained with Bili on the dais. "And I?" inquired the whiterobed physician. "What would the Lord Thoheeks have me to do?"

Bili smiled again. "Whatever you wish, Lord Ahlee, for you have served me and my House well. I know you to be a stark warrior, for all that you profess to be a man of peace. You may remain with your patients or you may ride with me."

Ahlee's gentle smile answered Bili's. "Young Eeshmaheel is become as accomplished a physician as am I.

Indeed, he already has a Volunteer apprentice,' so the wounded here can receive no better care from me. I had long forgotten how exhilarating is combat. I will fetch my blade and see to my horse."

"And me, Bili?" inquired Milo.

The smile slipped from the young Thoheeks" face. "Who am I to give orders to My Lord?" he answered uncomfortably, the memory of his attempt to execute this more-than-man still painfully fresh in his mind.

"No, Bili," Milo mindspoke. "Put that from your thoughts. I knew your intention and could easily have stopped you, had I so desired.

"But that was last night. May I ride with your force this morning?"

"Any sound horse in my stables is yours, My Lord," Bili silently assured him. "I will be most honored to do whatever the High Lord commands."

Milo grinned. "Remember that promise, Bili; for are you truly that which I believe you to be. I have great plans for you.

"But for now, for a little while longer, think of me only as your distant-Kinsman Klairuhnz, and command me as you would him. You see, young Bili, the life of a High Lord is often boring, and I must return to that life soon enough.

"Now," he smiled, "shall we go and see if that witchman's big chestnut is the charger he claims to be?"

PROLOGUE

The shaven scalp of the tall, broad-shouldered young warrior glinted in the light of the rising sun, as did the burnished surfaces of his suit of three-quarter armor and the dolphin-shaped silver goblet in his right hand. Though heavier and squarely masculine, his face bore a startling similarity to those of the two tall, handsome women who stood before him, their hair but slightly darker than his bushy cornsilk eyebrows.

The large, battlemented building, atop the flat roof of which they stood, was known as Morguhn Hall and was the young man's ancestral home. The hall crowned a gently sloping hill and, to north, south, east and west, as far as the eye might see, the fields and woodlands and rolling leas were all his domain, the Thoheekahtohn of Morguhn.

To their left, a tall column of smoke arose from the rear courtyard, wherein had been laid the funeral pyre of the man who had been husband to the two women and father to the young warrior. Though the man had died of natural causes, the six hacked corpses which had shared his pyre had fallen in battle just hours before their cremations; among them had been a younger son of the two women, Djef Morguhn.

As the hall had but recently been invested, the bailey to their right lay cluttered, and jerrybuilt pens were tightly packed with hundreds of cattle, sheep and goats. The small open space remaining was now filled with above threescore stamping, whickering warhorses, astride most of which were armored and fully armed fighting men. The majority of these riders wore the scalemail hauberks and open-faced helms which identified them as Middle Kingdoms Freefighters or mercenary cavalrymen-armed with broadsword or heavy saber, two-foot hide buckler shod with iron, long, broad dirk and a few short-shafted, well-balanced darts. Ten of the horsemen were alike as peas in a pod, being Horseclansmen but recently arrived from the Sea of Grass,' thousands of kaiee to the west.

Of the remaining men, all save one were armed with broadswords and spears, and wore three-quarter plate very similar to that of the young man atop the hall. This last man, clad in a flowing white robe, was armed with daggers, a full dozen darts and a doublecurved yaghatan. Where all of the other men's faces, though tanned by sun and weather, were either olive or fair, his was the rich dark brown of old leather.

One who might have been a younger duplicate of the dark-skinned mounted man stood behind the young man on the rooftop. His name was Eeshmahehl and he was a physician from the Black Kingdoms, far away to the north and east of this land. A rail-thin lad, his own skin almost blue in its blackness, stood by the physician's side, holding with both hands a gleaming brass bowl. He was but recently freed from an odious bondage to a perverted nobleman and had voluntarily apprenticed himself to the tall, graceful brown-skinned man; his hated master had called him Peeos, but all here used his proper name, Peeair.

Eeshmahehl was placing a fresh bandage over a recent wound in the young man's scalp. As he performed this task, he talked constantly, explaining to Peeair just what he was doing and why, for so had the master physician, Ahlee, imparted his extensive knowledge to Eeshmahehl. The language he spoke was Kweebehkeekos, for, though Peeair was from an exotic land far to the south, this far-northern tongue was enough like his native speech to be easily comprehensible.

Lifting a thick cloth pad, damp with some liquid from the bowl held by Peeair, the physician briefly held the pad under the lad's fine-boned nose, slightly canted since a blow of his former master's fist had broken it "What is the smell, Peeair?"

"Brandy, master."

Eeshmahehl nodded, placed the pad over the healing wound, held it with his left hand while taking a length of rolled bandage from the compartmented bowl. "Just so, Peeair, just so. And why is the inner bandage so often soaked with brandy, do you remember?"

The boy closed his eyes and knitted his brows in concentration. "To . . . because wounds covered with such dressings seem to heal quicker and cleaner?"

"Very good, my son, very good. Ahlali has granted you a good memory, which makes me certain that the Elder Masters will quickly confirm you as my apprentice, when you return with me to Zahrtohgah. . . . Now, set down the basin, Peeair, and hand me the thoheeks" helmet."

Gingerly, the sinewy brown hands settled the weighty helm atop the thick bandages, then fumblingly commenced to thread straps through buckles.

Smiling, one of the two widows stepped forward, saying, "Please, Master Eeshmahehl, allow me. You are inexperienced at it, but my sister and I helped arm our father and brothers before we were half the age of young Peeair."

While the two women fastened the neckpiece to helm, lowered the cheekpieces, then set about checking and tightening the fit of various other components of their son's set of plate, a tall, much-scarred man of forty or so emerged from a corner tower and strode purposefully the length of the side wall, his Pitzburk plate clanking and the plume on his helm nodding.

After ascending the stone steps to the roof, he paced over to the young thoheeks, rendered a military salute and said, "The column is formed up, Duke Bill. Each horse bears a skin of watered wine and a wallet of war rations. Master Ahlee said that it would be neither painful or injurious to the beast, so I've had your black charger saddled and fitted with a chamfron."

The thoheeks nodded curtly. "Very good, captain. You may return, now. I'll join you, shortly."

Saluting once more, the officer spun and retraced his steps, while Bili embraced and kissed each of his mothers, saying, "When the Undying High Lady Aldora and her dragoons arrive, point them in the direction of the rebels' retreat. Tell them that his grace rides with us and wishes them to join us."

Mother Behrnees nodded briskly. "We will, Bili. But, ere you ride . . . you really should make your peace with Count Djeen."

Bili's mouth thinned into a grim line. There is no peace to be made, Mother. The tail does not wag the dog. I, not Count Djeen, am lord here, a fact which I had to make abundantly clear to him!"

