IF WE LIVE

 The winter slowly softened into spring. Thin films of water ran over the mushy ice in the rivers. The thaws got longer than the freezes, and the snow shrank back into shadowed pockets and odd hummocks. Wawee was paved with cold mud.

“We can go on up to the Hastab,” Kel said. “Soon as the mud dries a little. But what’re you planning on doing up there? Morik ain’t going to just hand your friends over. You get anywheres near him and you’ll be the ones handed.”

Plott nodded. “It’ll have to be by force and trickery.”

“Mostly trickery,” Kel said. “You ain’t got anywheres near the force part. I was thinking, maybe we’d run a little peddling train, maybe two wagons, the kind that goes round selling pots and pans, hammers and saws, needles and cloth, and the like. That way nobody’ll take notice of us moving up towards Ayventun. I got enough money to buy the wagons left over.”

“Lucky you just happened to have it left over,” Plott said dryly.

“Ain’t no luck about it. When you get to run a troop, you got to spend all your time scratching round to feed your soldiers, their horses, seeing to their tack, and paying them, and money, money, money to do it all. Hardly time to fight, you got to spend so much time on bullshit.”

“You need staff,” Plott said.

Kel was baffled. “You mean like a big stick?”

 As they went through the markets of Wawee, Plott explained how military staffing worked. They bought two wagons, all the wares they meant to peddle to the Hastab bands, and hired peddlers and tinkers. Plott and Kel were deep in logistics planning before they finished.

“Christ, chief,” Richard said. “Telling Kel Malin how to create a general staff is like giving him a nuclear weapon.”

“If I had a nuke, I would give it to him. We need him to win.”

They ran into Ivo, Moran’s chief scout.

“Hey, Ivo. What you doing here? Thought you’d be westbound with Yoakin and Moran.”

“I would’ve,” Ivo said. “But all Moran sees nowadays is that girl. She had some money, and bought two wagons. They’re partnering with Yoakin on his train.” He was embarrassed. “Don’t seem right somehow, being number three to those two.”

“I’ve got a job for you,” Kel said. “I’m putting together a couple of wagons to go up into the Hastab, like a peddling train to the bands.”

“You’re turning peddler?” Ivo was incredulous.

“Well no.” Kel explained his plan. “Was hoping you’d join us. You’re the best scout I know.”

“You’re fucking crazy! Why the hell should I join up with that?”

“Afterwards, we’ll be heading east. Won’t need the wagons anymore – they’re yours, and everything in them. You’re master from the day we roll.”

“Girl’s blood!” Ivo was silent for a moment. “I got a little coin. Maybe I could get a third wagon.” He grinned. “I’d roll more wheels than Moran and Beth.”

The little caravan rolled for the north. “Might even make some money,” Kel said. “From selling the trade-stuffs, I mean. With the big traders still holding their wagons for cause of the war, we’ve got a big swatch of the Hastab pretty much to ourselves. Be funny if this fake little caravan made an honest profit.”

“It won’t be funny if Morik catches us.” Richard indicated the women walking in the track of the wagons. “What would happen to them?”

 “Nothing worse than would happen if bandits got us. Or if one of the bands just thinks to steal everything and slave them. They’re traveling women. They go all over the world, walking behind the wagons, if they’re trading; or with their men if they’re soldiers’ women – whether it’s into battle or in chains; and lots of times you’ll see one with a kid on her back and another at her breast outmarch fellows that claim to be real tough fighting men. It’s a hard life, but they go right on and live it.”

The little caravan climbed up through the Starstab to Hastablen. The Hastab was the high steppe, as the Lastab was the low steppe; and some long-forgotten punster had imposed the name Stair Steppe on the innocent territory between. Peterson estimated that the southern edge of the Hastab was about five hundred meters above the northern part of the Lastab. At some time in the remote past, a titanic cataclysm had shoved the flat, rigid plate which was the Hastab above the Lastab. In those days, the eroded, rounded slopes they rode through must have been a series of high, jagged cliffs.

