Stealers` Sky

THE FIRE IN A GOD'S EYE by Robin Wayne Bailey

The shallow waters of the White Foal glimmered blackly in the late night, purling with a suspiciously sweet rush and gurgle over its stony bottom. It whisper-whispered, as if it ferried secrets; deepening, as it went south between its inauspicious banks toward Sanctuary and Downwind and beyond to the sea. Sharp as a razor's cut was the line where the water touched the land at the fording point between Apple Lane and the Generals' Road, but looking far up or down its course there was no telling the river from the sky. For all that a fanciful mind could guess, it might have flowed down from a source somewhere in the dark heavens to touch the earth only briefly, here at the end of the world, before it plummeted over the edge and on, to the underworld. This river, with all the detritus that it carried, with all the dead who had washed up on its shores, with all the souls who had given themselves in despair to its waves, this river would make such a fitting link.

But the lone rider, who sat quietly astride a huge gray horse in the middle of the ford, watching the water foam and rill around the animal's fetlocks, was no poet, just a soul weighed down with weariness and burdens of the spirit. Such thoughts were only the shrapnel of too many sleepless nights, easily kept at bay by drawing a dusty cloak tighter around the shoulders, and pulling a dusty hood closer to shadow one's face.

Sabellia, too, Bright Moon-mother, had shadowed Her face this night, turned away from the world below, and surrendered the world to the darkness. Even the stars, those myriad sparkling tears She had shed for Her heavenly children and for the children of the earth, those, too, were hidden behind a thick, cloudy veil.

The rider's gaze turned away from the sky and toward Sanctuary. At a nudge, the horse moved up the muddy bank and turned down the Generals' Road, its hooves clip-clopping smartly on the brick-and-stone paving, ringing even more loudly on the wooden planks of the tiny north bridge that crossed Splinter Creek. The rider halted briefly. Off to the left stood the charred ruins of the house of the dead vivisectionist, Kurd. Next to it, though, stood a new house, shoddily built from scavenged lumber and stones. Lamplight shone through the cracks of hastily constructed shutters, and gruff voices echoed through the door. There was the smell of lime and sand about the place, and unfamiliar tools leaned against the outside walls. Some itinerant workers on the city's new fortifications probably had decided to stay, though the work was done.

Suddenly, the door swung open a crack, and someone peered around the edge, alerted, no doubt, by the hoof-sounds on the bridge. They watched warily as the rider passed by. Obviously, they had quickly learned the ways of this city, this thieves' world.

Off to the left stood the high, stark silhouettes of the city's granaries, barely discernible in the night, though they towered above the new wall. Nearer burned the lamps of the Street of Red Lanterns, where scented women plied special delights and special tortures, according to the appetites of their customers and the weight of their coins. Special effort had been made to extend the new wall around the granaries, while the brothels were left outside in its shadow.

The rider thought about that, then shrugged. In Sanctuary, one might have expected just the reverse.

After a massive construction effort that had been the talk of the Empire, the new wall was finished. It encompassed the entire city now. Atop the huge edifice, watch fires burned, and shadows moved about in the flickering glow. The new, iron-banded doors of the great Gate of Triumph stood open, but a pair of garrison sentries stood at the duty post just inside.

"Whoa, there!" one of them called, coming forward as he curled one hand almost casually about the hilt of his sword. "What kind of foreigner comes visiting our town at such an unholy hour? Come out from under that damned hood. Show your face there."

The sentry's hair and clothing exuded the odor of smoked krrf as he came as close as the rider's knee, and his eyes sheened with drug-glaze as they caught the torchlight from the duty post. His jaw hung just a bit too slackly, and his motions were languid. An addict, probably.

The rider wanted no confrontation, so pulled just a corner of the concealing hood back and glared at the sentry, who backed up immediately.

"My apologies, Lady!" he mumbled. He took his hand quickly away from his sword's hilt, and shot a fearful glance at his partner. "We didn't know it was you. Of course, you can pass. Welcome home'" He made a deep bow, and the rider passed him by without a word.

Caravan Square was abandoned this time of night. So was the Farmer's Run, though one could never be too sure there, for it was too close to the Maze, and every shadow and dark cranny was to be watched. Governor's Walk was also quiet, and the sounds of the horse's hoof-falls cracked with uncomfortable volume on freshly repaired street cobbles. Even in the darkness the work on the smaller, inner wall that enclosed the palace was evident. The rider continued straight ahead, following that wall.

At the place where West Gate Street joined Governor's Walk, a city watch patrol, six uniformed men, suddenly blocked the way. The oldest of them, a man whose graying curls spilled out from under his steel cap, and apparently the captain, held up a lantern and shined it on the rider.

The light glimmered on a sleeve of metal rings that covered the rider's left arm and the hand that held the reins. It fell, also, on the hilt of a sword, whose tangs were shaped like the wings of a bird. As the rider shifted in the saddle, the cloak parted slightly.

"Why, if it ain't the Daughter o' the Sun, 'erself, it is!" The old man laughed unpleasantly. "Come back to stir up more trouble, have ye?"

A much younger watchman stepped up to his captain's side and grinned. "You know," he said nastily, "I had a cousin killed in that PFLS ambush she set up last year. I can tell it straight, I was glad to hear somebody fixed her ... '"

The old man gave his subordinate a sharp elbow in the ribs and scowled. "Shut yer mouth, Barik!" The scowl turned into a twisted little smile that showed several missing teeth. "Can't ye see she's just on 'er way home after a long while gone?"

The younger watchman gave his captain an insubordinate look as he rubbed his side. "Yeah," he said sullenly. "I guess I can see that."

"Then bid 'er good nightie, boys, an' let 'er pass'" He motioned all his men back and made a deep, sweeping bow that was pure mockery. "Welcome home, Lady Chenaya!" he said grandly. "Our regards to yer noble Rankan family!"

Chenaya was tired and rode on, forgetting about the watchmen and their meaningless taunts. But when she reached the Processional she stopped again. A wind swept up Sanctuary's most famous street, bringing with it the sweet tang of the salty sea, and there, in the silence, she thought she could just hear the rush of the breakers and the rocking creak of the old wharves at the Processional's farther end.

Gods, it was good to be home, and it would be good to rest soon. She wanted to sleep, sleep for days, and wake up to the faces and laughter of those she loved- She had seen too much in her time away from Sanctuary, learned too much, perhaps dared too much. All she wanted was to close her eyes and forget it all.

She rode on along Governor's Walk, past the park called the Promise of Heaven, until she reached the Avenue of Temples. She saw no one else in the streets as she went, and reflected on that. Sanctuary had quietened in her absence. From the park, it was only a short distance to the Temple of the Rankan Gods.

Chenaya dismounted and dropped the reins other horse. She gave it an affectionate pat along the withers before she turned toward the temple steps. The animal was war-trained, bred in the finest stables of Ranke's capital. It wouldn't wander away while she was inside, and she pitied the hapless fool stupid enough to try to steal it, horse bites being a difficult thing for any physician to treat.

She climbed the twelve marble stairs and passed between the columns that formed the temple entrance. A pair of oil pots burned there, providing light, for adherents were welcome at any hour. On either side of the temple rose the great stone images of Ranke's lost war-god, Vashanka, and Sabellia, the moon-goddess. Streamers of incense wafted up around them from circles of tiny holes cut into the floor about their feet. The sweet smoke curled and swirled, and rose out through round, open skylights.

Between those two deities, though, was the great altar of Savankala, overhung with its massive golden sunburst and ringed with burnished oil pots, whose flames sputtered and danced. There was no statue, no image of Savankala, save the symbolic sunburst. Who, after all, could look on the face of the sun?

Chenaya knelt wearily before the sun-god's altar, made proper obeisance, and fished out from inside her garments a heavy leather purse that hung on a thong around her neck. Loosening its strings, she poured into her hand an egg-sized diamond. It was warm with the heat of her body, and as she opened her fingers wider, its perfect facets caught the firelight from the oil pots. A rainbow of rays shot about the temple.

The stone tiles of the floor vibrated suddenly, and the very air grew taut with an unutterable tension. Above the altar, Savankala's sunburst began to burn with a potent white light, until all darkness fled His temple, and the shadows shriveled into nothingness-

Chenaya curled into a ball around the diamond, and trembled. The light stabbed her eyes, though she flung up her hood to hide her face and squeezed her eyes shut with all her strength until they leaked thick tears. She did not cry out, though, or call her god's name.