Mother Mahrnee's blond braids swished as she shook her head. "Admittedly, he did provoke you, son, but he is a very proud man. You could have taken him to a place apart. You should not have humiliated him before everyone in the hall."

The thoheeks snorted harshly. "When did he hesitate to call me to task, to question my every word, before whoever happened to be nearby, Mother? No, the time was overripe for him and everyone else to be made aware that this is now my duchy and that I will order it and its affairs in my way. Now, I must go."

When the last scale-clad trooper had cleared the courtyard, Feelahks Sami Kahrtuh, the castellan, saw the heavy, thick gates shut and the two massive bars dropped into place, but the outer grille of wrought iron he left raised, for with the would-be rebels in full flight, hotly pursued by Duke Bili's stout little band, there were no rams to threaten the entry portals.

Old Komees Djeen Morguhn, retired strahteegos of the Confederation Army and a soldier for most of his sixty-odd years, limped along the length of the wall and up the stairs to the roof, where the ladies still stood, watching their son's column re-form and set off down the hill at a brisk trot. The plates of the old man's set of proof scraped loudly each time he leaned against the wall to swing his stiff leg up onto the next step. His visor was raised so his one eye might do the work of two, and the shiny brass hook which had replaced his left hand sparkled in the morning sunlight.

He limped over to the ladies, muttering, "Damned foolishness, that's what it is, and no mistake! Probably get himself and half his troop killed for a piece of senseless stupidity! The tower has already spotted the van of the Confederation kahtahfrahktoee, why not let professionals handle this matter of pursuit and harassment, eh?"

"Sun and Wind, my lord count," snapped Mother Behrnees, "what do you want? For more years than I care to recall, you chivvied our Bili's father to forsake his passive, peaceful ways. Now you would condemn the son for being actively warlike! But I think you've learned better than to do so to his face, have you not?"

The scarred, wrinkled features flushed hotly. "The young whippersnapper! To so abase me before my wife and daughter and everyone else in this hall! And after all I've done and tried to do for him! That act, alone, shows how dangerous is his immaturity!"

"Now hold!" Mother Mahrnee's tone was cold and brittle as midwinter ice. "Lord count, think you. When did you ever shrink from patronizing or upbraiding Bili before all and sundry? How long did you think a proud man would submit to such abuse and humiliation?"

The nobleman's lips made as if to spit. "But he's no man, dammit, he's a murderous, hotheaded boy in a man's body. He needs guidance, discipline!"

Mother Mahrnee smiled grimly. "Bili, your lord, is less than two moons shy of eighteen summers, lord count, and he is a seasoned warrior ... as you have reason to know, would you but admit the fact He has fought battles and single combats; he has commanded men and earned their respect. King Gilbuht of Harzburk saw fit to knight him on the field, investing him with the Order of the Blue Bear!

"He has done as much as any veteran. He has bedded noblewomen and tumbled serving girls, one at least within this hall, he has fought and pillaged and razed and raped his way through at least two intakings. Though he is as stark a warrior as you are likely to meet, he is no braggart or hector, preferring to let his scars and his honors and the strength of his arm tell of his prowess."

"Fagh! The accomplishments of a northern barbarian pocket princeling!" snorted Komees Djeen, derisively. "But, as I told him, a thoheeks must have more than a strong arm and an overgrown battle-axe to rule in Morguhn! Why, the arrogant young puppy even attempted to murder the High Lord. Sun and Wind, my ladies, this isn't some blood-soaked barbarian kingdom, where the lords rule by steel and rope!"

Mother Mahrnee's laugh was harsh. "No wonder you were so successful a strahteegos-your maneuvers were nothing short of amazing! Up until the eve of the very day that his illness claimed him, were you not urging Bili's sire to rule in that very way you now claim to abhor-badgering him to hang the Ehleen hooreeos and all his priests, and to have off the heads of Vahrohnos Myros and half a score of petty lords of the old blood! One might think, on the basis of your past preachments, that you'd be overjoyed with your new lord, not ceaselessly nitpicking and criticizing him in public and in private."

The old man stamped a foot in his angry frustration. "But last night, to try to slay a Kinsman over so petty a matter-"

"The High Lord does not fault him," stated Mother Mahrnee flatly. "Why then should you? The High Lord told my sister and me that, had he been in Bill's place, considering last night's dangers and turmoil, he might well have done the same thing to a subordinate-Kinsman or no-who had seen fit to disobey orders and desert his assigned post. I repeat, Count Djeen, why do you continue to harp on a matter which the Undying High Lord, who was the only injured party, has seen fit to utterly dismiss?

"I'll tell you why!" Mother Behrnees' blue eyes flashed fire and her voice cracked like a lash. "Pique, petulance and pettishness are what now drive our Komees Djeen, sister! So yon waste breath trying to reason with him. Showing his breeding, Bili respected age and deferred to military experience; whereupon the good Komees seized upon this respect and deference as a lever to cant his lord in directions contrary to his nature. After swallowing far more censure and disrespect than would the average nobleman, our son enlightened Count Djeen, made it clear to him whose hand holds the whip. Count Djeen has for so long been issuing uncontested orders and manipulating the lives of younger men that he is now peeved beyond bearing to be confronted by a young man who not only owns the power to command him, but who refuses to be manipulated!"

"Madam, you go too far!" His gnarled right hand had unconsciously sought his dirk hilt and his single eye glowered.

Hotly, Mother Mahrnee's voice cut in. "Oh, no, Count Djeen, not nearly far enough! Do you truly think you'll need that dirk to still us from stating the bare truth? Or don't you think you've enough Morguhn blood on your hands?"

He opened his mouth, but so enraged was he that he could not speak, as she ruthlessly went on. "Poor Bili blames himself for his brother's death, but it is you who must bear that onus, Count Djeen. You and Spiros browbeat him into allowing Djef-who though but six moons younger was much less seasoned, having been reared at Eeree, which fights fewer wars than Harzburk and is internally peaceful-to lead last night's sortie.

"As you well know, Bili had envisaged and laid out a plan to simply fire the stores and engines, then slay as many of the officers and priests as darts or arrows could reach, capturing an officer or two, if they chanced to run in the proper direction, but on no account closing with enemies who so far outnumbered the sally band. But Djef, in his youthful inexperience, chose to disregard not only his brother's very good plan but the equally good advice of Captain Raikuh. He charged an armed and fully aroused camp with only a dozen dragoons, and no one of them even mounted! It was only because Chief Hwahltuh, seeing their predicament, led his clansmen to their aid and then covered the withdrawal with his bowmen, that they-any of them!-got back here.

"Well, Count Djeen, your insistence that all men's lives be so ordered as to always accord with your selfish dictates has exacted a high price. Six of those brave dragoons are now dead, along with two of the Sanderz clansmen. Djef paid the ultimate cost for his rashness, and Bili, because he is a man who accepts full responsibility for his actions-no matter whose words may have influenced those actions-will probably castigate himself for the rest of his life."