Kel said the Hastab was more rolling than the Lastab. It sloped evenly down to the northern ocean. “Fifty days’ ride to cross it any which way you go, and nothing in all that great distance but one town, one big river, and grass. Sounds damned dull — but it sure don’t feel that way. “

 As they traveled, Richard noticed a yellowish tinge on the freshening green of the whipgrass. He saw that the top of each stalk was exuding a golden, pollen-like dust. A rather grudging concession to the season, Peterson remarked — if you considered only the single stalk. But there were trillions of those stalks. A shimmer of sun-yellow lay on the gray green Hastab, rolling under the wind-rush of the spring.

The austere land sprang to life. Countless tiny insects appeared to feed upon the golden pollen of the whipgrass. A lesser infinity of bird-like creatures swarmed in to consume the insects, and small predators chased the birds. Peterson, intent on being the Uman Linnaeus, pursued insects, insect-eating birds, and bird-eating predators alike. He inspected his captures and pigeon-holed them into the classification system he was working up. He said that the pseudo-birds’ feathers were actually fine hairs fused into thin, fuzzy-edged scales. An interesting adaptation: no doubt the refractive grooves formed in the scales by their hairy origins explained the rainbow iridescence of their colors.

Fluffy white clouds towered in a sky of endless blue. Sometimes they darkened the remote horizons with cool rain squalls; their deep shadows moved ponderously over the great plain. In the evening the galaxy rising in the east began to shine down before the sun was fully set. “Ain’t it something?” Kel said. “Now you can see why I spent so many years here. This Stablen’s the hardest, meanest land in the world; but if you don’t watch out, it’ll swallow you right down.”

“It’s beautiful,” Plott admitted. “But when are we going to get to the river? Where are the people?”

“You won’t be seeing any people in this part. We ought to hit the river tomorrow or the next day, and then we’ll get down to work.”

Ivo scouted toward the river. “There’s a little trading post there. The boss’s got two, three slaves working for him. And…”

Ivo glanced at Richard and Plott. “There was some Hastab men there trading. They said he’s got a strange foreign woman he slaved. Keeps her in a strong room in the back. Beats and fucks her ever’ night.”

“How many guards?” Kel asked.

“None. Hastab men say Morik outlawed banditry. So, he let his guards go.”

“Stupid fucker. His cheapness is going to cost him. What kind of building?”

 “There’s a fair-sized building with sod walls and a thatch roof. The thatch’s covered with clay and the walls is pretty thick. Like So.” Ivo held his hands about a meter apart. “Only two doors in the place, front and back. There’s stockades on both sides of the building and some little shacks out back.”

“We’ll rush it,” Kel said. “Ivo, you take your boys and gallop right in, bust through the doors and keep them open. Me and Richard’ll armor up and be as close as we can.”

“I have to go too,” Plott said. His voice was strained.

Kel considered him. “All right. Go at whatever pace you can manage. Don’t try to keep up. You’re an even worse rider than Richard.”

They cantered together towards the trading post. “Gonna go now, boss,” Ivo said.

“Just go fast,” Kel said. “Let me and Richard do the fighting.”

The scouts kicked their horses to a gallop. They whooped and hollered as they bolted toward the station. They were so much faster than the big warhorses that they got to the trading post before Richard could see it. He and Kel went through a last patch of undisturbed whip grass and saw Ivo going through the trading post door. It was a small version of a Nakalyn building set on a dusty yard near the river.

“Hurry,” Kel said. He jumped off his horse and ran through the door, pulling his sword.  Richard followed. Ivo was holding a group of people at bay with his saber. Three were dressed in rags. The fourth wore a long Nakalyn style kaftan.

“You’re going to be sorry you’ve done this,” he said. “The Kepta’s outlawed banditry on the Hastab.”

Kel ignored him. “Pile everything worth taking in the yard. Richard, find that woman.”

In the back of the building he found a small, dingy cell. A woman was moaning inside. Richard saw someone huddled in a corner. She was wrapped in a grubby blanket, but he saw her black hair and ivory skin. “Ema?”

She looked at him. Richard touched her shoulder. “Ema…”

Her eyes were blank. She turned her face to the wall. The dirty blanket slipped from her shoulders. Her naked body was covered with welts and old bruises.

“Christ. Are you here, Chief? Come here. Come here quick.”

Plott came in. “Akiyama. Look at me, Akiyama.”

Ema turned her head. Plott looked just as he had always looked. He had managed to keep himself neatly barbered, and his blue Valener jacket looked something like a chief engineer’s uniform coat.

