JEMIDON gasped when the cold water hit his face, snapping him awake. Squinting into the dawn sun, he saw that he was outside Kenton's castle at the edge of a field of wheat. A steel belt and chains fettered him to the sides of a large metal cage. He was the only occupant, although the volume could have accommodated many more. Straining as far as his bounds would allow, he came nowhere near to touching one of the walls. Bars were spaced a handspan apart on all four sides. A steel plate formed the ceiling, its underneath side bracketed with tools, gears, screens, and other machinery that Jemidon did not immediately recognize. The bottom was open; he stood on the rough ground. And all of the bars were attached only at the top, like the teeth of a giant comb. In each of the four corners, large wooden wheels pressed into the damp earth. Identical cells formed a precise line staggered into the distance, each one placed a cage length behind the one in front and offset half a width to the right.
The man-at-arms who had splashed Jemidon awake continued down the row, waking others who hung slumped in their bonds. A sergeant followed behind, tapping each cage with a baton and barking the order to make ready. He stopped at Jemidon's cell and pointed at the scythe attached just within arm's reach to a bracket on the ceiling.
"You must cut it all," he said. "If any tickles the touch-plate in back, the flagella will whirl. And get rid of the cape. It will merely get in your way."
Jemidon did not reply. Only with great restraint had he not resisted being seized the night before. It had saved him from certain injury. He had been thrust into the cage in such a hurry that he was still dressed for the feast. In silence, he watched the sergeant look at the gently waving stalks and then turn a crank that led into the top of the cage. As the handle spun, a coarse screen lowered from the ceiling to about waist level, directly behind Jemidon. Twisting to look over his shoulder, he saw a cylindrical drum mounted above the screen, with its axis parallel to the back of the cage. Long strips of leather coiled around the drum, and sharp metal brads covered the loose ends that dangled in the air.
The sergeant looked a second time at the grain, made a small adjustment with the crank, and then nodded to himself in satisfaction. He tapped his baton once more on the metal bars and turned his attention to the next in line.
As the sky brightened, Jemidon gazed across the field down the long lines of tall grain. In the distance, he could see more treadmills like those of the feasting hall, but built on a larger scale, with ambulators four abreast.
Jemidon watched the ambulators start the treadmills in motion and expectantly waited for what the thaumaturgical effect would be. Almost immediately, a strange rustling shimmered throughout the grainstalks. Thin tendrils of vapor snaked into the morning air. Triggered by the incantation the day before, the crop had matured and was ready to harvest. His cage lurched and began to rumble forward toward the high-standing grain. Jemidon looked forward and back and saw the rest of the staggered line move in unison. Somewhere, a thaumaturge was guiding a small toy to which all these were bound. He stumbled on a rock and missed a step, but the cage continued forward, pulling him by the fetters tied to his waist.
Jemidon saw the man in the cage directly ahead enter the field and grab his scythe. With a practiced stroke, the prisoner felled the stalks that filtered through the vertical bars in front. His path was such that the left edge of his swath matched the right of the prisoner who preceded him. Jemidon grunted understanding as he saw what was happening. The cages were large enough to give each man room to swing, yet they were grouped in such a way that, once they had all passed over the field, no grain would remain standing.
Jemidon watched the uncut grain dance into his cage as he reached the field. But his anger of the previous night still lingered. Nurturing a spark of defiance, he folded his arms and stomped on the grain as it came underfoot, letting the growth on either side pass by untouched. He looked over his shoulder, to see it spring back to nearly full height, almost as if he had not gone by at all.
He saw the tall stalks poke through the screen that the sergeant had lowered into place. As the first tassel passed through the grid, one of the gear trains on the ceiling began to creak. A lever pulled a pawl from a ratchet, and suddenly the disk at Jemidon's back whirled into motion. The leather thongs uncoiled and whipped from their resting place, striking his back with a barrage of the sharp metal tips. Hot bursts of pain exploded across his shoulders and neck, staggering Jemidon almost to his knees.
The sergeant's words suddenly had meaning. Jemidon grabbed the scythe as quickly as he could. With a slashing abandon, he hacked at the grain that continued to pour through the bars of the cage, toppling all the stalks before they slipped past him to be detected by the screen. The swinging blade tangled in his cape. With a rip of his free hand, he flung the garment to the ground. He looked again at the methodical sweep of the other prisoners' scythes in front and tried to imitate their economy of motion. He felt his own cage pick up speed and fell into a rhythm to keep up with the pace.