At last he managed to get a few words past the rage-constricted tightness of his throat. "I will now return to my duties, ladies, I-"

"You'll withdraw when you've our leave, Count Djeen!" stated Mother Behrnees. "For we are not the 'barbarian trollops' you once saw fit to name us, when you were attempting to dissuade our late husband from marrying us. No, we are the granddaughters of a duke, the daughters of a duke, the cousins-german of a duke, the sisters of a duke, the widows of a duke and the mothers of a duke! You'll accord us the respect due us or, by Sun and Wind, you'll suffer the consequences!

"Yes, Count Djeen, you might do well to remember that you no longer are dealing with poor, weak-willed Hwahruhn, whom you could accuse of foolishness and cowardice with virtual impunity. An open affront to my sister or me will be an open affront to our son; and Bili, already quite wroth at you and your arrogances, just might decide to treat you as King Gilbuht, long his mentor, would treat an impertinent noble."

"Now, by Sacred Sun, madam," grated the komees, from betwixt bared, yellow teeth, "I'll not see my homeland ruled in the bloody manner of an unlettered northern barbarian!"

"It is you who are the fool," hissed Mother Mahrnee, "not our late husband! You make a loud noise of despising the Ehleenee and their ways, yet you talk just like one, as well you should, since you are at least half-Ehleen by blood. You, of all men in this duchy, after your years of soldiering in the Middle Kingdoms, should be aware that they and their peoples are in no way barbarian. Our civilization is much different from that to which you were born, but it is in no wise inferior and, in many ways, superior to yours!"

Hate lanced from his eye as he cackled, "Ha! Hit a nerve, did I? Your kind have always been thin-skinned, proud as peacocks of the stinking middens which spawned you. Yes, I peddled my sword from Hwehlzburk to Hahrbuhnburk, and right often did I find it hard not to laugh at the unlearned apes you call noblemen-who marveled at a noble officer's abilities to read and write-even while I tried not to gag at the stenches of their long-unwashed bodies! When did one of your kind ever do anything to support your claim of civilized status, eh? They can but fight and kill, breed and wallow in their own filth and ignorance. You're, none of you, any better than the mountain barbarians; you're even of the same race!"

"Yes," nodded Mother Mahrnee. "We are of the same, ancient race as the mountain folk, and you Ehleenee would do well to remember that fact. Our race is descended in direct line from the demigods, the Mehruhkuhnz, untainted by the blood of effete Ehleenee.

"When first the Ehleenee came to this land, driving our race north and west, they were strong and valiant and honor? able foemen, but in the centuries since, while we progressed, they have either remained static or have actually regressed. It required the Coming of the Horseclans and the unstinting efforts of the Undying High Lord to infuse new purpose along with new blood and inaugurate the snail-slow process of snapping your Ehleenee ancestors out of their course of certain racial suicide.

"As for what you have said of our people, some of it is true. No, we do not take to books and quills and soaps and scented water, but you who do so would not long be contented or safe as you now are without certain of the creations and products of our own civilization. Count Djeen.

"Your good sword bears the hallmark of the Kingdom of Pitzburk, as does each piece of your armor and, indeed, most of the decent weapons and armor in this duchy! That fine velvet you wore last night at dinner was woven in the capital of our own homeland, the Duchy of Zunburk, while your boots look to be from the County of Pahtzburk. And who but Middle Kingdoms Freefighters fought the Ehleenee's wars, ere God Milo crossbred Ehleenee with Horseclansmen and forced them to become other than effeminate fops?"

"And, speaking of God Milo, Count Djeen," interjected Mother Behrnees, "he knows the folk of the Middle Kingdoms far better than do you, yet he has never slandered us. Why, then, do you take such joy in it, not just here and now, but right often in the past?"

"You may be certain," the old man smiled thinly, "that my dear lord feels precisely as I do, but he must be diplomatic in any congress with your barbarians, since your dungheaps adjoin his northern and northwestern borders, just as he must call common mercenaries 'Freefighters.' But I need not be so careful of treading on barbarian toes, for I am but-"

"You are but a fool!" The mindspeak was of terrible intensity and was broadbeamed into the minds of every mind-speaker in the hall. "You were a hidebound, opinionated, self-righteous young fool, forty years ago, Djeen Morguhn, and I can see that age has not brought you wisdom!"

Then the alarm trumpet pealed from the watchtower and Feelahks Sami bellowed, "They have forded the stream and they now approach the hall. Open the gates! Now comes the Undying High Lady Aldora Linszee Treeah-Pohtohmahs Pahpahs!"

Chapter I

Vahrohneeskos Drehkos Daiviz had gotten the last contingent of his peasant-pikemen across the stream and jogging toward Morguhnpolis before the Vawnee scouts galloped in to report the Confederation cavalry's van to be no more than some two miles distant. He was distractedly rubbing an unshaven cheek and wondering whether he should try to cover the retreat of the hapless infantry with his mere handful of mounted men when the senior of the remaining sub-priests intruded upon his reverie with a demand.

"Lord Drehkos, if it be true that the hordes of the cursed Undying be not a mile away, I must insist that our coaches be returned to us, for the lives of those who do God's work are certainly of more importance than are those of the wretches you have ordered our conveyances filled with!"

Drehkos was not at all religious. He had joined the rebellion for the avowed purpose of gaining his brother's landa and title. His answer was heavily larded with studied irreverence. "Reverend Father, if you and your fellow 'servants of God' expect to reach Morguhnpolis other than on your well-shod feet, perhaps you had best start praying that God quickly grant you wings. You can blame Lord Myros and Father Rikos for the fact you have to walk; for had they not taken the last of the sound and usable wagons when they- ahhhh, shall we say, "proceeded* our departure last night- you'd be able to ride in the style to which you feel entitled. But III be damned if I intend to leave behind wounded officers and men, simply so priestly feet might be spared a few honest blisters!

"Now, go away and leave me alone! Fve weightier things to consider than your possible discomforts."

With the departure of the glowering priest, Drehkos returned to his ponderings. For the first time in his life, he regretted not riding north in his youth to serve as a Freefighter in the Middle Kingdoms with Djeen Morguhn, as had so many others of the young Kindred nobility. If he had, at least, he might now have a bare glimmering of his best course to follow, might not now be in this sorry mess. Finally, he sent for the only professional officer left after the previous Bight's chaos and carnage.

Shortly, the barbarian sublieutenant ambled in, his battered helmet sitting askew over his bandaged head. "You wanta talk to me, Lord Drehkos?"

Drehkos gestured at the other chair, charred slightly, like his own. When the skinny, long-bodied man had seated himself, the commander outlined the overall situation, admitted his own ignorance, and bluntly asked what he should do.