“Chief?” Ema’s voice quavered. Her face crumpled.

 Richard stepped out to get her a kaftan from a stock he had seen in the warehouse. When he came back, she was sobbing and clinging to Plott’s hand. She cringed when she saw Richard. He took off his helmet and spoke to her. But she wouldn’t look away from Plott’s face. Richard and Plott lifted her to her feet and pulled the kaftan over her head. She tottered as if she hadn’t walked in months.

He went back into the common room. Kel was interrogating the trading post boss. Richard drew his sword and brought it down on the boss’s neck in one swift motion. The boss fell forward. Arterial blood spurted from his neck.

Kel jumped back to avoid the blood. “Why the hell did you do that? He hadn’t told me anything yet.”

 “He had Ema. He had my girlfriend in there. She can hardly stand up. “

  “Oh. I’m sorry, son. That’s real hard. Guess I’d’ve done the same… On the good side, you finally learned to make the big draw and cut.”

The three other people huddled in a corner, staring at Richard and his sword: a crippled old man, a woman, and a young girl.

“What happened to you, Dad?” Kel asked.

“Tried to run,” The old man said. “He cut my heel cords.”
            Kel nodded. “Well, I can’t leave you here, where you might be made to tell what happened. So you’re going to be traveling people, from now on.”

The woman knelt in front of Richard. She kissed his boot. “Thank you. I was the one that piece of shit fucked and beat, ‘for he got that pale girl.”

“He got any coin hid around here?”

The three slaves showed Kel a strong box hidden in a wall.  They returned to the caravan. Ema rode in Plott’s lap, her head pressed against his shoulder.

“Seems like you lost another woman,” Kel said. “She’ll hardly let go of him.”

Plott and Ema were riding on a wagon gate. She slept with her head in his lap.

“Plott always loved her,” Richard said. “But he’s ex-military: the rule is you don’t sleep with the people you boss. And Plott always follows the rules.”

“Strange rule,” Kel said. “I feel like people’re going to fuck, no matter what.”

 Kel, Richard, and Plott went to reconnoiter Ayventun. Kel told them about the strange city of the keptas. “The damndest place you ever saw. The part where we’re going first, on the west bank of the river, is sort of like a big trading station, with inns, storehouses, and the like; but you can’t so much as step foot on the east bank, where the regular town is, without what they call a badge. Nobody’s allowed to stay overnight there but the people that live there, and they’re all slaves. Except for a few that live in the castle, every man, woman, and child in the place belongs to the kepta. They say the old-time keptas used to sell off some of the boys and girls when they needed money: just line everybody up and pick off whatever number was wanted. “

“Sounds hellish,” Plott said.

 “Well, it is hellish strange. It’s a funny-looking place, with all the buildings like the ones in Nakaly, every one just the same, and all laid out like tents in an army camp: in straight rows and squares. Only it ain’t nearly so bad as you’d think. There’s thousands of the slave people, but none of them is new at it: they’ve been there for hundreds of years, from when Aykay the Butcher carried them off from Nakaly. All they know is Ayventun and the Hastab they see around, so they get the idea they’re pretty well off. And as slaves lives go, I guess maybe they’re right.”

 Richard saw something against the horizon. “What’s that?” It looked like a mesa or butte.

Kel squinted. “That’s the castle. We’re a little bit closer than I figured. “

 “But – we can’t even see the rest of the town…”

Kel grinned. “Yeah. It’s that big.”

 As they rode the castle loomed larger and larger. When they got close enough to see its regular, man-made shape, it looked as if it were a nearby Nakalyn building of ordinary size. The flat, featureless Hastab made it hard to estimate distances. But they rode and rode, and the castle kept getting bigger and bigger. Richard and Plott were unable to take in its grotesque size until they saw the rooftops of the city rise above the horizon.

The town stood on a bend in the river. It flowed around some obstacle in its bed and returned to its northerly course. The looping eddies had etched a large bay out of the earth of the eastern bank. The quiet piece of water was half covered with trade boats. A thin belt of old, mismatched buildings surrounded the arc of the bay. The old town, Kel said. The old castle, a rambling brick structure, stood on the southern headland of the bay. The new castle, the castle, loomed mountain-like behind it.

