Beson listened to the speech of the imprisoned prince with incredulity and mounting rage. Peter finished and Aron Beson let loose a gutter flood of obscenity that would have made a horse drover blush.

Peter stood before it, impa.s.sive.

"You murdering snot-nosed hound!" Beson finished, in a tone that was close to wonder. "I guess you think yer still livin ' in the b.l.o.o.d.y lap o luxury, with yer sairvants to run scurrying every time you lift one o yer perfoomed little fingers. But it ain't like that in here, my young prince. No, sir."

Beson leaned forward from the waist, scruffy chin jutting, and although the stench of the man-sweat and thick cheap wine and great gray scales of dirt-was nearly overpowering, Peter did not give ground. There were no bars between them; Beson had yet to fear a prisoner, and certainly he felt no fear of this young whelp. The Chief Warder was fifty, short, broad of shoulder, deep in the gut. His greasy hair hung in tangles around his cheeks and down the back of his neck. When he had come into Peter's room, one of the Lesser Warders had locked the door behind them.

Beson balled his left hand into a fist and shook it under Peter's nose. His right hand slid into the pouch pocket of his shirt and closed around a smooth cylinder of metal. One hard smash with that loaded fist would break a man's jaw. Beson had done it before.

"You take your requests, and you jam them up your nose with the rest of the boogers, my dear little prince. And the next time you call me in here for any such royal rubbage as this, you'll bleed for it."

Beson started away toward the door, short and hunched over and almost troll-like. He traveled in his own tight little cloud of stink.

"You are in danger of making an extremely bad mistake," Peter said. His voice was soft but grim, and it carried.

Beson turned back to him, his face incredulous. "What did you say?"

"You heard me," Peter said. "And when you speak to me next, you stinking little turnip, I think you had better remember you are speaking to royalty, don't you? My lineage did not change when I climbed those steps."

For a moment Beson could not reply. His mouth opened and closed like the mouth of a fish yanked out of the ocean-although any fisherman catching something as ugly as Beson would surely have thrown it back. Peter's cool requests-requests delivered in a tone which made it clear that they were in reality demands not to be refused-made Beson's head buzz with fury. One of the requests had been that of either an utter sissy or an outright lunatic. That one Beson had dismissed at once as nonsense and tomfoolery. The other, however, had to do with his meals. That, combined with the firm resolute look in Peter's eye, suggested that the young prince had thrown off his despair and meant to live.

The future prospects for idle days and drunken nights had looked bright. Now they had dimmed again. This young boy looked very healthy, very strong. He might live a long time. Beson might very well have to look at the young murderer's face for the rest of his own life-there was a thought to set a man's teeth on edge! And- Stinking turnip? Did he actually call me a stinking turnip?

"Oh, my dear little prince," Beson said, "I think you are the one who has made the mistake* but I can promise you'll never make it again." His lips split open in a grin, revealing a few blackened stumps of teeth. Now, about to attack, he moved with surprising grace. His right hand came out of the pouch pocket, wrapped around the bar of metal.

Peter took a step backward, his eyes moving from Beson's fisted hands to Beson's face and then back to his fists. Behind Beson, the tiny barred window in the middle of Peter's door was opened. Two of the Lesser Warders were crammed there cheek to stubbly cheek, grinning and waiting for the fun to start.

"You know that royal prisoners are to be given some consideration in smaller matters," Peter said, still backtracking and circling. "That is tradition. And I have asked you for nothing untoward."

Beson's grin widened. He imagined he heard fear in Peter's voice. He was mistaken. This error would shortly be brought home to him in a way to which he was unaccustomed.

"Such traditions are paid for, even among the royalty, my little prince." Beson rubbed his left thumb and finger together. His right fist remained tightly balled around the chunk of metal.

"If you mean you wish an odd bit of cash from time to time, that might be arranged," Peter said, continuing to circle away. "But only if you drop this foolish behavior of yours right now.

"Afraid, are you?"

"If anyone should be afraid here, I think it is you," Peter said. "You apparently mean to attack the brother of the King of De- tain.

This shot struck home, and for a moment Beson faltered. His eyes grew uncertain. Then he glanced toward the open window in the door, saw the faces of his Lesser Warders, and his own face darkened again. If he drew back now, he would have trouble with them-nothing he couldn't handle, of course, but still more annoyance than this little stinker was worth.

He moved forward in a rush and swung the weighted fist. He was grinning. The prince's screams as he fell to the stone floor with his smashed and squirting nose clutched in his hands would be, Beson thought, shrill and babyish.

