"Of course there isn't! You know he has the situation under control, no matter what it may look like! You've done something like it yourself! How many times have you gone among hundreds of enemies?"

"Yes, but not to defy them!"

"Neither does he! Interfere now, and they'll lose the faith in him that he's building! I know it's the most difficult thing in the world to do nothing, but that's what you must do!"

"Unless they jump him," Magnus muttered, and almost wished they would.

THE MOB ROARED around the two cousins, who stared, each marvelling that the other could be his kinsman. The ocean of sound washed about them until one voice pierced it: "Don't trust him! It's a trick!"

"Is there none who dares fight me?" Alain called. "Surely there must be, or you would not have come! Find at least one!"

But the crowd churned about him, their noise incredulous—then died suddenly, and a channel opened as men pressed back. At the end of that channel stood a man like a wall, six and a half feet tall with shoulders like a bull's, arms thick as an ordinary man's leg. "I dare!" he bellowed, and shook a seven-foot staff. "This is my weapon! Do you dare to fight me, princeling? Do you dare shed your armor and fight me with nothing but a staff?"

Twenty-Five

AT THE CITY GATE, CATHARINE TURNED IN A FURY. "Are you mad, Tuan? Our boy shall be slain!"

"I doubt it" Tuan returned, but his own face was taut with strain. "There is far less chance of death by staff than by swords—and our lad is well-trained."

"But if he were …"

"Then Diarmid would never forgive his slayer," Tuan said, "and the peasants would have far more to fear when you die, from a King who seeks to avenge his brother's death."

"They have not the wisdom to remember that!"

"They shall have no need to." Tuan took off his gauntlets and took her hand. "We must risk his hurt in this, as we had to risk it when he rode off to help his friends. How can he ever be King if he cannot rely upon himself?"

"But those were mere bandits and woodsrunners!"

"Is this opponent any more?" Tuan stroked her hand. "Courage, my sweet. The boy is well-trained and has faced worse enemies than this—and amazingly, he has reduced this conflict from a battle between armies to a bout with a quarterstaff."

Catharine stared at her son, stalking toward the huge peasant, and said, with a touch of awe, "So he has."

Then, tense with worry, she sat holding her husband's hand fiercely as she watched her son step forth to an apparent slaughter.

THE SENTRY WASN'T the only one by the southern river—a SPITE telepath stood within the forest border nearby. She heard the cacophony of the monsters invading and ran out of the trees—then froze, staring, horrified by the sight of the invading nightmares. She closed her eyes, shaking her head to free her from paralysis, and sent a thought north to Runnymede, to her fellow SPITE espers.

One of those telepaths was in the midst of the peasant army, right by the Mocker's elbow. "They've done it, chief! The dupe has invited the monsters in!"

"Then the telepaths will be too busy with them to help out in the battle."

"I dare fight you," Alain told the strapping peasant, "and I am delighted to see that at least one of my subjects has the courage to stand against me."

It was too much for Geoffrey. With a howl of anger, he charged the crowd. They pressed back with cries of alarm.

The Mocker raised his voice, calling out, 'Treachery! Charge him! Bury him! All of them, before they bury us all!" He knew his own psis would hobble any defenders, no matter how well armed.

The peasants answered with a roar of anger, and as Geoffrey rode in among them, dozens of hands seized his horse's harness. The brave beast screamed, trying to rear, but the weight of many peasants held him down. More peasants pressed in, hands reaching for Geoffrey—but the blades that thrust at him slowed and stopped inches short of his sides.

"Why can't they stab him?" the Mocker hissed. "What are our psis doing? Tell them to block the espers who are protecting him!"

"We're trying, Chief," the man at his other side said, face taut with strain, "but the royal psis are fighting us for all they're worth. We're deadlocked!"

"It's the Gallowglasses!" the Mocker hissed. "Why haven't they teleported south to fight the monsters?"

"I thank you, Sir Geoffrey!" Alain called out. "I had need of a squire. Will you unbuckle my armor, then?"

Geoffrey looked at the angry faces around him and swallowed. "Your highness, I shall."

Men pressed back to leave room as the knight slid down from his horse's back. He took a step or two away, then lifted his vizor to look at them impatiently. "Well, will none of you help me doff my own armor? How can I assist my prince with this weight of tin about me?"

The peasants stared in surprise. Then ten willing hands reached to help him unbuckle.

"Do not trust him!" a voice shrilled. "He is a warlock! He shall fell you with a thought!"

"I shall do no such thing!" Geoffrey shouted back in indignation. "I would be disgraced if I interfered in a duel!"

"If not him, the prince's wife!" another voice cried. "The High Warlock's daughter, the Princess Cordelia! Surely she shall not stand patiently to watch her husband slain!"

Geoffrey frowned, stilling, his gaze unfocused, and the men unbuckling him paused, staring in alarm at his face. Then his eyes came alive again; he gave them a curt not. "She gives her pledge that she too will withhold her power. She rages at me, but she will abide."

"You cannot trust him!" the voice screeched. "You cannot trust any lord."

Geoffrey stilled again, only his legs now armored. "Let him who would call me a liar come forth to meet me man to man, with our hands bare!"

The crowd was still, waiting expectantly, but the owner of the voice was silent. Geoffrey nodded and leaned down to unbuckle his greaves. Then, clad in only shirt and hose, he went to help Alain.

A few minutes later, Alain, too, stood in only shirt and hose. He looked about him, calling, "Who will lend me a staff?"

A dozen poles thrust at him. He tested one after another, nodding, and chose a stick of dark dense wood and inclined his head courteously to its owner. "I thank you." Then he stepped forward toward the big man with the seven-foot staff.

Geoffrey swallowed and remembered his word.

"THERE IS NO cause yet!" Allouette insisted. "I know it looks as though there is, but trust me, sister, this is truly a battle for men's minds, not their bodies—and your husband fights it like the expert he is!"

"How would you know?" Cordelia asked through clenched teeth.

"Because I was trained for this! Because I worked at it for five years! Trust me, sister—and trust him!"

Watching the woman he loved, Gregory marvelled. She didn't seem to realize the contradiction—that Cordelia should trust her because she had been trained to be a sub-verter—but she was right.

"If they harm one hair of his head," Cordelia said, "I shall burn their minds out where they stand!"

"Wait for more than one hair," Gregory advised.

"It is true." Allouette nodded. "He must let the big peasant strike him once, twice, or more, to win their respect!"

"How shall I know when he is truly in danger?" Cordelia cried.

"If they strike him down and he does not rally," Allouette explained. "So long as he rises again, he has them under his spell."

"You know a lot about spells, do you not?" Cordelia snapped, and instantly regretted it.

But Allouette seemed to take it as a mere statement of fact. "I do, so trust me in this. Withhold your might!"