The rate of progress increased two more times before Jemidon reached the end of the row. With leaden arms and gasping lungs, he mowed the last few lengths. He was not used to the hard labor. Already he felt his coordination deteriorate from the fatigue. He dropped the scythe to the ground, then thought better of it and barely managed to retrieve the blade as the cage continued to trundle along its predetermined track.
Jemidon was led to a second field adjacent to the first and placed into another staggered line. While the last of the cages were finishing their swaths and being moved into position, a small, hinged door opened from the ceiling and a cup of dirty water descended on the end of a long rod. Jemidon grabbed the offered liquid and drank deeply, thankful for a moment of rest.
On the first field, another row of prisoners had begun to move across the mowed ground. Their cages were different, with deep wooden bins hanging along the interior walls on both sides. Through a complex of linkages and springs, the suspended hoppers were connected to a circular disk, faced with two rotating pointers like the hands of a clock. One seemed to circle of its own volition, revolving at a steady but fairly rapid rate. The other bounced and jerked, moving forward through short arcs only whenever another armful of shorn stalks was dumped into one of the hoppers to increase the weight it contained.
Most of the time, the weight indicator led the other, but occasionally it would be passed and lag behind. And whenever it did, the drum in back of the occupant of the cage whirled into life, lashing out with the barbs of sharp metal. Snatching and scooping in a fury, the harvesters made sure that little of what had been mowed was left on the ground.
Without warning, Jemidon's line began to move again. The cup retreated back into the ceiling. In an instant, his cage lumbered into more uncut grain. Again he was late to stop the screen behind his back from being touched, and again he felt the incentive to leave no stalk uncut. Grimly he swung the scythe and tried to take his mind off anything more than ensuring that his task was perfectly done. Before the sun had reached its zenith, Jemidon had cut six more rows of wheat. By dusk, he had lost track of the number.
With the last rays of the sun, he was allowed to stop at the end of the row he had just worked. His arms, his back, his legs, and every muscle were throbbing in protest to the strenuous labor. His waist bled from a dozen sores where the metal belt had dug into his flesh. He hung like a damp rag in his harness, feel dragging on the ground and arms dangling with no life.
The blankness of his thoughts was interrupted by the sergeant, who placed a bowl beside his cage. The man-at-arms paused a moment, looked hastily over his shoulder, and then scooted a second bowl between the bars. "The first day is the roughest," he said, "but if you do not eat to get strength, then the next will be your last."
Jemidon raised his head and eyed the sergeant dully, too tired even to offer thanks. "I earn no favor with the lord if one of the cages stops working during the day," the guardsman said gruffly as he unknotted one of the chains binding Jemidon to the bars. "Take advantage of your good fortune so that I can ensure mine."
Later, with food in his stomach, Jemidon felt a small degree of reason return. Another ten days of this he could not endure. He slowly stood and looked around the cage. With only one fetter, he could reach the side, but rattling the bars revealed no looseness; they all heid tight and firm. Tentatively at first and then with greater vigor, he sawed with the scythe against the linkage that still bound him, but the blade just skittered across the harder metal, refusing to bite and make a notch.
Jemidon grasped the tool in both hands near the neck where the blade joined the wooden handle, trying to imagine how he might separate the two pieces and turn them into something that would be of use in an escape. He ran his hands over the gears and levers of the ceiling, pulling at protrusions and trying to break something free. Each object he could reach he studied in turn, grasping for some idea that would help his plight.
But try as he would, all his thoughts were leaden. Evidently he was too tired from the labor to think anything more than the obvious. With the certainty of failure, he went through the motions, making the escape attempts that every cage occupant probably tried.
Finally he turned his attention to his own possessions. He ran his hands over his newly purchased tunic, now deeply creased and smelling of sweat. As he touched his pockets, he felt the reassuring lumps of their contents; his purse of gold, Benedict's changer, and the various curios of his seven years of wandering were still there. In the haste to have him confined, no one had bothered to take anything away.
One by one, he removed the items, trying to couple them with something else in the cage. When he reached the changer, he idly thumbed piles of coins into his palm and poured them back into the slit in the top.
As the metal disks slid into the opening, Jemidon could hear the soft click of some sorting apparatus that directed them to the various columns. But the output of each was a jumble-gold, silver, copper, and steel, diameters of all sizes, coins with central holes and those without, all mixed when a dispensing lever was depressed.
