"Rulke here?" Faelamor was shocked.

"Not here-Thurkad. Months ago. Just after Yggur went through the gate."

Yggur dead? It did not occur to her that Faelamor might not know how it had ended, or that she might even lie. If Yggur was dead, what was the point of being here at all?

Faelamor gave her a moment to grieve while she thought. She was terrified of Rulke. He'd had so much time to set his plan in motion, yet she had scarcely begun her own. She had to act now. She needed Maigraith more than ever now and this might be her only opportunity. She could afford to be gentle.

"Your lover is surely dead," she said, but kindly this time. "There is nothing more for you here. Why do you cling to these foreigners? Let them fight this war if they must. They love their wars, these old humans, but when it is over nothing will have changed. I am going away now and will never return. Our time is near, the moment that I've worked toward all the long centuries of our exile. There is nothing here for you either." She went to her knees, speaking humbly. "Come with me. I need you, Maigraith."

Maigraith was bemused and off her guard. She needs me! Never before had Faelamor said that; it had always been duty. But then, Faelamor's emotions were malleable; always ready to serve her need.

"You say you need me, and Vanhe said that they needed me. I had to believe that Yggur's work was worthy, else how could I ever have cleaved to him? I should stay here. Here they want me for what I can do for them-I know that! Yet Vanhe has treated me with courtesy. Always you disparaged and humiliated me, made me to be of little worth. What do I care whether the Faellem return to Tallallame or not? They spurned me all my life. I will not go with you!"

"Outside there is talk of death or slavery for the entire Second Army. Did you sign that warrant?"

"No," Maigraith whispered, staring up at her.

"That is all they want you for, now that you have given them back everything they lost. To legitimise revenge and murder a thousand times over. How long will it take to erase that from your conscience? I never treated you that cruelly. Once it is done they will be rid of you too."

Faelamor came closer. She looked very controlled, very beautiful. Her eyes were golden in the lamplight. Maigraith had forgotten the compulsion put on her long months ago in the swamps of Orist, and did not think to put up her guard. She leaned away, but there was nowhere to retreat to. All her life and training had been a preparation against this need and nothing would prevent Faelamor from taking her.

The compulsion rewoke with the touch. Maigraith could not dredge up the strengths that had enabled her to defeat Thyllan; that had allowed her to command and to be obeyed. They were lost somewhere deep inside her.

"I beg you, please come," Faelamor said. "Indeed I treated you badly; one of my many crimes. But that is past now and the time you have been trained for is here. Despite everything, I tell no lie when I say that I care for you like a daughter. I have great need of you. Dress yourself. Here is a bag. Gather your clothes and precious things-I will help you."

Maigraith saw a tear in Faelamor's eye. You don't have to go that far, she thought cynically. There was little here that was truly Maigraith's, only her clothes and a gift from Yggur, an ivory bangle, so old that it was quite yellow and the original carving worn away to traces. It appealed to her because of its antiquity and simplicity. She slipped it on her wrist beside the ebony one that her unknown mother had given her at birth. Ebony and ivory-linked symbols of the two phases of her life, in a way.

Dressing took only minutes, for all that she was in a daze: part rebellious, part on-edge, but wholly unable to resist. Soon her bag was full. Faelamor looked around the tent, gathering one or two items of clothing that had been forgotten. Maigraith still stood beside the bed, cradling a journal in her arms, her log of the daily affairs of the army. Tears ran down the cover.

"That is precious? Then bring it, if it comforts you."

"It's over," Maigraith whispered, laying it down again.

Taking one arm, Faelamor drew her outside. Maigraith's troops were everywhere, but the glamour, or other form of illusion that Faelamor used, was so perfect that no one noted their going.

They passed by a tent where soldiers were reeling about, drunk with wine and with their great victory. More than once Maigraith heard her name mentioned, and always they praised her in voices tinged with awe. Then they went between two hospital tents, and in one a soldier screamed while three people held him down and another sawed off a mangled leg. She peered in through the flap, recognizing the yellow hair. It was Dilman, her faithful guide, his handsome face twisted into a mask of agony. I did that, Maigraith thought. What's going to happen to him? She tried to go to him but the compulsion would not allow her.