“When Aykay the Butcher took Nakaly, he carried off thousands of people and all sorts of loot to Ayventun. In those days, the place was just the old castle and some storehouses; nothing else but what’s here.” Kel waved a hand at the ocean of grass around them. “The Big Empty. Nowhere for those people to live, nothing for them to do, and nothing to do with them, after killing the men and raping the women started to get a little dull. So Aykay gets the idea of using them to build the castle: a place so big and strong no army could ever take it. He died before he could hardly get started, so his nephew Haral the Builder took it over. He also made the rest of the city, laying it out in that funny way, and it was him made the law that none but slaves could ever live in it — which seems like real sense to a Hastablener, as they figure city people’re all like slaves anyway. So the Hastableners never picked up city ways, staying just what they’ve always been: ignorant, murdering scum. And the slaves didn’t get any ideas from seeing a lot of free people around. They came to think that being a slave was the natural, right thing to be.”

They had ridden within sight of the buildings on the west bank. Kel peered at the banners flying above the town. “Look there, Richard. Are those green flags?” Richard said they were. “Then we’re on time. Green flags means it’s a fair day. When the fair’s on you can get a badge to go over the river and look at the town. “

 They rode through the tents of the fair-going Hastableners and stabled their horses. Plott wanted to cross the river and look at the castle, but Kel said they should make a show of enjoying the fair. “Wouldn’t be natural if we didn’t see the sights and maybe take a look at the horse races. They have some damn good races here, with any amount of money, livestock, and women bet on them. “

The fair swarmed with people. Hastableners stalked around with terrific arrogance, but they seemed uneasy among all the citified strangers. The Nakalyns were there on business – they were always on business. The city people, conspicuous in gray knee-length smocks, wandered excitedly around buying cheap trinkets and laying small bets with the bookmakers. “They let some of them come over for the fair,” Kel said. “And give ’em a few coin to spend. They think it’s a hell of a big thing.” He urged them in the direction of the racetrack. They didn’t want to look unnatural, did they?

“What are those girls doing?” Richard nodded at a procession of young girls. Kel was eyeing the girls too. “Just going to the races like everybody else. But they don’t let the poor things out by themselves, so ever’ time they’re away from their home band they have to troop ’round in mobs like that, with their mamas trying to keep the boys away. Which they have a hard time doing. See the way the boys follow them around?”

“Pretty hard not to.” A column of boys and young men was convoying the girls to the racetrack. The boys had exchanged their practical, handsome leathers for all manner of garish finery. They wore enormous sombreros with dangling tassels, billowing pantaloons, and short, tight jackets decorated with shiny gewgaws. The girls pretended to ignore their peacock escort, but they tended to drift into the aisle separating them from the boys.

Richard pursed his lips in a silent whistle. “Look there.” He indicated a young woman. Like most of the Hastablener women, she wore a loose, pajama-like outfit; but hers was nearly sheer. She was encrusted with fine gilt chains. Rough-cut gems hung from her neck, waist, wrists, and ankles; the straps and edges of her sandals were covered with gold foil. ” A rather barbaric effect – but not at all bad. “

“Watch out, fool,” Kel hissed. “That’s a married woman. That nasty-looking fellow with her’ll be her husband.” Kel hurried Richard and Plott away. “You could’ve gotten us killed. When they’re wearing a veil like that it means they’re married, and you can’t stare at them; not so anybody notices, anyway. Specially if they’re coated with gold and jewels like that one. Her man must be a powerful chief.”

 “He shouldn’t complain if people stare. You can hardly help it.”

 “He oughtn’t to, maybe. But he would. Did you see how the top of his saber stuck out of the sheath? That means he thinks he’s a hell of a killer and is sort of on the look-out for somebody to cut. Somebody like riffraff slavering over his gold covered wife.”

“When are we going across the river?” Plott asked. “Haven’t we been over here long enough to be natural?”

“Guess we’ll have to go now,” Kel said. “If we went to the races, stud here might run into that fellow with the saber.”