Almost hypnotically, Jemidon cycled the coins, letting the soft jangle soothe the soreness from his limbs and back. He found himself watching the pattern of types as they emerged and trying to guess what the next might be. Silver, he thought, fingering the lever for the leftmost column. Silver again; he smiled when his choice proved correct. "And again," he muttered half aloud when he was right a second time. "Perhaps, even without magic, the box can still sort, if given enough tries."
Five silver coins in a row fell from the column before a brass dranbot ended the string. "An interesting puzzle," Jemidon mused, putting the device aside as he tried to visualize what the internal mechanism must be. After a moment's thought, he lifted the changer again. With a rapid series of motions, he emptied the entire contents of coins onto the ground. Then he selected one copper and inserted it in the slit. Trying the dispensing levers one by one, he found that the third column had received the coin.
Two coppers in sequence were partitioned into columns three and four. And if they followed a silver, they went instead to two and five. In a rapid series of experiments, Jemidon used longer sequences of coins, trying to deduce the rule by which they were distributed. He inserted runs of all one coin and then two types, interleaved in pairs. Cycles of four, mixed triplets, groups of seven-the various combinations filled his thoughts as he struggled to assemble all the results into a coherent whole.
The sky dimmed into night, and then the first stars twinkled into view. The moon streaked pale shadows of the cage bars onto the ground, but Jemidon continued on unheedingly. He divided the coins into distinct piles that he could locate by feel in the darkness. "Suppose we limit the problem to five of each type," he muttered. "And the challenge is to choose the order so that in the end they all will be sorted. Yes, I will call it Benedict's problem. The path each one takes from the slit depends not only on its type but on what the columns already contain as well. It cannot be done in one pass. When four coppers are in column one, unless a silver is in both two and three, the last will go to five instead. So one must carefully remove some from the bottom and intermix them with those remaining to be added at the top. Only then can there be a chance."
"With the setting of the moon! Pass it along." A whispered voice broke Jemidon's concentration sometime later. He had not noticed that another of the harvest cages had moved to barely ten feet away.
"With the setting of the moon. Do not sleep. Pass it along," the voice repeated. "The message comes from one of the Pelinad's band. Kenton expects him only to touch the fields on the east, if at all. But it will be tonight. Here. They will make the attempt."
Jemidon shook himself alert. He frowned at the scatter of metal disks that lay in front of him. He looked at the sky, now quite different from when he had last noticed it. "What have I been doing?" he gasped aloud. "Frittering away time on a meaningless puzzle, and one of my own making at that. I must be more tired than I thought." Disgustedly he scooped up aU the coins and inserted them in the changer. He shook his head, confused about his actions, and thrust the device away. The visions of sliding mechanisms and clinking coins began to fade. He wrinkled his brow and forced his thoughts back to his immediate plight.
"Wait," he said to the occupant of the other cage. "The setting of the moon. Pelinad's messenger. What do you mean?"
"The reward justifies the risk. With common laborers too tired to lift a sword, there was no reason for taking the chance. But two new ones were added to the cages today-and one is a sorcerer from Morgana."
"I am no sorcerer," Jemidon said. "I was only on a visit to the island to learn the craft."
"Not you, dolt. The big man farther down the line. Now pass it on, before the guardsmen hear your chatter and come to investigate."
Jemidon started to ask more, but the other cage began to move away. Silently, he cursed himself for not noticing sooner that the message was close at hand. Sorcerers and Pelinad's rebels, he thought. They were far more important than the tinkle of a few pieces of metal. Determined, he made up his mind to recover the time he had lost. He checked the ground to ensure that all the coins had been retrieved and then began to push his cage in the direction of the next in line.
And at the next, rather than returning to his own position, he offered to carry the message farther down the row. At each stop, as he whispered the words, he stared into the darkness, trying to recognize a familiar face. The practice of sorcery in Arcadia had been confined to Morgana. A master sorcerer would have to come from there. But it would not be tradition-bound Farnel and certainly not Gerilac. And why would any of the other masters journey to the wheatlands?
A dozen stops produced nothing, and Jemidon felt his fatigued legs begin to tremble from the effort of pushing over the ruts that ran alongside the lines of wheat. But the memory of his mental lapse goaded him on, and he continued to the next. He lost track of how many cages he visited. The end of the line finally came within sight.
As he approached the fourth from the last, a sudden scream jerked him alert. A drum sounded to the left, and the guard fires sprang back to life. Shouts of alarm came from all along the line. Steel clanged against steel three cages away. In a matter of moments, Jemidon saw dark figures running from cell to cell and keying open the doors. He heard the jangle of freedom in the back of his own cage and tugged with an energy he was surprised he still had to free himself of the melal belt.
