This part had been Danel's idea. Back at Gathering, the lesser sage had seen Rety flip through dozens of picture books in apparent fascination-when she felt no one was watching. Dwer was trying to mix insult with encouragement, shame with curiosity, so the girl would have no choice but to look at this one.

Wearing an unhappy grimace, Rety reached down further and accepted the book. She sat up and riffled the paper leaves, clearly puzzled. "I don't get it. What page should I look at?"

The robot's hover-fields brushed Dwer's leg, making all the hairs stand on end. His mouth felt dry, and his heart pounded. He fought a wave of antic.i.p.ation-weakness by pure force of will.

"Oh, didn't I open it to the right picture? Here, let me show it to you."

As Rety turned toward him, the robot dropped lower. Dwer raised his arms, reaching toward the book, but staggered when he b.u.mped the robot's side.

It was fiery death if the thing thought it was being attacked. Would the machine recognize normal human clumsiness and make allowances?

Nothing happened. The robot didn't fear his touch.

"Hey, watch it," he complained. "Tell your pal here to take it easy, will you?"

"What? It's not any o' my doin'." She kicked the machine. "Leave him be, you stupid thing!"

Dwer nodded. "All right, let's try again."

Both hands went up. His legs were like coiled springs-and Dwer's life seemed to float above him like a sound, ready to flee on the wind.

He leaped.

The robot's brief hesitation ended in a sudden yowl, joined instantly by a series of sharp detonations, coming from the nearby forest. Heat flared between Dwer's legs as he yanked two of the sensor-heads, using them as hand-holds to swarm desperately up the machine's flank, away from the deadly ball. Pain erupted along one thigh the split instant before he hauled his torso atop the gyrating machine. He clutched the bucking thing with his left hand while his right brought forth the slender tube.

The world was a blur of trees and clouds and whirling sky. More explosions pealed, accompanied by horrible sizzling sounds. Desperately, Dwer shoved the tube at the robot's central spindle and squeezed.

Traeki enzymes combined and emerged in an acrid, fizzing stream, vanishing down openings at the spindle's base. Dwer kept squirting despite the robot's wild pirouettes, until his aim was spoiled by Rety, shoving his arm away. Only then did Dwer note her screams amid the general tumult. When her teeth clamped on his wrist, Dwer's own howl joined in. The half-empty tube escaped his convulsing hand, tumbling away.

Purple steam rose from the robot's center. The spindle began to slump. Dwer shook Rety off and with a reckless cry threw himself on the drooping antenna, taking it in both hands, heaving with all his might. He shouted an ululation of triumph when the whole thing tore free at the base, though it left him rolling across the flat surface, clutching futilely for a hold.

Flailing, he tumbled off the edge, falling toward the meadow floor.

Dwer never worried, during that brief interval, about striking some rock or jagged tree stump. The machine would likely dice him to bits before he ever hit the ground.

But he was not sliced. Nor did he strike the rough meadow. Blinking in surprise, he found that a pair of arms had caught him!

Relief was tempered when he saw the arms belonged to the robot.

Oh, great. Out of the frying pan and into the- There came another series of detonations, and the hovering machine rocked as if slammed along one side. Hanging below the octagonal body, Dwer saw part of the globe underneath explode in a spray of steel and gla.s.s. The weapons-ball was already a smoking ruin. Not a single lens or tube appeared intact.

Great work, Lena, Dwer thought, proud of how well she used the terrible devices that only she and a few others on the Slope were trained to use. Firearms that did not use a bit of metal. He turned his head in time to see more brief flares as Lena or Danel fired again from the forest edge. The machine rocked as another exploding sh.e.l.l impacted. This time one of the dangling tentacles holding Dwer shuddered and went limp.

That was definitely Lena's work. What a clever girl, he thought, half-dazed from pain. The sages chose well. I would've been a lucky boy, if things had gone according to- He got no chance to finish the thought, as the robot whirled around to flee, zigzagging across the meadow, using his body as a shield between it and danger. Dwer saw Lena rise and take aim with her launcher, then lower it, shaking her head.

"No! Shoot, dammit!" he screamed. "Don't worry about me!"

But the rushing wind of flight carried off his words. Lena dropped her weapon and hurried to a figure lying on the ground nearby, slumped beside a second missile tube. She turned Danel Ozawa over, revealing a red river pouring from his chest.