The reply was just as blunt. "Lord Drehkos, including me, it ain't but twenny real soljers left. Mosta them Vawnees done been long gone, an" I cain't say I blames 'em none. The only ones in this whole kit-and-kaboodle what has any chance of getting back to Morguhnpolis is the horsemen and, mebbe* them there coaches. Them pike-toters is dead meat no matter how you riggers it, and you and us a-gittin' ourselves kilt long with 'em ain't gonna do nobody no good.

"Way I sees it, there's two things you can do, and 111 tell 'em to you. But I don't think neither one's gonna set in your craw too good." He paused, raising his grizzled brows in an unspoken question.

"Don't fear to speak, Lieutenant Hohguhn," smiled Drehkos. "I'm not Lord Myros. I don't punish men for speaking the truth as they see it, no matter how distasteful that truth may be to me."

"Wai, Lord Drehkos, if I *uz you, Fd ride up yonder and surrender and see if I couldn't git my lord to go easy on my men, even if he wouldn't on me!"

Drehkos shook his head slowly. "Would that I could, lieutenant, but I don't think that that gesture would accomplish anything. I've met Thoheeks Bili, both in friendship and in enmity, and I've found him hard as steel. He was reared in Harzburk and tutored at the court of King Gilbuht, if you know what that means."

Hohguhn nodded vehemently. "I shore do, Lord Drehkos, I shore do, and you're right as rain, too. Won't do no particle of good to expeck no mercy off one of the Iron King's folks. Only thing you and your officers and them few Vawnees can do now is make tracks for Morguhnpolis, and I shorely do wish you luck."

"You won't be riding with us then, Hohguhn?"

The lieutenant looked the nobleman squarely in the eye. "No suh, I won't, and neither will none of my men."

"May I ask why, good Hohguhn? I'll not hold your answer against you."

The officer cracked his scarred knuckles before answering. "Wai, Lord Drehkos, it's thisaway. We's all Freefighters and we ain't been paid in near three moons, but we *uz all willing to stick around, long as it looked like we might get some loot, no matter how common Lord Myros treated us; but didn't none of us sign on to fight the Confederation Army or to die in a losing fight for no pay but rotten rations and horsepiss wine and hard words."

He glanced around uncomfortably, then leaned forward and spoke in a much-lowered voice. "Lord Drehkos, you done treated us better all along then any of the others', so 111 level with you. You cain't hold Morguhnpolis! Them old walls ain't near thick nor high enough, and mosta the engines whut wuz burnt up las' night was took off of them walls, so Morguhnpolis ain't nuthin* now but a big oP rat trap. Don't you git yourself caught in it, Lord Drehkos. You just keep on by. You don't look like no Ehleen, so mebbe the mountain folks'll take you in. This all's just 'tween you and me, you un-nerstan'."

The skinny officer stood and extended his hand. Soberly, Drehkos arose and gripped the officer's grubby, broken-nailed hand as if he had been an equal, saying, "I thank you, Hohguhn, I thank you for everything. Now, let me advise you, if I may. Your men may, of course, take anything left in the camps that strikes their fancy, but don't linger too long, lest you be taken for a rearguard and attacked."

From the top of the hill, the camps appeared deserted. Nonetheless, Bili rode with his visor down and his uncased axe laid ready across his wide-flaring pommel. While he had ridden through the dark, narrow passage to the gate, he had mindspoken his warhorse, Mahvros, reaffirming their brotherhood and telling him how much he regretted their enforced separation and how pleased he was to be once more able to ride into battle astride one on whom he could depend. Nor was any of it untrue, for Bili actually felt kinship with the devoted stallion, had felt his own wounds no more keenly than he had the horse's at the embattled bridge where he and the High Lord and Vahrohneeskos Ahndee had stood off a score or more of mounted rebels. Had it only been less than a week since that affray? It seemed a lifetime-and he well knew how important to a warrior's safety was the cooperation of a disciplined and courageous mount.

As for Mahvros, he all but purred! Once clear of the gate, he arched his steel-clad neck and lifted his white-stockinged feet high in his showiest parade strut, his powerful thews rolling under his glossy black hide. Mahvros loved nothing more than a good blood-spurting fight, and his brother had told him that soon there would be two-legs in plenty to savage and kick.

Bili spoke aloud, for though Chief Hwahltuh Sanderz, who rode at his right, could mindspeak, Captain Pawl Raikuh, on his left, could not.

"Captain, should I fall. Baron Spiros Morguhn will be acting duke until my brother, Tcharlee, can get here from Pitzburk. You are a brave and honorable man and you have served me well-serve them equally. Command of the present warband will devolve upon the Undying High Lord.

"Regarding the rebels, the only men I want taken alive are those damned priests and the treacherous nobles, but no man is to chance undue risks simply to capture them. I would like to have the bastards for public torture and execution, but none of them are worth the lives of any of your men, and I'll settle for just their heads, if it comes to that

"As for the common scum, I want to see no living ones along our track. Understood?" At his companions' grim nods, he went on.

"Save your darts and arrows for the unlikely event that someone persuades the pigs to make a stand, or for later, when the horses are too blown to run them down; for now, let's have sword and axe and spear work. And, since our numbers be small, we'd best stay together until we're certain there's no organized rearguard to hack through. We-What's this?"

A broadbeamed mindspeak from Chief Hwahltuh and a hand signal from Captain Raikuh brought troopers and clansmen into line of battle on the flanks of the three leaders. Then every eye was fixed upon the tall, broad form of the young thoheeks, awaiting his word or gesture to charge the small band which had emerged from a fold of ground and was now moving slowly up the hill.

Bili raised his visor for better visibility and kneed Mahvros forward a few yards, then a few yards more, until he could clearly see the approaching men. Only the leading six were mounted, though several others led limping horses or saddled mules. The foremost, a skinny man whose dented helmet bore the horsehair crest of a commoner officer, was gripping his sheathed sword by the tip and holding it high over his head. Noting Bill's advanced position, the officer turned to halt his party, then spurred forward alone.

Bili unwound the thong from his wrist, grasped the central spike of his axe and waved the haft above his head.

"Now, what the hell is going on?" demanded the Sanderz of Raikuh.

His eyes still upon his young lord, the captain snapped, "Sword Truce. Those men must be Freefighters, probably part of Captain Manos' two troops of dragoons. But keep your eyes peeled, lord chief, and your bow ready. Sword Truce is sacred to those of us who worship Steel, but others have been known to invoke it for purposes of unhallowed treachery."

When but a yard separated the two riders, the lanky officer extended his weapon, hilt first, to Bili, who accepted it with one hand while proffering his axe with the other. Gravely, the officer raised the head of the upended axe to his lips and kissed the burnished metal. No less gravely, Bili partially drew the sword and reverently pressed his lips to the flat of the wide, well-honed blade, gently resheathed it, then returned it to its owner, accepting his axe in return. Moving up knee to knee, the men exchanged whispered words and a complicated handclasp.

