"You do not know of me, that much is plain! And I think that I shall leave it so, for you have made me laugh by your innocence. Soon enough shall you leam. But then again, your assessment of my situation is not incorrect. Return to your rest, Feltheryn Thespian, and consider that you have the best of the bargains a man can make: for you change form at will, and can take off the masks you assume. Now sleep!"

Feltheryn wanted desperately to pursue the conversation and stay in the presence of Enas Yorl, for at that moment he observed that his interviewer was not only seeming to change his form somewhat under the robes, but to change his mass as well; and that was a trick he would dearly love to leam. Playing Roget the Hunchback was one of the greatest accomplishments of the stage, not because of the powerful emotion of the role but because of the difficulty of acting while strapped into the elaborate harness that simulated the deformity. He was about to plead his case for study with Enas Yorl when darkness intervened and he was awaking in his own bed, his arm thrown protectively over his lady and the morning sun pouring through the casement.

He moved his hand gently back, so as not to disturb her beauty rest, then climbed out of bed and dressed quietly.

He was in the small kitchen heating water for tisane when he heard the door of the theater open and close. That would be Lalo the Limner, come to paint the next set of flats and the periactois for the auto-da-fe in Act Three-

There was certainly nothing more impressive in all the world than the illusion of fire on stage, and nothing harder to accomplish- Feltheryn had chosen this time to bring about the miracle through the use of periactois -three-sided columns with different paintings on each side-which could be revolved. There would also be ragged strips of cloth dyed like flames which Lempchin could waggle furiously by means of strings descending from the flies. The strings would not be visible, and in the flickering light of the onstage torches the effect would be terrifying.

The vision so captured Feltheryn's early morning imagination that he quite forgot the kettle of boiling water and went to get his script and notebook, adding several details which he thought would improve the stage picture. He barely noticed when Glisselrand put the pot of tisane and a clean cup at his elbow, and with it a plate of freshly scrambled eggs, cheese, sliced bread from the previous day, and a pot of rare red jelly made from the legendary oranges of Enlibar; of which they had a dozen left in trade for seating when (hey had played The Steel Skeleton, a play which many assumed to have been written by an Enlibrite wizard, and which the Enlibrites would travel fantastic distances to see.

He was roused from his deep reverie and study of the text when an unfamiliar voice echoed in the theater, followed by Glisselrand's most opulent tones.

"I only came to bring Lalo his midday meal," a woman's voice said. "But I confess I did hope to see if it was you. It's been many years, but how could I forget? While Lalo was working on the painting that won my hand there was nothing for me to do, so I came to see the play. I had seen you do a piece before the tent, so I knew it would be good."

"Why yes," said Glisselrand, and her voice held all the charm and delight that only an actor can know when remembered after twenty years. "What play was it that we did?"

"The Master Poet," said the woman, whom Feltheryn now took to be Gilla, Lalo's wife. "It was so personal, at that time, for your situation was much like my own. When I came away I felt as if my whole outlook on life had changed. People looked so different! I felt so differently!"

Feltheryn smiled to himself. Yes, the plays worked their magic in strange and subtle ways. And that play was a comedy of love, a comedy of love between the generations. But even then he had chosen to play the older man, the lovable shoemaker who could have the young girl, but who chose wisely to let her love the younger man, the man of her own generation.

"I am so pleased that you remember my performance," said Glisselrand, and Feltheryn knew that it was true. He tried to hark back in his mind to that distant day, to remember some trace that would lead him down the path to a sensual recall of time and place, but it was hopeless. He had done The Master Poet so many times that one performance blended into another. The sunlight falling on flowers that his mental search prompted could have been in any of a hundred small towns. The play was too universal to attach itself to time and place. Only the first time he had done it was clear in his memory, and then he had not played the older man, but Dainis, the apprentice who danced and fought . , .

The King recalled him to the page and Glisselrand and Lalo and Gilla faded into the paint of the periactois like soft music played behind the potted palms in the Emperor's palace. His hand shot out into the air, retreated, his lips moved, and anyone watching might have thought him in the grip of some seizure as he moved in slight indications of the broad gestures he would use upon the stage.

It was much later when he came to the realization that he was eating his supper, not his breakfast, and that he had been absorbed for the whole of the day. He carefully set the script aside, finished the boiled turnip with butter that was the last of the food on his plate, and washed it down with the watered wine that Glisselrand had provided. He was not up to the full strength stuff anymore. Then he stood and stretched his very tall frame, forcing air back into the stagnant blood. It was,, he considered, time to visit the Vulgar Unicorn.

Snegelringe and Rounsnouf were already there, drinking at a table in the company of a handsome young man with shoulder-length glossy black hair, a man dressed far too fine for the likes of this low dive, Feltheryn observed as he entered unobtrusively and looked over the place.

And yet, low though the dive was, it was not without merit. He thought of the many taverns he had entered over the years and the general lack of lustre they displayed, and he decided that perhaps Rounsnouf was right, the place was a treasure house. There was a certain dark color that crackled with hidden decisions, a subdued excitement that spoke of desperation. He spied out the barkeep and headed across the room, then dodged deftly as a scrawny, heavy-lidded man who feigned sleep at one of the tables tried to trip him without seeming to.

"It would seem that Hakiem does not like you," the big man behind the bar said.

Feltheryn had assumed his dodge deft enough that nobody would notice the interchange, but that was clearly not the case. The eyes of thieves, he reminded himself, were trained in much the same techniques as those of actors, to see and learn what was not always apparent.

"Now why should that be?" he asked, drawing out a small coin and putting in down.

"He views you as competition, King of Players," said the barkeep. "He is a storyteller in the streets. What will you drink?"

"Half water, half wine," said Feltheryn. "That is foolish of him, for he will be able to tell a thousand tales to each play I perform. And the stories we offer are different."

"Half water?" the barkeep asked, and his look was of the greatest contempt.

Feltheryn drew himself up tall, taller than the barkeep though not so broad or strong: taller than anyone in the room, though probably thinner than anyone as well.

"I am an old man, in case you have not noticed," he said with dignity. "My body does not move as quickly as it once did, nor do my guts digest as well. I will pay you as if the whole cup were wine."

That settled the matter and the barkeep gave him what he wanted.

"I will pay for something else as well," he said after he had taken a drink. "Something within your proper duties but which might be distasteful without the gold."