'Well, you see how it is, sir,' said Ankray. 'I'll just be getting along now. If you take my advice you'll leave it alone. There's others will take it away - you can be sure of that. If by any chance I shouldn't be back before dark, perhaps you'd be so kind as to wait in the courtyard, same as I did for you last night. But I shan't be loitering-'

He swung up his sack and set off, looking sharply about him as he went.

Kelderek bolted the door and returned to the house. Ankray had cleared and swept the kitchen hearth but lit no fire, and he was washing in cold water when Melathys came in, carrying a dark-red robe and some other garments. Kelderek, head bent over the pail, smiled up at her, shaking the water out of his eyes and cars.

'These were the Baron's,' she said, 'but that's no reason to leave them folded away for ever. They'll fit quite as well as your soldier's clothes and be far more comfortable.' She laid them down, filled a pitcher for the Tuginda and took it away.

As he dressed, he wondered whether this might be the very robe which Bel-ka-Trazet had been wearing when he fled from Ortelga. If it were not, he could only have taken it from some enemy killed since, for it was inconceivable that such a garment could have been traded in Zeray. Elleroth himself, he thought wryly, might have sported it with confidence. It was of excellent cloth, evenly dyed a clear, dark red, and the workmanship was so fine that the seams were almost invisible. It was, as Melathys had said, very comfortable, being yielding and smooth, and the very act of wearing it seemed to remove him a step further from his dismal wanderings and the sufferings he had undergone.

The Tuginda, thinner and hollow-eyed, was sitting up, propped against the wall behind the bed while Melathys combed her hair. Kelderek, taking one of her hands between his own, asked whether she would like him to bring her some food. She shook her head.

'Later,' she answered. Then, after a little, 'Kelderek, thank you for helping me to reach Zeray: and I must ask your forgiveness for deceiving you in one matter.'

'For deceiving me, saiyett? How?'

'I knew, of course, what had become of the Baron. All news reaches Quiso. I expected to find him here, but I did not tell you. I could see that you were badly shocked and exhausted, and I thought it better not to trouble you further. But he would not have harmed you; neither you nor me.'

'You don't need to ask forgiveness of me, saiyett, but since you have, it's given very willingly.'

'Melathys has told me that now that the Baron is gone there's no possibility of our finding help in Zeray/ She sighed deeply, staring down at her sunlit hands on the blanket with a look so disappointed and hopeless that he was moved, as people are apt to be by pity, to say more than he could be sure of.

'Don't distress yourself, saiyett. It's true enough that this is a place of rogues and worse, but as soon as you're well enough we shall leave - Melathys, you and I and the Baron's man. There's a village not far to the north where I hope we may find safety.'

'Melathys told me. The servant has set out to go there today. Will the poor man be safe?'

Kelderek laughed. 'There's one person who's sure of it and that's himself.'

The Tuginda closed her eyes wearily and Melathys put down the comb.

'You should rest again now, saiyett,' she said, 'and then try to eat something. I'll be off to the kitchen, for there's a fire to be lit before I can cook.'

The Tuginda nodded without opening her eyes. Kelderek followed Melathys out of the room. When he had laid the fire, she lit it with a fragment of curved glass held in a sunbeam. He was content to stand and watch as she busied herself with the food, only speaking a word occasionally or trying to anticipate her need of this or that. The room seemed as full of calm and reassurance as of sunlight, and for the time being the future caused no more anxiety to him than to the joyous insects darting in the brightness outside.

Later, as the day, moving towards noon, filled the courtyard with a heat like that of summer, Melathys drew water from the well, washed the household clothes and laid them in the sun to drv. Coming back into the shade of the house, she sat down in the narrow window-scat, wiping her neck and forehead with a rough cloth in place of a towel.

'Elsewhere, women can go and wash clothes in the river and take it for granted,' she said. 'That's what rivers are for - laundry and gossip: but not in Zeray.'

'On Quiso?'

'On Quiso we were often less solemn than you may suppose. But I was thinking of any town or village where ordinary, decent people can go about the business of life without fear: yes, and without dragging shame behind them like a chain. Wouldn't it be fine -wouldn't it seem like a miracle - just to go to a market, to bargain with a stall-keeper, to loiter in the road eating something that you'd bought fair and honestly, to give some of it away to a friend while you gossiped by the river? I remember those things - the Quiso girls came and went a good deal on the island's business, you know: in some ways we were freer than other women. To be deprived of little, common pleasures that honest people take for granted - that's imprisonment, that's retribution, that's grief and loss. If people valued such things at their worth, they'd give themselves more credit for the common trust and honesty on which those things depend.'

'You've got some compensation. Most women can't use words like that,' answered Kelderek. 'It's a narrow life for a village girl -cooking, weaving, children, pounding clothes on the stones.'