 They took the ferry across the river. A functionary wrote their names on a slate and gave them day-pass badges. They were told to wear them at all times and return them before nightfall – or else. The badges were ceramic discs glazed with colored patterns. “They got a whole bunch of these things,” Kel said. “With different colors and shapes on them. They change ’em every day, to keep people from trying to stay in town with them. The slave people’ve got bits of leather sown to their clothes, with squiggles showing what work they do. The bosses, constabs, and soldiers wear brass badges pinned to their belts.”

 Plott inspected his badge. “Sounds even worse than the navy. Isn’t anyone allowed to go without a badge?”

“Sure,” Kel said. “The little kids, that go without anything in the hot weather, and the kepta.”

The ferry let them off near the old castle. They walked through the old town, which looked like a Nakalyn city but smelled better. “Old Haral the Bugger, the kepta before Morik, was real fussy about stuff like that. Always laying down some law about where people was to shit, sending out gangs to haul away garbage, and all. Seemed to have a real tender nose for bad smells. Which was strange, when you consider where he liked to put his cock.”

They left the confused jumble of the old town. Kel marveled again at the freakishly straight streets of the new city. Richard and Plott smiled. The bizarre regularity Kel wondered at was a simple grid plan. Brick sidewalks edged the broad streets; they even had real gutters and drains. The streets were dirt, but they were coated with some tarry substance to keep the dust down. Every other intersection had a cistern or well for drinking, washing, and firefighting. The walls of the buildings were white-washed halfway up — to show people trying to sneak around after dark, Kel said. Iron brackets on the corners held torches ready for the night.

A loud, hollow booming made Plott and Richard jump. “Just the gong,” Kel said. “Big sheet of iron they got back at the old castle. They beat on it to tell the people when to work, eat, and like that.”

 Gray-smocked people poured out of the buildings. Kel, Richard, and Plott pushed through the sudden crowd, extricating themselves from a swiftly formed queue. A kind of shower-wagon had been set up over a cistern in one of the squares. A gang of men worked pump-handles, driving water through a perforated pipe which protruded from the back of the wagon. The people pulled their clothes off and ducked under the water. They strolled casually around the square, unselfconsciously drying themselves in the bright sunlight.

 A regular dado of wet, naked factory girls stood along one wall. They were combing out their hair and chattering vivaciously. Kel, Richard, and Plott looked at the girls. The girls looked back and giggled. “Sweet life,” Kel muttered. “We better go look at that castle quick, or I ain’t going to be able to hold myself back.”

They left the square with some reluctance. “That’s another thing old Haral did to keep the stink down,” Kel said. “But you see what I mean about these people thinking they’re well off and being partly right. What other slaver would let them wash off every day?  When I worked in this town, I used to tell them that we did pretty well at home without a kepta to own us and tell us what to do, but they just couldn’t see how that’d work out. “

Richard and Plott weren’t listening. They had come to the sudden, sharp edge of the town. “There she is,” Kel said. It was the most unnecessary remark Richard and Plott had ever heard. The castle stood before them, alone on a great stretch of open ground. It was exactly the same shape as the ubiquitous and functional Nakalyn buildings. Its walls sloped inward at the same angle, and their height and width had the same proportion to its square base. Kel said that it was made entirely of stone; the great ashlars used in the lower courses were fitted together without mortar. No cement known could stand the immense weight of the upper storeys. The sides of the great mountain-building were surfaced with smooth, carefully fitted slabs. The snow-white stone glared in the sun.

“Well,” Richard said. “I guess we’re not going to take it by storm. “

 Kel laughed. “Morik himself couldn’t take it with every man in the Hastab. Even I couldn’t take it, and I know more about forts than he ever will. Guess you could starve it out, if you had a good-sized army and four-five years to do it in.”

Plott shook his head. “If it’s built the way you say it is, you couldn’t take it with attack lasers. All you could do is nuke it flat. “

“Well, I wish we had some of those nukes you talk about. Because that place needs flattening. After they got it built, it looked like it was going to keep the keptas quiet, as most of them was scared to leave the place for fear somebody’d sneak in behind them and close them out. They say Krishim the Timid wouldn’t hardly even leave his room. But Morik’s as tough and smart as any kepta has ever been, and he ain’t afraid of nothing. With that thing to use as his base, a whole town of slaves to make weapons for him, and the whole north to gather fighting men from, it’s hard to see how to stop him from doing just what he wants to do.”

