There’s more, too, isn’t there?’

‘Yes,’ Stragen admitted. ‘After what she did back in Matherion that night, I’m not about to let her get away from me. She’s one of the coolest and most courageous people I’ve ever met.’

‘Pretty, too.’

‘You noticed.’ Stragen sighed. Im afraid I’m going to end up being at least semi-respectable, my friend.’

‘Shocking.’

‘Isn’t it? First, though, there’s this other little matter I want to deal with. I think I’ll present my beloved with the head of a certain Astellian poet of our acquaintance. If I can find a good taxidermist, I may even have it stuffed and mounted for her.’

‘It’s the kind of wedding present every girl dreams of.’

‘Maybe not every girl,’ Stragen grinned, ‘but I’m in love with a very special lady.’

‘But there are so many of them, U-lat,’ Bhlokw said plaintively. ‘They would not miss just one, would they?’

‘I am certain they would, Bhlokw,’ Ulath told the huge, brown-furred Troll. ‘The man-things are not like the deer. They pay very close attention to the other members of the herd. If you eat one of them, they will know that we are here. Catch and eat one of their dogs instead.’

Is dog good-to-eat?’

‘I am not sure. Eat one and tell me if it is good.’

Bhlokw grumbled and squatted down on his haunches.

The process Ghnomb had called breaking the moments in two pieces’ produced some rather strange effects. The brightness of noon was dimmed to twilight, for one thing, and the citizens of Sopal seemed to walk about their town with a fast, jerky kind of movement, for another. The God of Eat had assured them that because they were present in only a small part of each instant, they had been rendered effectively invisible. Ulath could see a rather large logical flaw in the explanation, but the belief that the spell worked seemed to override logic.

Tynian came back up the street shaking his head. ‘It’s impossible to understand them,’ he reported. ‘I can pick up a word or two now and then, but the rest is pure gibberish.’

‘It is talking in bird-noises again,’ Bhlokw complained.

‘You’d better speak in Trollish, Tynian,’ Ulath said. ‘You’re making Bhlokw nervous.’

‘I forgot,’ Tynian admitted, reverting to the hideous language of the Trolls. I am –’ he groped. ‘What is the word that means that you want it that you had not done something?’ he asked their shaggy companion.

‘There is no such word, Tin-in,’ Bhlokw replied.

‘Can you ask Ghnomb to make it so that we can understand what the man-things are saying?’ Ulath asked.

‘Why? What does it matter?’ Bhlokw’s face was puzzled.

‘If we can know what they are saying, we will know which ones of the herd we should follow,’ Tynian explained. ‘They will be the ones who will know about the wicked ones.’

‘They do not all know?’ Bhlokw asked with some amazement.

‘No. Only some know.’

‘The man-things are very strange. I will talk with Ghnomb. He may understand this,’ He rose to his feet, towering over them. I will do it as soon as I come back.’

‘Where are you going?’ Tynian asked politely.

‘I am hungry. I will go eat a dog. Then I will come back and talk with Ghnomb.’ He paused. ‘I can bring a dog back for you as well, if you are also hungry.’

‘Ah – no, Bhlokw,’ Tynian replied. ‘I do not think I am hungry right now. It was good of you to ask, though.’

‘We are pack-mates now,’ Bhlokw shrugged. ‘It is right to do this.’ And he shambled off down the street.

‘It’s not really all that far,’ Aphrael told her sister as the two of them rode with Xanetia up out of the valley of Delphaeus toward the town of Dirgis in southern Atan, ‘but Edaemus is still reluctant to help us, so I think I’d better mind my manners. He might be offended if I start “tampering” in the home of his children.’

‘You’ve never used that word to describe it before,’ Sephrenia noted.

‘Sparhawk’s influence, I guess,’ the Child Goddess replied. ‘It’s a useful sort of term. It glosses over things that we don’t want to discuss in front of strangers. After we get to Dirgis, we’ll be well clear of the home of the Delphae. Then I’ll be able to tamper to my heart’s content.’

‘How long dost thou think it will take us to reach Natayos, Goddess?’ Xanetia asked. She had once again altered her coloration and suppressed her inner radiance to conceal her racial characteristics.

‘No more than a few hours – in real time,’ Aphrael shrugged. ‘I can’t quite jump us around the way Bhelliom does, but I can cover a lot of ground in a hurry when there’s an emergency. If things were really desperate, I could fly us there.’

Sephrenia shuddered. ‘It’s not that desperate, Aphrael.’

Xanetia gave her Styric sister a puzzled look.

‘It makes her queasy,’ Aphrael explained.

‘No, Aphrael,’ Sephrenia corrected, ‘not queasy – terrified. It’s a horrible experience, Xanetia. She’s done it to me about five times in the past three hundred years. I’m an absolute wreck for weeks afterward.’

‘I keep telling you not to look down, Sephrenia,’ Aphrael told her. ‘If you’d just look at the clouds instead of down at the ground, it wouldn’t bother you so much.’

‘I can’t help myself, Aphrael,’ Sephrenia told her.

‘Is it truly so disturbing, sister mine?’ Xanetia asked.

‘You couldn’t even begin to imagine it, Xanetia. You skim along with nothing but about five thousand feet of empty air between you and the ground. It’s awful!’

‘We’ll do it the other way,’ Aphrael assured her.

‘I’ll start composing a prayer of thanksgiving immediately.’

‘We’ll stay the night in Dirgis,’ Aphrael told them, ‘and then tomorrow morning we’ll run down to Natayos. Sephrenia and I’ll stay out in the woods, Xanetia, and you can go into town and have a look around. If Mother’s really being held there, we should be able to bring this little crisis to an end in short order. Once Sparhawk knows exactly where she is, he’ll fall on Scarpa and his father like a vengeful mountain. Natayos won’t even be a ruin any more when he’s done. It’ll just be a big hole in the ground.’