'Perhaps,' she said. 'Perhaps. Birds sing in the trees, find their food, mate, build nests. They don't know anything else.' She looked up at him, smiling and drawing the cloth slowly from side to side across the back of her neck. 'It's a narrow life for birds. But you catch one and put it in a cage and you'll soon find out whether it values what it's lost.'

He longed to take her in his arms so strongly that for a few moments his head swam. To conceal his feelings he bent over his knife and half-finished fish-hook.

'You sing, too,' he said. 'I've heard you.'

'Yes. I'll sing now, if you like. I sometimes used to sing for the Baron. He liked to hear old songs he remembered, but really it was all the same to him who sang them - Ankray would do. By the Ledges, you should hear him!'

'No - you. I can wait to hear Ankray.'

She rose, peeped in at the Tuginda, left the room and returned with a plain, unornamented hinnari hinnari of light-coloured of light-coloured sesttiaga sesttiaga wood, much battered along the finger-board. She put it into his hands. It was warped and more than a little out of true. wood, much battered along the finger-board. She put it into his hands. It was warped and more than a little out of true.

'Don't you say a word against it,' she said. 'As far as I know, it's the only one in Zeray. It was found floating down the river and the Baron put his pride in his pocket and begged the strings from Lak. If they break there aren't any more.'

Sitting down again in the window-seat, she plucked the strings softly for a while, adjusting and coaxing the hard-toned hinnari into such tune as it possessed. Then, looking into her lap as though singing to herself alone, she sang the old ballad of U-Deparioth and the Silver Flower of Sarkid. Kelderek remembered the tale - still told as true in that country - how Deparioth, abandoned by traitors in the terrible Blue Forest, left to wander till he died and long given up for lost by friends and servants, had been roused from his despair by a mysterious and beautiful girl, dressed like a queen in that desolate wilderness. She tended his hurts, found him fruits, fungus and roots fit to cat, restored his courage and guided his limping steps day by day through the maze of the woods, until at last they came to a place that he knew. But as he turned to lead her towards the friends running to meet them, she vanished and he saw only a tall, silver lily blooming where she had been standing in the long grass. Heart-broken, he sank weeping to the ground, and ever after longed only to recover those days of hardship that he had spent with her in the forest.

Give back the miry solitude, The thorns and briars outstretched to bless. The thorns and briars outstretched to bless. There lay my kingdom, past compare: There lay my kingdom, past compare: This court's the desert wilderness. This court's the desert wilderness.

Ending, she was silent, and he too said nothing, knowing that there was no need for him to speak. She plucked the strings idly for a while and then, as though on impulse, broke into the little song 'Cat catch a fish', that generations of Ortelgan children had known and played on the shore. He could not help laughing with delight to be taken thus by surprise, for he had neither heard nor thought of the song since he himself had left Ortelga.

'Have you lived on Ortelga, then?' he asked. 'I don't remember you when I was a child.'

'On Ortelga - no. I learnt that song as a child on Quiso.'

'You were a child child on Quiso?' He had no recollection of what Rantzay had once told him. 'Then when -' on Quiso?' He had no recollection of what Rantzay had once told him. 'Then when -'

'You don't know how I came to Quiso? I'll tell you. I was born on a slave-farm in Tonilda and if I ever knew my mother I can't remember her. That was before the Slave Wars and we were simply goods to be prepared for sale. When I was seven the farm was taken by Santil-ki-Erketlis and the Heldril. A wounded captain was making the journey to Quiso to be healed by the Tuginda, and he took me and a girl called Bria, to offer us to be brought up as priestesses. Bria ran away before we reached the Telthearna and what became of her I never knew. But I became a child of the Ledges.'

'Were you happy?'

'Oh, yes. To have a home and wise, good people to love you and look after you, after being part of the stock of a slave-farm - you can't imagine what that meant It's not incurable, you know - the harm done to an ill-treated child. Everyone was kind -I was spoiled. I got on well - I was clever, you see - and I grew up to believe that I was God's gift to Quiso. That was why, when the time came, I wasn't fit for any real self-sacrifice, as poor Rantzay was.' She was silent for a little and then said, 'But I've learnt since then.' was spoiled. I got on well - I was clever, you see - and I grew up to believe that I was God's gift to Quiso. That was why, when the time came, I wasn't fit for any real self-sacrifice, as poor Rantzay was.' She was silent for a little and then said, 'But I've learnt since then.'

'Are you sorry that you'll never go back to Quiso?'

*Not now: I told you, it's been made plain to me-' He interrupted her. 'Not too later'

'Oh, yes,' she answered, 'it's always too late.' She got up and, passing close to him on her way to the Tuginda's room, bent down so that her lips just brushed his ear. 'No, it's never too late.' A few moments afterwards she called to him to come and help the Tuginda to a seat by the fire, while she made the bed and swept the room.

