To distract herself by the first means to mind, she said, 'Why did he tell you all this ... ? Ah, I'm an idiot. He didn't.'

'Correct.' Melilot looked smug. 'For that you deserve a taste of lobster. Here!' He tossed over a lump that by his standards was generous, and a chunk of bread also; she caught both in mid-air with stammered thanks and wolfed them down.

'You need to have your strength built up,' the portly scribe went on. 'I have a very responsible errand for you to undertake tonight.'

'Errand?'

'Yes. The imperial officer who lost the scroll is called Commander Nizharu. He and his men are billeted in pavilions in the courtyard of the governor's palace; seemingly he's afraid of contamination if they have to go into barracks with the local soldiery.

'After dark this evening you are to steal in and wait on him, and inquire whether he will pay more for the return of his scroll and the name of the man who filched it, or for a convincing but fraudulent translation which will provoke the unlawful possessor into some rash action. For all I can guess,' he concluded sanctimoniously, 'he may have let it fall deliberately. HmV

3

It was far from the first time since her arrival that Jarveena had been out after curfew. It was not even the first time she had had to scamper in shadow across the broad expanse of Governor's Walk in order to reach and scramble over the palace wall, nimble as a monkey despite the mass of scar-tissue where her right breast would never grow. Much practice enabled her to whip off her cloak, roll it into a cylinder not much thicker than a money-belt, fasten it around her, and rush up the convenient hand- and toeholds in the outer wall which were carefully not repaired, and for a fat consideration, when the chief mason undertook his annual re-pointing.

But it was definitely the first time she had had to contend with crack soldiers from Ranke on the other side. One of them, by ill chance, was relieving himself behind a flowering shrub as she descended, and needed to do no more than thrust the haft of his pike between her legs. She gasped and went sprawling.

But Melilot had foreseen all this, and she was prepared with her story and the evidence to back it up.

'Don't hurt me, please! I don't mean any harm!' she whimpered, making her voice as childish as possible. There was a torch guttering in a sconce nearby; the soldier heaved her to her feet by her right wrist, his grip as cruel as a trap's, and forced her towards it. A sergeant appeared from the direction of the pavilions which since her last visit had sprouted like mushrooms between the entry to the Hall of Justice and the clustered granaries on the north-west side of the grounds.

'What you got?' he rumbled in a threatening bass voice.

'Sir, I mean no harm! I have to do what my mistress tells me, or I'll be nailed to the temple door!'

That took both of them aback. The soldier somewhat relaxed his fingers and the sergeant bent close to look her over better in the wan torchlight.

'By that, I take it you serve a priestess of Argash?' he said eventually.

It was a logical deduction. On the twenty-foot-high fane of that divinity his most devoted followers volunteered, when life wearied them, to be hung up and fast unto death.

But Jarveena shook her head violently.

'N-no, sir! Dyareela!' naming a goddess banned these thirty years owing to the bloodthirstiness of her votaries.

The sergeant frowned. 'I saw no shrine to'her when we escorted the prince along Temple Avenue!'

'N-no, sir! Her temple was destroyed, but-her worshippers endure!'

'Do they now!' the sergeant grunted. 'Hmm! That sounds like something the commander ought to know!'

'Is that Commander Nizharu?' Jarveena said eagerly.

'What? How do you know his name?'

'My mistress sent me to him! She saw him early today when he was abroad in the city, and she was so taken with his handsome' ness that she resolved at once to send a message to him. But it was all to be in secret!' Jarveena let a quaver enter her voice. 'Now I've let it out, and she'll turn me over to the priests of Argash, and ... Oh, I'm done for! I might as well be dead right now!' • . 'Dying can wait,' the sergeant said, reaching an abrupt decision. 'But the commander will definitely want to know about the Dyareelans. I thought only madmen in the desert paid attention to that old bitch nowadays ... Hello, what's this at your side?' He lifted it into the light. 'A writing-case, is it?'

'Yes, sir. That's what I mainly do for my mistress.'

'If you can write, why deliver messages yourself? That's what I always say. Oh, well, I guess you're her confidante, are you?' Jarveena nodded vigorously.

'A secret shared is a secret no longer, and here's one more proof of the proverb. Oh, come along!'

By the light of two lamps filled, to judge by their smell, with poor-grade fish oil, Nizharu was turning the contents of his pavilion upside-down, with not even an orderly to help him. He had cleared out two brass-bound wooden chests and was beginning on a third, while the bedding from his field couch of wood and canvas was strewn on the floor, and a dozen bags and pouches had been emptied and not repacked.

He was furious when the sergeant raised the tent flap, and roared that he was not to be disturbed. But Jarveena took in the situation ' at a glance and said in a clear firm voice, 'I wonder if you're looking for a scroll.'

Nizharu froze, his face turned so that light fell on it. He was as fair a man as she had ever seen: his hair like washed wool, his eyes like chips of summer sky. Under a nose keen as a bird's beak, his thin lips framed well-kept teeth marred by a chip off the right upper front molar. He was lean and obviously very strong, for he was turning over a chest that must weigh a hundred pounds and his biceps were scarcely bulging.

'Scroll?' he said softly, setting down the chest. 'What scroll?'

It was very hard for Jarveena to reply. She felt her heart was going to stop. The world wavered. It took all her force to maintain her balance. Distantly she heard the sergeant say, 'She didn't mention any scroll to us!'

And, amazingly, she was able to speak for herself again.

'That's true, commander,' she said. 'I had to lie to those men to stop them killing me before I got to you. I'm sorry.' Meantime she was silently thanking the network of informers who kept Melilot so well supplied with information that the lie had been credible even to these strangers. 'But I think this morning you mislaid a scroll...?'

Nizharu hesitated a single moment. Then he rapped, 'Out! Leave the boy here!'

Boy! Oh, miracle! If Jarveena had believed in a deity, now was when she would have resolved to make sacrifice for gratitude. For i that implied he hadn't recognized her.

She waited while the puzzled sergeant and soldier withdrew, mouth dry, palms moist, a faint singing in her ears. Nizharu slammed the lid of the chest he had been about to overturn, sat down on it, and said, 'Now explain! And the explanation had better be a good one!'

It was. It was excellent. Melilot had devised it with great care and drilled her through it a dozen times during the afternoon. It was tinged with just enough of the truth to be convincing.

Aye-Gophlan, notoriously, had accepted bribes. (So had everyone in the guard who might possibly be useful to anybody wealthier than himself, but that was by-the by.) It had consequently occurred to Melilot - a most loyal and law-abiding citizen, who as all his acquaintance would swear had loudly welcomed the appointment of the prince, the new governor, and looked forward to the city being reformed - it had occurred to him that perhaps this was part of a plan. One could scarcely conceive of a high-ranking imperial officer being so casual with what was obviously a top-secret document. Could one?