Grinning, Bili laid his axe back across his pommel and relaxed against the high cantle of his warkak. "Well, Sword Brother, I hope that, if you and yours were a part of that sorry rabble just departed, you at least got paid."

Lieutenant Hohguhn smiled ruefully. "Not for the last three moons, noble Sword Brother, but Lord Drehkos, he give us leave to loot the camp, after he 'uz gone. 'Course, we would've enyhow, pay or no pay, but she were a nice touch, having permission and all."

"Well, what want you of me and the sacred Truce, Brother?" asked Bill, adding, "I must be brusque, for there is a day of bladework ahead."

Hohguhn snorted. "Butcher's work, it'll be, and no mistaking, 'less some o' them Vawnee dig up enough gumption to stand and fight."

An icy prickling crept under Bill's backplate. "Vawnee, Sword Brother? Is Thoheeks Vawn involved, then, in this sorry affair?"

"If you'd a-lissuned to whatall them Vawnee said, you'd of thought their Ehleen god'd done in the thoheeks and all his kin. But iffen you "uz raised in mountains, like me, you'd know what probly really happuned."

"Thoheeks Vawn and his Kindred are then dead?" Bill's voice was tight.

"Oh, aye, noble Sword Brother," Hohguhn stated. "Seems as how him and his got drove up inta the mountains and holed up in a old Confederation fort and they 'uz standing off the whole dang Ehleen force, then-and this here's where them Vawnee gits all walleyed and sweaty-what I figger happened was a big ole thunderstorm come on and lightning struck their wall. I tell you, I seen the like happen, up near to Pahkuhzburk, where I 'uz borned, Sword Brother. A hit like that, with a lotta thunder a-ratiling the rocks will real often set off a landslide, so when them Vawnee tolt me part o* the fort slid down the mountain, I knowed didn't no Ehleen god have nuthin to do with it.

"But, anyhow, five or six hundred of them Vawnee come a-riding in last night, fulla piss and vinegar and set to lick the whole Confederation. Leastways they wuz till all that ruckus got started. Half of 'em wuz dead afore dawn. And that wuz a right fine piece of work, that sally. Did you lead her. Sword Brother?"

"No," said Bili simply. "It was led by my birth brother, Djef, Tanist of Morguhn, now dead."

Hohguhn clasped his cased sword in both hands, saying, "Honor of the Steel to his memory. Sword Brother."

"Thank you, Sword Brother Hohguhn. But I repeat, what is it you want of me? Safe passage out of Morguhn, or employment?"

A note of ill-concealed eagerness entered the officer's voice. "You . . . you'd hire us on, then, Sword Brother?"

"Of course," Bili replied shortly. "Unless you've some compunction against drawing steel in my cause. I'll confirm you as sublieutenant and pay you as such, but you'll be under the command of Captain Raikuh, who leads my dragoons."

Hohguhn's bushy brows rose. "Pawl Raikuh, what useta be a gate sergeant at Morguhnpolis?"

Bill's helmeted head bobbed once. "The same. You see, Brother Hohguhn, men of proven loyalty rise fast in my service."

Hohguhn beamed a gap-toothed smile. "Then Bohreegahd Hohguhn's your man, and no mistake! B'sides, I weren't no officer till I signed on with Captain Manos, anyhow. Highest I'd ever been afore that 'uz troop sergeant for Captain Feeliks Kahtruhl."

Now Bili looked amazed. "You mean that some of you Freefighters actually got out of Behreezburk alive? With our lines drawn so tightly it seems hard to believe that anything larger than a rat could have wormed through them."

All at once, Hohguhn's mouth dropped open, his seamed and weathered face mirroring surprise. When, at length, he again spoke, his tone was less of respect than of utter awe. "By my Steel, you . . . you be Bili the Axe! It wuz you what slew the earl and two of his bodyguards in that fight under the north wall. I seen it!

"And now you be duke here? Well, my lord, me and my men, what's left of us, we'd be purely honored to fight under your banner, we would!"

While Lieutenant Krahndahl conducted Hohguhn and his men up to the hall to get them outfitted and decently mounted, Bili and the warband picked through what was left of the string of camps, dispatching any wounded they came across, making certain that the dead really were deceased and earmarking usable spoils for later collection by the hall garrison.

Then Krahndahl and Hohguhn were cantering down the hill at the head of the reinforcements and, at Bili's word, Raikuh's bugler sounded the recall while the thoheeks and Milo mindcalled the rest. And the larger-by-a-third column reformed and negotiated the ford and set off in pursuit of the quarry, the great prairiecats-Whitetip, Lover-of-Water and Steelclaws-bounding well in the lead.

The road beyond the ford was muddy for several hundred yards, deeply indented with impressions of hoof and wheel, of bpotsole and sandal and bare foot. Even after the mud had given way to choking dust, the discarded weapons and equipment gave clear evidence of retreat bordering upon rout.

Then, from the far side of a small patch of woods around which the road curved, came the rippling snarls of the huge cats, immediately followed by a veritable chorus of screams and wails of terror.

When Bili galloped around the turn, Mahvros had to make a quick, jarring jump, lest he trample Steelclaws and the writhing, black-bearded man into whose shoulder the cat had sunk his long fangs. Whitetip and Lover-of-Water had cor-raled the other four-and-twenty priests into a tight, shrieking bunch as neatly as might a pair of veteran herd dogs with an equal number of sheep.

A glance back at the blood-spurting man under the youngest cat told Bili that he could not live out the hour bearing such terrible wounds, so he mindspoke Steelclaws, "You may kill him, Cat Brother. But wait until all the horses are past you; then do it messily. Well put fear of Sun and Wind into these bastards!"

Bili had his warriors ring the knot of clerics, but made certain that all the prisoners had an unobstructed view of Steel-claws and his still-flopping victim. At his silent command, the huge cat rolled onto his back, the claws and teeth sunk into the gory flesh, bringing the priest over atop him. Then muscles rippled and bunched under dusty fur as the powerful hind legs were flexed, their needle-sharp talons sinking deep, grating on the hapless man's lowest ribs. The preceding shrieks had been as nothing to the ear-shattering scream of ultimate agony emitted by the dying man when the cat abruptly thrust backward, tearing eight great, ragged wounds from chest to crotch and then flipping the eviscerated creature three yards up the road, trailing gouts of dark blood and coils of pinkish-white guts.

The packhorses were relieved of enough manacles to secure each of the living priests to a tree, and Steelclaws, his coat soaked and clotted with blood, was left to guard them while the grim little band rode on.

Out of the wooded patch, they cantered between fields of burgeoning oats, maize and rye, billowing like green lakes in the morning breeze. Between fields of flax and tobacco, they spotted the first of the rebel pikemen where he sat on the edge of the ditch, repairing a sandal strap. But when, alerted by the pounding hooves, he spotted the body of horsemen and identified the Morguhn banner, he forsook sandal, pike and shield and ran for his life. A couple of the clansmen uncased bows and hastily nocked arrows, but Bili mindspoke.