During the later part of the afternoon the sun became cooler and the courtyard shady. They sat outside, near the fig-tree by the wall, Melathys on a bench under the Tuginda's open window, Kelderek on the coping of the well. After a time, disturbed in memory by the low chuckling and whispering sounds deep in the shaft, he rose and began to gather up the clothes she had spread during the morning.

'Some of these haven't dried, Melathys.'

She stretched lazily, arching her back and lifting her face to the sky. 'They will.' 'Not by tonight.' 'M'mm. Fuss, fuss.'

'I'll spread them on the roof for you, if you like. It's still sunny there.' 'No way up.'

'In Bekla every house had steps up to the roof.' 'In Bekla town the pigs all fly, and the wine in the river goes gurgling by-'

Looking up the fifteen or sixteen feet of the wall, he picked a way, scrambled up the rough stonework, got both hands on the parapet and pulled himself over. Inside there was a drop of about a foot to the flat, stone roof. He tried it cautiously, but it was solid enough and he stepped down. The stones were warm in the sun.

'Throw the clothes up and I'll spread them.'

'It must be dirty.'

'A broom, then. Can you -'

He broke off, looking towards the river.

'What is it?' called Melathys, with a touch of anxiety.

Kelderek did not answer and she asked again, more urgently.

'Men on the opposite side of the river.'

' What?' She stared up at him incredulously. 'That's a desert shore, no village for forty miles, or so I've always been told. I've never seen a man there since I've been here.' She stared up at him incredulously. 'That's a desert shore, no village for forty miles, or so I've always been told. I've never seen a man there since I've been here.'

'Well, you can now.'

'What are they doing?'

'I can't make out They look like soldiers. People this side seem just as much surprised as you.'

'Help me up, Kelderek.'

After a little difficulty she climbed high enough for him to grasp her wrists and pull her up. Stepping on the roof, she immediately knelt down behind the parapet and motioned him to copy her.

'A month ago we might have stood openly on a roof in Zeray. I don't think I would now.'

Together they looked eastward. Along the Zeray waterfront the rabble of loiterers were gathered in groups, talking together and pointing across the river. On the further shore, about half a mile from where they were kneeling on the roof, a band of perhaps fifty men could be seen, intent on some business of their own among the rocks.

'That man on the left - he's giving orders, do you see ?' 'But what is it they're carrying?'

'Stakes. Look at that nearer one - it must be as long as the centre-pole of an Ortelgan hut. I suppose they're going to build a hut - but whatever for?'

'Heaven knows - but one thing's certain, it can't be anything to do with Zeray. No one's ever yet crossed that strait. The current's far too strong.'

'They're soldiers, aren't they?'

'I think so - or else a hunting expedition.'

'In a desert? Look, they've started digging. And those are two great mauls they've got there. So when they've sunk those stakes deep enough to be able to get at the heads, they must be going to drive them in further.'

'For a hut?'

'Well, let's wait and see. They'll probably-' He stopped as she laid a hand on his arm and drew him back from the parapet. 'What is it?'

She lowered her voice. 'Possibly nothing. But there was a man watching us from below - one of your friends of last night, I dare say. It might be better to go down now, in case he has ideas of breaking in. Anyway, the less attention we attract the better, and out of sight out of mind's a good maxim in this place.'

After he had helped her down, he closed and secured the shutters of the few windows on the outer wall, brought Ankray's heavy spear into the courtyard and remained listening for some time. All was quiet, however, and at length he returned indoors. The Tuginda was awake and he sat down near the foot of the bed, content to listen while she and Melathys talked of old days on Quiso. Once the Tuginda spoke of Ged-la-Dan, but though Melathys evidently understood well enough the terms she used in describing his fruitless attempts to reach the island, Kelderek could make nothing of them.

Nor, he thought, was there any reason why he should. Melathys had said that she would never return there and certainly he would not. Magic, mysticism, the fulfilment of prophecies and the search for meanings beyond those of hearth and home - it was little enough he had gained from them, unless indeed he could count his hard-won experience. But though he himself was disillusioned, it seemed from what she had said that Melathys was not. It was dear enough, too, that the Tuginda thought of her as healed or redeemed - if those terms had any meaning - in some sense that did not apply to himself. No doubt, he thought, this was because Melathys had begged her forgiveness. Why had he been unable to do so?

Soon it would be dusk. Still deep in his thoughts, he left the women together and went out into the courtyard to wait for Ankray.

