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sun? He grew spindly.”
    Spaeth stroked down the cat’s bristling back fur. “Be still, or you will start a hurricane.” All the world knew it was the lashing of Ridwit’s tail that stirred up the wind.
    “I
want
a hurricane,” Ridwit said maliciously. “It’s been a long time.”
    “Go north, then, and don’t trouble us. We have enough worries.”
    Ridwit’s keen eyes turned from the approaching figure to Spaeth. “They are our enemies, you know,” she growled low in her throat. “They want to keep me from my kingdom, to tie me in bonds. I hate them. If you bring this one to me, I’ll help you.”
    Spaeth frowned. “What do you want with him?”
    “To feed on his terror.”
    “I can’t do that. You know that.”
    The Inning was at the base of the steep dirt path that led to the Whispering Stones. Ridwit turned to hiss at him with primeval malevolence, then with a single movement stepped out of reality into myth. Where she had been, a dried bush of wild pea rattled in the wind.
    The young man climbing the grassy slope was tall, rawboned, and blond, with an awkward gait and spectacles that gave him a slightly baffled look. He had not yet spied Spaeth, so she crouched to slip away. But curiosity stopped her. She had never seen someone from beyond the isles. And so when he reached the crest of the hill she was perched on one of the granite boulders with her arms around her legs.
    He stopped to catch his breath, leaning on the oak walking-stick he carried. By now Spaeth had remembered what the islanders called him: Nathaway Talley, the Justice of the Peace who had come to teach Yorans about Inning law.
    “Hello,” he said breathlessly.
    “Hello,” Spaeth answered.
    After a tortured pause he said, “I came up here to see the ancient curiosity.” He waved his stick at the stones. “What are they, a fortification?”
    “I don’t think so,” Spaeth said.
    He waited a moment for her to say more, but when she didn’t, he went on, “Are they a holy site, a shrine?”
    “No,” said Spaeth.
    “Is it all right if I look at them?”
    “You have to ask them,” Spaeth said.
    He gave her an odd look, and didn’t follow her advice. Instead, he began to walk around the circle, taking out a small notebook to record the positions of the boulders. He paced out the diameter and circumference of the ring, writing down numbers. Spaeth crouched like a cormorant, watching him. Ridwit was right: he looked uncomfortable in his body, as if it fitted him too loosely. It was a ramshackle assemblage of limbs and defensiveness.
    At last he climbed atop the largest boulder to survey the view. “Granite isn’t native to the South Chain,” he said. “Do you know where the stones came from?”
    “From the north,” Spaeth said, repeating what Ridwit had told her.
    Shading his eyes with one hand, the Inning looked down the steep slopes and ravines between the beaches and the hill. “How did they get up here?”
    “Up the path from Lone Tree Point. The stones came of their own accord.”
    He turned to her with such a sceptical expression that she felt obliged to explain. “The Altans caught the stones in nets and sang them to the surface of the sea. When they reached the land, the stone-fishers danced ahead along the path, and sang so sweetly that the stones came after to hear.”
    “I see,” Nathaway observed noncommittally, then turned back to the stone he stood on. “They must weigh several tons apiece, but the natives then had no wheeled vehicles, no pulleys, and no ropes strong enough for the task. It must have been an extraordinary feat.”
    Since she had already told him how it was done, Spaeth wondered if she were not expressing herself very well, or if perhaps he were a trifle stupid.
    He was studying her, though when she looked at him he glanced quickly away. She knew he was curious. “You’re not Adaina, are you?” he said at last.
    “No.”
    He jumped down from the boulder and came over. Fascination and