Her lips smiled. She looked him slowly up and down, finally acknowledged him by looking at him directly. “I have studied your city, t’Elas. I have gathered information from most unlikely sources, even you and my human, t’Morgan.”

“And what,” Kta asked softly, “has the Methi concluded?”

“That a wise person does not contest reality. Sufaki—are a reality. Annihilation of all Sufaki is hardly practical, since they are the population of the entire coast of Sufak. T’Morgan has told me a fable—of human wars. I considered the prospect of dead villages, wasted fields. Somehow this did not seem profitable. Therefore,although I do not think the sons of the east will ever be other than trouble to us, I consider that they are less trouble where they are, in Nephane and in their villages, rather than scattered and shooting arrows at my occupation forces. Religiously, I will yield nothing. But I had rather have a city than a ruin, a province than a desolation, and considering that it is your city and your land in question,—you may perhaps agree with me.”

“We might,” said Ian t’Ilev when she looked aside at him. “If not for that phrase occupation forces.The Families rule Nephane.”

“ Ai,no word of Sufaki? Well, but you know the law, t’Ilev. A Methi does not reach within families. The question of precedence would be between your two hearths. How you resolve it is not mine to say. But I cannot foresee that Ilev-in-Indresul would be eager to cross the sea to intervene in the affairs of Ilev-in-Nephane. I do not think occupation would prove necessary.”

“Your word on that?” asked Kta.

The Methi gave a curious look to him, a smile of faint irony. Then she opened both palms to the sky. “So let the holy light of heaven regard me: I do not mislead you.” She leaned back then, stretched her hands along the arms of her chair, her lovely face suddenly grave and businesslike. “Terms: removal of Djan, the dissolution of the t’Tefuri’s party, the death of t’Tefur himself, the allegiance of the Families to Indresul and to me. That is the limit of what I demand.”

“And the fleet?” asked Ian t’Ilev.

“You can make Nephane in a day, I think. By this time tomorrow you could reach port. You will have a day further to accomplish what I have named or find us among you by force.”

“You mean we are to conquer Nephane for you?” t’Ilev exclaimed. “Gods,—no.”

“Peace, control of your own city,—or war. If we enter, we will not be bound by these terms.”

“Give us a little time,” t’Ilev pleaded. “Let us bear these proposals to the rest of the fleet. We cannot agree alone.”

“Do that, t’Ilev. We shall give you a day’s start toward Nephane whatever you decide. If you use that day’s grace to prepare your city to resist us, we will not negotiate again until we meet in the ruins of your city. We are not twice generous, t’Ilev.”

T’Ilev bowed, gathered the three of the crew who had come with him, and the gathered crew of the trireme parted widely to let them pass.

“Methi,” said Kta.

“Would you go with them?”

“By your leave, Methi.”

“It is permitted. Make them believe you, t’Elas. You have your chance,—one day to make your city exist. I hope you succeed. I shall be sorry if I learn you have failed. Will you go with him, t’Morgan? I shall be sorry to part with you.”

“Yes,” Kurt said. “By your leave.”

“Look,” she said. “Look up at me.” And when he had done so, he had the feeling that she studied him as a curiosity she might not see again. Her dark eyes held a little of fascinated fear. “You are,” she said, “like Djan-methi.”

“We are of one kind.”

“Bring me Djan,” she said. “But not as Methi of Nephane.”

And her gesture had dismissed them. They gave back a pace. But then Lhe t’Nethim bowed at her feet, head to the deck, as one who asked a great favor.

“Methi,” he said when she acknowledged him, “let me go with this ship. I have business in Nephane, with t’Tefur.”

“You are valuable to me, Lhe,” she said in great distress.

“Methi, it is hearth-business, and you must let me go.”

“Must? They will kill you before you reach Nephane, and where will your debt be honored then, t’Nethim, and how will I answer your father, that I let his son do this thing?”

“It is family,” he said.

The Methi pressed her lips together. “If they kill you,” she said, “then we will know how they will regard any pact with us. —T’Elas, be witness. Treat him honorably, however you decide, for his life or for his death. You will answer to me for this.”

T’Nethim bowed a final, heartfelt thanks, and sprang up and hurried after them, among the men of Ilev’s party who had delayed also to hear what passed.

“Someone willcut his throat,” t’Ilev hissed at Kta, before they went over the rail. “What is he to you?”

“Mim’s cousin.”

“Gods! How long have you been of Indresul, Kta?”

“Trust me. If otherwise, let us at least clear this deck. I beg you, Ian.”

T’Ilev bit his lip, then made haste to seek the ladder. “Gods help us,” he murmured. “Gods help us,—I will keep silent on it. Burden me with nothing else, Kta.”

And he disappeared over the side first and quickly descended to the longship, where his anxious crew waited.

The Ilev vessel glided in among the wrecked fleet with the white assembly streamer flying beside the red, and other captains gathered to her deck as quickly as possible: Eta t’Nechis; Pan t’Ranek; Camit t’Ilev, cousin of Ian—others, young men, whose captaincies now told of tragedies at sea or at home.

“Is that it?” shouted Eta t’Nechis when he had heard the terms, and looked at t’Ilev as if other words failed him. “Great gods, t’Ilev, did you decide for all of us? Or have you handed command over to Elas and its company,—to Elas, who ruined us in the first place, with its human guest. And now they bring us an overseas house-friend!”

“Argue it later,” said Kta. “Whether you want to fight or negotiate at Nephane, put the fleet about for home now. Every moment we waste will be badly needed.”

“We have men still adrift out there!” cried t’Ranek, “men the Indras will not let us reach.”

“They are being picked up,” said Ian. “That is better than we can do for them. Kta is right. Put about.”

“Give the Methi back her man,” said t’Nechis, “all three of them,—t’Elas, human and foreigner.”

T’Nethim was pale, but he kept his dignity behind the shelter Ian t’Ilev gave the three of them: voices were raised, weapons all but drawn; and finally Ian settled the matter by ordering his ship put about for Nephane with the fleet streamer flying beside the others.

Then they were underway, and the sight of the Methi’s fleet dropping astern with no visible evidence of pursuit greatly heartened the men and silenced some of the demands for vengeance.

“What need of them to pursue,” asked t’Nechis, “if we do their work for them? Gods, gods, this is wrong!”

And once again there was talk of throat-cutting, of throwing the three of them into the sea with Lhe t’Nethim cut in pieces, until the t’Ilevi together put themselves bodily between the t’Nechisen and Kta t’Elas.

“Stop this,” said Ian, and for all that he was a young man and beneath the age of some of the men who quarreled, he put such anger into his voice that there was a silence made, if only a breath of one.

“It is shameful,” said Lu t’Isulan with great feeling. “We disgrace ourselves under the eyes of this Indras stranger. Bring tea. It is a long distance to Nephane. If we cannot make a well-thought decision in that length of time, then we deserve our misery. Let us be still and think for a time.”

“We will not share fire and drink with a man of Indresul,” said t’Nechis. “Put him in irons.”

T’Nethim drew himself back with great dignity. “I will go apart from you,” he said, the first words they had listened for him to say. “And I will not interfere. I will still be on this ship if you decide for war.”