He bolted so quickly to the outside that he nearly knocked down the man racing from the adjacent cell. Together, they flailed to regain their balance in the dimness. As they spun about, the moon on the horizon caught the other man's features. Jemidon's mouth dropped open in sudden recognition.
"Canthor!" he exclaimed. "Canthor, the bailiff of Morgana Island. Why are you here? You are no more a sorcerer than I!"
Jemidon looked around the campfire in the small bowl framed by the rising hills. He tried to stretch himself into a more comfortable position. His linen tunic was now bunched in thick creases beneath a vest of stiff leather. The equally fine leggings hung in tatters beneath his knees. There had been no pursuit for over two days. And now Pelinad's band was high enough in the foothills so that the lookouts would be able to spot any activity out of Kenton's castle on the plain below. The slopes rapidly merged into the higher mountains in the east, and escape was possible in a dozen ways. Not that flight was the only option. Before the attack, Pelinad's brigands had numbered about sixty. Now they were three times the number. Not a single one of the bondsmen or freetoilers had elected to stay. Even the troop from Searoyal would find the rebels more than a mere nuisance.
In small groups of three and four, they huddled around the sprinkling of morning fires. Some sprawled exhausted, still asleep despite the cold and rocky ground. Others talked with loud animation, slapping the arms of old acquaintances and testing the feel of the newly supplied hide-covered shields. Behind them, the silhouettes of craggy spires were just barely discernible in the brightening sky. Slightly north of where the sun would rise, Jemidon saw the dark crestline dip into the deep notch that was Plowblade Pass.
Jemidon watched Canthor return from a huddled conference with Pelinad and his lieutenants around one of the fires to the left. The bailiff squinted off into the distance, then looked at Jemidon and smiled.
"Farnel's tyro," he said as he approached. "Who would have guessed it? Returned to his homeland, no doubt to seek his fortune the same as an old soldier who knows that where there is turmoil, there is also the opportunity for gain."
"But the message said that there was a sorcerer among the captives," Jemidon whispered. "Did you come with someone else?"
"I am the master." Canthor patted his chest and laughed. "It is for me that Pelinad staged his raid. And he has just told me why. He is to meet this morning with Ocanar, the leader of the other rebel band, and the village whispers say that this rival has acquired the aid of a master of one of the arts. Pelinad feels that he must show equivalent strength if he is to bend Ocanar to his will, rather than the other way around."
"But you do not practice sorcery," Jemidon said. "Pelinad has made a mistake."
"And one that I have chosen not yet to correct."
"But why?"
"Why not? For all intents now, I can weave illusions as well as any master." Canthor grimaced and looked in the direction of the sea. "No need, they said. No need for a bailiff or men-at-arms. With no art, there would be no visitors. What little order they needed they could manage by themselves. Booted out from the keep with wages a month in arrears! A fine thanks for services almost two decades done. And so it was either starve or beguile the weak-witted with impressive-sounding chants that I have heard repeated over and over. A wave of the hand, a penetrating glance, a deep-pitched voice in a dimly lighted room. There are enough begging to imagine some fantasy in the air that the coin was easy enough to come by along the way."
"Pelinad rescued us for no less," Jemidon said. "With sixty men or three times that, he will not directly challenge Kenton's sharp steel and tight mail. The rest are all babbling about their good fortune. They think that finally they have a weapon to use against the catapults and the lord's missiles of war. You had better explain quickly that you are a fighter like them and no more."
"You did not seem so quick to speak when they filled your bowl with a double portion," Canthor remarked. "Even the tyro of a sorcerer rates more than an even share."
"I put forth no such claim," Jemidon protested. "The forced march was enough, after a day in the fields, to keep any man's mouth from wasted chatter."
"Nevertheless, they have accepted my word as to your budding proficiency." Canthor waved down the volume of Jemidon's voice. "And, as I said, Pelinad needs to have a sorcerer in his retinue for the parlay. For the moment, it is better that things proceed as they are. Besides, with two we should be able to carry out the illusion all the better. There will be time enough to reveal the reality. And if no harm is done in the process, then what can it really matter?"
"My purpose for coming to the wheatlands was not to fight in a rebellion," Jemidon said. "Rather, I intended to warn the high prince of the power of a stranger who has mercenaries of his own."
