The dwarf took a huge bite out of the melon. The crowd roared with laughter in which the Khad joined. He sank his teeth into his slice of melon, chewed and swallowed.

Blade felt the sweat creeping out on his forehead. Morpho had said it would take a little time.

Sadda leaned to him, her hand on his knee. "What is it, my Blade? You look so strange."

The Khad took another bite of melon, swallowed it, and stood up. He raised a hand and the gathering fell silent once more.

"I have more news," said the Khad. "Concerning myself. I, your ruler,, am also to be married soon. I have at last found the moon of my desire. My heart is smitten after all these years."

He clapped his hands sharply. "Bring in the bride of Khad Tambur. Bring her who will soon share the throne of the Ruler of the World."

The crowd sighed and hushed. The Khad smiled in triumph at having so surprised and caught them off guard. He raised his bowl of bross and drank, his eyes feral over the rim. Of all things in the world they had not expected this.

Only Sadda was not surprised. Blade saw that and also saw the flutter of malice and hate and antic.i.p.ation in her eyes. Her gaze eluded his and followed the blacks. She formed the words with her red lips. "Soon now. Be ready."

The blacks came back. Between them, led by one of them, was a slim little figure, a girl. A child-girl. She was richly arrayed, her dark hair piled and caught on her head with scarlet combs. She was beautiful. Blade's heart stopped beating. Too late now, but he understood.

The girl stumbled and one of the black slaves caught her. She peered around, her eyes blank, and she raised a hand and said, her voice chiming in the dead silence: "My father? Are you here, my father? I do not like this place. I am afraid, my father." Nantee.

Chapter Seventeen.

The dwarf uttered a cry of rage and anguish and rushed at Sadda.

Blade was frozen and moved too late. Sadda half turned on the throne, wide-eyed in shock and surprise, as Morpho buried his knife under her left breast. She screamed once then, and stared down in disbelief at the hilt protruding from that golden flesh.

She fell slowly forward onto the rugs before the dais.

The next moment, while shock and horror held the crowd, the Khad fell beside his sister. He gasped and clawed at his throat as terrible convulsions racked his body.

Blade came to life. The blacks were the first to leap at Morpho. Blade flung the throne at them and they went down in a heap. Blade drew his sword as he bellowed at the dwarf.

"Behind me - behind me!"

Rahstum had whipped a sword from under the covers of his pallet and was brandishing it and roaring at the top of his voice.

"To me! To Rahstum! Obey your orders - to me, to me!"

It was whirling, sweating, screaming, fighting pandemonium. Some of the Khad's men tried to fight and were cut down. Two of them rushed at the dwarf, sheltering behind Blade, and he killed one and badly wounded another.

Blade moved quickly back to guard the little man, seeing that it was not going to be much of a fight after all.

Rahstum had planned too well.

There was a flurry of action near the entrance as some of the Khad's men sought to break out of the tent. Baber, a wide grin on his face, rolled his cart into the melee and began to slash at legs. He had had a sword in a sling beneath his cart.

In five minutes the worst was over. Some few of the Khad's men escaped by slitting the tent cloth with their swords and bursting out. Rahstum sent men after them.

Rahstum had himself carried to the throne and placed on it. He smiled at Blade and waved his arm.

"Too weak to walk. I must be carried to my throne. A fine beginning for the new Khad, eh?"

"At least a beginning," Blade replied. "But what now, Captain? Or shall I already call you Khad?"

Their glances locked and held for an instant. Rahstum smiled faintly. "You will call me Captain - at least in private. But there is no time for that nonsense now. We must get on with it. You, Sir Blade, and Morpho, will remain here with me. My men have their orders."

It was a long night and a b.l.o.o.d.y one. Rahstum had planned so well that most of the Khad's men and officers were caught completely unaware. With the common soldiers there was no difficulty. It was all one to them who paid them, they had not cared much for the Khad anyway, and they came over to Rahstum in droves and without demur.

Rahstum's troops rounded up all the Khad's officers, those who had not been in the tent, and brought them before the Captain. It moved rapidly. They were given a minute to swear fealty to Rahstum or lose their heads. The headsman waited just outside with his block. A good three quarters of the officers took the oath.

They finished as the sun came bounding up. Rahstum was fatigued and in great pain, and greatly in need of sleep. He dozed on his pallet and a rug was thrown over him.

The bodies of the Khad and Sadda had been taken away. Not before Blade asked, and received, a promise that Sadda at least should have a decent burial. His child was dead now, which could not be helped, but he would not have Sadda, with whom he had shared a bed, if not love, treated as the corpse of the Khad was to be treated.

The dwarf spent most of the night in a corner of the tent with Nantee, cozening and petting her, and allaying her fears. At last she went to sleep, her cheeks tearstained, and Morpho holding one small hand.

Blade, seeking explanations now that it was over, smiled down at the sleeping girl.

"She will be all right, Morpho. He had no chance to harm her. And it is unlikely that she understood what it was about. She will not be haunted by it. And now she has Rahstum's protection. You heard him promise it."

