And how much damage the devils had done to her, pulling her up into there.

"Violent storms can do surprising things, " Inclito said.

"I've seen splinters driven into trees like nails."

Fava nodded. "I've seen that, too, and worse. Why don't you arrange for a storm to flatten Soldo, Incanto?"

"If I could, I'd consider it. Unfortunately I can't do anything more to harm the Duko than you can-which may be harm enough. We'll see."

"Good thing?" Oreb inquired.

"No. But she may become one."

Mora addressed her grandmother. "You've told us over and over that Incanto's a strego. Are you saying that he's wicked? That's impossible!"

The old lady flushed, and the faint touch of pink that rose to her cheeks gladdened my heart. "No, not at all. Not all stregas are wicked. You mustn't read such meanings into every old story you hear."

To me she said, "I didn't intend to offend you, Incanto, really I didn't. I would never treat a guest like that, and I've felt ever so much better since I've been sleeping with a fire in my little fireplace and bolting my door and both the windows as you told me."

I picked up a dish of dumplings that chanced to be near my place and passed it to Fava, saying, "Have some. They're tender and savory, and you must be hungry." She gave me a murderous look.

"I went first tonight just as I promised I would, " the old lady told us. "Who'll go next? How about you, Mora darling?"

Mora's Second Story: The False Friend and the True Friend.

Once very long ago, there were two little girls whose houses were only a few steps apart, but were far from any other houses at all. This was soon after the first landers, I suppose, when there were only a few people here and everything was unsettled. One little girl was very good and very kind, but the other little girl was a liar, a cheat, and a thief. Just the same, the two played together neatly every day. They had to, because there was nobody else for either of them to play with.

More people came, but the girls were used to each other by that time. They played together as before, no longer as little as they had been, and seemed closer than ever. No one could understand it, because the one was so very nice and the other was so very, very bad.

But they did it just the same.

A little settlement that was nowhere near them grew to a town and broke out in politics, as it seems towns always do. The good little girl's father got involved in it, and when the other side won, the town took his land and told him that he and his family had to move away. The good little girl was so brave and strong then that even people who hated her father admired her and talked about her "noble spirit."

But the bad little girl wept bitterly and would not be consoled. She helped her friend's family pack, working harder than anybody, and showered everyone in it with presents. Some of the pretty things she gave them she was really giving back, because they were things she had taken from them to begin with. But many others were her own dearest possessions. When they left, she walked beside their wagon crying, and when night came, and they got ready to camp next to the road, she embraced her little friend for the last time and started back home.

She was already tired, so she walked slowly. The night passed and the sun came up again, and she was not home yet. An old woman who knew both families was going out to milk her cow just then. She saw the bad girl, and how terribly tired she was, and got her to come inside and sit down, and shared her breakfast.

"I've known you all your life, Mora, " the old woman said after they had talked a bit, "and you're as mean and selfish a child as ever I saw. What's gotten into you?"

"I'm very, very selfish, exactly as you say, " the bad little girl replied, "and she was the only friend I had."

"I've heard that story before, " Fava told Mora firmly.

"Bad thing!"

"But it was the other way 'round. You've got the parts mixed up."

Mora shook her head. "I've told the truth. Even liars like me tell the truth sometimes." She has a mole or wart in the middle of her left cheek; unless I am vigilant I find myself looking at it instead of her expression, and that can be a serious mistake.

My host's mother said, "I like it the way Mora told it. So often the people in stories are either completely bad or completely good. Mora's saying that even bad people can be good sometimes, and I agree." It was clear that she had no idea what her granddaughter had been talking about.

Inclito asked, "How about you next, Fava?" Seeing her reluctance he shrugged. "Or I will, if you rather do it that way."

She nodded eagerly.

Inclito's Second Story: The Mercenary's Employer.

There are lots of stories I could tell, but Mama and Mora have heard them. Fava has heard a lot of my stories too by now. Even you, Incanto. I told stories when I drove you that I should have saved. So what I'm going to tell tonight is one I just heard from somebody else today. Not even Mama has heard it.

These days there's all this war talk. I wouldn't want to scare Mora and Fava, but they know it already. Even if nobody said anything out here, they'd hear it in town.

In a war there's no such thing as too many men. Too many to feed, maybe, but never too many to fight. You got enough, maybe you won't have to fight at all. The Duko's been hiring mercenaries to fight for him and to scare us, we think we should get some too. For us there's never enough cards, but we got a few.

So today I'm in town to talk to some and look them over for us. One of them tells me this.

The last time he fights, it's for this big town down south. When a lander comes here, mostly it sets down in just the one place. Everybody knows that. And the people, they take out all the old supplies that were in it. Then they say, "I'm here, what do I need with this lander now?" So pretty soon the cards are all gone out of it, and lots of the wiring. Sometimes I go into other people's houses and sit down, and it is a couch out of a lander. There's steel and titanium, all that stuff, and the people it brought think they need it.

This town down south is different. A god tells them they got to leave their lander like it is, just take supplies and nothing else. That's what they all say, he says. Maybe somebody just says a god said it. Who knows about that stuff? Anyway, they take the supplies and leave the rest. This is all years ago.

So after a while it goes back up. Wonderful. It goes back to the Long Sun Whorl and gets more people from their city up there and comes back. It keeps on doing that.

Things are bad there, like in Mora's story. People fight and steal. There's no justice. You want to win your case, you pay a big bribe. The biggest bribe wins. So pretty soon they say, "This's no good. Let's some of us go back with the lander next time. We'll find somebody real honest and wise up there and make him come back here and straighten everything out." This mercenary never heard of anybody doing it before and neither did I. But he says that's what they said they did.

So they went and got the wise man they needed, a real tall man. His beard is white like new snow, he's only got one eye and it's the color of deep water. He's still there when the mercenary comes, and this is the man that hires him when he gets to that big town down south. Before, another man that was working for this wise man had talked to them and put them on a boat that took them there.

This is a real good man, the mercenary says. Soon as he talks to him he knows he can trust him. He's living in a house the town gave him, a big one with floors up above each other, maybe three or maybe four. I remember houses like that in Grandecitta and so does Mama, she lived in one like that a long time ago. But this mercenary was born here. He never seen a house with more than two before. He's younger than I am, younger than anybody here but Mora and Fava.