The robot's next zigging turn spun that poignant scene away. Now Dwer spied terrified villagers cowering beyond a low hill of garbage near the prisoners' pen. So dismayed were they by the battle that they seemed unaware of the group now circling around behind them-Jenin Worley and a dozen newly released urs. The former captives held ropes and arbalests. Dwer prayed this part of Danel's plan would turn out all right.

"All or nothing, " Ozawa had said. "Either we live together as civilized beings, or let's end it. End it now- bringing as much harm to our enemy as we can."

Dwer had time for one benedictory thought, as Rety's cousins grew aware of the reversal taking place behind their backs.

Learn to be wise . . .

Then the village vanished as the fleeing machine streaked around a bend, whipped through a forest aisle, and plunged almost straight downhill, accelerating.

Rety was still shrieking from her perch, wailing for it to stop. From Dwer's point of view, dangling underneath, the ground seemed to sweep by in a blur. Fighting the buffeting wind, he brought up both arms to grab the base of the tendril wrapped around his torso, holding him horizontal to the rushing terrain. If he tore it loose, the fall might kill him, but anything would be better than this torment.

He tugged with all his might, but the tentacle would not budge. It flexed occasionally, yanking him up in time to miss being smashed against some boulder or shrub. Soon they were swooping beside the canyon's central stream, an obstacle course of sudden turns and bitter, stinging spray. Disorientation forced Dwer to close his eyes, moaning.

Faintness took hold, threatening to haul him the rest of the way to unconsciousness.

Come on, he chided. Now's not the time to give up. If you can't escape, at least check and see if you 're bleeding to death!

Pain helped him concentrate, ignoring the looming vertigo. It came in a nagging medley, from a searing ache in his left thigh, to Rety's teeth-marks that still oozed blood from his right hand, to the chafing rub of the robot's arm, all the way to a series of awful, biting scratches that clawed into his hip, then his abdomen, and finally his chest-as if someone *were stabbing him with cl.u.s.ters of sharp needles, working their way up along his battered body.

He opened his eyes-and shrieked at the sight of a gaping mouth, filled with horrible, glistening fangs!

"Oh, Ifni . . ." he moaned. "Oh, G.o.d oh G.o.d oh G.o.d . . ."

Even when he knew the truth about the specter that loomed inches from his face, it didn't help much. At this point, and for a while longer, all Dwer could manage was a frail, thready whimper.

Mudfoot, the noor, yawned a second time, then settled into the narrow s.p.a.ce between Dwer's chest and the robot's hard sh.e.l.l. The beast watched the boy-jibbering from one shock over his limit. With a sigh of affectionate scorn, it started chuttering, less to comfort Dwer than for its own simple pleasure, making a sound somewhat like that of a hoon sailor, umbling a song about the joys of travel.

Asx IF THE COMMONS SURVIVES-IF WE SIX ENDURE into times to come-no doubt it will be called the Battle of the Glade.

It was brief, b.l.o.o.d.y, and tactically decisive, was it not, my rings?

And strategically futile. An interval of flame and terror that made my/our manicolored bands so very glad/sorrowful that we are traeki.

Sorrowful because these stacks of rings seemed so useless, so helpless to match the frantic pace of other beings whose antic warlike fury drives them so quickly in a crisis. With such speed that waxy imprints cannot form within our core, except duras behind actual events.

Sorrowful that we could not help, except to serve as chroniclers-after-the-fact, bearing testimony to what already took place.

And yet we are also glad, are we not, my rings? Glad because the full impact of violence never quite fills our central cavity with a searing steam of dread. Not until the action is already over, leaving the dead like smoky embers, scattered on the ground. That is a blessing, is it not, my rings? To us, horror is seldom an "experience," only a memory.

It was not always so. Not for the beings we once were, when our kind roamed the stars and were a terror on the Five Galaxies. In those days, creatures like us wore bright shining rings. Not only the ones given to us by our patrons, the Poa, but special collars, donated by the meddlesome Oailie.

Rings of power. Rings of rapid decisiveness and monumental ego. Had we possessed such rings but moments ago, they might have spurred us to move swiftly, in time to help our friends during the struggle.

But then, if the old tales are true, those same rings might have kept us from having friends in the first place.

Stroke the wax. Trace the images, frozen in fatty drippings.

Images of atrocity and dread.

There lies Bloor, the portraitist, a smoldering ruin, draped over his precious camera.