"Indeed." Canthor flicked another branch onto the fire. "Then perhaps you should demand an immediate audience with Pelinad and inform him forthwith where your allegiances lie. I am sure that the others who were released with you would delight in the presence of a representative of the prince."
Jemidon scowled and looked about the campground. What Canthor said was true. None of Pelinad's rebels would care anything about warning the prince. Perhaps he should slip away when there was opportunity. But slip away to what? Certainly not back to the toil of the cages or the oppression of Kenton's barony. Was it for the benefit of the Arcadian nobles that he was to offer his aid? He shook his head in confusion.
But if there was no warning to the prince, then how could Melizar be apprehended? And the secrets of the stranger were the slender threads from which everything else hung. There would be no robe of the master, no calming of the strange longing that made him turn away from all that Augusta had offered.
Jemidon lapsed into a deep contemplation, clutching the coin about his neck and cutting out Canthor's words. He tried to dissect the compulsion that apparently lay behind all the reasons he had thought were driving him on. What was the allure of Melizar's lattice and the soft, cold words that issued from the dark hood? Why did he care about the Postulate of Invariance and the new laws, the new sorceries, and the magics that somehow switched on and off, according to the stranger's commands? Lattices, drums and weights, flitting imps, visions of changers, and stacks of coins danced in his head. Copper and silver slid into the slit, and precise columns of gold issued from the bottom. Benedict's problem-inserting three regals followed by one galleon should produce-
"Alert, to arms," he heard Pelinad say. "Ocanar comes for the parlay, and I do not trust his intent." The tall, angular warrior thumped his fist on his chest. "Stand upright now and show them, each and every one, that you are the equal of any whom he has to command."
Jemidon groaned and willed his body erect. Understanding the puzzle of his own mind would take more than a few minutes in a crowd of men pursuing a desperate cause. Without words, he accepted Canthor's nimble fingers tightening and adjusting his leather vest. He grasped the scythe in one hand, wondering how well he would fare against someone who knew how to use a blade. Pelinad shouted orders, drawing his men into a jagged line that faced the direction from which Ocanar would come.
After a few moments, the trail sounds that had alerted the lookout grew loud enough for everyone to hear. Shortly thereafter, the first of Ocanar's band topped the small rise to the west. Murmurs of surprise arose among Pelinad's own troop as they saw the procession come forward.
"Mail," the rebels whispered. "Some of them are in mail."
"Yes, Ocanar and at least a dozen more."
"And the total number-he comes with unexpected strength."
"Silence," Pelinad snapped, but Jemidon barely noticed the command. He had expected Ocanar's master to be the same as Canthor, another fraudulent sorcerer manipulating the gullibilities about an art that was no more. But instead, what followed the line in front was a shock.
"Melizar!" Jemidon cried. "And the men in mail. They must be Nimrod and the Pluton mercenaries."
Canthor cuffed Jemidon in the arm as a warning. Jemidon looked back, surprised, and then dropped his eyes from Pelinad's disapproving stare. Fidgeting uncomfortably, he waited with the others, watching the troop pour over the hill and form into another straggly rank, a few pike lengths from Pelinad's own. He saw his father march up with the last, in a clump of older villagers, all with faces set in grim lines. But he was already numb from the jolt of Melizar's appearance and gave the second surprise little thought. Both troops spread out to span the depression from lip to lip, each a single row deep, alternating clumps of men and large gaps. Despite the attempts of each leader to make his following appear the larger, Jemidon estimated that the forces numbered about the same.
"Greetings, brother," the red-bearded man in front hailed. He alone wore an embroidered surcoat, and the morning sun glinted off a cap of steel. "The hills speak of an increase in your might. Had I not been augmenting myself, then your size might have begun to rival even my own."
"The lord's burden grows too oppressive." Pelinad moved forward to answer the greeting. "Two nights ago my following tripled. Tomorrow, if I approach the village, it will probably double again."
"A day too late." Ocanar forced a laugh. "I have already made the sweep while you were fussing over the harvest of a single field. Look at my legion." He waved a thick arm to those filling in behind. "At least two hundred, trained freetoilers, and ready to fight. Yes, two hundred. It is clear that the momentum has swung my way. The rebellion is growing, and I am the center. The time for timid confusion is over. I charge you to accept my command, Pelinad. Swear allegiance to me as leader, so that we may strike Kenton's strength rather than poke with petty irritations at his periphery."