Slowly, the light subsided. Chenaya put the jewel back into the purse and hid it in her clothing again. She rose, then, to stare at the sunburst. It no longer burned with the Bright Father's essence, nor did the temple stones. Yet, in her soul she felt Him near.

She lifted one of the many oil pots, taking care not to drown the wick, and set it in the middle of the altar. Next, she drew a small dagger from her boot. The silver blade shimmered. She raised it quickly and cut a long blond lock from her hair and held it in the wick's flame. It went up in a flash. The singe-smell and the smoke curled upward as Chenaya left the dagger as a further offering on the altar next to the pot. A moment later, she turned away and left the temple.

Her horse snorted when he saw her coming. She gathered the reins and mounted, ready to go home to Land's End. Before she got far, though, something caught her eye, a gleam of metal lying on the ground by the outside corner of the temple. She cast a glance over her shoulder. No moon in the sky, no stars, nothing to cause such a glitter. Cautiously, she dismounted again.

It was her dagger, point down, stuck in the earth. Her jaw gaped as she bent closer. No mistake, it was hers. She rose again, and peered suspiciously up and down the street. No one, not even the best thief in Sanctuary, could have got into the temple, snatched the dagger from the altar, and gotten out again without her notice. Even if such a thief lived, he wouldn't have been so clumsy as to drop it making his getaway.

She frowned and thought about the gleam that had caught her eye. There was no such gleam now from any angle as she moved around it. The damn thing was barely visible in the temple's shadow.

She was too tired for such puzzles. The hour was late, and home was near. If Savankala didn't want her offering, she wasn't going to just leave it in the dirt. It was a good blade. She bent down and grabbed the hilt.

Her senses reeled suddenly, and the earth seemed to yawn as she fell crazily into a great black hole. A scream formed, burbling in her throat. She bit her lip, though, and clenched her jaws tight, refusing to give it voice. Down she tumbled into the strange darkness, deeper and deeper, until somewhere far below, or far ahead-she could no longer tell direction-she saw a greenish glow and a form like a body in its shroud cloth. It, too, was falling, falling toward her at fantastic speed, coming closer. Now the shroud slipped away from its head, and she saw a pallid, horrible face with no eyes rushing at her.

Chenaya threw up her arms, on the verge of releasing the pent-up scream. She mustn't, she knew. But she couldn't help herself!

Then, as she opened her mouth, she found herself outside the temple again, and the world was the world she knew. She collapsed back against the temple wall, gasped for breath, and slowly fought down the panic that had filled her. There was no hole, no corpse, no greenish glow. Just the dagger at her feet.

She stared at the blade. Whatever had just happened, the dagger had been the trigger. Her fingertips had only brushed the hilt, and the world had lurched.

Of a sudden, she kicked the dagger, sending it flying end over end into the middle of the street. Nothing happened. She folded her hands over her mouth and trembled. Maybe it had been an illusion, a standing dream. No, make that nightmare. She was so tired, but she had to master herself, had to keep a tighter control.

She picked up the dagger and thrust it into its sheath in her boot and mounted her horse. It was just a short ride now to Land's End. She would be there soon, and she could rest, though not sleep. That would come later. At least, though, she'd be home. It would be good to see her father and Dayrne.

But when she made the turn onto the short road from the Avenue of Temples that should have taken her to her father's estate, she found herself at a dead end, staring at the cold stone of the city wall. Damn it! The wall's course had effectively cut off Land's End, and all the other estates, from the rest of the city. No doubt, Uncle Molin had chuckled about that. Hell, he'd probably planned it.

Frowning, she turned her horse around, rode back down the Avenue of Temples to the street called Safe Haven, and from there, to the Wideway, which ran along the wharves. There, the rush of the breakers, the humming of ships' guy wires, and the creaking of old timbers made a magical music, and the smell of the salt sea blew inland, overpowering. Unfortunately, so was the smell of fish. She turned her gaze away from the beautiful sea and concentrated on the road, setting her mount to a gallop until she came to the Gate of Gold, so named because in former times, when the caravan trade came this far south, it marked the way to the lucrative trade in Ilsig.

Two more guards stood at the Gate of Gold's duty post. They moved into the middle of the road, blocking the way, when they heard a rider coming. Chenaya slowed to a walk, then stopped. One of the men recognized her at once. "Lady!" he said with genuine politeness, inclining his head, then coming to attention. "Glad we are to see you back, though it could be under more pleasant circumstances."

The other soldier also inclined his head. "Many of us respected your father," he added gently. "And his accomplishment at this year's Festival of Man .- ."

Chenaya's eyes widened at mention of her father. Respected? Past tense? Forgetting the guards, she spurred her horse suddenly, filled with a dreadful apprehension, and left the gate swiftly behind- There was no road north outside the wall. She rode overland at breakneck speed, pushing her mount, heedless of the dangers-the unexpected trench, the patch of slick grass. She bent low over the horse's neck. Its mane lashed her face as she sought to outrace the fear the guard's casual words had put into her.

She passed Sanctuary's southernmost estate. It was supposed to be abandoned, but above its private walls, lamps burning in some of its upper windows said differently. She had no time to worry over that, though. She used the reins to whip her horse, driving it faster as the ground rolled up and down.

At the main gate of Land's End, she jumped to the ground, ran, and seized the gigantic iron knocker. Thrice, she slammed it against the metal plate, and thrice more, before a small square portal of wood in the gate's door slid back and an unfamiliar face peered out at her.

"What do you want?" the face snapped. Dark eyes stared warily at her. "It's late."

Chenaya froze, incredulous, then glared angrily. It was her luck that the gate would be guarded tonight by one of Dayme's recruits. This fool didn't know who she was' She grabbed the knocker and smashed it down again and again with all her frantic might, raising a terrible noise.

The gate jerked open suddenly. Curses pouring from his lips, a huge figure stepped outside. Despite his size, he was cat-quick. He caught her hand and pulled her away from the knocker. "There's people sleeping!" he grumbled. "That's enough of ... !"

Chenaya seized his wrist and twisted hard. It didn't budge the giant, whose size and strength were obviously far greater than her own, but her mere attempt surprised him enough to let her move slightly behind him. She drove her heel into the weak area behind his knee, evoking a startled cry, and slammed her elbow into the side of his head just behind the ear. She didn't bother to watch him fall, just left him lying in the dirt, as she pushed the gates wide and rushed into the courtyard.

Two men, half naked, but with swords bared, came rushing out of the house.

Chenaya stopped and waved her hands desperately. Dismas and Gestus were old friends. They would know her.

They stopped as recognition dawned in their eyes. "Mistress!" Dismas shouted excitedly. "You're back!" He turned immediately to his partner. "Gestus, go wake Dayme. Tell him she's come back. Wake everybody!"

Gestus muttered an incoherent welcome in broken Rankene and ran back into the house. Chenaya whipped off her cloak. When Dismas reached out his hand to clasp her arm in a gladiator's greeting, she threw the cloak over it and dashed after Gestus. "Mistress!" Dismas called in surprise, then he hurried after.

Dayme was halfway down the great staircase when Chenaya reached the main hall. Wrapped only in a brief kilt, he stopped, stood there a moment, and looked at her. Then he rushed down the stairs, only to stop suddenly again. His eyes peered into hers, darted away momentarily, then drifted back. She read so many things in his eyes, things she had seen there before. She knew how Dayrne felt about her, had known for some time. But never had she seen his joy turn so abruptly to pain and hurt.

He reached out and clasped her arm. "Cheyne," he said quietly, using the nickname he had given her years ago. "There's no way to soften it. Lowan Vigeles is dead. So is your Aunt Rosanda."

Stunned, Chenaya could only look at him.

Dismas and Gestus were with them now, and they gathered close in a circle and put their arms around each other. The giant she had beaten at the gate rushed into the room, sword drawn. Immediately, though, he grasped the situation, looked shamefaced, and put down his blade.

"My apologies. Lady," he said sullenly. "I didn't know who you were, and you didn't say anything."

Dayrne started to turn and answer, but Chenaya's unyielding grip made him hesitate. She clung to him, grasping his arms, pouring all her strength into her grip. Hold on, she told herself desperately, locking his gaze. Here's your anchor! She felt Dismas and Gestus, their arms around her, too. Here are your anchors!

"It's all right, Dendur," Dayme said over his shoulder. "Have someone see to her horse, then go back to your post."