"No, save the shafts. Let our Cat Sister take this one."

In a flash of gray-brown fur, Lover-of-Water's big, sleek body hurdled the ditch and coursed through the flax, bringing down her quarry before he had run two hundred yards. The man screamed just once, when the razor-edged steel fang-spurs-originally designed for hamstringing horses or large game-sliced the tendons behind a knee. Before he could get out another utterance, he was dead. His killer effortlessly loped back through the flax, feeling that she had certainly demonstrated her age and expertise at the art of- slaying two-legs to this nice young chief.

In a high-walled cut, they found grisly evidence of the recklessly rapid passage of several wheeled vehicles, or, rather, of those unfortunate pikemen too slow to get out of the way. Broad, iron-tired wheels had severed limbs and mangled bodies and crushed skulls, grinding shreds of flesh and bits of shattered bone into the blood-muddy dust. In a buzzing black-and-blue-green cloud, the flies rose up from their feasting before the advance of the Morguhn column, while a mouse-gray opossum scurried up a bank and into the low brush, dragging his scaly tail and a chunk of mangled forearm.

A few hundred yards farther on, a heavy coach lay canted drunkenly, partially blocking the road. An exposed boulder had bent the iron tire and splintered the hardwood felly beneath. Some few of the cargo of wounded men had attempted to drag themselves in the wake of the driver and the three wounded officers he bad mounted on the horses before he cut them loose. But the arrival of Bill's column ended their sufferings-permanently.

They had been on the road for most of an hour before they at last closed with the rearmost gaggle of infantry, completely leader!ess and most of them lacking armor or weapons of any description. And it was then, just as Lieutenant Hohguhn had foretold, a butchery, the horsemen riding down and spearing or sabering or axing their fleeing, screaming prey, until horses were foam-flecked and blowing, until men's arms ached with deadly effort

And then they rode on.

The broad blades of Bill's huge axe were no longer shiny, being dimmed with clotted blood and dust, like every other bared weapon in the column. But the steel was soon rinsed- with fresher blood, as they overhauled another few hundred rebels. This time, however, perhaps half of their victims made good an escape, for men and cats and horses, all were tired, and Bili still insisted that the arrows and darts be husbanded against more pressing need.

The notes of the recall still were sounding when the High Lord led his weary mount through the trampled cornfield toward the limply fluttering Morguhn banner. He carried his bare saber, not wishing to befoul its case with the gory steel. While walking, tugging at the plodding horse, he was in telepathic contact with Aldora, whose troops had finally reached Morguhn Hall.

"Sorry, dear, to have had you put your men to a needless forced march, but none of us-I, least of all-had any idea that things would work out so well or so quickly."

"Damn you, Milo!" she raged. "You just tell that to the horses I've foundered this blasted night and morning. And you and the young duke had better not bite off too much out there, either, because FlI not bring any more men than I can find remounts for. And I doubt there're a hundred horses here."

Aloud, Milo sighed. "All right, Aldora, I'll suggest a halt to rest and clean our weapons. As I recall, the road crosses a sizable rill just ahead. But send the troops, don't come yourself-there're two witchmen in the cellars of Morguhn Hall and you're the only person I'm willing to entrust them to. They're drugged now and I want them kept that way until we can get them up to Kehnooryos Atheenahs."

'Tired and filthy as I am, I'll not protest that order, Milo. Besides," she added, "it will give me a chance to see sweet Ahndee again. You did say that he's recuperating here, did you not?"

Milo grinned broadly at the bloody ground and broken cornstalks before him. "Lord Ahndros is being tended by the woman he loves, Aldora, and I don't think the lady would appreciate your overtender solicitude for the welfare of the man she will wed. Why don't you save yourself for that woman's son, eh? Thoheeks Bili Morguhn is your kind of man-strong, brave, outspoken, ruthless toward his foes, virile and handsome. And he's every bit as bloodthirsty as you are, my dear. He only spares the lives of those men he means to see tortured to death."

"If you don't like what he's doing, Milo, why don't you Stop him?" Aldora asked.

He sighed again, shaking his steel-encased, sweating head. "No, I don't like it, sweetheart. What's left of my twentieth-century conscience cringes at this morning's work. But I also recognize facts, no matter how unpalatable to a man of my century. What Bili is doing is brutal, but it will be as effective as was the Gafnee affair. If he's allowed to put down the rebellion in his way, he'll provide a meaningful example to every thoheekahtohn in the Confederation, for one thing; for another, if he manages to net all the rebellious nobles, the commoners will never again dare to even think of rebellion within his lifetime. Nor will he need to worry about the Ehleen priests inciting any more of this kind of trouble."

"Sacred Sun be praised!" the woman exclaimed feelingly. "Mara will be pleased to know that you're finally going to scotch those black-robed vultures."

"I've never liked them any more than have you and Mara, Aldora, but they do happen to have a following, both noble and common. Proscribing their hierarchy without damned good cause would have been tantamount to bringing about a Confederation-wide rebellion . . . and the directors of that goddam Center knew the fact and used it against us.

"Gafnee was simply not enough provocation, unfortunately. You heard that mealy-mouthed Ahrkee'ehpeeskohpos Grehgohreeos whine and grovel and avow that it was an isolated incident of which he'd had no prior knowledge."

"Yes," agreed Aldora. "I recall his performance and I wondered, at the time, if he might not sing a different tune under the skillful direction of good Master Fyuhstohn. Do you want me to tell Mara to have him arrested?"

Leading his drooping horse around a fly-buzzing huddle of hacked bodies, Milo shook his head again. "No, not yet, not until this present business is more widely publicized. Just tell her to make damned sure the old buzzard doesn't leave the city-for any reason!"

"You think then that he, too, is a witchman?" Aldora inquired.

"No," he assured her. "Our precious archbishop isn't clever enough to be one of those vampires. Oh, he's shrewd, I grant you that, but he's made errors of judgment of which a really intelligent man would never have been guilty. Nonetheless, I'm damned sure that he knows far more of this conspiracy than he would have us believe. After all, it was he who appointed our three murderous witchmen-cum-kooreeohee at Gafnee, Vawn and here in Morguhn."

She questioned sadly, "All of the Clan Vawn kindred are truly gone to Wind, then, Milo?"

"It appears so, I'm sorry to say, for the get of brave old Djoh have been good men and quite valuable to the Confederation, over the years. But, from all I've heard of their passing, I think he'd have been proud of them. They took more than a few of the rebels with them. It's said they held the entire mob at bay for weeks, holed up in old Fort Brohdee. And they'd probably still be there, had they faced steel alone.

"And that reminds me, Aldora. Place a heavy round-the-clock guard on that big, gilded wain. Keep it well away from any fires and see that no one touches it or any of its contents. According to what I can comprehend of the instructions, those bombs are all safe to handle and transport, but we dare not take chances, since there're enough explosives in that wain to vaporize the hall and the hill and every living creature in or on or around it.

