There was a tremendous explosion in the distance, a long low ground-shaking boom that brought everyone in the wagon to attention. It continued for several minutes and gradually subsided to a quiet throb, then to silence.

"What was that?" Sleet cried, groping in the rack for an energy-thrower.

"Peace, peace," Deliamber said. "It is the sound of Piurifayne Fountain. We are approaching the boundary."

"Piurifayne Fountain?" Valentine asked.

"Wait and see," Deliamber told him.

The wagon came to a halt a few minutes later. Zalzan Kavol turned round from the driver’s seat and yelled, "Where’s that Vroon? Wizard, there’s a roadblock up ahead!"

"We are at Piurifayne Gate," said Deliamber. A barricade made of stout glossy yellow logs lashed with a bright emerald twine spanned the narrow roadway, and to the left of it was a guardhouse occupied by two Hjorts in customs-official uniform of gray and green. They ordered everyone out of the wagon and into the rain, though they themselves were under a protective canopy. "Where bound?" asked the fatter Hjort. "Ilirivoyne, to play at the Shapeshifter festival. We are jugglers," said Zalzan Kavol.

"Permit to enter Piurifayne Province?" the other Hjort demanded.

"No such permits are required," Deliamber said.

"You speak too confidently, Vroon. By decree of Lord Valentine the Coronal more than a month past, no citizens of Majipoor enter the Metamorph territory except on legitimate business."

"Ours is legitimate business," growled Zalzan Kavol

"Then you would have a permit."

"But we knew nothing of the need for one!" the Skandar protested.

The Hjorts looked indifferent to that. They seemed ready to turn their attention to other matters.

Zalzan Kavol glanced toward Vinorkis as though expecting him to have some sort of influence with his compatriots. But the Hjort merely shrugged. Zalzan Kavol glared at Deliamber next and said, "It falls within your responsibilities, wizard, to advise me of such matters."

The Vroon shrugged. "Not even wizards can learn of changes in the law that happen while they travel in forest preserves and other remote places."

"But what do we do now? Turn back to Verf?" The idea seemed to bring a glow of delight to Sleet’s eyes. Reprieved from this Metamorph adventure after all! But Zalzan Kavol was fuming. Lisamon Hultin’s hand strayed to the hilt of her vibration-sword. Valentine stiffened at that.

He said quietly to Zalzan Kavol, "Hjorts are not always incorruptible."

"A good thought," the Skandar murmured. Zalzan Kavol drew forth his money-pouch. Instantly the attention of the Hjorts sharpened. This was indeed the right tactic, Valentine decided.

"Perhaps I have found the necessary document," said Zalzan Kavol. Ostentatiously removing two one-crown pieces from the pouch, he caught a Hjort’s rough-skinned puffy hand in one of his, and with the others pressed a coin into each palm, smiling his most self-satisfied smile. The Hjorts exchanged glances, and they were not glances of bliss. Contemptuously they allowed the coins to fall to the muddy ground.

"A crown?" Carabella muttered in disbelief. "He expected to buy them with a crown?"

"Bribing an officer of the imperial government is a serious offense," the fatter Hjort declared ominously. "You are under arrest and remanded for trial to Verf. Remain in your vehicle until appropriate escort can be found for you."

Zalzan Kavol looked outraged. He whirled, began to say something to Valentine, choked it off, gestured angrily at Deliamber, made a growling noise, and spoke in a low voice and in the Skandar language to the three nearest of his brothers. Lisamon Hultin again began to finger her sword-hilt. Valentine felt despair. There would be two dead Hjorts here in another moment, and the jugglers would all be criminal fugitives at the edge of Piurifayne. That was not likely to speed his journey to the Lady of the Isle.

"Do something quickly," Valentine said under his breath to Autifon Deliamber.

But the Vroonish sorcerer was already in motion. Stepping forward, he snatched up the money and offered it again to the Hjorts, saying, "Your pardon, but you must have dropped these small coins." He dropped them into the Hjorts’ hands, and at the same time allowed the tips of his tentacles to coil lightly about their wrists for an instant.

When he released them, the thinner Hjort said, "Your visa is good for three weeks only, and you must leave Piurifayne by way of this gate. Other exit points are illegal for you."

"Not to mention very dangerous," added the other. He gestured and unseen figures pulled the barricade sideways fifteen feet along a buried track, so that there was room for the wagon to proceed.

As they entered the wagon Zalzan Kavol said furiously to Valentine, "In the future, give me no illegal advice! And you, Deliamber: make yourself aware of the regulations that apply to us. This could have caused us great delay, and much loss of income."

"Perhaps if you had tried bribing with royals instead of crowns," Carabella said beyond the Skandar’s range of hearing, "we would have had a simpler time of it."

"No matter, no matter," Deliamber said. "We were admitted, were we not? It was only a small sorcery, and cheaper than a heavy bribe."

"These new laws," Sleet began. "So many decrees!"

"A new Coronal," said Lisamon Hultin. "He wants to show his power. They always do. They decree this, they decree that, and the old Pontifex goes along with everything. This one decreed me right out of a job, do you know that?"

"How so?" Valentine asked.

"I was bodyguard to a merchant in Mazadone, much afraid of jealous rivals. This Lord Valentine placed a new tax on personal bodyguards for anyone below noble rank, amounting to my whole year’s salary; and my employer, damn his ears, let me go on a week’s notice! Two years, and it was goodbye, Lisamon, thank you very much, take a bottle of my best brandy as your going-away gift." She belched resonantly. "One day I was the defender of his miserable life, the next I was a superfluous luxury, and all thanks to Lord Valentine! Oh, poor Voriax! D’ye think his brother had him murdered?"

"Guard your tongue!" Sleet snapped. "Such things aren’t done on Majipoor."

But she persisted. "A hunting accident, was it? And the last one, old Malibor, drowned while out fishing? Why are our Coronals suddenly dying so strangely? It never happened before like this, did it? They went on to become Pontifex, they did, and hid themselves away in the Labyrinth and lived next to forever, and now here we have Malibor feeding the seadragons and Voriax taking a careless bolt in the forest." She belched again. "I wonder. Up there on Castle Mount, maybe they’re getting too hungry for the taste of power."

"Enough," Sleet said, looking uncomfortable with such talk.

"Once a new Coronal’s picked, all the rest of the princes are finished, you know, no hope of advancement. Unless, unless, unless, unless the Coronal should die, and back they go into the hopper to be picked again. When Voriax died and this Valentine came to rule, I said—"

"Stop it!" Sleet cried.

He rose to his full height, which was hardly chest-high to the warrior-woman, and his eyes blazed as if he planned to chop her off at the thighs to equalize matters between them. She remained at her ease, but her hand again was wandering toward her sword. Smoothly Valentine interposed himself.

"She means no offense to the Coronal," he said gently. "She is fond of wine, and it loosens her tongue." And to Lisamon Hultin he said, "Forgive him, will you? My friend is under strain in this part of the world, as you know."

A second enormous explosion, five times as loud and fifty times as frightening as the one that had occurred half an hour earlier, interrupted the discussion. The mounts reared and squealed; the wagon lurched; Zalzan Kavol shouted ferocious curses from the driver’s seat.