The soft closing of the door as Dendur departed made a sound that touched Chenaya with its symbolic finality. She let go of Dayme and slipped free of Dismas and Gestus. Slowly, she climbed the staircase and went to her father's room. The door was closed, but she pushed it open. Everything was just as she remembered it. Nothing had been disturbed. She walked to Lowan's sturdy chair by the fireplace. There was no fire, for it was too warm to need one. She unfastened her sword belt and let it drop to the floor. Then she sank down in the chair, just as her father always did, with the same languid motion, pushed her feet out, just as he always did, and stared into the hearth, the way she remembered him doing.

Dayme came into the room and closed the door. She looked up at him, and loved him for the concern he wore so plainly on his face. He knelt down beside her and laid his head on the chair's carved armrest. She rubbed her thumb over his brow, over the lines of his hurt, before her own pain became too great, and she turned away to gaze back into the cold fireplace.

"Cheyne?" he said, looking up. He repeated it. "Cheyne?" He leaned closer, trying to make her look at him, but she wouldn't.

"Chenaya?" He shook her arm, rising to his feet, the worry on his face transforming to fear. "Please, talk to me!"

She clutched the diamond hidden in its leather purse under her tunic, and twisted in the chair to avoid Dayme's face. She drew her legs upher father's chair was big enough for that-and curled into the crook of its great wooden arm. Tears streamed suddenly down her cheeks; she couldn't hold them back any longer. She hugged herself, and cried and cried.

But though she cried, she made not a sound,

Dayme paced about the peristyle, the large central room of the Land's End estate. It was also half garden, and the gray, depressing half-light of the Sanctuary morning streamed in. Though it was spring, there had been so little sunshine of late, Rashan, the high priest of Savankala, and friend of the family, sat motionless on one of the marble benches. Daphne, recently divorced from Prince Kadakithis, now a permanent resident of Land's End, tapped a dagger blade idly against one palm as she watched Dayrne.

"Word's out all over town that she's back," Daphne said with a wicked smile. "Word also has it that Zip decided hiding wasn't good enough. The little coward sneaked out of town before dawn this morning." Daphne flipped the dagger in the air and caught it by the point. "Anyone disappointed?"

Dayrne was disappointed. His hands clenched into fists. He'd have much preferred to find Zip and all the rest of his little PFLS rats and do to them what he'd done to their comrade, Ro-Karthis. He tried. His gladiators had torn up the town looking for piffles, but they'd all burrowed too deeply into the earth after Lowan's murder.

He'd made an example of Ro-Karthis, though. The people of Sanctuary had never seen a Bhokaran ferryboat. Few living in this hellhole even knew of that country far to the west. The sight had impressed them, though. He, himself, had fired the ship as it floated from the harbor with a living, screaming Ro-Karthis crucified on the mast with Lowan Vigeles and Lady Rosanda laid in regal splendor at his feet. Dayrne could still hear Ro-Karthis's shrieks, see the smoke and sparks rising on the wind while the flames burned all. A ferryboat, they called it in Bhokar. Two souls ferried to heaven, one to eternal hell.

It had been too good a death for Lowan Vigeles's murderer, but it had made a point. The few remaining members of the so-called Popular Front for the Liberation of Sanctuary had reportedly crept out of town one by one. Zip, supposedly reformed from the PFLS after being made one of the city's three commanders, had crawled into a hole so deep no one, not the prince, not Molin Torchholder, not even Walegrin, knew what had become of him.

Now, Daphne claimed, even Zip had gotten away.

Dayrne blamed himself. He should never have let old Lowan talk him into taking so many men north to the annual Festival of Man. Oh, they'd done well in the games. Spectacularly well. Twenty-five death matches and only two losses. The Empire's greatest gladiatorial schools had been not just defeated but humiliated by an unknown school from Sanctuary, of all places. It had driven the odds-makers and the bet-takers crazy. Ranke would be talking about it for years.

But while he and the best men from Land's End had been up north, Ro-Karthis had used iron claws to scale the wooden stable gate, crept unseen into the main house, and murdered Lowan and Rosanda in their sleep. The gods alone knew who might have been next if Daphne hadn't discovered him. Against orders, she'd been out after dark working the training machines alone-angry, no doubt, because he'd refused to take her to the games.

She'd just come back to her own quarters when Ro-Karthis emerged, bloody knife in hand, from Rosanda's rooms.

Daphne had damn near killed the bastard, and frankly, Dayme marveled at the self-control she'd shown by sparing Ro-Karthis until his return. Of course, Daphne's idea of self-control had been to hamstring Ro-Karthis and sever the tendons in his elbows. It probably hadn't taken her more than the necessary four quick strokes with her sword, either. Then she'd staunched and cauterized the blood flow to save his life.

Of course, long before Dayrne had gotten home she'd extracted from the stupid fool the reason for his crime-to revenge the PFLS for the damage Chenaya had done to their organization.

"What I can't figure out," Dayrne snapped suddenly, smacking his fist against an open palm, "is why she can't talk! She won't make a sound!" He turned toward Rashan. "You should have seen her last night. She cried and cried, tears enough to put Sabellia to shame, if hers could hang in the sky. But not once did she so much as whimper'" He shook his head as Daphne came to his side. "I tell you, it's weird!" She touched his arm, and he met her gaze worriedly. "It's got me scared," he said, no easy admission for a man like Dayme.

Rashan rose to his feet and he, too, began to pace. "Could it be shock? Maybe you should have told her more gently."

Daphne snickered and shot the priest a scornful look. "Chenaya?" she said with a sneer.

Dayme frowned and shook his head vigorously. "She beat poor Dendur up, rather than tell him her name," he reminded.

Daphne's eyebrow went up in mocking surprise. "Poor Dendur?" she muttered. "He's almost seven feet tall and thicker than the city gates!"

"You're not helping. Princess!" Dayme shouted abruptly, using her title as an insult, as he did on the training field to make her work harder.

But Daphne was having none of it this time. "How can I help?" she answered sharply. She waved the dagger under her trainer's nose. "Chenaya's in one of her moody snits, and that's understandable, if you ask me. Just leave her alone. She'll pull herself together."

Rashan folded his hands into his voluminous sleeves and gazed toward the ground. "Could it be a spelt?" he wondered aloud. "Or some curse? We don't know where she's been the past seven months, or what she's been up to."

"Knowing Chenaya," Daphne offered as she turned away, "only trouble."

"Don't you have a home of your own now?" Dayme said irritably. She gave him the kind of smile an adult loves to give a nasty neighbor child just before knocking it back on its side of the fence. He knew well enough she now owned the southernmost estate next to Land's End. It had been part of her divorce settlement from Kadakithis, that and half his treasury.

"It's full of your gladiators, remember, teacher?" She gave him a pouty look. "You couldn't let good men sleep in those drafty, leaky barracks you made them build, forever. They're gladiators, not carpenters. They'd have turned on you at the first sign of spring rain." She tilted her head playfully and winked at him. "I probably saved your life." "It could be a curse," Rashan mumbled to himself. The peristyle's doors opened, and a tall, blond man, clad in a brief red kilt and a gladiator's broad leather belt stepped across the threshold. He stopped there and called out to Dayrne, beckoning as he nodded greetings to Daphne and Rashan.

Dayrne walked over to him. "What is it, Leyn?" he said quietly.

Leyn kept his voice low. "Molin Torchholder is here," he said with a look of warning. "He heard Chenaya was back. You know what he wants."

Dayme nodded, frowning. Someday he'd drive a sword through that old schemer's gut, even if Molin was Chenaya's uncle. The human weasels of the world just weren't to be tolerated by honorable men, and there were far too many such in Sanctuary. He knew what Torchholder wanted, all right.

"You kept him in the courtyard?" Dayme asked.

Leyn pursed his lips and nodded.

"I'll take care of him," Dayme answered, ushering Leyn out and following him. He paused long enough to close the doors. He'd explain to Daphne and Rashan later. "I'm beginning to get irritated with Lord Molin," he added as he and Leyn walked side by side.

"He is a bit of a pimple in the crotch," Leyn agreed.

Dayrne went out into the courtyard and paused long enough to glance at the steel-colored sky. On such a gray day bad news just had to come calling. And there had been too many gray days, lately.

Molin had come with an escort of three garrison guards. Two stood just behind Molin, while the third remained beyond the gate with their horses. Dismas, Gestus, Ouijen, and Dendur stood on the opposite side of the courtyard and scowled unpleasantly at them. Leyn went to join his four friends and added his scowl to theire.

Dayme went straight up to Molin Torchholder without giving so much as a glance of acknowledgment to the two nervous guards. "This is not a good time, Molin," he said sternly.

Motin Torchholder was unruffled by the use of his first name without the use of his title. "I've come to talk with my niece about Lowan's estate," he said evenly, taking care to maintain his dignity in the face of Dayme's deliberate affront.