"Command is not measured by mere numbers." Pelinad pointed at Jemilor and those around him. "If I wanted to enlist the old men and the lame, I could have done so a year ago. No indeed, my raid was strategic. Because of it, I have garnered an element of great power." He motioned Canthor to come forward. "Henceforth I battle with a craft far removed from simple thaumaturgy. Here is my sorcerer, Ocanar, and from no less than Morgana itself."
Ocanar looked at Canthor as the bailiff walked forward. He frowned and pulled at his beard. "The village whispers that sorcery is no more," he said slowly. "And this man wears no robe with a logo. His walk is that of a fighter, not the shuffle of the masters I have seen."
"Look me in the eye and we will test the truth here and now." Canthor put his hands on his hips. "Let us see to what extent the village talk is true."
Ocanar took a step backward and threw his hand across his face. "Whatever resources we have should be tested in battle," he said quickly. "It is folly to waste them fighting between ourselves."
"Allow me to accept the challenge to your place." Melizar glided forward to stand by Ocanar. "Let the so-called master pit his skills against the powers that are mine."
"Ocanar speaks with good judgment." Pelinad put his hand on his sword hilt. "There is no need for confrontation."
Melizar hesitated. His deep cowl slowly scanned the line of Pelinad's men, all grasping weapons. Like cranked crossbows, they tensely waited the signal that would release their restraint. Ocanar's troop responded in kind.
For a long moment, no one moved. All eyes were on the leader to see what would happen next.
"A fight here in the foothills sheds none of Kenton's blood," Melizar said at last. "And it is not according to my plan. Perhaps I do agree, Ocanar. The battlefield is best. There is no need to test this so-called master now. Let him show his merits in the pass, and then all can judge the true prowess of his craft."
Jemidon bit his tip. Melizar knew full well that nothing remained of sorcery. The stranger was maneuvering Canthor and Pelinad into a position from which they were bound to fail. But right now, he could say nothing. His own position was too tenuous. And it was just as well that Melizar did not recognize him as one who had disrupted Trocolar's scheme in the grotto. Later, when he knew more, he could formulate the best course of action.
Ocanar tugged on his beard, looked at Melizar, and then glanced across to where Canthor stood. "Yes, tomorrow can be the judge. Pelinad, do you abide by it? The one of us whose power best decides the battle, then he is to lead us both."
"What battle?" Pelinad asked. "We do not yet have the strength to confront Kenton in his keep, even with both of us acting together. And soon he is to be fortified by a troop of the prince's own from Searoyal."
"It is your good fortune that we have met," Ocanar said. "Your ignorance would otherwise prove quite costly." He turned and forced a laugh that his men picked up in chorus. "This troop from Searoyal. No doubt you have seen some trace?" He turned back to mock Pelinad. "What would happen if they came upon you unaware?"
"In truth, we have seen nothing," Pelinad said. "We have been in these hills, planning for our successful raid."
"You would have seen nothing, even if you had been on the plain!" Ocanar roared. "They do not beat upriver for all to see, so that we can melt away." He waved a fleshy palm to the east. "No, they proceed by stealth in the next valley. Through Plowblade Pass they intend to come-to fall upon us in our lairs and thrash us from behind is their plan."
Ocanar paused, sucking in his breath. "But we are the ones who will stage the ambush. It is into our trap they will fall, not us into theirs. And after our victory, the plains will erupt with fire. Not a single man will hold back. Kenton and the others will be swept from the fields. It will be a true rebellion at last." Ocanar gazed off into the distance, savoring his thoughts, then fixed Pelinad with a hard stare. "You dispute my leadership, Pelinad. But by the laws, on what grounds? Certainly not your vision; you show as much imagination as an ambulator upon his mill."
"It was I who found the truth," Melizar said before Pelinad could reply. "Nimrod has many friends in the royal garrisons. Let us keep the importance of my contributions firmly in focus, Ocanar. I have been deceived once by your kind. This time there is to be no misunderstanding."
"Our agreement still stands," Ocanar said. "I see no reason to change it. You come with a dozen men in mail, fully trained fighters whom you offer to be my captains. And they have bullied my rabble into fighting shape, I do not deny it. Aid me in plucking Kenton from his keep, and what you ask shall be yours, even if I do not understand why you want it so."
"You find it strange, do you not, that my lust is not for a manor and rows of humble servants? Those trappings, Ocanar, will all come in the proper time. For now, I desire only a halt of all thaumaturgy. After the unlocking, I will need nothing more. And what better way to achieve what I wish than the chaos of insurrection? Unlike sorcery and magic, the craft is too widespread for the contradiction to be effective any other way."