Morpho nodded. His own rugged cheeks were tear-stained. "I owe you much, Sir Blade. More than before, which was my life."

Blade, who was also weary, found a seat and regarded the little man with a touch of sternness.

"Commence repayment, then, by telling me something of the truth. How came Sadda to know about Nantee?"

Morpho's eyes were sad over the fixed grin. "She was a devil. She had known for many years. Since Nantee was a baby. I do not know how she found out, but she did. She had spies everywhere."

Sadda had been, right, Blade thought, when she told him she could make the dwarf do anything. He had been her man. He had no choice.

"You lied," he said now. "You told me that only three people knew about Nantee. You, me, and your old crone. I half guessed, and would have known the truth, but you lied. Why, Morpho?"

The dwarf nodded slowly. "Yes. I lied, Sir Blade. I had to lie. She made me promise that I would never tell anyone that she knew about Nantee. I did not understand then. I do not understand now. But I had to promise and I dared not break it. She also promised me something - that if ever I told anyone that she knew about my child - Nantee would be killed at once. What could I do but obey, Blade. I dared not tell even you or Rahstum. If you were tortured and spoke, my daughter would die."

Nantee stirred and mumbled in her sleep. Morpho booted her and stroked her hair.

Blade thought he understood. Sadda had been subtle beyond all knowing. But what had she been protecting herself against? Her brother - who might have taken it amiss if she knew of such a lovely child as Nantee and concealed it from him?

Blade shrugged and gave up. She was dead and that was the end of it.

By noon the camp was nearly back to normal. Rahstum awakened, refreshed and hungry, and began issuing orders and making plans as he gulped his breakfast. Nantee was given to the charge of a trusted woman and taken to special quarters. Morpho went back to his tent to sleep. Baber, drunk on joy and bross, had to be carried to his wagon by four men. Rahstum, remembering the way Baber had fought on his cart, promised to make him a sublieutenant.

Blade and Rahstum went to look on the final humiliation of the Khad Tambur, Ruler of the World and Shaker of the Universe. It was a last degrading, but that was not the only end. Long lines of men and women and children, even the dung gatherers, waited to pa.s.s the body.

"There is no time for oaths of loyalty from all these," Rahstum explained. "This will do just as well. These people do not really care who rules them, and they know that I cannot be worse than the Khad. See how eager they are!"

The Khad's naked body had been tossed on a great pile of human dung. He lay on his back, his sightless eye staring at the sky. One by one the Mongs filed past, each one spitting on the corpse.

Blade looked at the Captain. "How did the little man do it? I meant to ask, but we got to talking of other things. Did he tell you?"

Rahstum eased his stub in the sling and grimaced. Blade thought his powers of recuperation far beyond the mere human.

"He did not tell me," Rahstum said a bit dourly. "I questioned him and made him talk. Lest I turn out to be a bad Khad and he use the same method on me one day."

"I doubt that," Blade said.

Rahstum shrugged, then laughed. "He is a clever little fiend. You saw the melon he took from the snow. It was whole? Uncut?"

"I thought so. But how could it have been - or had he a way of placing the poison without breaking the skin of the melon?"

The Captain shook his head. "Not so. He put the poison in the melon before the Khad's very eyes. It was on his knife. One side of the knife he had smeared with honey. On this he placed the poison so that it would stick - it was a powder."

Blade grinned. "I see it now. When he cut the melon the poison was left on one half only - the half he gave the Khad. So he could bite into the other half without harm to himself. He is a little fiend, Captain. I agree."

Rahstum laughed again. "It was a near thing at that, when the Khad challenged him. But that trick with his voice got him out of it. The Khad laughed and forgot and his laugh killed him."

They went back to the big tent. As they entered Blade said, "Suppose Morpho had failed. What then, Captain?"

"I would have killed the Khad myself. With my one remaining hand."

In the tent Rahstum swung on Blade. "I have much to do. As I am sure you do also. But you wanted a word in private, Sir Blade. You have it. What is the affair?"

It was more than a word. It was a long hour of talk, of question and answer, of anger and impatience and some little bellowing and shouting: But when Blade left the tent to sleep at last he felt that he had won - for the time being. His instincts had been right about Rahstum. He was a Cauca, not a Mong, and he was a reasonable man.

Chapter Eighteen.

The Mongs were trekking again. A week had seen vast reorganization in the warrior cla.s.s and the several tribes, and under Rahstum's firm and relatively merciful guidance the various factions achieved at least the appearance of unity. The Captain made a swift recovery; after the first two days he ignored his pain and was in the saddle constantly. Some days he s.n.a.t.c.hed but two or three hours sleep. Even so he had to delegate many tasks to Blade, who in turn had Baber and the dwarf as his aides.

Gradually, as time wore on, the four of them came to const.i.tute an unofficial, shadowy, but authentic quadruplex of authority that was not questioned. Rahstum commanded, Blade implemented. Baber, who now had a gentle old mare to draw him about on his cart, was learning to ride again and wielded power far greater than his rank, Rahstum being too cunning to immediately elevate another Cauca and so cause jealousy.

