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him, for he has made me break a taboo, and I shall have to perform unsightly things hereafter,” Oby ran off with a whoop.
    Again, there is no profit in laughing at Inch’s taboos, which embroil him in ludicrous situations, at least, not too much laughter, for we could always make Inch stand on his head with the mere scent of squish pie. I hauled a guard toward me by his harness. I used my left hand, for my right held the main gauche as well as the rapier in a somewhat awkward grip. Now had I been a Djang, or a Pachak, I could have done that little trick without trouble.
    I glared on the guard who rolled his eyes and flinched away.
    “Tell me of Himet the Mak, my friend,” I said, quite pleasantly, staring on the fellow. He blanched at this and his wild eyes went wilder still. He considered himself a dead man, that was certain, yet he had only been wounded, a long cut down his cheek. He made no attempt to lick at the blood. “Where has the arch-devil gone? Tell me that and you may live, dom.”
    Whether he believed me or not I do not know. He opened his mouth, slobbering, and I saw the stump of tongue there and felt the disgust in me. Had Himet done this? Did he employ dumb guards? But some had shouted as they fought.
    “Can you write?” demanded Roybin.
    A rolling, lolling shake of the head.
    That was to be expected. Illiterates, even if through no fault of their own, tended to end up in the lower levels of whatever trade they entered. I had no desire to play dwazn questions with him. Vallia, Havilfar, the islands, there were far too many bolt holes to go through even if this dumb devil knew. And, if Hamal was the homeland of the masichieri, I might ask all night and not get the right answer.
    Balass, cleaning his sword, said, “They use the thraxter and parrying-stick. That is not of Vallia.”
    “They wear rapiers and daggers,” said Roybin, fingering his chin. “Yet they left them in their scabbards and chose thraxters. It adds up. Hamal it must be.”
    Seg had jumped down to join us and we talked, taking no notice of the fisherfolk. I wanted these people of Veliadrin to see the picture and use their common sense. “Not Hamal, Roybin, surely?” Seg’s bow gleamed in the orange light. “Shields there. More likely the Dawn Lands of Havilfar, or over to the west. . .
    “Wherever they come from,” I said, “and this Himet the Mak, their target is Veliadrin. Right. Tell me, how far have they infiltrated Vallia to venture out here?”
    The question was the obvious one, of course. Why bother over an island off the east coast of Vallia, an island moreover split into different provinces, when the main island remained?
    Roybin looked worried. “You mean, my Prince, they have already completed their foul work in Vallia?”
    Now that he phrased it like that I realized I didn’t mean it . . . quite.
    Perhaps I was growing paranoid. The word is of this later time and my thoughts then were more earthy. I had thought that Himet the Mak was after me personally. All this business about capturing me and taking me to the leader and torturing me was pedestrian stuff. I had thought, perhaps, the Star Lords might be taking up again their interest in me or, perhaps, the Savanti. But this kind of rowdy fracas was not their style, never had been so far. If they wanted me they could reach down and by means of a gigantic and ghostly representation of a Scorpion they could snatch me up from wherever I happened to be on Kregen and dump me down anywhere else they desired. Aye, and they could send me packing back to Earth four hundred light-years off through space.
    The Star Lords and the Savanti between them had caused me great grief in my life, as you know, but I was no longer the same blind, ignorant, gasping puppet I had once been. Yet I was still painfully aware that at the whim of forces I did not understand and the dictates of superhuman men and women I might be flung willy-nilly into fights and adventures, into danger and