Peter moved back easily, his feet moving as gracefully as if in a dance. He seized Beson's fist and was not surprised in the least by its weight-he had seen the gleam of metal between Beson's swelled fingers. Peter pulled with a wiry strength that Beso would not have believed five minutes ago. He spun through the air and hit the curving inner wall of Peter's "sitting room" with a crash that rattled the few teeth remaining in his jaws. Stars exploded in his head. The metal cylinder flew from his fist and rolled across the floor. And before Beson could even begin to recover, Peter had sprung after it and seized it. He moved with the simple, pure liquidity of a cat.

This can't be happening, Beson thought with dawning dismay and stupid surprise. This absolutely can't be happening.

He had never feared entering the two-room prison at the top of the Needle, because there had never been a prisoner here, not of n.o.ble blood, not of royal blood, who could best him. Oh, there had been some famous fights up here, but he had taught them all who was boss. Perhaps they ruled the roost down below, but up here he was the boss, and they came to respect his dirty, compact power. But now this stripling of a boy*

Bellowing with rage, Beson came off the wall, shaking his head to clear it, and charged Peter, who had folded the cylinder of metal into his own right hand. The Lesser Warders stood staring at this unexpected development with stupid wonder. Neither thought of interfering; they could believe what was happening no more than Beson himself.

Beson ran at Peter with his arms outstretched. Now that the prince had gotten his fist weight away from him, Beson had no more interest in the sort of free-for-all swinging and hitting he thought of as "boxing." He meant to close with Peter, grapple with him, drive him to the floor, land on top of him, and then choke him unconscious.

But the s.p.a.ce where Peter had been emptied with magical suddenness as the boy stepped aside and dropped into a crouch. As the squat, troll-like Chief Warder went past, trying to turn, Peter hit him three times with his right fist, which was closed around the metal cylinder. Hardly fair, Peter thought, but, then, it wasn't I that brought this piece of metal into it, was it? The blows did not look hard at all. If Beson had been watching a fight an had seen those three quick, fluttering punches thrown, he would have laughed and called them "sissy punches." Beson's idea of a real man's punch was a roundhouse blow that made the air whistle.

But they weren't sissy punches at all, no matter what the likes of Beson might have thought. Each was driven out from the shoulder, just as Peter's boxing instructor had taught him in their twice-weekly cla.s.ses over the last six years. The punches were economical, they didn't make the air whistle, but Beson felt as if he had been kicked three times in rapid succession by a very small pony with very big hoofs. There was a flare of agony across the left side of his face as his cheekbone broke. To Beson, it sounded as if a small branch had snapped inside his head. He was driven into the wall again. He hit it like a rag doll and bounced back buckle-kneed. He stared at the prince with obvious dismay.

The Lesser Warders peering through the hole in the door were agog with surprise. Beson, being beaten by a boy? It was as unbelievable as rain would have been coming down from a clear blue sky. One of them now looked at the key in his hand, thought briefly of going in there, then thought better of it. A man could get hurt in there. He slipped the key into his pocket, where he could later claim to have forgotten it.

"Are you ready to talk reasonably now?" Peter wasn't even out of breath. "This is silly. I require only two small favors of you, favors for which you can count on being well and amply repaid. You-"

With a roar, Beson flung himself at Peter again. This time Peter was not expecting an attack, but he managed to pull back anyway, the way a matador pulls back from a bull which charges unexpectedly-the matador may be surprised, perhaps even gored, but he rarely loses his grace. Peter did not lose his, but he was wounded. Beson's nails were long, ragged, and filthy-more like animal claws than human nails-and he liked to tell his Lesser Warders (on dark winter's nights when a gruesome tale seeme required) about the time he had slit a prisoner's neck from ear to ear with one of those thumbnails.

Now one drew a b.l.o.o.d.y line down Peter's left cheek as Beson flailed his way by. The cut zigzagged from temple to jawline, missing Peter's left eye by hardly half an inch. Peter's cheek fell open in a flap, and all his life he would bear the scar of his encounter with Beson there.

Peter grew angry. All the things that had happened to him over the last ten days seemed to slam together in his head, and for a moment he was almost-not quite, but almost-angry enough to kill the brutish Chief Warder instead of just teaching him a lesson he would never, never forget.

As Beson turned, he was rocked by left looks and right jabs. The jabs would ordinarily have done little damage, but the pound and a half of metal in Peter's fist turned them into torpedoes. His knuckles sprung Beson's jaw. Beson roared with pain and again tried to close with Peter. This was a mistake. There was a crunch as his nose broke and blood flooded over his mouth and chin. It dripped onto his filthy jerkin. Then a bright flare of pain as that heavy right hand smashed his lips back. Beson spat a tooth onto the floor and tried to circle away. He had forgotten that his Lesser Warders were watching, afraid to interfere. Beson had forgotten his anger at the young prince's att.i.tude, had lost his former desire to teach the young prince a lesson.

For the first time in his tenure as Chief Warder, he had for-gotten everything but a blind desire to survive. For the first time in his tenure as Chief Warder, Beson was afraid.