Melizar paused, and his voice hardened. "And in the end, we shall see whose fiefdom is the greater. A single valley is not enough to interest even the least able pilot, and among them I am the first."
"As I have said, it is agreed." Ocanar waved his arm in irritation. "I have heard enough of your mumbled nonsense before. Just make sure that your rock rumblings and strange images are ready when they are needed."
"I begin my preparations for tomorrow now," Melizar said, motioning back to the hill over which he had come. "It is somewhat paradoxical that ihe power of thaumaturgy, which makes the transition so difficult, also greatly mitigates the unlocking."
"Your cozy tent provides the catalyst for much grumbling among the men," Ocanar said. "You should sleep on the ground like my men."
"Warmth?" Melizar said. "Rest? It is not for those that the Maxim of Perturbations was vitalized in the grotto. Which would you rather? Push a pack train along these trails, or have a single minion effortlessly guide my possessions as they are guided now?"
Ocanar did not respond. Jeminod looked to the crest-line and saw a large tent float over the rise. It was Drandor's, the one that had caught his eye in the bazaar on Morgana, its faded canvas hung in loose folds; coarse stitching bound swaths of different colors together in jagged seams. But, unlike the structure on the island, no guy ropes or stakes were to be seen. The bottom side panels gently rippled over the rock and scrubby plants, like the hem of a woman's dress. All the cloth danced and wavered as the whole structure bobbed along. A single man-at-arms held the end of a rope that ran to a ring attached above an entrance flap. He tugged the structure along without effort into a quickening morning breeze.
"Perturbations," Melizar repeated. "Perhaps not as dramatic as a dance which crashes open fissures in the earth, but guidance of small swirls of air at the right place and time can produce buoyant effects as good as the largest balloon."
With a soft whoosh of the tent, the men-at-arms halted a short distance behind Ocanar's line of men. Melizar glided into the opening and returned shortly with the drums and weights that Jemidon had seen briefly in the interior of the tent when Drandor had shown him around.
Drandor's tent. Drandor. Drandor and Delia. Jemidon's thoughts took another sudden turn. He ran his tongue over his teeth, trying to recapture the taste of his thoughts before Ocanar's band had arrived. The slave girl still felt important, as important as the lattice and the rest. But he was no closer to understanding the other pieces of the puzzle than he was to why she held such an allure.
"These will be used for our common benefit." Melizar waved the drums in Pelinad's direction. "Simple devices that aid me in my craft. Hold your men silent, so that I may receive all that they tell." He looked at Canthor. "If your master has any preparations to make as well, then gladly will Ocanar's legion return the favor."
Pelinad glanced at Canthor and then scowled. He flung his arm to the side in acquiescence and prepared to watch with the rest.
Jemidon tried to concentrate on what Melizar was doing as the cold one set the drums up in a row between the two lines of men and adjusted the tension in the heads, one by one. But the surge of his thoughts increased rather than subsided. He felt wispy tendrils in his mind, tantalizing glimmers of some insight that eluded his grasp. Deep inside, there seemed to be a tiny box whose lid was slowly beginning to open, oozing out marvels that had never been suspected, but which were nonetheless true.
Jemidon stared at Melizar. Even the proximity of the stranger was suddenly unsettling. Before, he had been mysterious. But now his every motion seemed to have an effect on Jemidon's thoughts. Each precise flick of the long, thin fingers crashed the images about in Jemidon's head. He felt the muscles tighten in his back. His mouth grew dry. A hint of queasiness floated up from his stomach. Something unpleasant was about to happen. For whatever the reason, now he wanted nothing to do with this stranger, nothing at all. Cautiously, Jemidon slumped to the ground and tightened his arms about his chest.
"Seven drums," Melizar said to Ocanar. "Seven drums, one for each of the laws."
"I am a fighter, not a practitioner of the arts," Ocanar responded impatiently. "The details of your craft are not my concern."
"Perhaps it is a weakness," Melizar said. "It gives me a perverse pleasure to display my workings for all to see and have none understand the slightest glimmer of what truths they mirror. Well spoken, Ocanar. It is the blind devotion to the narrow perspective of your kind that gives me the greatest assurance that a pilot and his manipulants shall succeed."
Melizar selected a small weight that was not wired to a drumhead and gently placed it in the center of the first tight membrane. The tare barely dimpled the surface. "The new sorcery," Melizar said. "And there are no animations, as the lack of depression shows.'" He placed another weight on the next drum in line, and it sagged further into the thin, translucent covering. "The tent," he said. "So close to the nexus that it alone has a strong effect."
