"And so was born the last god, the Bastard, love child of the goddess and the great-souled demon. Some say He was born on the eve of the last battle, fruit of a union upon Her great couch, some say the grieving Mother gathered up the great-souled demon's shattered dear remains from the stricken field and mixed them with Her blood, and so made the Bastard by Her great art. However so, their Son, of all the gods, was given agency over both spirit and matter, for He inherited as servants the demons that His father's great sacrifice had conquered and enslaved and so swept out of the world.

"What is certainly a lie," dy Cabon continued in a suddenly more prosaic, not to mention irate, tone of voice, "is the Quadrene heresy that the great-souled demon took the Mother by force and so engendered the Bastard upon Her against Her great will. A scurrilous and senseless and blasphemous lie..." Ista wasn't sure if he was still paraphrasing Ordol, or if that was his own gloss. He cleared his throat and finished more formally, "Here ends the tale and tally of the advent of the five gods."

Ista had heard various versions of the tally of the gods what seemed several hundred times since childhood, but she had to admit, dy Cabon's delivery of the old story had the eloquence and sincerity to make it seem almost new again. Granted, most versions did not give the complex story of the Bastard more space than the rest of the Holy Family put together, but people had to be allowed their favorites. Despite herself, she was moved.

Dy Cabon returned to ritual and called down the fivefold benison, asking of each god the proper gifts, leading the respondents in praise in return. Of the Daughter, growth and learning and love; of the Mother, children, health, and healing; of the Son, good comradeship, hunting, and harvest; of the Father, children, justice, and an easy death in its due time.

"And the Bastard grant us..."—dy Cabon's voice, fallen into the soothing singsong of ceremony, stumbled for the first time, slowing— "in our direst need, the smallest gifts; the nail of the horseshoe, the pin of the axle, the feather at the pivot point, the pebble at the mountain's peak, the kiss in despair, the one right word. In darkness, understanding." He blinked, looking startled.

Ista's chin snapped up; for an instant, her spine seemed to freeze. No. No. There is nothing here, nothing here, nothing here. Nothing, do you hear me? She forced her breath out slowly.

It was not the usual wording. Most prayers asked to be spared the fifth god's attention, the master of all disasters out of season as He was. The divine hastily signed himself, touching forehead, lip, navel, groin, and heart, hand spread wide upon his chest above his broad paunch, and signed again in the air to call down blessing upon all assembled there. The company, released, stirred and stretched, some breaking into low-voiced talk, some strolling away to their day's tasks. Dy Cabon came toward Ista, rubbing his hands and smiling anxiously.

"Thank you, Learned," Ista said, "for that good beginning."

He bowed in relief at her approval. "My very great pleasure, my lady." He brightened still further as the inn's servants hurried to bring out what promised to be a very hearty breakfast. Ista, a little shamed by the excellence of his effort to have purloined the divine with false pretenses of a sham pilgrimage, was heartened by the reflection that dy Cabon was clearly enjoying his work.

THE COUNTRY WEST OF PALMA WAS FLAT AND BARREN, WITH ONLY A few trees clustering in the watercourses that broke up the long dull vistas. Grazing, not crop farming, was the main work of the thinly scattered old fortified farmsteads along the seldom-used road. Boys and dogs tended sheep and cattle, all dozing together in the distant patches of shade. The warming afternoon seemed to hold a long silence that invited sleep, not traveling, but given their late start, Ista's party pushed on through the soft and somnolent air.

When the road widened for a time, Ista found herself riding with dy Cabon's fine sturdy mule on one side and Liss's rangy bay on the other.

As an antidote to dy Cabon's infectious yawns, Ista inquired of him, "Tell me, Learned, whatever happened to that little demon you were carrying when first we met?"

Liss, who'd been riding along with her feet out of the stirrups and her reins slack, turned her head to listen.

"Oh, all went well. I gave it up to the archdivine of Taryoon, and we oversaw its disposition. It is safely out of the world now. I was actually returning to my home from there when I spent the night in Valenda, and, well." A jerk of his head at the string of riders trailing them indicated his unexpected new duty with the royina.

"A demon? You had a demon?" said Liss in a tone of wonder.

"Not I," corrected the divine fastidiously. "It was trapped in a ferret. Fortunately, not a difficult animal to control. Compared to a wolf or a bull." He grimaced. "Or a man, seeking to plunder the demon's powers."

Her face screwed up. "How do you send a demon out of the world?"

Dy Cabon sighed. "Give it to someone who's going."

She frowned at her horse's ears for a moment, then gave up the riddle. "What?"

"If the demon is not grown too strong, the simplest way to return it to the gods is to give it into the keeping of a soul who is going to the gods. Who is dying," he added to her blank look.

"Oh," she said. Another pause. "So... you slew the ferret?"

"It is, alas, not quite so easy as that. A free demon whose mount is dying simply jumps to another. You see, an elemental escaped into the world of matter cannot exist without a being of matter to lend it intelligence and strength, for by its nature it cannot create such order for itself. It can only steal. In the beginning it is mindless, formless, as innocently destructive as a wild animal, at least until it learns more complicated sins from men. It is constrained in turn by the power of the creature or person upon whom it battens. A dislodged demon will always seek to leap to the strongest soul in its vicinity, creature to larger creature, animal to man, man to greater man, for it becomes what it... eats, in a sense." Dy Cabon drew breath and seemed to look into some well of memory. "But when a divine of long experience is finally dying in his or her order's house, the demon can be forced to jump to them. If the demon is weak enough, and the divine strong of heart and mind even in the last extremity, well, the matter solves itself." He cleared his throat. "Persons great-souled and grown detached from the world, and longing for their god. For a demon can tempt a weaker person to sorcery with promises to extend life."

"Rare strength," said Ista after a moment. Had he just come from such an extraordinary deathbed scene? It seemed so. She did not wonder at his air of daunted humility.

Dy Cabon gave a wry shrug of acknowledgment. "Yes. I don't know if I will ever... Fortunately, stray demons are rare. Except that..."

"Except what?" Liss prodded, when no more of this rarified theological discourse seemed to be forthcoming.

Dy Cabon's lips twisted. "The archdivine was most disturbed. Mine was the third such fugitive that has been captured this year in Baocia alone."

"How many do you usually catch?" asked Liss.

"Not one a year in all of Chalion, or so it has been for many years. The last great outbreak was in Roya Fonsa's day."

Ias's father; Iselle's grandfather, dead these fifty years.

Ista considered dy Cabon's words. "What if the demon is not weak enough?"

Dy Cabon said, "Ah. Indeed." He was silent for a moment, staring at his mule's limp ears, hanging out to either side of its head like oars. "That is why my order gives much thought and effort to removing them when they are still small."