"Come on," said Faelamor.

Dawn was breaking by the time they were out of the valley. They slipped into the forest and vanished, heading north.

After riding non-stop for three days, Yggur was slumped in his saddle. Dolodha was tied to her saddle horn, the horse pacing slowly on. Suddenly they rode out of a clot of smoke into a guard post. The sun was rising.

"Name yourselves," shouted the guard, a bandy-legged man with a gray bandage around his head. He wore the uniform of the First Army.

Dolodha roused. "Lord Yggur comes. Who are you?"

"Lord!" cried the guard, saluting. "A great victory."

"Where's Maigraith?" snapped Yggur.

"Resting in the command tent," said the guard, and his face lit up at her name. "That way!"

Turning away from the worship in his eyes, Yggur ran all the way to her tent. He tore open the flap. His eyesight could just make out a lantern flickering in the last of its oil. "Is she here, adjutant?"

He knew the answer, though. The tent was empty. A spasm passed through him. Maigraith was frugal; she would never have left a lantern burning in daylight.

"Where is she?" he roared.

No one had seen her. "Adjutant!"

Dolodha snapped to attention.

"Find her!"

She soon came running back. "She's gone from the camp. We found prints heading south, but no one saw her go."

Yggur went over the tent again. His eyesight told him no more but this time he smelt something familiar, a trace of Faelamor. "Send Private Vanhe to me," he roared.

"You mean Marshal Vanhe?" Dolodha said nervously.

"Adjutant Dolodha, or slave?" he said in a deadly voice.

She ran.

Maigraith was gone and no one had the faintest idea where. But Yggur knew, and knew that it was ended too. She had grown beyond him; he would never get her back. The pain was unbearable and there was only one way that he could think of to deal with it. He made himself into a machine, utterly devoid of compassion or human feeling.

He limped out of the tent, grim of face, and his first act was to strip Vanhe of his rank. His second: he signed the death warrants. By sunset the Second Army was no more.

A FEAST OF.

BAMUNDI.

After laying Selial to rest at the foot of the Rainbow Bridge, Karan and Llian had a rough journey across the sea, beating constantly into westerly winds in their wallowing old tub of a boat. The Aachim were unwontedly reserved, as was Karan. Hardly a word was spoken on the haul back to the boat or the trip across the sea to Meldorin.

Suddenly the long gray shore of Thripsi appeared above the white-feathered waves and Karan woke from her sightless contemplation of the distance to realize that Malien was talking to her.

"What's that?" Karan asked dreamily.

"I said, " 'Where do you want to go now?' " We're sailing west from here, to the Great Library."

"Why there?" Karan had assumed that the Aachim were going back to Thurkad. This raised all sorts of problems, not least how she and Llian were going to get to Gothryme.

"Private business."

"I'm going home," said Karan. "Better land us at the nearest port-Siftah, I think it's called."

"Will you sail to Thurkad?" Malien asked as they went forward to speak to the captain.

"Yggur's there!" Karan exclaimed. "I'm afraid, Malien. Afraid for Llian, and for myself too-Gothryme is the closest place to Shazmak. Rulke might be there already. I don't know what to do."

"Have you had any more dreams?"

"Not lately."

"Well, whatever your troubles, it's better to suffer them under your own roof. But go secretly, by the back roads."

"I will. What are your plans after Zile, Malien?"

"I don't know yet. My heart calls me east, to my home, but I daren't go until the business is finished. We've no home in Meldorin any longer."

"Why don't you come to Gothryme? You'll always be welcome in my house, though I don't know how it has survived the war."

"Thank you," said Malien, "perhaps we will, though we've much to do first."

The boat turned onto a new heading that made it wallow uncomfortably, then the two strolled back to where Llian sat in the shade of the sail, hunched over his journal. Their paired shadows fell on him from behind. Llian started up with a muffled cry.

"What's the matter?" said Malien.

"I-thought you were someone else."

We can't be off this boat soon enough, Karan thought. Just me and Llian, and no more troubles.