"But I've got to speak to Duke Bili, now. Ill resume contact when we halt. About a half-hour, I'd say."

The stallion, Mahvros, was not as done in as Mile's horse, but he too was obviously tired, standing docilely while cropping half-heartedly at a patch of weeds. He had lost his white stockings; they were now red-blood red. His cheeks and spiked faceplate, his massive barrel and the mail protecting his neck and withers, all were liberally splashed with crimson gore.

Astride the stallion sat an apparition of death incarnate. From sole to crest, Bili's boots and armor were besplattered with large splotches of dusty, crusty blood, the whole being sprinkled with gobbets of flesh and chips of winking-white bone. His terrible axe rested across the saddlebow, dripping slow, clotting droplets onto the steel cuishe which covered his left thigh.

But, beneath the raised visor, his blue eyes sparkled and a smile of grim satisfaction partially erased the lines of fatigue in his weather-browned face. When he sighted the High Lord approaching, his smile broadened and he raised his blood-slimy gauntleted hand in greeting.

"Ho, my lord! It's a good morning's work thus far. I doubt that an equal number of Blue Bear Knights could have done as well. Why, there must be near on a  thousand of the would-be pikepushers dead in this field alone!"

A shadow glided across Milo's path and he glanced up at a wide-banking turkey buzzard, one of an increasing number that were awaiting die departure of the living from the cornfield which was to be their feasting ground. The buzzards, at least, were silent. Unlike the brazen black carrion crows who were already flocking to the tons of still-quivering man-flesh, while filling the air with harsh cries.

"My only regret," added the young thoheeks, frowning for a moment, "is that there were just too few of us, so far too many of those murderous swine got away. But"-his smile returned-"I warrant they'll not stop running until their damned legs will no longer bear them; then they'll crawl for a while-and it will take more than a gaggle of demented priests abetted by a pack of perverted nobles to persuade them to again bear arms against their lawful lord!"

Though he made his lips return the young warrior's smile, Milo thought that he had not pictured his thoheeksee ever ruling their demesnes as Bili must now rule this one in years to come-owning not his people's love but their fear and hatred. That fear and hatred engendered by the brutal butchery, the victims of which lay stiffening in this field, as well as by the ravagings and savageries which must surely come ere the witchmen's poison be rooted out of Morguhn and Vawn.

It was a surface thought and unshielded, so easily grasped by Bili's sensitive mind. "But what other course can be taken, my lord? What else can I do?" came his powerful mindspeak. His own thoughts were a roil of disappointment and sorrow that he had so displeased his respected overlord, simply by doing mat which his instinct and training assured him was right.

"But you are right, Bili," Milo beamed gently. "You have followed the best course available to you, are pursuing the only choice that this time, this place, this world will allow you. It is your lord who is truly in the wrong!

"Just last night, I chided the witchman who calls himself Skiros for attempting to apply the standards of a long-dead time and world to the here and now. This morning, I find myself guilty of the same folly.

"If any erred, it was me, young Bili; and that was long years before ever your grandfather's grandfather first saw Sacred Sun. I should have realized that the Ehleen Church would never forget, never forgive me for weakening their stranglehold on their adherents, for discrediting their motives and for depriving them of most of their ill-gotten gains.

"I should have known that they would always provide a chink in the Confederation's armor and than, sooner or later, some enemy would discover and utilize that opening. And now we know that an enemy did just that.

"Bili, do you recall the conversation we had at Horse Hall? How I compared rebellion to a festered wound?"

Unconsciously, the thoheeks moved his head in an affirmative, the blood-draggled plume nodding above the blued-steel bear which surmounted his helm. "Yes, my lord," he beamed.

"Then you are aware that that evil infection has all but gobbled up Vawn and is deeply seated in Morguhn. So, regrettably, our surgery must be most extreme. You and I and the Undying Lady Aldora must be the physicians, Bili. Your brave Kinsmen and retainers, Chief Hwahltuh and his clansmen, and the Confederation troops must be our instruments.

"The initial cuts were made last night and this morning, but we must cut far deeper, deeply enough to be certain that we have excised the last trace of the infection. So heed you not those who would gainsay you in this, the work you know best. Sacred Sun was watching over our Confederation on the day you were sent to the court of King Gilbuht, for he has made of you the man whom I need in the present unpleasantness.

"I am displeased, Bili, but by the circumstances only. All that I have thus far seen of you is very pleasing, and when Morguhn and Vawn are both cleansed and again at peace, you shall experience the gratitude of the High Lord."

Chapter II

Sweat-soaked and dust-coated. Lord Drehkos Daiviz came within sight of the City of Morguhnpolis and vainly spur-raked his mount's heaving, foam-flecked barrel. Valiantly, the well-bred gray gave his best remaining effort, little as that was; but both he and his rider might have saved their exertions, for the east gate remained tightly closed, even when the_ weary vahrohneeskos drew his sword and pounded its pommel upon the thick old timbers.

Kneeing the staggering, trembling horse out from the gate arch, the rebel nobleman craned his neck until he could see to the top of the gate tower.

"Damn your eyes, Toorkos!" he roared at-the gate sergeant, who was leaning on a merlon. "You know who I ami Open the goddam gatel It is imperative that I see Lord Myros at once!"

But the dark, chunky man shook his balding head. "We dare not raise a single bar, Lord Drehkos. Were we to so much as crack any of the gates, we'd never get them closed, we wouldn't, ere most of the esteemed citizens of this city were gone, and Lord Myros says that we'll need them all for either defenders or hostages."

Drehkos shrugged. "Then drop me a rope, man."

From atop the wall, the city streets resembled nothing so much as an overturned anthill. Women and children, girls and boys and a few men scurried to and fro, seemingly aimlessly. The cacophony of shouts and screams and wails smote painfully upon Drehkos' ears and helped him to understand why the gate guards appeared so surly and vicious. Half a dozen arrow-studded corpses lay sprawled on the bloody stones just shy of the gate, and, ignored by the throngs, a middle-aged woman dragged herself, slowly, painfully, up High Street, a heavy iron dart shaft standing out from the small of her back.

"The cowardly pack tried to rush the gate, my lord," offered the sergeant, Toorkos, when he saw Drehkos eyeing the carnage. "Tried to shift the bars by brute strength, they did. But Lord Myros give us our orders when he posted us here. And we persuaded them to leave them gates be, we did!"

"Rather sharp persuasion, I'd say," remarked Drehkos wryly. But the witticism was lost on the sergeant. Drehkos then ordered, "I'll need a horse, Toorkos, and, from the look of things, probably an escort, as well."

But, ignoring alike importunings and orders, Toorkos flatly refused to part with even a single archer or spearman. And of horses he had none, but he at least gave Drehkos a hooded cloak to cover his armor and, hopefully, conceal his identity from the ugly, dangerous mob, until he might win to the city governor's palace.

