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use the boats?”
    “Aye, sir,” Helmut had said. “Easily can I care for myself now. Someday—” he had waved the stump of his arm, “if a smith could put such a hook hereon as once I saw—”
    “Someday, a smith will indeed put something there,” Sandivar said obliquely, “but not a hook. No matter. I leave you here alone, then, my confidence reposing in you fully.”
    “And shall be justified,” said Helmut. Now, remembering that, he tried to keep his eyes from the boats beached in their usual place. A secret little guilty thrill went through him. Then, because the breaking of one’s word was unfitting to a princeling and son of Sigrieth, he put that feeling from him; he had given Sandivar his promise. And yet—Four months had he lived here, and never once had he been beyond where he now stood: everything he looked upon was boringly familiar. But beyond the last reach of grass and reed which his eye could see, who knew what wonder awaited? Even the ocean. He had never seen the ocean. And that would be a sight for one’s eyes indeed—a lake of water so large that, like the sky and the concept of eternity, the mind stumbled over it.
    “But, no,” he said aloud, angrily and not knowing whether the anger was directed at himself or Sandivar. “No, I shall not.” Then, as he was fastening on the bear the leather headstraps with their reins, the tower door opened, and Sandivar emerged, saddlebags over his arm. These he strapped across the bear’s great rump.
    “Well done, Helmut,” he said, testing the saddle as he latched the bags in place. His voice had warmth in it, as if he were father speaking to son; and at the praise, Helmut felt a glow of pride. In this third of a year past, he had come to know Sandivar and to respect and love him. Such regard as he felt for Sandivar was of a kind heretofore reserved only for his own great father, Sigrieth, and, to lesser extent, for Vincio. It was Sandivar who soothed him when the nightmares came—and for the first month they had been frequent. It was Sandivar who tutored him patiently in the use of the shortsword he now wore, producing it from an old chest and handling it with an art that would have done credit to any warrior of the King’s Guard. It was Sandivar who also had worked patiently with him for hours every night with the books, so that his skill at the arts of reading and writing had miraculously enlarged, his head stuffed now with a world of glorious knowledge, of which he had never even dreamed in the court at Marmorburg. And Sandivar had taught him also something of the ways of beasts, for not only was Waddle the sorcerer’s bodyguard and steed, but every night and morning the island thronged with other animals, all come to report the happenings of the previous watches to the man. Sleek otters, and falcons and gulls and moorhens, and other bears; and in a way that Helmut still failed to understand, Sandivar held conference with them, took what they told him, gave instructions, and sent them on their way, but not before each had been introduced to Helmut in some fashion or other, so that he would cause them no alarm if they encountered each other in the future. All in all, it had, despite the tragedies that gave it origin, been one of the best and happiest periods of the boy’s life. So he owed Sandivar this much at least: obedience.
    Nevertheless, as if he were reading Helmut’s mind, Sandivar, gathering Waddle’s reins, let his eyes flicker to the boats. “You will remember the promise I have required of you. That you go not off the island, and that you venture not out of the tower after darkness. Mroggs are about at all hours. They will, having had certain experience with me, not approach this place; aye, not even the bravest of them. But they are out there—” he swept an arm in a way that encompassed the fens, “and they have no awe of you. No princeling you, but only a morsel, like any other. Nor would you be any match for even the