Nearby, can we trace the slithering path of a dying creature? A symbiont crawling off the face and brow of the dead Rothen named Ro-pol? Revealing in its wake a sharp, angular visage, humanoid, but much less so than we had thought. Less charismatic. Less winsomely womanlike than we were led to believe.

If Bloor died for seeing this, are all eyes now accursed?

There, screams Ro-kenn, ordering Rann, the star-human servant, to call back the fierce sky-car from its distant errand, even if it means "breaking" something called "radio silence."

There, screams Ro-kenn once more, ordering his slave-demons, his robots, aloft to-"clear all of these away."

Meaning us. All witnesses to this abrupt revelation. All who know the secret of Bloor's Bane.

Up, up rise the awful instrumentalities, meting out slashing doom. From their bellies lash spears of cold flame, slicing through the stunned host, turning it into a roiling, screaming mob. Four-legged urs bound high into the air, screeching panic. Qheuens cower low, trying to burrow away from rays that carve chitin as easily as flesh. Humans and hoon throw themselves flat on the ground, while poor g'Keks spin their wheels, trying to back away.

We traeki-those left at Gathering after weeks of silent departures-mostly stand where we were, venting multi-fragranced fumes of woe, erupting wet fear-stench as cutting beams slice through popping toruses, spilling rich liquor, setting our stacks afire.

But look! Stroke the image layers one more time, my rings. See the darkly clad ones? Those who rush forward toward the terror, not away? Our vision spots scry little, even by daylight, for their clothing blurs them in uncanny ways. Nonetheless, we/i trace squat qheuen shapes, running with humans crouched on their backs, and urrish troops sweeping alongside. There comes, as well, a booming noise, a rarely heard sound, that of lethal hoonish ire. From their midst, these dim shapes raise strange tubes, even as the soaring demons turn their killing rage upon the newcomers, slashing at them mercilessly.

There is a place . . .

It is here, in our core, where the wax depicts only a roar-a flash-an overload of searing afterimages-and then . . .

What followed now lies before us.

Cinders-where the robots fell to sully Jijo's holy soil, shattered and reduced to dross.

Three sky-lords-stunned to find themselves held captive, taken prisoner, stripped of their G.o.dlike tools.

A poignant field-strewn with lamented dead. So many dead.

A makeshift infirmary-where even more wounded writhe and grimace, crying diverse plaints of pain.

Here, at last, is something we can do in real time. Perhaps they can use the a.s.sistance of an old retired pharmacist.

Is it agreed, my rings?

Wonderful unanimity. It makes easier the unaccustomed haste as i hurry forth to help.

Sara THE HARD MARCH HAD TAKEN NOTHING FROM the tension between the two rebel groups. UrKachu's painted warriors and Dedinger's dun-clothed hunters eyed each other warily while eating separate meals under an aged canopy of patched and weathered blur-cloth, never wandering far from their weapons. Members of each group took turns sleeping after supper, no more than six at a time, while the rest kept watch. Sara found it hard to imagine this alliance lasting a dura longer than it was in both sides' perceived self-interest.

What if fighting broke out? In these close quarters it would be no artful exercise in maneuver and strategy but a roiling tumble of slashing, grappling forms.

She recalled the frontispiece ill.u.s.tration in volume one of The Urrish-Earthling Wars, by Hauph-hutau, one of the most popular t.i.tles published since the Great Printing. In small type, the great historian acknowledged copying the scene from a Tabernacle-era, art book, showing the sculpture frieze that once surrounded the Parthenon, in ancient Greece. That famous relief depicted a long row of mighty figures, clenched in mortal combat-naked men brawling with furious monsters, half human and half horse, who reared, kicked, and slashed at their foes in a bitter fight to the death. According to myth, the feud broke' out during a festival of peace and concluded with extinction for the centaur race.

Of course, an urs had almost nothing in common with a centaur, beyond having four legs and two arms. Yet the symbolism of the frieze was so eerie, so unnerving, that it became notorious during the age of struggle, helping steel the resolve of both sides. Sara had no wish to see such a b.l.o.o.d.y scene enacted in front of her.

Of the others taken captive at Uryutta's Oasis, young Jomah was already out like a snuffed candle, curled in his bedroll, fast asleep. The Stranger picked away at his meal of corn mush, frequently putting down his spoon to pluck a series of soft notes from his dulcimer, or else performing the ritual of counting its strings. Numbers, it seemed, were like music to him-a window to what he once had been, more faithful than the knack at sentences, that he had lost.

