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"And gifts to Ayekar?" Pahid asked.

"If they are freely given."

"And--and Pahid?"

She shook her head. "If with us, yes. If not, then not."

He rested his forearms on the table, looking at his clenched fists. "They say he freed Pa'ula. They wonder why. Maybe he knew she was the seed, that she would do as he wished her to do wherever she went. Even now, your people tell me she is a conciliator and leads them away from strength toward peace. That, in the end, will make them spare the servants of the Temple, and so it will not die. Maybe he thought, the seed planted, she would return as to her soul's father. They say Pahid won her--"

"They say Pahid is a devilspawn!" Clark interjected. In the silence that followed, he considered how little a politician he was, that he was really only a friend of Sevit, only the guy Efirr happened to confess to, only a sympathetic lover.

Pahid turned to Berthe. "That which I forgave in you, you betrayed in me," he said in a voice almost tender. Berthe recoiled, truly frightened.

He had turned his back on Paula. The thin tunic clung tight to his body so she could see his ribs, the bumps of the spine and the narrow hips. She turned in her seat, planting herself firmly to deliver the blow. Her arms came in tight to her sides, fists clenched, one to the left and one to the right.

Reaching across the table, Akiva laid his hand over her fist. She was stopped.

As she looked at him, she remembered the story of the man Akiva held under water to hide him and the stories about ghosts from the bottom of the Lir. She imagined the Lir's water flowing, draining some lakes, filling others, and her hatred dissipated. Akiva's hand on hers allowed her to relax her body. He did not take it away.

Pahid saw this and turned to Akiva. "Are you he?"

"The Lost God resides in every willing heart," Akiva replied.

"You're Akiva. You've saved my life, so I'll warn you to get back from us. You're human, I guess, not like them. Get over there." He pointed a little distance away and Akiva moved, still keeping his gaze on Paula.

She almost rose, but didn't. Now a delightful tinkling sounded inside Pahid's tunic. He pulled out a string of silever bells on a purple cord.

"Waken, waken. These bells sing to the soul's condition, ghosts," he said. He repeated it, chanting, then took a lump of chalk from a pocket and drew a mandala on the table while they watched. Tiyar's hand went to his Puro, as did Fuego's and Clark's, but the danger only added to the magic tension. "Listen, listen, listen," he chanted. "The rippling water, the shining Lir, they are calling." Done the mandala, he raised one hand, palm out, and pointed at Tiyar.

Tiyar flinched.

"That you and your companions and all not born of women of Paffir Haretz return to the worlds of your birth to never trespass this world again, I, Pahid, by my hope of Ayekar, command in the name of Marlow Maxwell."

Tiyar and Fuego went white. Seeing this, many Verloringers and Itscriyites lost their nerve. People ran from the building and left the camp without stopping. Others were too afraid to move.

Paula stood up. She approached Pahid, saying, "Tell Marlow Maxwell I will not obey."

Pahid started back. The two stood looking at one another for a long time.

An alarm went off.

"That's Krup!" Fuego said.

Paula put her hands to her head. "I won't go back! Some go, some are dragged, some believe until the last instant that they're running in the opposite direction, but not me! I don't go. Dig your heels in, stop up your ears. It's the only way they can't use you."

She lowered her hands and made fists. Pahid did not attempt to defend himself, but spread his arms and said, "I wait."

Paula felt something she could not interpret, a rush of sensation and many emotions at once. Hatred left her before she struck. She knew something was wrong and then knew, without anger, that she was dying. Her body worked, her limbs moving vigorously, perhaps in fits. Something bright appeared. It looked like a radiant island. She felt that she was swimming toward a place of tranquility. She was flying as to a planet, crossing not the void that separates heavenly bodies but a space that was full. It was full of light and human voices resounding, a space that does not separate but joins, and the brightness enveloped her, had always enveloped her. She joined it and was no more.

Clark had seen this. He had to think, then to release himself into his memory and look around as he had been taught, before he recognized those seizures, the asymmetric flailing of limbs, and what he recalled was a nightmare that billowed up empty but was rooted in fact, in something he had seen. It was a conversation in Merced with Teresa da Flora about something that had happened in a Resheborian lab, to a rat with a transmitter in its brain.

That time he had been frightened and had pitied. This time he must act. He grabbed the scanner from Tiyar, heard an alarm ring somewhere, and shouted something about Krup. That must be what the road slave's equipment was for.

Paula could not be saved; she was dead already. Torches were lit, smoke darkened their light, people shouted and wailed. The smoke thickened. Whole buildings were burning. The dining hall, built on a watertight floor, slipped free and drifted, burning bright on the bright-reflecting black swamp. The smoke grew sweet and thicker; granaries were burning; grew acrid, some were put out. Krup's minions, caught, spilled blood and then stopped. The Itscriyites contained their killing, and that was a wonder, but they performed it unawares. There was too much to do. Paula was dead in her triumph, by an unknown hand, but there was no time for grief or awe.

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CONTINUE.....................

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INDEX