“Hm?” he said. “What’ll you do?”

“Wander about with Ph… Phee-leep Hroash For. He has been where Vodan is.”

You too? Arinnian thought.

“And he is the mate of Hrill, our friend,” Eyath added.

“Go if you wish,” Arinnian said.

“An hour, then.” Claws ticked, feathers rustled as Eyath crossed the floor to the Terran. She reached up and took his arm. “Come; we have much to trade,” she said in her lilting Anglic.

He smiled again, brushed his lips across Tabitha’s, and escorted the Ythrian away. Silence lingered behind them, save for a soughing in the trees outside. Arinnian stood where he was. Draun fleered. Tabitha sought her pipes, chose one and began stuffing it. Her eyes held very closely on that task.

“Blame not me,” Draun said. “I’d have halved him like his bald-skin fellow, if Hrill hadn’t objected. Do you know she wouldn’t let me make a goblet from the skull?”

Tabitha stiffened.

“Well, tell me when you tire of his bouncing you,” Draun continued. “I’ll open his belly on Dlarian’s altar.”

She swung to confront him. The scar on her cheek stood bonelike over the skin. “Are you asking me to end our partnership?” tore from her. “Or to challenge you?”

“Tabitha Falkayn may regulate her own life, Draun,” Arinnian said.

“Ar-r-rkh, could be I uttered what I shouldn’t,” the other male growled. His plumage ruffled, his teeth flashed forth. “Yet how long must we sit in this cage of Terran ships?”

“As long as need be,” Tabitha snapped, still pale and shivering. “Do you want to charge out and die for naught witless as any saga hero? Or invite the warheads that kindle firestorms across a whole continent?”

“Why not? All dies at last,” Draun grinned. “What glorious pyrotechnics to go out in! Better to throw Terra onto hell-wind, alight; but since we can’t do that, unfortunately—”

“I’d sooner lose the war than kill a planet, any planet,” Tabitha said. “As many times sooner as it has living creatures. And I’d sooner lose this planet than see it killed.” She leveled her voice and looked straight at the Ythrian. “Your trouble is, the Old Faith reinforces every wish to kill that war has roused in you — and you’ve no way to do it.”

Draun’s expression said, Maybe. At least I don’t rut with the enemy. He kept mute, though, and Tabitha chose not to watch him. Instead she turned to Arinnian. “Can you change that situation?” she asked. Her smile was almost timid.

He did not return it “Yes,” he answered. “Let me explain what we have in mind.”

Since the ornithoids did not care to walk any considerable distance, and extended conversation was impossible in flight, Eyath first led Rochefort to the stables. After repeated visits in recent weeks she knew her way about. A few zirraukhs were kept there, and a horee for Tabitha. The former were smaller than the latter and resembled it only in being warm-blooded quadrupeds — they weren’t mammals, strictly speaking — but served an identical purpose. “Can you outfit your beast?” she inquired.

“Yes, now I’ve lived here awhile. Before, I don’t remember ever even seeing a horse outside of a zoo.” His chuckle was perfunctory. “Uh, shouldn’t we have asked permission?”

“Why? Chothfolk are supposed to observe the customs of their guests, and in Stormgate you don’t ask to borrow when you’re among friends.”

“How I wish we really were.”

She braced a hand against a stall in order to reach out a wing and gently stroke the pinions down his cheek.

They saddled up and rode side by side along a trail through the groves… Leaves rustled to the sea breeze, silvery-hued in that clear shadowless light. Hoofs plopped, but the damp air kept dust from rising.

“You’re kind, Eyath,” Rochefort said at last, awkwardly. “Most of the people have been. More, I’m afraid, than a nonhuman prisoner of war would meet on a human planet”

Eyath sought words. She was using Anglic, for the practice as much as the courtesy. But her problem here was to find concepts. The single phrase which came to her seemed a mere tautology: “One need not hate to fight.”

“It helps. If you’re human, anyway,” he said wryly. “And that Draun—”

“Oh, he doesn’t hate you. He’s always thus. I feel… pity?… for his wife. No, not pity. That would mean I think her inferior, would it not? And she endures.”

“Why does she stay with him?”

“The children, of course. And perhaps she is not unhappy. Draun must have his good points, since he keeps Hrill in partnership. Still, I will be much luckier in my marriage.”

“Hrill—” Rochefort shook his head. “I fear I’ve earned the hate of your, uh, brother Christopher Holm.”

Eyath trilled. “Clear to see, you’re where he especially wanted to go. He bleeds so you can hear the splashes.”

“You don’t mind? Considering how close you two are.”

“Well, I do not watch his pain gladly. But he will master it. Besides, I wondered if she might not bind him too closely.” Sheer off from there, lass. Eyath regarded the man. “We gabble of what does not concern us. I would ask you about the stars you have been at, the spaces you have crossed, and what it is like to be a warrior yonder.”

“I don’t know,” Tabitha said. “Sounds damned iffy.”

“Show me the stratagem that never was,” Arinnian replied. “Thing is, whether or not it succeeds, we’ll have changed the terms of the fight. The Imperials will have no reason to bombard, good reason not to, and Avalon is spared.” He glanced at Draun.

The fisher laughed. “Whether I wish that or not, akh?” he said. “Well, I think any scheme’s a fine one which lets us kill Terrans personally.”

“Are you sure they’ll land where they’re supposed to?” Tabitha wondered.

“No, of course we’re not sure,” Arinnian barked. “We’ll do whatever we can to make that area their logical choice. Among other moves, we’re arranging a few defections. The Terrans oughtn’t to suspect they’re due to us, because in fact it is not hard to get off this planet. Its defenses aren’t set against objects traveling outward.”

“Hm.” Tabitha stroked her chin… big well-formed hand over square jaw, beneath heavy mouth… “If I were a Terran intelligence officer and someone who claimed to have fled from Avalon brought me such a story, I’d put him under — what do they call that obscene gadget? — a hypnoprobe.”

“No doubt.” Arinnian’s nod was jerky. “But these will be genuine defectors. My father has assigned shrewd men to take care of that. I don’t know the details, but I can guess. We do have people who’re panicked, or who want us to surrender because they’re convinced we’ll lose regardless. And we have more who feel that way in lesser degree, whom the first kind will trust. Suppose — well, suppose, for instance, we get President Vickery to call a potential traitor in for a secret discussion. Vickery explains that he himself wants to quit, it’s political suicide for him to act openly, but he can help by arranging for certain persons to carry certain suggestions to the Terrans. Do you see? I’m not saying that’s how it will be done — I really don’t know how far we can trust Vickery — but we can leave the specifics to my father’s men.”

“And likewise the military dispositions which will make the yarn look plausible. Fine, fine,” Draun gloated.

’That’s what I came about,” Arinnian said. “My mission’s to brief the various home-guard leaders, and get their efforts coordinated.”

Rising from his chair, he started pacing, back and forth in front of Tabitha and never looking at her. “An extra item in your case,” he went on, staccato. “It’d help tremendously if one of their own brought them the same general information.”

Breath hissed between her teeth. Draun rocked forward, off his alatans, onto his toes.

“Yes,” Arinnian said, “Your dear Philippe Rochefort. You tell him I’m here because I’m worried about Equatoria.” He gave details. “Then I find some business in the neighbor islands and belt-flit with Eyath. Our boat stays behind, carelessly unguarded. You let him stroll freely around, don’t you? His action is obvious.”