 Kel pointed out other features of the monstrosity. The castle was backed against the river. A high dike of earth arced around it and many acres of open grass, making a semicircle chorded by the river. The field inside the dike was the Kepta’s Yard, the pasture of the monarch’s personal horses. All the land for a day’s ride in every direction was constantly patrolled by the kepta’s soldiers.

“You see that top row of windows?” Plott and Richard squinted. The windows looked like tiny scratches on the castle’s slick, smooth surface. “Himself lives in that near corner, and all his women in the same row. They call it the honeycomb, because that’s where the kepta keeps his honeys; which I thought was pretty good the first time I heard it. But they hardly ever let the poor things out of there. The second and third rows down is where the kepta’s biggest and best prisoners is kept, and also some of his relations; the relations is mainly prisoners too. That’s where I figure your people’ll be – right there under Morik’s eye.”

 “I’ve seen enough,” Plott said. “Let’s get out of here.”

They walked back into town. “The whole rest of that north wall is full of soldiers. Back in the old days there used to be a lot of Valens working to guard the kepta, but they’re all Morik’s Personals now; the Blacks, they call them, from the black armors they wear. There’s a regular army of them, and another army of constabs, the slave-soldiers that guard the town. And there’s a sizable town of other people that live in the castle: clerks for running all the Hastab and Nakaly, and all the people it takes to run the castle itself, and all their women and kids.”

   Plott listened with increasing gloom. “Do you think we can get my spacers out?”               

  “Ain’t likely, Plott. I stole a slave girl out of there back when I worked for the Bugger, but she wasn’t guarded. We’ll think on it, though. Really be something if we could pull it off. “

 The people around them were drifting back to their workplaces in the buildings. They suddenly stilled, listening to something Kel and the two spacers had missed. It came again: a blare of horns. The crowd rushed out of the street Kel and the others were walking through. The people packed themselves into intersecting streets. Kel, Richard, and Plott were caught in the crush. The street was cleared. Four horsemen cantered past. They blew horns at each intersection, making a chord in a whining minor key. A large body of light cavalry followed the horn-blowers. Some had arrows nocked. They stared at the people with exaggerated suspicion. Others beat crowd-bulges back into intersecting streets with lances.

Richard and Kel hunched to hide their conspicuous height. “I get it,” Kel said. “Here come the Blacks.”

 Richard saw them. They rode past in tight, neatly dressed formations. Every troop was mounted on horses of a different color. Each man was armored in black scales and leathers. They ignored the admiring and slightly fearful crowd.

A bannerman went past. The square flag he carried showed a gray horse running on a black and green background. “There he is, the man himself.” Morik rode between two gray-horse troops. Richard didn’t need to be told that the grays were the elite of the elite. Nobody needed to be told which Morik was.

He was a slight young man with jet black hair. He wore the same black gear as the soldiers, but his head was bare. He grinned and waved to his cheering people. Morik was handsome almost to prettiness. His eyes were a striking amber. He seemed to radiate power and vitality.

 “Ain’t he something?” Kel didn’t grudge his admiration. “That little fellow can charm the fuzz onto whipgrass, himself into any woman alive, and almost any man in the world into following him. I’ve met some dangerous men in my life, but I don’t believe any of them had as much dangerousness in their whole bodies as Morik can manage with his mouth alone. “

 A group of ragged men, women, and children followed Morik and his horsemen. Soldiers drove them lances. “Squatters,” Kel explained. “Tried to live in town without badges. They drive them outside the boundary and go at the men with lances. Stick them, ride them down, and the like.”

“And the women and children?” Plott asked.

 “They slave any women they want. Anybody that likes can go out and pick some up, slave them, kill them, do whatever they want. The rest they drive out onto the empty.”

 “What a hell of a place,” Plott said’ “That’s just the perfect touch. “

The crowd dispersed. Kel and the spacers took the ferry to the west bank. He looked back at the vast bulk of the castle. “You know what? Morik ain’t at home! We just saw him ride out, and I know where he’s going to.”

Plott was puzzled. “What do you mean?”

“Think how we knew about your Ema. The Hastab men told Ivo about her. They go back to trade again, and everybody’s gone – or really, really dead. They’re going to run to tell Morik’s people. Soon as he hears about the strange foreign woman, the cunning little bastard’ll know it was us. He’s rode south to catch us.”