Dayme glared into the other man's face, then down at his sternum just under the breastbone, imagining he could see the spot right through Molin's robes. Yes, there he would put his blade cleanly- It would make a soft, squishing sound, steel and flesh, and Molin would give a little moan as he rolled his eyes. Someday.

"She's resting," Dayme finally answered. At least, he hoped she was resting. Chenaya was almost hysterical about not falling asleep. No sleeping, no talking. What was happening to her?

Molin Torchholder regarded Dayrne stimy and lifted the point of his nose a bit higher in the air. "I've come twice now," he reminded Dayme. "We've got to get this business settled."

Dayrne almost reached for his sword then and there. Instead, he clenched his fist. "You pompous bureaucrat!" he hissed, making the effort to keep his voice under control. "Lowan Vigeles wasn't dead a day before you showed up to claim his estate."

A low chuckle came from behind Dayme. "Daphne threw him out on his ass," Ouijen remembered aloud as he idly twisted the long braided lock of dark hair that draped over his shoulder.

Dayrne ignored the interruption. "Now, Chenaya's not back a day, and here you are to press your claim again. What's the matter, Molin? Doesn't Kitty-Kat want you at the palace anymore?"

The insults were beginning to take effect on Molin Torchholder. His cheeks had reddened at Ouijen's remark, and now a second time, Dayrne had addressed him personally, and in such a mocking tone. His eyes burned with suppressed anger. "It is not a claim," he stated starkly. "It is a fact. Land's End is mine. Under Rankan law, daughters do not inherit their fathers' holdings. Lowan was my brother ..."

"Half-brother," corrected Daphne, coming out the door and joining the gladiators behind Dayme. She smiled at Molin and blew him a kiss, all the while tapping the dagger on her palm as she had done in the peristyle.

Molin deigned to acknowledge her. "Princess," he said with a nod. "Nevertheless, I am Lowan's closest surviving male relative. The fact is indisputable, and the law is the law."

Daphne, Dismas, Gestus, Leyn, Ouijen, and Dendur all crept forward until they stood in a semicircle on either side of Dayme. They were all tapping daggers on their palms now, and they were all grinning unpleasant little grins, winking at one another, and giving tiny provocative nods and suggestive tilts of the head to the garrison guards, who began casting nervous glances toward the open gate at their backs.

"When the Lady Chenaya is ready to discuss it," Dayme said, emphasizing her title this time, "I'm sure she'll send for you." He glanced meaningfully at his companions and back at Molin. "Meanwhile, occupation is nine-tenths of the law."

"And armed occupation is the other tenth," Daphne added, wearing her favorite smile again, the adult one.

Molin Torchholder knew the better pan of valor. "Very well," he said finally. "Give my niece my regards, and tell her I'll call on her again in three days' time in the hopes that she'll be feeling better. Meanwhile," he added, putting on a smile very much like Daphne's, "try not to damage or scratch anything." He spun about and motioned his escort out the gate.

The gladiators closed ranks around Dayme. "He's going to be trouble," Leyn said, watching the three departing men mount horses just beyond the gate.

"I could speak to Kadakithis," Daphne offered. Dayrne's mouth drew into a tight line. "No," he said finally. "Technically, Molin's right, and we can't hold him off forever. Sooner or later, Chenaya's going to have to deal with him. Where is she?"

Gestus answered in his fractured Rankene. "Sees Lady sunrise down by hers temple giving worship." He glanced up at the sky and shrugged his shoulders. "Precious no sun to worship lately."

Ouijen had more recent knowledge. "I saw her just a while ago in the aviary. She was feeding Reyk. I tell you, though, she looked like hell. I don't think she's slept or eaten for days."

"I'd better have a talk with her," Dayrne said. "Somebody close the gate." He let out a heavy breath and looked around suddenly. "And what are you all doing here? Who's running the training drills this morning? This is a school, remember?"

He left them then, and went to look for Chenaya. He would check the aviary out back in case she was still there with her pet falcon, but first, since it was closer, he'd check her room. In the main hall he started up the great staircase. Then, remembering Rashan, he happened to glance down the hallway to the peristyle and glimpsed his mistress just going through the doors. Dayrne turned and hurried after her.

A strange scene greeted him as he entered. Chenaya shot a look his way and swiftly closed her hand around something she'd been showing Rashan. The priest's face was white as a virgin's wedding sheets. He stared fearfully at Dayrne, as if he'd been caught in a criminal act.

Obviously, Dayrne had interrupted something, Chenaya walked a few paces away from the priest and tried to act nonchalant while she slipped something into a small bag that hung on a thong about her neck. Rashan licked his lips, his eyes darting every which way. Dayrne thought he looked like a mouse suddenly come face-to-face with a very big cat.

Dayrne was in no mood for games. "What is it, Cheyne?" he insisted. "What have you got there?"

Chenaya gave him a stubborn look and dropped the purse down the front of her tunic. Rashan wrung his hands. "I've got something to do," he said suddenly, and he headed toward the door.

Dayrne caught the priest's wrist as he tried to go past. "Oh, no you don't!" He gently but firmly pushed Rashan back. Then he turned again to Chenaya. "You've never kept anything from me, Cheyne, not since we were kids. Don't start now."

Chenaya bit her lip, her face mirroring some inner struggle. She clutched at the bag under her tunic, but her hand hesitated there, and she said nothing.

"Let me help, damn it!" Dayrne shouted suddenly. His frustration and worry built past the point of control. He wanted to reach out and rip the purse from her neck, or grab Chenaya and shake her, or, gods help him, just wrap his arms around her and hold her close until she broke down and told him everything. That last, he knew, would never happen.

Chenaya gave him a doubtful look. Dark circles ringed her puffy eyes, and her cheeks were gaunt. Dayrne realized then that she had not even taken off the armor she had worn last night. Even her garments were the same.

He met her gaze, and this time his eyes did the pleading.

It was enough. Slowly, Chenaya pulled out the purse again and poured the huge diamond into her open palm for him to see. It drew the weak light in the room like a sponge and gave off fantastic flashes of fire in exchange. Dayrne caught his breath.

"It's called the Fire in God's Eye," Rashan said in a worried voice as he came to join them. He lifted his own hand over the stone, as if warming his fingers before a fire. Tiny dazzling points of light reflected on his skin. "There's another jewel just like it," he continued in a bare whisper. "A twin. Sometimes, they're called the Savankala's Eyes, because they're mounted in the holy sunburst in the great Temple in Ranke."

Dayrne had heard of the stones, of course. He looked incredulously at Chenaya. "You stole it?"

She nodded slowly.

"Just the one," he pressed, "or both of them?"

She tapped the diamond with a finger, indicating just the one jewel.

"And this has something to do with why you can't or won't speak?" he asked again, and again she nodded.

Dayme began to pace. He was doing a lot of that lately, it seemed. He knew of the stones, but he'd never seen them. Until recently, he'd never been much of a god worshipper, and he'd never been in the Great Temple at Ranke. He turned to Rashan as Chenaya put the diamond back into its purse once again. A sudden suspicion flared up within him. "What do you know about this?" he said to the priest. "You're Savankala's high holy-holy in this city. Is this why she left Sanctuary? Did you send her to steal this?"

Rashan wrung his hands, and he gave Dayme a look of pained offense. "No! No!" he protested. "I wouldn't have dared! She didn't say a word to me before she left town!"

Dayrne caught the priest by the sleeve. "Then why was she showing it to you?"

Angrily, Chenaya knocked Dayrne's hand away from Rashan, and she stepped between them. Then her expression softened, and she eased the priest back toward a marble bench and motioned for him to sit.

Rashan folded his hands in his lap to keep them still. "Each jewel is invested with a portion of Savankala's power," the priest went on in a rush. "They were the god's own gift to the Rankan nation, given generations ago when the Empire was young, as His personal sign of divine favor."

"They're magic?" Dayrne grumbled. He turned to Chenaya again. "Then you are cursed?"

She shook her head violently.

"Maybe this will help." Daphne sauntered into the room, bearing a flat, brown box, which, when its hinged lid was opened, exposed a smooth sheet of soft, wax tallow, and a delicate bone stylus. She offered these to Chenaya, along with a smile of welcome. The two women exchanged embraces and stood apart again. "Just because she can't talk doesn't mean you can't still get some answers." She continued lightly. "Personally, I think I prefer her this way."

Chenaya ignored Daphne, took the wax tablet, and began to write in the soft substance with the point of the stylus. A moment later, she showed the box to Rashan. It was not writing at all, but a drawing of a sunburst.