When at last he stood before the huge, ornate, brass-sheathed doors of the building, he was presented with another problem-how to rap loudly enough to gain the attention of those within without also bringing the mob, which he had thus far largely avoided. But he had only put hand to swordhilt, when a small door set within one of the larger ones swung open to reveal the beak-nosed visage of Gahlos Gahlahktios, Lord Myros' guard captain.

"Thank God you're safe, lord vahrohneeskosl You are ..." he began.

But Drehkos roughly shouldered him aside as he stepped over the high sill and entered the abbreviated courtyard of the palace. "Where," he snarled, "is your thrice-damned coward of a master? Where cowers the self-proclaimed, oft-proclaimed, 'Savior of Morgubn,' eh? In a cellar? In a closet? Under his bed?"

Before the stuttering officer could frame an answer, Vahrohnos Myros stood in the doorway of the palace proper, his handsome, regular features drawn with worry and tension. But his voice was calm and unruffled, albeit a little sad.

"I am most relieved to see you, Drehkos. You would have ridden with me, had we been able to find you in that unholy mess last night. Have you seen aught of Nathos or Djaimos or Captain Manos?"

Myros' evident self-control took some measure of the edge from Drehkos' anger, and he answered shortly, "Manos is dead, trampled to death in a stampede of his own troops' horses. The valiant Nathos was found wandering, witless with terror; I had him knocked in the head and put on one of the coaches with the wounded. Of Djaimos I know nothing. But Myros, why did you not wait long enough to help us, at least, in organizing a decent withdrawal? The Confederation cavalry weren't all that close-not when you must have left."

Eyes widening, Myros' face paled and he tottered back, clutching at the doorframe for support. "Con-Confederation cavalry? You .. . you're certain?"

Drehkos strode forward, his lips skinned back in a wolfish grin, amused at the abrupt collapse of Myros* bravado. "Oh, aye, I'm certain, Myros. Where else would several thousand fully armed and equipped kahtahfrahktoee and some hundreds of lancers come from, hey?"

The ... the troops of Vawn. . . ? The re-reinforcements we ex-expected . . . ?" stuttered the shaking vahrohnos.

Drehkos laughed gratingly. "Hardly, Myros, hardly. Not riding in from the northwest. And the Vawnee scouts recognized none of them. And," he casually added, "their banners bore prairiecats ... all save one, and that one was a fish and something like a weasel, or so I was told." Then he fell silent, aghast, as the vahrohnos1 appearance and demeanor underwent so sudden and radical a change that he seemed in the throes of a seizure.

Features contorted, body and limbs jerking, twitching, the vahrohnos stumbled back into the foyer, then crashed back full-length upon the floor, sprawled across a mosaic representing the Red Eagle of Morguhn. Abruptly, his eyes rolled back and consciousness left him.

The shock mirrored on the faces of servants and bodyguards alike, as they rushed to the assistance of their swooning master, answered Drehkos' unspoken query; such paroxysms must never before have occurred during their service to Vahrohnos Myros.

But, as he had earlier this morning, he immediately took command, snapping, "Don't put him to bed, get him on a horse litter. We're leaving Morguhnpolis as soon as the Vawnee rearguard gets here!"

The guard captain looked up from where he squatted at the VaKrohnos" head. "But I only have thirty men, Lord Drehkos, and some of them are wounded, and that's not enough to fight our way through that scum in the streets-not and protect Lord Myros, too. Besides, it was his order that we remain and defend the city."

Drehkos snorted disparagingly. "And a piss-poor order that was, my good Gahlos. This city is a deathtrap. It can't be defended, and the esteemed Myros should have known as much, considering his training and experience. As for the dear citizens, captain, if they are properly handled, they'll pose no threat to us. Indeed, they may even be of help to us."

The tunnel was old, very old. So ancient was it that no living man had been aware of its existence a year before. Its rediscovery had been accidental, Myros having secretly commissioned workmen to excavate just such a passage, as well as a clandestine meeting place and armory, below the lowest cellars of the governor's palace. But when the first heavy stones of the cellar paving had been raised, it had been discovered that under them was not the expected earth and clay, but, rather, tightly packed rubble. When cleared, the find proved to be an oval, high-ceilinged chamber, walled and columned and paved with finely worked stone, boasting two wide staircases and a long, gradual ramp leading upward, requiring only removal of certain areas of pavement to provide easy access to the subcellar by man or beast.

Examination and careful measurement established the subcellar to be even larger than the palace above it. And in the center of the north wall was plain evidence of a sealed opening-unmatched stones of inferior workmanship spanning a width of two metrobee and a height of nearly three.

The passage far exceeded any of Myros' expectations, being stone-walled and cobbled for most of its length. It was wide enough to accommodate a warcart or two horses abreast and exited in a long-abandoned quarry a quarter-mile beyond the north wall of the city. Myros had had entrance and exit carefully recamoufiaged and seen to h that only nobles, officers and priests were apprised of where and how to find it Nor was Myros worried that his workmen might betray the secret-since he had had his bodyguards murder them all.

At Drehkos' direction, Captain Gahlos used the heliograph mounted on the palace roof to signal the immediate unbarring and opening of the south and west gates. The message continued with an order for all guards to report to the governor's palace as soon as the mob was out and the gates again closed and secured.

While carefully rehooding the device, Gahlos asked, "Please, my lord, I don't understand. We unbar the gates and let the rabble flee, then rebar them on what will soon be an empty city?"

Drehkos chuckled good-naturedly. "And you can't comprehend, eh, Gahlos? Well, look you, youVe seen the sleight-of-hand practiced by the traveling tricksters? Seen them make a host of meaningless gestures to mask the one, practiced movement which causes coins or objects to suddenly and mysteriously disappear or reappear?"

Gahlos nodded hesitantly. "Yes, my lord, but-"

Drehkos continued. "And I am essaying a similar feat of legerdemain, and, Gahlos, let us pray that it succeeds. You see, we can't fight, cant defend Morguhnpolis against the forces now approaching it, and no noble or officer or priest in his right mind should allow-should even dream of allowing-Bili Morguhn to take him alive, so our only hope is to flee.

"But we can only mount half our men, and Fll be damned if I'll leave any one of them to the 'tender mercies' of the Morguhns, so we couldn't move too fast, even were we not burdened with Lord Myros. And our pursuers are all cavalry; they'll be moving faster than we can.

"However, Gahlos, they'll think Myros still commands and, knowing his obsession for this city, they'll be certain he'll try to hold it. Of course, none of them knows about our bolt hole down below, so let us pray that when they find the gates barred from within, even with no men visible on the walls, they'll be sufficiently wary of a trap to halt and regroup and possibly bring up or make scaling ladders-anything, any reason that will delay them long enough for us to put some distance between us and them."