Join me . . . Thyerri invited her silently. A dancer needed no words. He spun about, stretched toward the ceiling . . .

and when his arms descended, she was in them.

Thyerri was drunk with the music and his personal resur- rection. With Sakhithe, instinct discovered a whole new mode of expression. He'd danced the rings, he'd danced the mountain, he'd danced the wind and the rain, even the ley itself. As a radical in training, he'd danced choreo- graphed partnerships.

But he'd never danced another radical.

Sakhithe added a new random factor. Sakhithe found dif- ferent complexities within the music, moving sometimes as one with him, sometimes on a different, seemingly dissoci- ate course, only to return to his arms without a single dis- cordant step.

Time had no meaning. Space had none. There was the Music. There was Sakhithe. And there was Thyerri. To- gether, they wove a pattern that was in their time and their space absolute Truth.

Only when Sakhithe stumbled and collapsed against him did the world's Truth infringe on theirs. Exhaustion: Thy- erri's and Sakhithe's. Holding Sakhithe close, Thyerri spun the drumbeats to a spiraling, continuous roll that rose to a climactic peak, then imploded as he and Sakhithe collapsed in a tangle on the floor.

Silence. Then pandemonium. Applause, cheers, stomping feetbut nothing that could drown out the laboring of his own heart.

It had been the exquisite madness of a frenzy dance, the like of which Rijhili couldn't imagine, let alone experience.

The like of which Thyerri himself hadn't, except in lonely, hillside moments where his music was the birds and the wind and a waterfall's rumble.

Sakhithe bugged him, right there on the floor, and gasped blessings in his ear. Crying. Sakhithe, six years his senior, whose dance must have been as dead within her as his had been within his own heart.

Something small and hard struck his shoulder, another his knee. Still more pinged off the floorboards behind him.

Hail? His mind wondered dimly, spinning back to those hillside dementias, and he buried his face in Sakhithe's shoulder, protecting both their heads with his arms.

But he was inside . . .

Not hail. Coins. A hail of coins clattering all around them.

Hands reached and touched, raised them to their feet. Some- one drew Sakhithe from his arms. Or him from hers. She was lost in a sea of bodies. Another wave pulled him about, exclaiming in wonder and pressing on him the strange printed notes that substituted for coins in other nodes.

Other nodes.

Foreigners.

Valley-folk.

Rijhilii.

Thyerri let himself be passed from one table to the next, wondering vaguely what had become of his tray and the glass of carili, for which he would still have to pay.

An exhausted haze settled over his vision and his thoughts. He was out of condition, embarrassed. His dance had not been for them. Not for their cheers, certainly not for their money.

Even aiding Sakhithe had been nothing but happen- stance. She'd been there, an addition, not an encumbrance, to the dance.

His dance.

But they didn't know. Strangers. Rijhilii. They didn't un- derstand that to reward a frenzy with money was tanta- mount to insult. So he accepted the notes they tucked into his sash, or thrust into the overlapped front of his tunic, thanked them blindly, and escaped at last to the kitchen.

Sakhithe was there before him, perched on a stool beside Bharlori. On the table before them was a scattering of coins and notes, piles that grew as the other employees darted into the kitchen between orders.

Sakhithe hopped down when she saw him, her face glow- ing with excitement. She bugged him, hard, and whispered, "Thank you!"

Their embrace crackled; she stepped back, taking his hands and holding them wide.

"Look at you!" She laughed. "Thyerri the money tree!"

She pulled him over to the table and emptied his tunic, exclaiming over the inscribed values on the notes. And there was gold among the copper and silver on the table.

Dazed, Thyerri wondered if he ought not return the money: a true frenzy was said to disrupt the sanity of the viewers, and he had to believe that this generosity would be regretted in the morning.

For all he knew, it was illegal to accept the offerings.

But such moral and legal decisions were not his concern.

This treasure, as did all the customer gratuities, belonged to Bharlori, and as ownership went, so followed conscience.

He said something he hoped appropriate, and returned to his customers, only to discover they no longer wanted ale or food, but him. Some wanted to flood him with praises. Some wanted to know who he was and was he available for intimate parties.

A few simply wanted to buy him for the night.

Panicked, he tried not to insult anyone, and with a plea to Khani to take his tables, escaped a second time, slipping out a side door and into the back alley, where a feeble oil lamp granted safe anonymity.

There, beside the midden box, the cool, mountain air rushed between the buildings and cleansed him of the smoke and heat of Bharlori's.

Panic faded, Thyerri's heart slowed, and as his gut re- called the music of his heart, his body swayed in small, stationary dance.

"So this is where you bolted," a voice said out of the darkness, and dunKarlon stepped into the dim light be- neath the lamp. Two others appeared at his flanks, almost, but not quite, barring Thyerri from the door.

But Thyerri was no fool. Even were he a fighter, which he was not, he'd have no chance against three men, each of whom was half-again his size. Even had he a chance, he'd be a fool to challenge one of Bharlori's paying custom- ers: better bruises than back on the streets.

Thyerri forced indifference into his voice. "I warned you, sir, three large brothers. I had to interfere. I didn't want them angry at me."

"I thought there were five."

"How clever you are." Despite his efforts, Thyerri's con- tempt for dunKarlon and all his ilk crept into his voice. In fear, then, of his own unruly tongue, he moved a step toward the almost-opening. "If you please"

His attempt came a heartbeat too soon, a shade to ea- gerly. DunKarlon's arm intercepted him, and shoved him up against the wall.