Kurt, the exploser, doodled on his notepad, occasionally picking up one of the little books he kept so secretively, either in his valise or the inner pocket of his gown. He covered his work whenever any human or urs pa.s.sed close but seemed not to mind that Prity lingered nearby, after bringing his meal. Putting on her best I'm-just-a-dumb-critter act, Prity spent some time pretending to inspect her leg for lice. But soon the little chimp was peering over the exploser's shoulder, rubbing her chin, drawing her lips past her gums, exposing a grin of silent, delighted interest.

Sara had to squelch an urge to laugh out loud. At the same time, she worried.

The Urunthai and desert-men are politely leaving Kurt alone, for now. The habit of deference to explosers runs deep and is hard to break. But they also promised "persuasion" when we reach our destination. Does Kurt really imagine he can keep his work secret then?

He'd be better off throwing his notebooks into the fire, Sara restrained her own curiosity. Explosers were a mysterious, formidable sect. Frankly, she doubted the wisdom of the Urunthai in messing with them.

"We won't wait till nightfall, vefore setting forth," Ulgor told Sara, pa.s.sing near her bedroll. "I'd catch uf on sleef, if I were you."

The urrish tinker's unpainted pelt, well-kept mane, and piercing black true-eyes set her apart from her wild cousins. There was no air of antagonism, no anti-human hostility. After all, Ulgor had visited Dolo Village dozens of times, always on friendly terms.

Sara shook her head. "I can see what drives the others. Religion can be a strong motive when you think your descendants' salvation is at stake. But what do you get out of all this, Ulgor? I know it can't be profit."

The narrow, conical head split in a triangular grin.

Sara did not need a rewq to know the expression was sardonic.

"Why exclude the overt reason? Earnings. Personal gain."

Sara quoted scripture: " 'What use will be all your wealth and goods, two leagues down Redemption's Road?' "

Ulgor breathed a soft whistle of laughter. "Little good at all. On the other hoof, hero status can ve useful in a clan of savages. Ferhafs I will ve one of the great chiefs of the plains, higher in renown than Ur-Chown!"

Ulgor's self-mocking tone dismissed that idea, while encouraging Sara to keep guessing.

Sara suddenly felt tired. "You're right, Ulgor."

"You think so?"

"Indeed I do. It would be a good idea to catch up on sleep, while I can."

The tinker stared, twisting her neck a half spiral. "I thought you wanted to know-"

Sara covered a yawn. "Please be a.s.sured, Ulgor, that I am very sorry I asked."

With that she turned away to lie down on her bedroll. Prity hurried over to tuck the blanket around Sara, then chuffed at Ulgor, shooing her away. Sara listened to the urbane traitor's hooves pound a nervous retreat, as if burdened by Sara's contempt.

She really was exhausted. Her muscles throbbed from several days' unaccustomed exertion, and her tailbone from jarring contact with the hard leather saddle. And there was an emotional element.

I was given a job to do. Several of them. Now it looks like I won't complete even one.

A low, repet.i.tive thrum pervaded the pavilion, like the synchronous, pulselike snoring of the urs. It was the Stranger, plucking his dulcimer's lowest string, so softly and regularly that no one, not even UrKachu, might find any cause for complaint, creating a lulling rhythm, resembling less a heartbeat than the rise-and-fall cadence of ribcages-both urrish and human-as members of both parties slept.

Ariana figured he'd develop new skills, to compensate for those he lost, she thought. I guess this musical sensitivity is pan of that.

Just after dawn, while the two radical groups worked to set up camp, the s.p.a.ceman had played for the urrish males, briefly released from the close confines of their wives' pouches, taking advantage of the break to stretch their legs in the fresh air. A few males kept close watch on maturing larvae, with six short legs and no arms, almost ready to be spilled onto the plains and fend for themselves.

Using two curved mallets to strike the dulcimer strings, the Stranger had accompanied himself as he sang a chain of children's melodies, familiar enough to flow smoothly from undamaged memory. Sara even recognized a few. Among the rest, one seemed especially apropos.

"I had a little husband, no bigger than my thumb, I put him in a pint pot, and there I bid him drum; I bought a little handkerchief, to wipe his little nose, And a pair of little garters, to tie his little hose."