Daphne raised an eyebrow. "She's no Lalo," she commented.

The priest peered closely at the wax. "The holy sunburst in Ranke," he said, squinting.

Chenaya shook her head and drew the symbol for Sanctuary beneath the sunburst. Then she pulled the purse from around her neck. Without removing the diamond, she thrust it down in the center of her drawing.

Rashan's face turned a new shade of pale. "Mount it in our sunburst?" he exclaimed with sudden comprehension. "This is stolen! God would strike me dead and destroy the temple!"

Chenaya shook her head emphatically and scrawled on the tablet. His permission.

The priest's expression underwent a slow transformation. His eyes filled with a queer light, and he rose to his feet. "You've accepted it, then. You've spoken with Him again." He reached out and grasped Chenaya by the shoulders. "You are truly the Daughter of the Sun!"

Dayrne watched as Chenaya's face crinkled with irritation and she brushed the priest's hands away. It was an old argument between Rashan and Cheyne. It was no secret that Chenaya was favored by the Bright Father, but the priest had been possessed of a strange fanaticism for some time now that she was, in fact, the sun-god's true daughter. Rashan had even tried to convince Dayrne, and with the help of an even stranger painting, which hung in Chenaya's rooms, he'd almost succeeded.

Chenaya rubbed the heel of her palm over the wax surface, wiping away the old markings, smoothing it again for more writing. With hasty precision, she carved two smaller sunbursts side by side. Under one, she put the symbol for Sanctuary. Under the other, the symbol for Ranke. Then she wrote, Savankala's will.

Rashan's face transformed. His look of worry turned to determination and excitement. "One in Ranke, and one in Sanctuary," he cried. "Then we must do it immediately." He spun toward Dayrne, gesticulating, his hands aflutter. "This explains the sky of late," he said, "Savankala has risked much to send us this prize. This jewel has traveled without the proper consecrations. Until it is safely mounted in His temple, He is half blind." He touched Daphne's arm as if the two of them were close friends, something the princess would have adamantly denied. "It's just as I've suspected recently. One by one, the gods are turning away from Ranke."

"But why can't she speak?" Dayme said insistently. "What's this jewel to do with that?"

Chenaya bit her lip, and the stylus remained still above the wax tablet, though her gaze nickered over all their faces, imploring.

Finally, Daphne tilted her head and shrugged. "A girl's just got to have her secrets." She went to Chenaya and took her by the arm. "At least, let me clean you up and get some food down you while Rashan makes his preparations," she suggested with her usual sarcastic lilt. "I know priests and priestly ways. Something this important will take at least a week."

Chenaya looked genuinely frightened. Frantically, she scrawled across the tablet. Tomorrow. It was the only symbol she made, and she drew it again for emphasis- Tomorrow.

A platter of cold roast pork, the two turnips, and bits of cheese and bread had lifted Chenaya's spirits considerably. The mug of milk laced lightly with amber-colored vuksebah, a very expensive liquor, had done even more. She couldn't quite remember when she had eaten last. Sometime in Ranke before she'd stolen the jewel, she assumed. Once that was in her possession, she'd ridden hard for Sanctuary, killing one horse on the way, avoiding all towns, stopping at one noble's isolated estate long enough to sign her desire to buy another mount, There'd been no time for eating, and little to drink,

A serving woman, under Daphne's orders, had brought the food to Chenaya's rooms, and that had surprised Chenaya. Except for Aunt Rosanda, Daphne, and herself, there had never been any women at Land's End. Daphne, apparently, had taken it on herself to change that.

There were just over a hundred men on the estate now. Someone had to launder their clothes and do the cooking and marketing.

Daphne had mentioned hastily that, in Chenaya's absence, she had shared some adventure with the poor women who sold their bodies in the Promise of Heaven for coins to feed their children and to keep some kind of hovel's roof over their heads. With her own money, which was quite plentiful thanks to her settlement with the prince, Daphne had hired some of those women, taken them out of the park, and given them decent jobs as household staff.

Chenaya wasn't about to object. Two of those women had just bathed her and dried her with soft towels and combed out her tangled hair. She felt better than she had in days as she dressed in a clean white chiton, fastened her broad leather belt about her waist, and laced on a pair of sandals. That done, she fastened her short sword to the belt, and hung the small bag containing the diamond around her neck once more.

Fed and dressed, she started to leave her rooms. Near the door, though, hung the painting of her, which Lalo the Limner had executed. She stopped before it, feeling the arcane heat that radiated from it, staring at an idealized image of her face with shining blond hair that swept outward and upward and became flame. It had been this portrait and what it portended that had driven her, half mad, from Sanctuary, that, and the very unpleasant ending to her business with Zip and the PFLS.

Only, it hadn't been an ending. She had fallen in love with Zip while setting her trap for the piffles, and instead of killing him when she should have, she'd saved him for prison, instead, and turned him over to Walegrin. Devious were the minds of Sanctuary's politicians, however, and somehow, with her gone, Zip had been released and made one of the city's military commanders, along with Walegrin and Critias. No doubt, she had Uncle Molin to thank for that. And Kadakithis, once her favorite cousin, could not be held unaccountable, either.

They all had played their part in Lowan Vigeles's death. Ro-Karthis was not the only one who had cut her father's throat. Zip, Walegrin, Uncle Molin, Kadakithis. Not one of them was innocent.

She brushed her fingertips gingerly over the portrait. The paint and canvas were warm, almost too hot to touch. It had frightened her that night, watching Lalo, at her insistence, paint it. It had terrified her. His particular magic had revealed the truth she had been unwilling to accept, that she was bound body and spirit to the sun-god. In her fear, she had fled like an unreasoning child.

Seven months had changed that. She clutched the jewel called the Fire in God's Eye, without taking it from its bag. There were more changes yet to come, changes for her and changes for Sanctuary. But first, she had to survive another night, and she feared, for she could feel herself weakening. More than anything, she wanted to sleep.

But she had to check on Rashan and his progress at the temple. When the diamond was safe in a consecrated mounting, then she could rest, then she could moum her father and Aunt Rosanda properly, then she could contemplate a new direction for her life.

She left her rooms and passed through the upper hallways, refusing to let herself even glance toward the door to her father's rooms, putting his death out of her mind for now. She went downstairs, nodding curtly to a pair of unfamiliar women who smiled at her from their work in the kitchen, and stepped out into the rear grounds near the aviary. There were a dozen cages there, each home to a fine raptor, and a large cabinet built on a post, which contained bells, jesses, and proper gloves for handling such birds.

Chenaya took a thick leather glove and a jess from the cabinet and went to Reyk's cage. The falcon fluttered its magnificent wings in greeting as it climbed onto her arm, and she slipped the less onto its right leg. Reyk was excited to see her and he flexed his talons in the glove's quilted leather. They'd been apart too long, she and this bird.

From the aviary she could see the training fields. Scores of men were hard at work on the great wooden machines and in the sand pits. Beyond were the old, hastily built barracks, no longer in use. Beyond that rose the private wall that encircled Land's End. Opposite the training field, against the southern wall, were the stables. She headed there at a brisk walk.

A large man, unfamiliar to her, bowed when she approached. "Lady Chenaya," he said in a gruff but courteous voice. "You honor us." She nodded and gave him a brief smile, the only response she could make. He had the look of an experienced stablemaster, and she assumed Dayrne had found him somewhere. Indeed, the stables were as clean as any part of Land's End. Fresh straw had been laid, and the horses stood contentedly in their stalls.

With the stablemaster in tow, she went to the stall where her big gray stood. He had been well groomed this morning, and his mane had been freshly clipped close to his neck. He had carried her well the past few days. Chenaya led him from the stall by his halter and informed the stable master through hand signals that she wanted him saddled. He fastened a lead to the halter and led the gray toward the tack room.

Chenaya wandered toward the far end of the stables, where those horses were kept that were either too young or not properly broken for riding. There she found the colt that she had such hopes for, the product of a god-blessed union between Lowan's snow-white mare and Tempus's full-blooded Tros horse. She gazed at the young animal with pleased wonderment. Its coat was a golden color she had never seen before, its mane and tail flaxen. It had the Tros fire in its eyes.

"He grows rapidly, mistress. I've never seen one like him."

Reyk's wings beat the air, and he gave off a shrill cry of menace. Chenaya had not heard the stablemaster come up behind her. The man stepped quickly back, eyes widening, bringing a hand up to ward off an attack. Chenaya grinned to herself. He knew a lot about horses, that much was plain, but he had a lot to learn about birds and how to approach them. She gazed toward the stable entrance. The gray stood saddled and ready for her.

