"Well, if you say so, Maia, I must. But these are troubled times and I don't think you realize-I don't think you've got the slightest idea-what unscrupulous, ruthless people you'll be-er-disobliging. I thought you'd be
"Who will, my lord?"
"Why, Kembri; and the Council-"
"Oh, I see. So it was Kembri as started all this, was it?"
"Yes. He told me he thought it would be an excellent thing both from your point of view and mine, and I absolutely agreed with him. It would solve all manner of problems-"
"I see. Well now, my lord, the banzi slave-girl's going to tell the middle-aged baron something he apparently doesn't know. Next time you're thinking of getting married, start by choosing a girl for yourself. And when you come to ask her, start by telling her you love her."
"I really can't see that you've got anything to be so angry about, Maia-"
"There seems to be a lot you can't see, my lord."
He sprang to his feet. "Be careful how you make
At this season of the year the upstairs room adjacent to the Bramba Tower in the Barons' Palace-that same room in which Durakkon had been persuaded by Kembri and Sencho to consent to the killing of Enka-Mordet-was scarcely large or airy enough for ten men to confer together in comfort during the heat of the afternoon. Yet here they had been for half an hour already. The air had grown stale and heavy, for despite the height above the city there seemed to be no breeze. Durakkon, sweating under his robes of state, sat with one hand over his left eye, which had begun to hurt neuralgically. At the moment there was silence, for the Lord General, seated next to him, had just ceased speaking and was making notes and calculations with a stick of charcoal on a board.
The delegates were not seated formally, but here and there about the room. The governors of Kabin, Tonilda and Belishba sat side by side on the couch where Sencho had been accustomed to sprawl. Bel-ka-Trazet, his hands clasped about his drawn-up knees, was sitting in one of the window embrasures looking (thought Durakkon) like some ravaged kobold waiting sardonically for propitiation. Gel-Ethlin, in the undress uniform of the Beklan regiment, was at the other end of the table, next to Donnered, the representative of Sarkid (for Sarkid, like Uriah, was a province where Bekla maintained no governor). Eud-Ecachlon, who throughout the meeting had given the impression of being preoccupied and ill-at-ease, stood leaning against the door.
Despite Kembri's request, no representative had appeared on behalf of Gelt. None had been summoned from Paltesh; nor yet from Yelda, since the latter had effectively fallen to Santil-ke-Erketlis.
From time to time one man or another would glance towards the tenth person in the room; the oldest present, shock-haired, grizzled and silent, his sunken eyes gazing intently from his deeply-lined, brown face. He also, with his short, squat build, rather suggested to Durakkon some sort of goblin creature; yet-unlike Bel-ka-Trazet-one at the same time benign and magisterial, as though, while attending the meeting but not entirely of it, he was listening and even adjudicating from some detached, forbearing
standpoint of his own. So far he had spoken only at the outset, when Durakkon had asked him to swear by Frella-Tiltheh the Inscrutable that he came in peace and would impart to Karnat nothing that he might hear about the forces, dispositions and intentions of Bekla. With this request he had at once complied in a manner which carried conviction to all present. This was Nasada, the renowned physician of Suba. Evidently the Lord General had concluded that it would look better to grant than to refuse his request to attend.
