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more flat than it had in rehearsal?
    Annis-as-Gyotia nodded gravely. He pulled a quill from the pack and broke it into pieces, launching into a long diatribe. Halfway through, he turned and lifted the round stone tablet that had been hidden behind him; to the audience it seemed to appear magically, and they gasped in appreciation. “Aqil,” he bellowed. “I name you god of sacred learning, in place of Sotia the traitorous.”
    Prince Mati stepped forward. The instant he removed hisfoot from my back, I scrambled up and lunged at Annis, knocking the tablet from his hands.
    It hit the stage with a crash—out of the corner of my eye I saw many in the crowd jump. I hobbled after it, until Prince Mati touched my arm and I fell again. To the audience it would seem he had thrown me to the ground, but we had practiced so that he wouldn’t hurt me.
    I rolled onto my side, panting. Aliana Gamo, perfectly cast as Gyotia’s timid wife Lanea, lifted the tablet from the ground. Aliana had to turn the tablet as she lifted it, so that the side with the missing piece, previously hidden, faced out. She heaved it into Annis’s arms, and he let out a convincing howl of rage.
    I looked out over the crowd as he and Mati exchanged several lines about the missing piece. King Tyno sat in the middle of the front row with his arms crossed, showing no hint of pride in his son’s performance. The other Scholars on the benches wore expressions ranging from polite indifference to outright boredom, as did the rows of city dwellers and servants standing on the slope behind them. Emilana Kret and the palace slave children stood near the back. The white-blond puff of Linti’s hair was intermittently visible as she craned her neck to see over the people in front of her, but her blocked view seemed a blessing. I hated the idea of her witnessing me like this.
    A clump of green-clad Arnathim stood at the back corner of the crowd, where a stand of palms obscured the view; a few even perched in the trees. Lying on the raised stage, I was level with them, and a familiar face caught my eye—a young man with sand-colored curls whom I’d seen often at the market, back in mydays of running errands for Emilana Kret. My cheeks flushed at his disgusted scowl.
    â€œWhat have you done with it?” Annis bellowed, grabbing my hair and turning me to face him. I stared back at him defiantly, conscious of the Arnath gazes in the crowd. He pushed me away. “No matter,” he said, but his voice seemed to have lost some of its certainty—probably because I wasn’t behaving as meekly as I had in rehearsals. “One symbol will not save you.”
    Annis produced a branding rod, which he handed to Prince Mati. “Mark this traitor, and we shall have done with her.”
    Mati pressed the cold rod to my cheek, but my face burned as if it had been red-hot. The fact that it was the prince holding the rod seemed far worse now than it had in rehearsal.
    The curly-haired slave jumped down from the tree and I lost sight of him as he pushed his way through the crowd.
    It was time for my grand exit. Penta Rale had developed a new trick this year; the crowd seemed suitably impressed when I was lowered through a hole in the floor of the stage, while the others chanted, “Imprisoned in walls of stone forever. Behold the cost of betraying Gyotia.”
    As soon as my head was below the stage, I jumped down from the moving platform so that the high priest himself could take my place. I landed sideways on my ankle, but scrambled back up in time to see Rale slipping onto the platform. He held a long metal tube up to the level of the stage; when he did something to one end of it, flames shot out of the other. Heat rushed down into the close space under the stage, and I heard screams and gasps from the audience.
    I pulled the gag down so it hung around my neck, but decided to wait until I got back into the light to deal with my