There would be time later, she hoped, to play with the colt, but there was business to attend to now. She calmed Reyk by stroking the crown of his head with delicate touches. Perhaps she should have hooded him this morning, but she never hooded him. He was just excited to see her.

The stablemaster hurried along ahead of her and set down a step stool so she could mount the gray with Reyk on her arm. When she was settled in the saddle, she leaned down far enough to touch the stablemaster's shoulder. It was the only thanks she could offer. Then she turned the horse from the stable and waited while he opened the southern gate for her and closed it after.

Chenaya looked at Reyk and stroked his head again. Ready for some exercise, pet? she thought silently. She made an upward motion with her arm, letting go of the jess at the same time, and Reyk soared upward. She watched him as he circled higher and higher in the slate-gray sky. Then she started off, knowing he would follow.

She rode toward Sanctuary's great wall and followed it south to the Gate of Gold, retracing the path she had made last night. The falcon beat her to the gate and perched atop it until she caught up. Then, calling to her, he took to the sky again. Two sentries at the duty post watched as she trotted through. They made no effort this time to delay her.

The Wideway was full of carts and people coming and going about their morning business. Some glanced up with smiles and watched her go by. Others pointedly ignored her. She didn't care. She drew a deep breath of the lively salt air. Far out on the sea, the white sails of the fishing fleet and the Beysib treasure ships knifed through the ashen clouds.

Safe Haven Street was also crowded, and that surprised her. Sanctuary seemed to have gained populace in her absence. The roadways teemed in marked contrast to their dead-of-night emptiness. She was forced to slow her mount to a walk as she turned up the Avenue of Temples.

Suddenly, her head swam. She clutched at the homless rim of her saddle and wrapped her legs around the horse's barrel chest to keep from falling. A queer darkness surrounded her, filled her, though she was sure her eyes were open. Out of that blackness, tumbling end over end, came the same shrouded corpse she had thought was a dream the night before.

Straight for her it flew, and the cloth parted from its horrible face. Its eyeless gaze met hers.

The blackness and the vision exploded in a shower of red sparks, and pain shot through Chenaya's body. She opened her eyes slowly and found herself on the ground. She had fallen off the horse after all. A throng of people quickly gathered around as she tried to draw a decent breath.

An old woman, whose brightly dyed red hair sprouted in all directions about her head, set aside her marketing basket and bent down beside Chenaya. Her wrinkled old face was twisted with narrow-eyed concern.

"Are you all right, honey?" she kept repeating, taking Chenaya's hand in her own.

Chenaya's eyes snapped wide suddenly at the old woman's touch, and her gaze swept the sky, spotting Reyk already in his killing dive. "Get back!" she shouted, pushing the woman away. Barely in time she got the thick leather glove up and gave a sharp whistle. Reyk's weight hit her wrist like a rock, but she caught his jess and held him securely.

She looked at the old woman then, sprawled beside her. "Sorry," she said with a sigh of relief. "He thought you were attacking me."

The old woman put on a dazed smile. "S'all right," she muttered, staring at Reyk as others in the crowd helped her up. "S'all right. You folks at Land's End been right good to some of us," she said to Chenaya. "I knowed who you were when I saw you fall ..."

Suddenly, Chenaya clapped a hand to her mouth. She'd spoken! She hadn't meant to, but the deed was done. She glanced fearfully up at the sky. Its gray color was already darkening. One hand felt for the diamond in its purse under her clothing. It pulsed against her skin with a steady, inaudible thrumming that unnerved her.

She grabbed the old woman by the shoulder with her free hand. "Get to your homes," she said urgently to everyone. "Shutter your windows, and don't look at the sky! Believe me! Go!"

The crowd stared uncertainly for a moment, no doubt wondering if she hadn't fallen on her head. Reyk beat his wings as if to drive them away, but still they hesitated. Then, as if sensing her urgency, the old woman made a quick curtsy and hurried away. It was enough to break whatever spell held the crowd. They looked at the sky, at Chenaya, then hugged their baskets to their bodies and hurried away.

Chenaya whirled around and found herself staring at the cornerstone of the Rankan Temple. Here, almost on this same spot, she had found her dagger point down in the earth the night before, and here, she had had her first vision of that deathly hurtling specter. Now she had had the second.

"Up, Reyk!" she cried, releasing the falcon. Her horse stood still, waiting, as it had been trained to do. She left him there and ran inside the temple. Rashan and a dozen other priests were hard at work, lowering the sunburst on the great chains that held it suspended above Savankala's altar.

"Rashan!" she called. There was no point in keeping silent any longer. The damage had been done. She could feel the diamond's pulse against her chest. Rashan saw her and came running as fast as his old legs would allow. The others stopped their work to see what transpired.

"Your voice ... ," he started, but Chenaya waved an impatient hand to shut him up.

"The diamond is in danger," she told the priest hurriedly- "We all are!" She licked her dry lips and swallowed, getting control of herself. "First, though, tell me. Is there something buried under the cornerstone of this temple? Don't lie, and be quick!"

It was Rashan's turn to swallow. "Every Great Temple is consecrated with a sacrifice," he told her. "A human sacrifice?"

He nodded again. "It was done on the night of the Ten-Slaying in honor ofVashanka some years ago. He requires such sacrifices."

Chenaya cut him off". "Vashanka is lost," she snapped. "Remove his image from this place. But right now, put half your priests to work digging that thing up. Dispose of it. Whatever it is, it is repugnant to Savankala. It pollutes his temple."

Rashan looked indignant. "How can you know these things'" She caught him by the front of his robes and glared. "I am the Daughter of the Sun, old man'" she said, setting him down roughly. "You and the Bright Father both wanted a high priestess. You've preached my heritage all over town, don't deny if I don't any longer. In the desert far from here, Savankala came to me, and I acquiesced." She pulled the purse from under her clothes and squeezed it in a fist. The thrumming was stronger now, more desperate. "That's why I have the Fire in God's Eye. He asked me to steal it and bring it here!"

"But it's a public street!" Rashan cried, protesting. "If we try to dig it up, Walegrin's men will surely stop us!"

Chenaya grabbed his sleeve and drew him outside. "Look up!" she shouted in his ear.

The sky had taken on the color of a deep bruise. Clouds of purple and yellow rolled in from the north. Only the palest hint of the sun showed through the infrequent gaps. A wind swept down the streets, blowing thick dust and refuse. Sanctuary's citizens went running in the gale as their garments whipped about them.

Rays of rainbow radiance began to leak from the purse about Chenaya's neck, giving her face an eerie, up-shadowed appearance. "This is my fault!" she shouted over the rising wind. "While I kept silent the high priests ofRanke could not find the jewel." She clutched at the small bag again. The light from it was bright enough now to show the bones of her fingers through the skin. 'T didn't even sleep for fear of crying out in my dreams. But I broke my vow to save that old woman's life. The priests of Ranke still wield considerable magic. They know where I am now. The sound of my voice alerted them, as God, Himself, warned me it would, and they want the diamond back!"

"But Savankala wants it here!" Rashan answered, his voice rising 'n pitch, like the wind. He wrung his hands. "What-can I do?"

She grabbed the front of his robes again and pulled him close. The wind was screaming now, as if it were trying to drown her voice and stop her words. "Dig that thing up!" she ordered. "The Bright Father rejects it. The Fire in God's Eye can't dwell in the same house where it's buried. Purify this place. Use every priest you have. And prepare the mounting as swiftly as you can!"

"How much time?" Rashan wailed.

Chenaya gazed at the festering sky. "Very little," she answered with a cold shiver. "Do what I tell you," she charged. "The diamond must stay with me until you're ready. I'll send Dayrne and some men to help with the digging. He'll act as a messenger, also. Send him to me at the private temple by the Red Foal River as soon as you're done!"

Rashan ran back inside to organize his priests, and Chenaya ran to her horse. There was no sign of Reyk. The dust stung her eyes as she leaped astride her mount and raced away. The streets were almost empty, but still she nearly rode down an unwary pedestrian. He cursed, and she cursed, and then she raced on.

People were huddled in doorways, in nooks and alleys, under carts, behind barrels and crates, all cowering down, faces half covered with shawls or cloaks or collars. On the docks, ships and timbers groaned and creaked. Sails snapped like angry whips, and riggings hummed wildly. Rising whitecaps danced on the surface of the sea.

Chenaya sped through the Gate of Gold, at last catching sight of Reyk as the falcon followed overhead. In no time she was at the southern gate of Land's End. She pounded furiously on it with her fists. "Let me in!" she shouted. "Let me in!"

