Illyra pushed back her heavy hair with a thin hand. "Limner, I know what I have done," she said dully. "Take up your paints and I will give you the designs, for all the help that will be. I think the gift I abused has gone from me now."

Lalo shuddered, but his face remained implacable as he went to his worktable and began to unstopper the little jars of pigment. Gilla stared at him, for it was a face she had never seen her husband wear before.

"The Seven of Ores is called Red Clay, the card of the potter, the craftsman," Illyra began as Lalo picked up his brush. Then Latilla began to whimper, and Gilla forgot to listen to the S'danzo as she bent to comfort her child.

In the night the mobs began to drag the dead and their possessions into the streets to burn them, but the sight of scorching brocades or melting gilt was too much for many of the more lawless, so the devout took to firing houses without checking too closely to see whether anyone were left alive inside. Both the Stepsons and the Third Commando had their hands full trying to keep the flames from spreading into the mercantile section of town, while Walegrin and the garrison guarded the palace from shouting mobs who bayed for the deaths of Prince Kadakithis and the Beysib whore. By the time the sun rose like a red eye upon the horizon, the sky bore a pall reminiscent of wizard weather, but this evil came wholly from mortals, or perhaps from mortality.

When Lalo finally woke, it took a few disoriented moments for him to realize that his head was throbbing and his neck stiff not from fever, but from having slept slumped over his worktable, and that the gray light that filtered through the curtain was not the cool dimness of dawn, but a dreadful noon. With a groan he straightened, blinked, and looked around him.

On the worktable before him were the last of the S'danzo cards. Illyra lay still in her chair. For one shocked moment Lalo thought she was dead, and realized that the horror and hatred he had felt the night before had drained away, leaving only a hollow despair. Gilla sat by the couch like a monument, but at his movement her eyes opened, red-rimmed in her ravaged face.

"How-" The word came out as a croak, and Lalo swallowed, trying to make his voice obey him.

"She's still alive," said Gilla, "but she still bums." She looked at him apprehensively.

Lalo made it to his feet, remembering how he had felt when the Black Unicorn leaped off the wall, and went to her. The Unicorn had been the child of his pride, and it was only one, though the worst, of his sins over the years. But Gilla's only sin had been born of her despair. Perhaps it made them fit mates for each other, but he could hardly say that to her now.

Instead he rested his arm across Gilla's massive shoulders and began to softly stroke her hair. Latilla moved restlessly in her feverish sleep, then stilled again. She was flushed, and it seemed to him that her cheekbones had grown more prominent, so that he saw the skull beneath the skin. His arm tightened convulsively, and Gilla turned her face against his chest.

"You were right about the Unicorn," he said softly then. "But we got rid of it. We'll find some way to deal with this, too."

Gilla straightened and looked up at him, her eyes luminous with unshed tears. "Oh, you ridiculous man! You make me ashamed for all those years when I thought I was the only one with anything to forgive...." She took a deep breath and heaved herself to her feet.

"Yes, we'll do-something! But first we need to wash up and get some food!" The floor shook slightly as she strode to the door and called for the girl who had been waiting on them.

By the time they had finished eating, Lalo felt marginally more effective. In the distance the deep beat of temple drumming mingled with the confused roaring of the mob. Myrtis's servants said that the high priest of Us had agreed to perform a sacrifice for Dyareela when sunset came. It was hoped that the scent of bull's blood would appease the goddess and the mob. If it did not, the combined might of the garrison, the Stepsons, and the 3rd Commando might be insufficient to prevent royal blood from running where the bull's blood had flowed, and with such provocation, the Emperor was unlikely to wait until the New Year to "pacify" what was left of the town.

Lalo sat before his worktable, eyeing the bright array of cards. It was remarkable, considering his physical and mental state the night before, that they looked like anything at all. But the vision of the seeress had flowed through his hands, and he knew that these cards were artistically far superior to the ones the S'danzo had possessed before. He suppressed the flicker of pride that the thought gave him. He had no memory of painting them-any praise belonged to the power that had impelled his hand. And prettiness would not matter if they could not use the cards to undo the damage they had done.

"I tried to do a reading while you were both asleep," Illyra said when the girl had taken the dishes away. "It's no use, Gilla. The cards kept returning to the pattern we made with them before."

"Then we'll have to try something else," Gilla nodded de-terminedly.

"Lay them out in another pattern," said Lalo, "a pattern of healing this time."

"I did that too," said the S'danzo helplessly. "But there was no power in it. I could tell."

They did it again, and then another time, but Illyra had told them truly. The cards were no more than pretty pictures making a pattern on the tablecloth. The bright colors glowed mockingly in the lurid afternoon sun.

Illyra was sponging Latilla's face and chest. Lalo sighed, and cut the pack again. The card on top of the deck now was the Archway, a massive gate whose keystone was carved with an arcane symbol whose meaning even Illyra did not know. Beyond it was a mass of greenery, perhaps a garden. Lalo let his gaze unfocus, trying desperately to think of something else to do. Green vibrated in his vision, and he was abruptly aware of a tantalizing sense of familiarity.

He blinked, looked at the card again, and rubbed his eyes. With normal vision he could see nothing, but there had been something.... Gilla leaned forward to pour more water into his glass, and the movement of her arm triggered a sudden memory of a white arm pouring wine of Carronne from a crystal flagon into a goblet of gold-it had been the arm of Eshi, in the country of the gods.

"Lalo, what are you looking at?" Gilla asked.

"I'm not sure," he said slowly. "But I think I know where I might find out...."

"You can't go outside," said Illyra in alarm. "Listen!" Even from the Street of the Red Lanterns they could hear the tumult in the city, and Lalo shuddered.

"I don't mean to," he said simply. "I'm going to go inward, through there-" He pointed at the archway in the card. Illyra stared at him, bewildered, but in Gilla's face understanding began to dawn, and with it fear.

"If you mean to go into trance then I'm going with you to make sure you remember to come back again!" she said tartly. "I don't have the means to compel you the way I did before."

Lalo had no idea what she meant by that, but there was no time to question her now. "If you can, surely you have the right to," he told her, "if either of us can get there that way," he went on, doubting his own intuition suddenly. He propped the card up against the flagon so that they could, both see it, and pointed at the other chair.

It creaked as Gilla eased into it. She settled herself, her hands clasped firmly in her lap, then looked at Illyra. "If this works, don't let anyone disturb us, and in the name of your own Lillis, watch over my child!"