The next three were tested in quick succession, each one pulling down the drumhead by about the same amount. "Alchemy and wizardry, three laws in all," Melizar continued. "They will be the last, after we are sure of the victory." He looked at the final two drums in the line and simultaneously moved a weight to the center of each one. Instantly, the tares snapped from his fingertips and, with what looked to Jemidon like a force far stronger than the pull of the ground, the weights distorted the planes with deep, cone-shaped depressions.
Melizar rubbed his fingertips together and then looked through a collection of small metal rings mixed with the weights. He selected one from the rest and placed it on the warped drumhead, over the indentation caused by the tare. Instantly, it disappeared from sight into the hole. "Excellent," he said. "The workings of the art are not as nearby as a vault, but they are widespread and strong. The unlocking will proceed better than I first would have thought."
"Well," Ocanar demanded impatiently, "what does your reading portend?"
"That the unlocking should be now, when it is easiest," Melizar replied. "Before, I was too cautious, when there was no need. Now I know that it does not matter. There are none here who can tug in directions other than my own. Yes, I will unlock the nexus now and then be ready when the rebellion has reduced thaumaturgy to a level from which I can proceed."
Melizar bent to the ground and released the tension in the drumheads. He stored the apparatus back in the tent and then indicated silently to Ocanar that he would be but a moment more. In a fashion almost as theatrical as Holgon's, he removed from a chain on his belt a small cubical structure that was painted with a crosshatching of smaller squares.
No, not painted squares, Jemidon thought as he watched Melizar manipulate the solid, twisting faces in a series of rapid rotations that his eye could barely follow. It was a collection of smaller cubes, bound together and yet able to move in several independent directions, creating and destroying intricate patterns as they came together in varying juxtapositions. There were six sides and six different colors on the small cubes. Could the structure be manipulated so that-
Just as the thought formed, Jemidon saw Melizar stop and display the solid for all the onlookers to see. The random patterns of the small, colored squares on the faces of the larger cube were now all homogeneous. In less than the time one could hold his breath, Melizar had solved the unusual puzzle.
Puzzle? Jemidon frowned at why he thought of the cube in that way. It was a puzzle, yes, but certainly of much greater significance than that. And what sort of mechanism inside would allow the small cubes in the corners to rotate about three independent axes-?
Jemidon gasped. The impending uneasiness that had forced him to sit roared suddenly through his being like a wild wind. He was aware of a great snap that released some inner restraint and cast him adrift. Like a swimmer struggling against the current for the shore, he felt himself swept away. Like one diving off a cliff in a dizzying spin, he sensed a tingling thrill radiate out from the pit of his stomach to his fingertips.
Jemidon closed his eyes, but it did not help. Coins, changers, cube puzzles, all danced in his head, streaking by faster and faster, becoming glowing blurs that fused into a distant background with no landmarks. Jemidon clutched his arms around his chest tighter and slowly rocked back and forth. With deliberate effort, he breathed deeply and tried to blot out the dizzying thoughts. The words of Melizar and the others dimmed as he concentrated. He was missing the preparations for the battle, but he did not care.
Onward he seemed to streak, lashing out to grab at the formless glows as they sped by. With numbing impact, they ripped through his hands as he continued on his way. Jemidon strained to strengthen his grip and, after countless failures, held one for a moment, before his fingers let go. His body seemed to whip around, losing some of its momentum and slowing its mad rush. He reached out and held onto the next a little longer, pulling the glow along, his fingers slowly sliding off its rough and bumpy surface. Again and again, in the image in his mind, he flailed his arms to grasp the blobs and, with each successful contact, he decreased the blinding rush. The forms took on detail and shape, as individual coins, changers, and cubes, each with a unique structure differentiated from the shapeless glows farther away. He seemed to slow to a fast run, then to a trot, and finally to a gentle drift that carried him along.
Gradually, after how long a struggle he could not tell, Jemidon opened his eyes. The sense of motion persisted, but with a much lower intensity. He still felt as if he were falling, but the acceleration was not nearly as great as it had been at first. The images of the streaking lights faded into the background of the reality around him. Melizar and the tent were gone, presumably back over the hilltop. Both Ocanar's and Pelinad's bands were in their separate camps. Jemidon looked up at the one man standing patiently before him.
"If you are finished with the dreaming, then I have a suggestion," his father said. "Ask to be that Melizar's apprentice. Perhaps he can teach you a thing or two."