Nor was it the fact that Peter was now punching him at will that frightened him. He had taken bad beatings before, although never at the hands of a prisoner. No, it was the look in Peter's eyes that had so terrified him. It is the look of a King. G.o.ds protect me, it is the face of a King-his fury blazes almost with the heat of the sun.

Peter drove Beson against the wall, measured the distance to Beson's chin, and then drew back his weighted right fist.

"Do you need more convincing, turnip?" Peter asked grimly. "No more," Beson replied groggily, through his rapidly puffing lips. "No more, my King, I cry your mercy, I cry your mercy.

"What?" Peter asked, flabbergasted. "What did you call me?"

But Beson was sliding slowly down the curved stone wall. When he had called Peter my King, he had done so as unconsciousness stole over him. He would not remember saying it, but Peter never forgot.

Beson was unconscious for over two hours. If not for his thick, snoring breaths, Peter would have been afraid that perhaps he really had killed the Chief Warder. The man was a gross, vicious, underhanded pig* but for all of that, Peter had no wish to kill him. The Lesser Warders took turns staring in the little window in the oaken door, their eyes wide and round-the eyes of small boys looking at the man-eating Anduan tiger in the King's Menagerie. Niether made any effort to rescue their superior, and their faces told Peter that they expected him to leap on the unconscious Beson at any moment and tear his throat out. Perhaps with his teeth.

Well, why shouldn't they think such things? Peter asked himself bitterly. They think I killed my own father, and a man who would do such a thing might stoop to any low act, even that of killing an unconscious opponent.

Finally Beson began to moan and stir. His right eye fluttered and came open-the left couldn't open, and wouldn't completely for some days.

The right eye looked at Peter not with hate, but with unmistakable alarm.

"Are you ready to speak reasonably?" Peter asked.

Beson said something Peter couldn't understand. It sounded like mush.

"I don't understand you."

Beson tried again. "You could have killed me."

"I've never killed anyone," Peter said. "The time may come when I'll have to, but if it ever does, I hope I don't have to start with unconscious warders."

Beson sat against the wall, looking at Peter with his one open eye. An expression of deep thought, absurd and a little frightening on his swelled and battered features, settled over his face.

At last he managed another mushy phrase. Peter thought he understood this one, but wanted to be absolutely sure.

"Repeat that, please, Mr. Chief Warder Beson."

Beson looked startled. As Yosef had never been called Lord High Groom before Peter, so Beson had never been called Mr. Chief Warder.

"We can do business," he said.

"That is very well."

Beson struggled slowly to his feet. He wanted no more to do with Peter, at least not today. He had other problems. His Lesser Warders had just watched him take a bad beating at the hands of a boy who hadn't had anything to eat for a week. Watched and no more, the cowardly sots. His head ached, and he might well have to whip those poor fools into line before he could slink off to bed.

He had started out when Peter called to him.

Beson turned back. That turning was really all it took. Both of them knew who was in charge here. Beson had been beaten. When his prisoner told him to wait, he waited.

"I have something I want to say to you. It will be good for both of us if I do."

Beson said nothing. He only stood and watched Peter warily.

"Tell them"-Peter jerked his head toward the door-"to close the spyhol Beson stared at Peter for a moment, then turned toward the staring warders and gave the command.

The Lesser Warders currently jammed cheek to cheek into the opening, stood there staring, not understanding Beson's blurred words* or pretending not to. Beson ran his tongue over his blood-flecked teeth and spoke more clearly, obviously with some pain. This time the peephole was swung shut and bolted from the outside* but not before Beson had heard the contemptuous laughter of his underlings. He sighed wearily-yes, they would have to be taught some hard lessons before he could go home. Cowards learned quickly, though. This prince, whatever else he might be, was surely no coward. He wondered if he really wanted to do any business at all with Peter.

"I want to give you a note to take to Anders Peyna, " Peter said. "You'll come back for it tonight, I hope."

Beson said nothing, but he was trying very hard to think. This was the most unsettling twist yet. Peyna! A note to Peyna! He had had a cold moment when Peter reminded him that he was the brother of the King, but it had been nothing compared with this. Peyna, by the G.o.ds!

The more he thought of it the less he liked it.

King Thomas might not much care if his older brother was roughed up in the Needle. The older brother had murdered their father, for one thing; Thomas probably didn't feel much brotherly love right now. And more important, Beson felt little or no fright when the name of King Thomas the Light-Bringer was invoked. Like almost everyone else in Delain, Beson had already begun to view Thomas with a certain contempt. But Peyna, now* Peyna was different.

To the likes of Beson, Anders Peyna was more frightening than a whole marching regiment of Kings, anyway. A King was a distant sort of being, bright and mysterious, like the sun. It didn't matter if the sun went behind the clouds and froze you, or came out all hot and white to bake you alive-either way you only accepted, because what the sun did was far beyond the ability of mortal creatures to understand or to change.

