"On the Scales then let it lie. You do not judge – "

"Am I still exile?"

"You are what you are, by your choice. Thassa is not closed to you nor" – she now leveled the wand and pointed at Lord-One Krip – "to you, once stranger, who have worn our seeming well. Nor – "

Once more the wand centered on Parree. And he saw a look of vast surprise cross her face, the rod quivering in her hand.

"Go with Molester's Hand above you, small one," she said slowly. "His Scales shall weigh you and in the end it shall be the truth for you also."

He wondered at the way she said those words, as if she pronounced some judgment. Yet one that was not a heavy one for him. Perhaps, he thought, with a stab of the bitterness that was always with him, her surprise was that such a one as he had ventured into this company. Dung of the Limits might have no place here. He dropped his head and looked downward to his clawlike hands with the greenish skin, his feet which were no better, looking too small and weak to support that burden on his back. Thus he saw Toggor's eyestalks looming out of the neck opening of his robe, turning this way and that as if the smux must acquaint himself with all this company and the moon-glow hall in which they were gathered.

"You have not yet come into your inheritance." That loud, clear voice rang in his head. "We are what Molester shapes, and for each shape there is a reason and a duty – "

It was the bitterness which made him brave enough to answer with the mind touch, "And if the shape is spoiled in the making. Lady?"

"There is nothing save that which is ordained. You will come into that which is yours at the proper time."

He supposed she meant when he was dead, which was hardly an encouraging message. Then he remembered Lord-One Krip's own tale of how he had been, at a time of great need, transferred by Thassa power into the body of an animal and then into a man's form again. Could such work for him? For the first time Parree thought seriously of that part of the off-worlder's story. Would it be better to run like Yazz on four feet, or claw a way in Toggor's form, than to shamble as Dung? That was a thought to consider.

However, though the words of the Thassa Elder might promise change – what change and how? He breathed a little faster and then became aware that around him the people were starting to leave the hall within the cliff. Only Maelen and Lord-One Krip did not move, and, seeing that, he also stayed where he was.

The Elders did not leave the dais, but she of the wand made a small beckoning gesture, and Maelen and Krip moved toward her. Only Farree remained where he was, still bemused by that thought of another body, unburdened, four-footed perhaps. Though where was even a beast that would change places with such as he?

Those on the dais had come forward to face the two from the ship, and again there was a flow of thought too high and fast for Farree to catch. He dropped cross-legged on the stone where he was, and Toggor climbed out to hold the folds of his robe and project the feeling of hunger and impatience to be fed.

Then the smux suddenly loosed hold on Farree and with a leap reached the stone of the floor and caught a big-bodied insect that had swung from circling about one of the moon globes above, transferring the morsel to his mouth with a message that such prey hardly made up for the hunger in him.

"Come, Farree." Lord-One Krip looked back to him. "It is back to the ship for us now."

Yet the Lady Maelen remained still with those leaders of the Thassa as he rose to shamble after the off-worlder. No, not an off-worlder here where he wore a Thassa body, whatever might lie within that.

"What do we – you" – he caught himself quickly not to claim too such familiarity with the Lord-One – "do now?"

The man shrugged. "That remains with Maelen and the temper of the Thassa, This she had longed to do – to return here and be again a Singer, a companion to little ones with fur and feathers."

"But – " The question Farree might have asked was swallowed up by sound from the sky above them: the beat of a flitter coming low above the valley which led to the hall, swinging on toward the ship. Lord-One Krip began to run and Farree could not keep up, only trotted along as best he might. He noticed as he passed that none of those gathered by the wagons looked skyward.

There was something here to which he could not put name, but it made him feel that he was forcing his misshapen body through a turgid flood which sought to cover and stifle him.

The flitter swept on, and he fought to follow Lord-One Krip into the open where the ship stood. Was that strange wave of strength broadcast from the airborne craft, or was it some side issue of a protection summoned by the Thassa?

Farree stumbled around boulders, having twice to stop and draw enough panting breaths to send him on. He could see Lord-One Krip ahead but he, too, moved as if caught in some flood that would wash him back instead of forward, a current of power raised to keep him from his goal.

They reached the end of the valley, and there Krip halted, the whole tense posture of his body showing that it was not by his will. He was struggling still.

Farree felt a sudden push of new force against him, and he could not breast it for himself. Rather he clung to another boulder and stood as straight as he could, watching – almost certain now that this force came from the flitter and was not a protection raised by the Thassa.

The flitter set down not far from their ship. Men issued forth from the flitter. Two of them went toward the inclined way leading from the smoking land about the fins into the center of their ship, and two others took their places between that and the open mouth of the canyon, standing with feet slightly apart and weapons ready in their hands – That pressure kept Krip and Farree away from them, helpless against what they would do.

Once more his own shoulders' burden began to ache, weighing him down, as if the pressure against him had sought out his weakest portion of being and there centered upon him. Lord-One Krip no longer struggled but stood where he had been stopped, his arms folded across his chest. Farree could feel the thrust of thought he hurled toward those at the ship, though it was pure pressure in the mind, not coherent words and phrases.

They were not gone long, those two who had invaded the ship, and when they came back they had the former prisoners with them, walking easily, not hampered any longer by then-bonds. Then, together, those from the flitter and the two others lined up before the ship's fins. One of those who had gone aboard had in his hand what looked like a square box which the downing sun caught and awoke into an eye-hurting burst of light. He placed this carefully on the ground and knelt beside it —

The current of power that had entrapped them within the canyon was in a single moment reversed. Farree gave a shout of sheer astonishment and fear as he was swiftly drawn forward in spite of his attempts to anchor himself to one or another of the boulders his small body scraped by.

If that force left him from anchorage, it was not as successful with Lord-One Krip. Just as he had earlier striven to pass some unseen barrier into the open, now he fought fiercely, as attested by all the movements of his body, to remain now where he was.

Farree had not the personal strength of the other. He scraped stone painfully, looked vainly into the face of Krip as he was drawn past the man. The Lord-One's features were stark with effort. He looked to Farree and a single thought passed from him to the other.

"Hold – where and how you can."

Only, if Krip was able to hold, there was no hope in any such battle on Parree's part. He was aware only of a movement at his breast. Toggor had leaped from his clawhold there to seize upon the Lord-One's arm.