With a shake of her head, Malta rattled it free of dreams. A door out, she told herself. That was all she sought, a door out of the buried city.

The corridor ran on and on, past practice rooms and past the small shops of those who supported the artists of the theatre. That had been a costumer's shop, and this door had gone to a fine little drug den. Here was the wigmaker, and there was the paint - and - paste artist's shop. Gone, all gone, still and dead. This had been the beating heart of the city, for what art is greater than art that imitates life itself? Malta hurried past them, but inside her heart, the memories of a hundred artists mourned their own demise.

When she did see daylight ahead, it was so pale and gray, it seemed a cheat. The final stretch of the corridor was damaged. The light strip was gone, and their lantern failing. They would have to hurry now. The blocks that made up the walls had lost their plaster and frescoes. They bowed in, and gleams of water edged down them. Stains on the wall showed Malta that this corridor had been flooded, and more than once. Whenever the river was swollen with the rains, it probably filled these tunnels. It was only good fortune that the way was clear now. Even so, they waded through soft muck. Malta had long ago given up any care for her clothes, but both the Satrap and his Companion made dismayed noises as they squelched along behind her.

The verandah and boathouse that had once been the terminus of this corridor were now tumbled wreckage. There was no clear pathway. Malta ignored the protests of the others, and picked her way through, moving always toward the gray daylight ahead. Rains had washed dirt and leaves into what remained of the corridor. Some quake long ago had cleft both earth and corridor. “We're out!” Malta called back to them. She climbed over the remains of stacked boats, wriggled through the muddy cleft and suddenly stumbled out into early morning light. She drew breath after breath of the fresh air, rejoicing simply in the open space around her. She had not realized how being surrounded by dark and earth had oppressed her spirits until she stood clear of it. She stood clear, also, of all the whispering spirits. It was like wakening from a long and confusing dream. She started to rub her face, then stopped. Her hands were smeared and gritty. The few fingernails she had left were packed with mud. Her clothing clung to her in muddy rags. She discovered she had but one shoe on. Where and who had she been?

She was still blinking as the Satrap and his Companion emerged. They were a bit muddy, but not near as bedraggled as Malta. She turned to smile at them, expecting thanks. Instead, Magnadon Satrap Cosgo demanded, “Where is the city? What is the use of bringing us out of the wreckage to this forsaken spot?”

Malta gazed all around her. Trees. Sluggish gray water around the bases of the trees. She stood on a hump of tussocky ground in the middle of a swamp. She had lost all her bearings in her time underground. She oriented herself by the rising sun and looked for Trehaug. The forest blocked her view. She shrugged. “We're either upriver or downriver of it,” she hazarded to herself.

“As we seem to be on a tiny island, that seems a very safe thing to say,” the Satrap opined.

Malta climbed to higher ground for a better view, but it only confirmed his sour guess. It was not so much an island as a hummock in a swamp. She could not be sure which direction was the river channel and which led to swamp. The immense gray columns of the river trees extended as far as she could see in every direction.

“We'll have to go back,” she concluded, her heart sinking. She did not know if she could face those ranked ghosts again.

“No!” Kekki uttered the word with a little shriek, then sat flat on the ground. She began sobbing hopelessly. “I cannot. I will not go back into the dark. I won't.”

“Obviously we don't have to,” the Satrap observed impatiently. “We climbed over a number of little boats getting out. Maid, go back in and find the best one. Drag it out here, and row us back to the city.” He looked about in disgust, then drew a kerchief out of his pocket and spread it on the ground. He sat down on it. “I shall rest here.” He shook his head. “This is a poor way for these Traders to treat their rightful leader. They will regret their careless misuse of me.”

“Possibly. But not as much as we regret how we have allowed you to misuse us,” Malta heard herself say. She was suddenly angry with these ungrateful wretches. She had toiled through the night to guide them out of the tunnels, and this was her thanks? To be ordered to fetch a boat and row them to Trehaug? She shook out her ragged skirts and mocked a curtsey at the Satrap. “Malta Vestrit, of the Bingtown Traders, bids Magnadon Satrap Cosgo and his Companion Kekki farewell. I am not your servant to be put to your bidding. Nor do I consider myself your subject anymore. Good-bye.”