Morpho, with skill and determination, set about organizing a new provost and a secret spy network so that Rahstum might know all that was whispered or plotted. Business was very slack. The Mongs seemed satisfied.

They moved to the south, following the line of the seash.o.r.e, and after twenty miles they topped a rise and saw the great yellow wall glimmering along the horizon. Blade and the Captain were riding at the head of the column. Scouts had been sent ahead, but had not returned or sent any word.

Rahstum signaled a stop and looked at Blade. "So there is our wall again, Sir Blade. What say you now? We come in peace, for I will keep the promise you extracted from me, but who can parley with a wall?"

Blade studied the wall for a long time, shielding his eyes against the blazing sun. There was no sign of movement, no life, and the wall did not reach the sea. As best he could make out it tapered off, unfinished, some five hundred yards from the ocean.

"I think nothing has changed," he told Rahstum. "We can pa.s.s between the end of the wall and sea and then turn back west again, just as we had planned. Just so your outriders do not disobey orders and provoke fighting. Make sure of that, Captain! The Caths must understand that this time we come in peace."

"I have made sure," grunted the Captain. "The officers know they will pay with their heads if they provoke a fight."

The column moved on. They skirted the end of the wall and swung back to the west. The wall snaked away, deserted and desolate, to the far faint beginnings of mountains. That night, just before the sun dropped out of sight, it hovered over those mountains and a wondrous green light lay shimmering along the edge of the world, like a jade mist that moved and swirled and formed fantastic pictures of itself.

Blade watched it with a feeling of awe. It could not but mean that the range ahead was another ma.s.s of the Jade Mountains he had seen in Serendip. This was raw stone, uncut and unpolished, yet of such purity that it dyed the heavens with its color.

Remembrance of his last night with Lali came. What of Lali now? Who had replaced him?

The long column of Mongs, a fat disjointed serpent, crawled over to the west. The land began to revert to steppe, though fertile and with many trees, and one day Blade caught the scent of banyo trees. After that the air was increasingly soft and sweet. They were getting into the heartland of the Caths. Still they met no opposing forces, saw no towns or villages, and nothing moved along the wall.

It was some little time before Blade noted that the dwarf seemed to be avoiding him. One day he taxed the little man with it.

Morpho, sitting his pony, nodded. "That is truth, Sir Blade. It is not of my own wish, but I thought it best.

Time will heal, but until it does I thought it best to stay away."

Blade understood and smiled and patted the little fellow's shoulder. "It could not be helped, Morpho. In your place I would have done the same. You were in a rage and thought only to protect your child."

"And slew yours, Sir Blade." Morpho did not look at him. His eyes were on the horizon.

Blade was silent for a moment. He had put the matter from his mind. No good came of thinking too much in the past, or grieving over what might have been. In his case especially. For the last two days now he had been having dull headaches, and now and then a stroke of real pain. Lord L was groping for him with the computer.

"Avoid me no more," he told the dwarf. "We are friends. I tell you I would have done the same - only I would have killed the Khad, not Sadda."

Morpho flexed his grin. "As I would have, had I not known him already dying of my poison. Sadda counted on that because she did not know about the poison. We were fortunate in the way things fell out, Sir Blade."

Blade nodded in agreement. "We were lucky. She reckoned that the shock of seeing Nantee would drive you to slay the Khad. Then I was to kill you, and Sadda would reign. It was a good plan. Had there been no counterplot it might well have worked."

Their eyes met. "Would you have slain me, Sir Blade, to save yourself?"

"I cannot answer that," answered Blade. "Forget, Morpho. Let it blow with the wind. She sleeps now, in a decent grave, and the matter is best forgot."

"So it shall be." The dwarf pointed to the horizon. "See yonder. Dust. I think our scouting party returns."

Blade had duties back along the column and it was an hour before he rode back to the vanguard. The Mong scouts, fatigued and dirty, their ponies drooping, were still being questioned by Rahstum. When Blade rode up, the Captain beckoned to him with an odd smile on his face. He held up a small object that glittered in the sun.

"Come and see yourself, Sir Blade. You are now become a house G.o.d of the Caths."

Puzzled, Blade rode into the group. The Mong scouts eyed him curiously. Rahstum handed him the little object with a thin smile. His tone was sardonic.

"I had not known you so famous, Sir Blade. I think we waste time in this long march to treat with the Caths. You and I might settle matters between us, since you are so great in Cath."

Blade, staring at the little statuette, was dumfounded. He reached to take it in his hand. It was a foot high, of faultless jade, and carven in the exact image of himself as he had been in Cath. He wore the wooden armor and carried a sword, standing erect and calm with one foot slightly advanced. The artisan had caught his features exactly.

Blade looked at the Captain and shrugged. "You speak in riddles, Captain. How came you by this? What does it mean?"

Rahstum signed to the lieutenant of the scouts, a little man with a fierce beard and dusty armor. "Tell him, man."