The stablemaster opened the gate for her. She raced past him without explanation and rode for the training fields. There she found Dayrne running his gladiators through drills even in the face of a budding storm. He brightened when he saw her, but she had no time for friendship.

"Take as many men as can leave right now!" she told him loudly enough for everyone to hear. His jaw dropped when he heard her speak. Then he snapped it shut. He knew her well, and he knew by her face alone when she was deadly serious. "Take shovels and do what Rashan tells you." She started to turn away, then paused long enough to add, "Some of you may have to hold off Walegrin and his men. Don't let him interfere."

She sped away, taking the memory of Dayme's sudden grin as she crossed the field and pulled up before the armory. She dismounted. The door was unlocked. Rushing past the racks of wooden training weapons, she drew down four good swords with sheaths, whose weight and balance suited her. With the one she wore at her belt, that made five. She prayed they would be enough.

Carrying the swords under one arm, she mounted clumsily again. Reyk sprang from the armory's roof edge and screamed shrilly to let her know he was still with her. She rode off, weaving among the banks of huge training machines, casting a glance toward the stables, pleased to see Dayrne's force already assembling there.

At the east wall of Land's End was another double-doored gate with a wooden bar. Without dismounting, she wrestled with it, nearly dropping her armload of weapons, but managing. She sped through, leaving the doors to bang in the wind.

The waters of the Red Foal lashed the shoreline furiously. She paid little attention, but rode straight for her private temple to Savankala. It stood, white and beautiful and open-roofed, a circular arrangement of eight slender columns, just above the shore. She jumped off the horse, clutching her swords.

The sky churned above her, as if she were the center of a great disturbance. It was not her, though. It was the diamond. Forces were marshaling, forces that would steal the diamond back or destroy it. The priests of Ranke had not suffered the magic-stealing destruction of the Nisibisi Globes of Power, which had robbed Sanctuary of so much arcane vitality. Their magic was still quite formidable. Already, in the strangely colored clouds, she could feel things probing, searching, taking shape.

Here, at her own temple, she stood the best chance of facing whatever shape their magic took. Also, out here beyond the city wall, there was far less threat to the townspeople. Chenaya ran up the three steps, across the round marble floor, to the small altar. Twin braziers stood at either end, kept always burning, tended each day by Rashan. She laid her swords down upon the altar and added to them the one she wore. She cast away their sheaths, exposing the bright blades.

Chenaya lifted each blade and prayed over it, then shoved it deep into the coals of a brazier. There was a small chest near one end of the altar where Rashan kept the fragrant incense, kasabahr, favored by the sungod. She scooped two bountiful handfuls and cast them on the coals. Smoke and sweet scent rose swirling up, and she prayed again, consecrating the blades in the heat and fumes, and with her prayers.

The air screamed suddenly. Out of the vortex of clouds, a pair of demons came shrieking down, the vanguard of an army taking form in the demented sky above the temple. The demons' eyes burned redly, and they reached for her as they dived, slavering, fanged mouths yawning.

Chenaya gave a scream of her own, snatched one of the swords from the coals. The blade shone, endowed with a white heat the braziers alone could never have achieved. It trailed smoke and light as she swung at the first demon. A red flash erupted, the demon wailed in pain, darting aside, and the blade's light dimmed a little.

The second demon flew at her. Again she swung, Striking at the neck as she sidestepped, and again there came a red flash as sword touched demon flesh. Twice more she chopped. Each time the flash nearly blinded her, and the sword dimmed a bit more. The demon emitted a piercing cry of pain. It seemed no more to the eye than a creature of gas and cloud, but Chenaya felt the impact of her blows. It clutched its vaporous body suddenly, and with taloned fingers, as if to end its agony, it ripped itself apart and discorporated.

Chenaya had no time to cheer her victory. A rain of demons fell upon her then. She swung her blade in a dazzling arc, driving them back, striking a clawed hand, severing it in a red flash. It dissolved into nothingness before it hit the ground, and the demon wailed. Others pressed her, and her sword dimmed, each blow having less and less effect.

Abruptly, the glow wavered and faded from her blade altogether, and it was just a sword again, its metal scorched and blackened. Before she could react, a demon sprang at her. One hand tangled in her hair, and she screamed with pain, while its other hand ripped open her chiton and closed on the purse and the diamond within. Chenaya tried to push it off, and though her fists beat on nothing tangible, still it struggled and clung on, grappling with the leather thong about her neck.

Then a sword swung down, passing harmlessly through the creature's skull. Chenaya twisted enough to see Daphne, crouched on the altar and swinging ferociously, but ineffectively, at the hideous shapes that swam around her.

"The consecrated swords!" she cried to Daphne. "Use those!"

Daphne understood at once. She drew a blade and swung it in one practiced motion, and a burst of scarlet erupted over her head as a demon died. The red glow reflected spectacularly on the silver links of the manica she wore on her sword arm. "Nice!" the princess muttered. With a weird smile she chopped at the demon wrestling Chenaya, slaying it.

Chenaya spun toward a brazier, grabbing a pair of swords. She whirled them twice, sectioning a creature as it reached for her. Cold hands raked suddenly at her back, and she cried with pain and despair as the severed thongs gave way, and the purse fell to the floor. The diamond spilled out, glowing like a compressed beam of sunlight.

A demon dived for the jewel, but a golden brown streak beat him to it. Reyk climbed again, clutching the Fire in God's Eye in his razor talons. immediately, the demons forgot Chenaya and Daphne and swept up into the sky after the falcon.

Daphne wiped the sweat from her brow. Blood flowed from a trio of lined cuts on her unarmored left arm. She glanced down from the altar where she stood. "You'd better have a damn good explanation, mistress," she said with her usual mocking lilt on the final word.

Chenaya ran out between a pair of columns to follow Reyk's darting flight. The demons were too close, too swift, and too many for Reyk to avoid very long. She gave a sharp whistle. The raptor folded his wings tightly and plummeted earthward, momentarily leaving the demons behind. Chenaya held out her gloved arm, and Reyk landed, dropping the jewel. Immediately, she sent him up again, set down one of her blades, and grabbed the diamond from the floor.

"I wish you hadn't done that," Daphne muttered, glancing at the charging demons and, briefly, at her sword. Its light was almost gone. Still, she struck fearlessly at the first to come near enough.

Then Dayrne was there, too. Picking up the sword Chenaya had set down, he lashed out, cleaving a demon in midair. "Rashan's ready!" He shouted, shielding his eyes against the unexpected flash. "Go!"

Chenaya threw down her blade and grabbed another from the brazier. Daphne did the same, taking the last of the consecrated weapons. "We all go!" Chenaya called back.

"I don't have a horse!" Daphne cried. "Go on!"

Chenaya ran toward her own mount, clutching sword and jewel. "Ride with Dayrne!" she ordered, throwing herself into the saddle. "If I go down, one of you get this thing to Rashan!"

She rode as fast as the horse could carry her, swinging her sword wildly at the pursuing demons. The air shimmered with flashes of red as creatures swarmed around her and tried to drag her off, caught her reins and tried to tear them from her hands or gnaw them in two, as they ripped at her hair and clothes. She felt blood trickle down her back. Though they were physically weak, their claws were sharp.

The guards at the Gate of Gold saw her coming and flung themselves into the ditches on either side of the road. She risked a glance over her shoulder as they scrambled up, shouting curses. Dayme and Daphne were right behind her. The demons had no interest in them at all. It was the jewel they were after.

She raced up Safe Haven Street and onto the Avenue of Temples. The way was suddenly blocked by gladiators and priests all clustered at the comer of the Rankan Temple. At her cries they turned, dropping shovels and tools, and scattered out of the way. A wide, black pit yawned before her. Even as her eyes widened in surprise, she felt the horse's muscles bunch. She hugged the animal with her knees as it leaped the pit and crashed to the other side, its great hooves hurling dirt.

All the way up the steps of the temple, she fought demons, until the fire faded from her consecrated blade. She threw it down, screaming with frustration, and clutched the diamond to her breasts as the demons swarmed around her. But Dayrne and Daphne were swiftly at her side, their blades still bright and glowing. "Get inside!" Dayme shouted, pushing her toward the temple entrance. "Rashan's waiting! We'll try to hold these things here!"

Chenaya ran inside. A pair of young acolyte priests heaved the great doors closed behind her. It did no good. The demons followed, passing right through the heavy wood, like ghosts.