The midden-box pressed against his leg.

"You needn't worry about the hiller-bitch's brothers. I'm not interested. Not in her."

"Very wis" Thyerri's voice caught as dunKarlon's gloved hand gripped his chin, and two gloved fingers pressed into his neck. And Thyerri wondered if Rakshi had given him back his dance just so he could die.

But he didn't want to die. Not any more.

"Sir," he whispered, "I"

DunKarlon hissed. "You owe me, whore."

"I1 don't underst- "

"No man moves like that." DunKarlon released his throat, holding him captive with his hips. One gloved hand gripped his hair and jerked his head back, the other in- vaded the tunic, pulling the plackets apart, exposing him to that dim light.

Thyerri, confused, frightenedand angrydidn't move.

The gloved hand groped lower, past the tunic, past the drawstring waist And stopped.

Gripped hard enough to bring tears, but Thyerri clenched his jaw and smothered a protest.

"Damn!" dunKarlon hissed with all the fury of a man who had just made a fool of himself.

Thyerri laughed, half-hysterically, thinking the incident closed.

He never saw the blow that sent him reeling. Reflexes responded late, but turned the stumbling fall into a tumble that brought him back to his feet in a blind, instinctive dash for the shadows down the alley.

But legs as uncertain as his reflexes faltered, and the men were on him. He struck wildlyfutilely. There were too many of them.

And he was no fighter.

"Thyerri?"

Feminine voice, shrill above the clamor.

"Thyerri!"

A scream that would wake a corpse.

And his attackers were gone. Nothing but booted feet scuffling and thudding all around him. Dazed, aching, Thy- erri curled around his bruised and aching ribs, trying to protect his head from those heavy boots.

"Thyerri, help'."

Sakhithe. Without thought, Thyerri threw himself toward the voice. His arms encountered booted legs and clamped tight.

Sakhithe screamed. The boot kicked, trying to shake him , off. He clung with both arms and bithardclamping his teeth into the flesh behind the man's knee. Clinging like a wolf to a boar.

A roaring curse overhead: dunKarlon.

The captain kicked again. Thyerri dug his feet into the mud and lunged all his weight against that knee. A snap next to his ear. Another roar, this time of pain, and Dun- Karlon fell, with Sakhithe, into a pile of arms and legs.

And all the while, Thyerri clung, hands and teeth, to that leg, while the other rijhili kicked him and cursed, while breathing grew difficult, and blood filled his mouth.

And the world grew quiet.

A sharp, slicing pain along his cheek brought Thyerri back to his senses.

"And don't come back. Ever."

That was Bharlori.

Pounding feet: the rijhili running away, and Thyerri wanted, insanely, to chase them, for all he couldn't find his feet. And he fought that anger, fearing such blind stupidity more than he feared the blood bubbling in his mouth.

"Thyerri!" Sakhithe's hands fluttered over him.

Then Bharlori's voice ordered her aside and the tavern owner's powerful arms surrounded him, lifted him against a barrel chest. And Bharlori's voice boomed above his head, "Out of the wayall of you!"

Bharlori swayed, a sickening twist that put Thyerri's head low. The blood bubbled and he began to choke.

"Get the damn door! Now."'

Thyerri grasped blindly for Bharlori's shoulders, trying to bring his head up.

"You! Fresh straw for his pallet. Extra pillows and blan- kets"

"But"

"Your own, dammit!"

Thyerri tried to object, tried to get Bharlori to put him down. Terrified at that moment that the customers were all leaving and Bharlori would blame him and he'd lose his job because he couldn't work, not with the blood bubbling down his face.

"Khani," Bharlori said, "fetch Brishini. Now."

Brishini. The local physician..

"No," Thyerri whispered, then with more strength than he thought he had left, "No! I'm fine. Please, sir, let me down!"

But Bharlori wouldn't let him go. Bharlori hauled him into that back room he shared with the girls and Besho, and set him gently on his pallet. And put pillows at his back to keep his head up.

"Rest easy, son," Bharlori said, which Bharlori never called anyone, and there was a strange tone in his voice.

"We'll take care of you. And never you worry about the cost."

"I will, Thyerri," said Sakhithe, suddenly there beside him. And seemingly unhurt, though it was difficult to tell with one eye swelling shut. "I can take care of him. Master Bharlo. He's from the hills. He won't be wanting a valley doctor."

Which argument (along with a promise to call the physi- cian in an instant, should Thyerri's condition worsen) got him at least a reprieve, and his own pallet, and his privacy, save for Sakhithe who was part of his privacy these days.

"Sakhithe," he whispered, as she knelt beside him, hold- ing a mug of spirit-laced, herbal tea, "is Bharlo going to fire me?"

"Fire you?" She rocked backward, as if to see him better.

"Why would he do that?"

"I . . . They were customers. . . . I know b-better. I tried not to fight, Sakhithe. I truly did, but"

"Fight?" she repeated, and he could tell she was trying hard not to laugh. "Thyerri, dear, that was not a fight." She smoothed his hair back from his face; hair that was stiff from the hated dye, wet and evil-smelling from the mud beside the midden. He winced as her touch brushed a rising mouse on the point of his cheek. "No, sweet, after tonight, it will take much more than that little squabble to convince Bharlo to turn us out."

He didn't really understand, but Sakhithe wouldn't lie to him, not about something so important, so he didn't ask her to explain.