The following day they approached the fishing town of Siftah, on the north-eastern corner of Meldorin. The hill slopes were clad in herbs, heath and aromatic rosemary, a gray and silver mass that stirred in the breeze. On that hot afternoon they could smell it as soon as they rounded the point.

"I remember this place," said Llian as they sailed up a winding inlet. To left and right rose steep hills of barren conglomerate, brown cobbles sticking out of a yellow matrix like balls of chocolate in a biscuit. "The fisherfolk here are tremendous drinkers."

"I imagine that suited you pretty well," she smiled.

"Not then. I was too worn out. I went to sleep under the table. And a couple of days later the survivors of Shazmak appeared. I lived in fear of my life after that."

Karan looked up to see Basitor staring down at them from beside the wheel-house. Though he had not caused any trouble since the Dry Sea, his presence was a constant reminder of it. She put her arm around Llian, protectively. "It'll soon be over. We're going home."

Siftah was a pretty town, a few hundred whitewashed buildings set on a steep hill that curved around the end of the estuary like an amphitheater, and twenty or thirty fishing boats, most of very rustic design.

Karan and Llian disembarked and said their goodbyes on the wharf. The Aachim waved, all but one, then the boat slipped away. They headed up the street to buy supplies for the long trek south.

"That's that then," Karan said. "We're alone at last."

"At last!" Llian agreed. "I don't have to look over my shoulder anymore."

Karan did just that, then smiled. "Hello," she said, squinting at the fishing vessels anchored on the other side of the harbor. "I know that boat."

"I don't," said Llian, anxious to be going. "Come on!"

"No, it's Tess, I'm sure of it. I'm going back."

Llian sighed and followed after her. The pack was heavy after the days on the boat.

"Tess!" cried Karan, running along the cobbled waterfront, in dire peril of skidding into the harbor.

On one of the boats a big shapeless figure turned from the task she was supervising and her weatherbeaten face broke into a great beaming smile.

"Why, it's little Karan," she said, holding out her arms. "And you've filled out a bit since I last saw you. Where have you been?"

"Halfway across the Dry Sea and back again," Karan said, embracing her.

"Well!" said Tessariel in amazement. "Your sinews must be made of adamant. When last I saw you, you were just a handful of bones. I wouldn't have thought you could have walked from one side of Ganport to the other. So, did you find what you were looking for? Ah, I can see that you did," she concluded as Llian came straggling up.

"This is my very special friend, Llian of Chanthed," Karan said, dragging him forward. "Llian, meet Tessariel, the owner of this boat. She fishes for bamundi."

Tess inspected Llian minutely, until he grew embarrassed. "The teller! You'll do. You were quite famous once, I recall."

"And I will be again, after this is over," Llian muttered.

"What happened to the old man, Karan? Did you leave him out in the middle of the Dry Sea?"

"Shand went his own way from Flude, not long ago," said Karan.

"No matter, all the more for us! Now, come with me." She took Karan's wrist in an iron grip. "You caused me no end of trouble, do you realize?"

Karan looked dismayed, but Tess was smiling. "It's all right, that was half a year ago. Someone in Ganport informed on me-your old friend Gooseface the innkeeper, I suspect. A pox on her inn and her famous bathtub! Llian, did Karan tell you that story, I wonder?"

Karan went red. "I don't believe she did," said Llian with a grin, "but I'll be only too glad to hear your tale."

"Anyway," Tess continued, "when Yggur's captain, Zareth the Hlune-you remember the fellow, I'm sure ..."

"Well, I never actually saw him," said Karan, "since I was at the bottom of a basket of fish ..."

"She didn't tell me that story either," said Llian, laughing.

"When he recovered from the octopus venom and found out that I'd helped you get away, he was not pleased. I had to go into hiding. Lucky for you the bamundi season was ending or I'd have had you scrubbing my decks for a thousand weeks to make up the loss." She grinned hugely. Her front teeth, top and bottom, were solid gold.

"Well," said Karan, "when you put us ashore last time I promised to tell you my tale, if ever we met again."

"Why, so you did! And, if I remember correctly, I offered a bamundi dinner in return."