"Here!" Rashan called from the altar at the front of the temple. Savankala's sunburst had been lowered on its golden chains until its points touched the floor. Rashan stood before it, waving frantically to her. A half-dozen priests waited on each chain to hoist it aloft again.

"Hurry!" Rashan urged as she reached his side. Demons flew down the aisles toward them. "Place it right in the center," he instructed, pointing to a position on the sunburst.

"Where?" she cried in confusion, staring. Only a couple of grooves and notches had been carved into the metal, far too wide to hold the Fire in God's Eye. "There's no mounting!"

Rashan snatched the diamond from her and held it to the sunburst. Then he took something from his robe pocket, slammed it over the diamond, gave it a twist, and stood back.

Within a strange bubble of translucent blue, the Fire in God's Eye began to shine with a greater light, igniting the sunburst, itself. As it had last night when she first brought the diamond, the sunburst exploded with a pure white luminescence that filled the temple. The priests cried out, shielding their eyes, falling to the floor to hide their faces. The demons, too, shrieked with despair. As the light touched them, they broke apart like brittle things, and the nieces wafted away into nothingness.

When the last demon was gone, the light from the sunburst ebbed. All that remained was a soft golden glow that issued from the sunburst's heart.

Chenaya rose to her feet and helped Rashan to his. "What was that bubble?" she asked breathlessly. "That thing you put over the diamond?"

A rare small grin broke over Rashan's face. "Beysib glass," he answered. "It's something new they've started making while you've been gone. There wasn't time to sculpt a proper mounting into the metal, so I improvised."

Chenaya raised an eyebrow in amazement. "A bowl?" she said.

The old priest shrugged. "It worked, didn't it?" He turned and gazed at the sunburst. Tentatively, he reached out and touched it with his fingertips. It was more than a symbolic image now. It was holy. It contained a fragment of the sun-god's power. "The Rankan priests will try to seize it back," he murmured lowly so his fellow priests wouldn't overhear-

Chenaya shook her head. "No. Since I was successful, they know it is Savankala's will. They still have the twin stone. The Bright Father has not forsaken Ranke, but now his favor also falls on Sanctuary."

There was a heavy, frantic pounding on the temple doors, and shouts from the other side. At Rashan's nod, the acolytes nearest drew back the bar and tugged them open. The entrance immediately filled with gladiators ready to do battle. When they saw that the fight was already over, they lowered their weapons, looking almost disappointed.

Daphne sighed. "Well, since there's nothing more to do in here," she said to Chenaya, "you should come see what they dug up from under the cornerstone."

They all backed outside. On the ground near the pit lay the shroudcovered form from Chenaya's visions. She bent down and lifted the cloth slowly from its face. "Ugh!" was all she managed. She moved quickly away, scanned the sky, and whistled Reyk down. She wrapped his jess around her hand and gave him a soothing stroke.

"Looks a lot like Kadakithis the morning after our wedding night," Daphne said. She nudged Dayme in the ribs. "I was kind of hard on him his first time."

Dayrne's expression betrayed nothing. "I should hope it was the other way around," he answered.

Leyn gestured for some of the gladiators to carry the thing away. Then he turned to Chenaya and Rashan. "It wasn't a body at all," he explained. "Rather, pieces of many bodies all stitched clumsily together to make a simulacrum of a corpse." He rubbed the back of his head. "For the life of me, I can't figure why someone would go to that kind of trouble."

"To pollute the temple," Rashan answered, his eyes filling with a sudden understanding. "Vashanka demanded a human sacrifice to consecrate this place. It was to become one of the Great Temples of the Empire, but from the beginning things kept going wrong in the construction. Rooms collapsed, ceilings leaked, columns cracked, and it never quite seemed to get finished." He folded his arms into his sleeves and stared into the hole they had made in the road. "But this was not a proper sacrifice at all. There never was a consecration. Whoever put this thing here saw to that." He clapped his hands with new joy. "We must have a new consecration! A celebration!"

Chenaya caught Rashan's sleeve. "No sacrifices," she told him. "The barbarous Vashanka is forever lost. Savankala frowns on such practices. This will be a Great Temple now, but only if you heed Him."

Rashan looked at her for a moment, then made a deep bow. "I heed the word of Savankala," he said reverently, "and I heed his true daughter."

Chenaya looked at him piercingly. She turned to Dayme and touched his huge arm. Then she turned back to Rashan. "I lied to you about that," she said abruptly, "to convince you to follow my orders. In the desert, I made a pact with the sun-god. There is a bond between us, yes. One that you do not understand and that I will not explain. What transpired is very personal and very private." She looked at Dayme again, reached out for his hand, and interlocked her fingers with his. "In any case, He has a sincere desire to spread His worship here. Ranke has become moribund. It's an empire without a future. However, in exchange for my bringing the Fire in God's Eye to Sanctuary, the Bright Father has agreed to stay out of my life. My fate is my own again."

Dayme stared down at the hand he held, so small against his own, yet filled with strength. "What does that mean?" he asked, his confusion plain.

She smiled at him. "Don't worry. You and I will discuss it over the days and nights to come." She let go of him then, catching the gleam in Daphne's eyes. "But not now. Right now, I think we'd better refill this hole before Walegrin comes along."

"So you see," Chenaya said frankly, standing before a full court in the Hall of Justice, meeting the hostile gaze of Molin Torchholder who stood at the side of Prince Kadakithis's great chair as her cousin squinted over the document she had given him. 'I did not inherit Land's End. Knowing the Rankan law, my father left it to Dayrne. You know Lowan's writing. You have his seal."

Kadakithis looked utterly uninterested. He handed the document back to Molin and folded his hands in the lap of his expensive silk robe as he gazed down at Dayrne, who stood just behind Chenaya. "Then why didn't your man simply explain this to Molin when he came to visit?"

"Because it's a forgery!" Molin Torchholder muttered, casting the document to the floor. It slithered down the few steps of the dias from the throne to Chenaya's feet. "A clever forgery!"

Chenaya declined to pick the document up. She merely smiled patiently at her uncle. She liked to see him twitch. "Because he didn't know about it. Father told only me where he kept his will, and as you know, cousin"-she nodded to Kadakithis again-"I've been out of town."

Kadakithis waved a hand under his nose as if to shoo away a fly. "Well, it all looks legal to me-the signature, the seal, the whole business. It is a prime piece of real estate, Molin, and I don't blame you for trying. But I'm afraid it belongs to Dayrne now."

Dayrne stepped forward, the smug glee on his usually stern face almost enough to make Chenaya chuckle. But now wasn't the time for that. "No," Dayrne said gruffly. "It belongs to Cheyne. Rankan law says she can't inherit property, but it doesn't prevent her from owning property. I sold Land's End back to her this morning"-he looked straight at Molin -"for a single gold soldat." He pulled the gold coin from his waistband and held it up for all to see. A murmur of restrained amusement ran around the court while Molin fumed.

Dayme and Chenaya turned as one and marched from the Hall of Justice, across the courtyard, and out into Vashanka's Square where their friends and comrades were waiting. "Well?" Ouijen said eagerly. "What happened?"

A slow grin spread across Chenaya's face.

"You should have seen Molin," Dayrne whispered, drawing them all closer.

Daphne clapped her hands and laughed. "It worked!" she cried before Gestus shushed her.

Dismas sighed with melodramatic relief. "Thank the gods!" he said. "I practiced all night on that signature. I didn't think I'd ever get it right!" Chenaya's grin brightened into a smile as she reached up and rumpled Dismas's hair. "You?" she teased. "The best thief and forger ever sentenced to an arena anywhere?"

They walked across the square and out the Processional Gate. The clouds over Sanctuary had vanished. The sky was a wonderful blue, and the sun shone warm and golden. A fresh wind blew up from the sea. Chenaya stared that way, watching the tops of the masts of ships rocking to and fro along the wharves where she had sat two nights ago and thrown a painting into the water.

"You miss him, don't you?" Dayrne whispered in her ear.

She thought of her father, calling up all the good memories of times they had spent together. "I'll always miss him," she answered quietly.

"But not today!" Daphne snapped. "No morbid moods today." She pulled a fat purse from her belt and tossed it in the air, catching it again before Leyn could snatch it. "It's the Maze for us, my brothers, and a few drinks at the Unicorn. That's as good a place as any to spread the word and let this city know." She waited, looking at them and finally winking.

"Chenaya's back in town," she proclaimed. She turned then, tossing her raven hair over her shoulders, grabbing Leyn's arm, and pulling him along as she led the way.

"Somehow," Dayrne muttered with a weak half-smile, "I think it knows."