He was leaning against the bolted gate, listening for any sound of approach and wondering whether he should climb once more to the roof when, looking up, he saw Melathys standing in the doorway. The flame light of evening covered her from head to foot and showed the long fall of her hair as a smooth, glowing shadow, like the curved trough of a wave. As a man, having stopped to gaze at a rainbow, continues on his way but then, turning to look at it once more, is immediately enraptured yet again by its marvellous beauty, as though he had never seen it in his life before, so Kelderek was moved by the sight of Melathys. Arrested by his fixed look and catching, as it were, the echo of herself in his eyes, the girl stood still, smiling a little, as though to tell him that she was happy to oblige him until he should find himself able to release her from his gaze.

'Don't move,' he said, at once bidding and entreating, and she showed neither confusion nor embarrassment, but a dignity joyous, spontaneous and unassuming as a dancer's. Suddenly, with an illusion like that which, in the hall of the King's House at Bekla, while he stood awaiting the soldiers bringing Elleroth, had shown him Shardik as both bear and distant mountain-summit, he saw her as the tall zoan tree on the shore of Ortelga - an enclosing arbour of ferny boughs by the waterside. Without taking his eyes from hc/s he crossed the courtyard.

'What do you see?' asked Melathys, looking up at him with a little spurt of laughter; and Kelderek, recalling the power of the priestesses of Quiso, wondered whether she herself had called the image of the zoan into his mind.

'A tall tree by the river,' he answered. 'A landmark for a homecoming.'

Taking her hands in his own, he raised them to his lips. As he did so, there fell upon the courtyard door a rapid, urgent knocking. This was followed immediately by an ugly sound of jeering and Ankray's voice calling,' Now then, be off with you, and look sharp about it!*

47 Ankray's News

Kelderek, snatching up the spear, ran and drew the bolts and Ankray, his sword drawn in his hand, ducked his head and stepped backwards into the courtyard, slipping his sack from his shoulder as Kelderek shut the gate.

'I hope all's well, sir, with you and the priestesses,' he said, drawing the javelin from his belt and sitting down on the coping of the well to pull off his muddy leggings. 'I did my best to get back as quick as I could, but it's a fair step over that rough country.'

Kelderek, unable at once to find words, merely nodded but then, unwilling to seem churlish to this good fellow who had risked his life for their sakes, laid a hand on his shoulder and smiled.

'No, no trouble here,' he said. 'You'd better come in and have a wash and a drink. Let me take your sack - that's it. By God, it's heavy! You haven't been too unlucky, then?'

'Well, yes and no, sir,' replied Ankray, stooping to enter the doorway. '1 was able to pick up a few things, true enough. I've got some fresh meat, if the priestess could fancy a bit of it this evening.'

'I'll cook it,' said Melathys, bringing a bowl of hot water and crushing herbs into it as she put it down on the floor. 'You've done enough for one day. No, don't be stupid, Ankray: of course I'm going to wash your feet. I want to have a look at them. There's a cut, for a start. Keep still.'

'There are three full wine-skins in this sack,' said Kelderek, looking into it, 'as well as the meat and these two cheeses and some loaves. Here's some oil, and what's this - lard? And some leather. You must be as strong as five oxen to have carried this lot nine miles.'

'Mind the fish-hooks and the knife-blades, sir,' said Ankray. 'They're loose, but then I know where I put them, you see.'

'Well, whatever your news is, let's eat first,' said Kelderek. 'If this is the Yes, we may as well make the most of it before you start on the No. Come on, drink some of this wine you've brought, and here's your good health.'

It was well over an hour before the meal had been cooked and eaten. Ankray and Kelderek, after going out of the gate to look round the house, test the barred shutters from outside and make sure all was quiet, returned to find that Melathys had taken two lamps from the kitchen to add to that already in the Tuginda's room. The Tuginda welcomed Ankray and thanked him, praising his strength and courage and questioning him so warmly and sincerely that he soon found himself giving her an account of the day's adventures with as little constraint as he might have related it to the Baron. She told him to fetch a stool and sit down, and he did so without embarrassment.

'Do they still remember the Baron kindly in Lak?' asked Melathys.

'Oh yes, saiyett,' answered the man. 'There was two or three of them asked me whether I thought it would be safe if they was to come here, to pay their respects, like, at the grave. I said I'd fix a day to meet them, to make sure of them finding the right spot They've got a great opinion of the Baron, have the folk in Lak.'

'Did you get any chance to tell them about what's happened, or to find out whether we may be able to go there ?'

'Well, that's just it, saiyett: I can't say as I was able to get far there. You sec, I couldn't talk to the chief or any of the ciders. It seems they're all greatly taken up with this business of the bear. They were holding some sort of meeting about it, and 'twas still going on when I had to start back.'

'The bear?' asked Kelderek sharply. 'What bear? What do you mean?'

'There's no one knows what to make of it, sir,' replied Ankray. 'They say it's witchcraft There's not a man of them but he's frightened, for never a bear's been known before in those parts and by all I can make out this one's no natural creature.'

'What did they tell you?' asked Melathys, white to the lips.