Peyna was a more earthly being. The sort of being Beso could understand* and fear. Peyna with his narrow face and his ice-blue eyes, Peyna with his high-collared judge's robes, Peyna who decided who would live and who would go under the headsman's axe.

Could this boy really command Peyna from his cell here at the top of the Needle? Or was it only a desperate bluff?

How can it be a bluff if he means to write him a note r shall myself deliver?

"If I were King, Peyna would have served me in any way I commanded," Peter said. "I am not a King now, only a prisoner. Still, not long ago I did him a favor for which I think he is very grateful.

"I see," Beson replied, as noncommittally as he could.

Peter sighed. Suddenly he felt very weary, and wondered what sort of foolish dream he was pursuing here. Did he really believe he was taking the first few steps on the road to freedom by beating up this stupid warder and then bending him to his will? Did he have any real guarantee that Peyna would do even the smallest thing for him? Perhaps the concept of a favor owed was only in Peter's own mind.

But it had to be tried. Hadn't he decided, on his long, lonely nights of meditation as he grieved for both his father and himself, that the only real sin would be in not trying?

"Peyna is not my friend," Peter went on. "I won't even try to tell you that he is. I've been convicted of murdering my father, the King, and I shouldn't think I have a friend left in all of Delain, from north to south. Would you agree, Mr. Chief Warder Beson?"

"Yes," Beson said stonily. "I would."

"Nevertheless, I believe that Peyna will undertake to provide you with the bit of cash you are used to receiving from your inmates."

Beson nodded. When a n.o.ble was imprisoned in the Needle for any length of time, Beson would commonly see that the prisoner got a better grade of food than the fatty meat and water ale, fresh linen once a week, and sometimes a visit from a wife or a sweetheart. He did not do this free, of course. Imprisoned n.o.bles almost always came from rich families, and there was always someone in those families willing to pay Beson for Be-son's services, no matter what the crime had been.

This crime was of an exceptionally terrible nature, but here was this boy, saying that no less a one than Anders Peyna might be willing to provide the bribe.

"One other thing," Peter said softly. "I believe Peyna will do this because he is a man of honor. And if anything were to happen to me-if you and several of your Lesser Warders were to rush in here tonight, and beat me in revenge for the beating I have given you, for example-I believe that Peyna might take an interest in the matter."

Peter paused.

"A personal interest in the matter."

He looked closely at Beson.

"Do you understand me?"

"Yes," Beson said, and then added: "my Lord."

"Will you provide me with pen, inkpot, blotter, and paper?" "Yes.

"Come here."

With some trepidation, Beson came.

The Chief Warder's stink was tremendous, but Peter did not draw away-the stink of the crime with which he had been accused had almost inured him to the smell of sweat and dirt, he had discovered. He looked at Beson with a hint of a smile.

"Whisper in my ear," Peter said.

Beson blinked uneasily. "What shall I whisper, my Lord?"

"A number," Peter said.

After a moment, Beson did.

One of the Lesser Warders brought Peter the writing implements he had asked for. He gave Peter the wary look of an alley cat that has been often kicked, and skittered away before he could receive a helping of the anger that had been heaped on Beson's head.

Peter sat down at the rickety table by the window, breath puffing out in the deep cold. He listened to the restless whine of the wind around the tip of the Needle and looked down at the lights of the city.

Dear Judge-General Peyna, he wrote, and then stopped.

Will you see who this is from, crumple it in your hand, and throw it into the fire unread? Will you read it and then laugh contemptuously at the fool who murdered his father and then dared to expect help from the Judge-General of the land? Will you, perhaps, even see through the scheme, and understand what it is I'm up to?

Peter was in a cheerier frame of mind that evening, and thought the answer to all three questions would probably be no. His plan might well fail, but it was unlikely to be foreseen by such an orderly and methodical man as Peyna. The Judge-General would be as apt to imagine himself donning a dress and dancing a hornpipe in the Plaza of the Needle at the full of the moon as he was to guess what Peter was up to. And what I'm asking is so little, Peter thought. That ghost of a smile touched his lips again. At least I hope and believe it will seem so* to him.

Bending forward, he dipped the quill pen in the inkpot and began to write. *On the following evening, shortly after nine had struck, Anders Peyna's butler answered an unaccustomedly lat knock and looked down his long nose at the figure of the Chief Warder standing on the doorstep. Arlen-that was the butler's name-had seen Beson before, of course; like Arlen's master, Beson was a part of the Kingdom's legal machinery. But Arlen did not recognize him now. The beating Peter had given Beson had had a day to set, and his face was a sunset of reds and purples and yellows. His left eye had opened a little, but was still little more than a slit. He looked like a dwarvish ghoul, and the butler began to swing the door shut almost at once.