 They rejoined the caravan. Kel sent Ivo into Ayventun to try to find out where the spacers were being held.

 “And it was easy,” Ivo reported. “Seems like Morik’s set hundreds of people to working for Richard and Plott’s friends, and the whole town’s talking about them and the strange stuff they’re doing. I just hung ’round and listened, and right off I heard that they was staying in the castle all the time, and living high up in the north wall, right under the honeycomb.”

“Then I went out to watch the wagons hauling stuff into the castle, and it was just the way you said, Kel. They stopped the wagons to see whether the fellows driving them was ones they knew, but they didn’t look inside the wagons or anything. You could sneak in the castle pretty easy, if you could get one of the teamsters to let you in his wagon. But I was scared to ask an Ayventuner to do a thing like that, as it seemed like to me they’d be sure to tell on us.”

 “They ain’t Ayventuners,” Kel said. “The slave people ain’t any good with stock, so they bring in all the teamsters and such from other places.”

 “Yeah, I found that out. I was standing outside of the big food storehouse where all the wagons was coming from, trying to figure out some good, safe way to ask a teamster to smuggle us into the castle, when this fellow whipped his team out; and just from the way he was cussing his mules, I knew him for a west Lastab man. I followed him till we could talk, thinking more to ask him what he was doing in Ayventun than to get him to do the job; but the very first words I said, he was on me to help him get back to his home band. Said he was slaved by this Nakalyn trader, but he couldn’t get away ’cause they lock up all the horses on the east bank, and he couldn’t swim to get over to the other side.”

Kel nodded. “Think we can trust him?”

“Seems like it to me. I wouldn’t ask this Lon to do more than just drive you in, as he ain’t the smartest fellow I ever met; but I know he’s what he says he is. Nobody in the world but those people from up near the break of the Starstab talks in the mush-mouf way he does.”

Kel considered it. “When’s the next time he takes a load into the castle?”

 “Two days from now. Long about noon, he said.”

One night later Kel and Richard were floating down the river. They carried their clothes and weapons in the inflated bladders they were using as water wings. Ropes linked them to Plott and a select band of scouts. “Watch out,” Kel whispered. “Here comes the castle. Jerk the rope to warn the others. “

They eased themselves off their bladders. Richard saw the huge facade of the castle go by. The river whipped them around the southern point of its bay. It swirled them towards the eastern shore. They swam slowly and cautiously through clots of moored boats. Kel took a long look around and led them out of the water. They scrambled onto the flat roof of the warehouse used by Lon’s owner, put their clothes on, and waited. At noon Lon unlocked a trapdoor. He snuck them down through the warehouse to his wagon. They were covered with a tarpaulin and jammed in with a cargo of big round cheeses. They feasted on them during the long ride. They felt the wagon strike an incline. It was the levee around the Kepta’s Yard. They stopped grubbing in the cheeses and reached for their knives. If the constabs guarding the yard lifted the tarpaulin, maybe to steal a cheese… Kel shrugged in the cheesy darkness. Nothing they could do.

 The wagon kept on going. Lon had been making deliveries for years. The wagon rolled across the Kepta’s Yard to the castle gate. Lon stopped and explained his business. Then they were in.

Lon backed his wagon into a deeply shadowed arch. Kel, Richard, and the others climbed out of the wagon and crept through tunnels cut into the castle’s cyclopean foundations. They hid in an unused storeroom. They talked in whispers, smelled the thick, dank reek of the cellars, and waited. Richard put his ear to the wall and heard a dim murmuring, the sound of the river sliding by in its nearby bed. Occasionally they heard people talking somewhere in the tunnels; hissing sibilants echoed in the stony hallways. But the unseen speakers never came close.

After a very long time, Kel sent one of the men out to see what time it was. He returned and said that it was early afternoon. The others said there must be something wrong with his eyes; or maybe a whole day and night had passed, and it was the next afternoon’s light he had seen. Kel waited some more and sent a second man. He said it was nearing sunset. “All right,” Kel said. “‘We’ll chance it. Now remember, we’re slaves – sort of slump along with your heads down.”

They slumped along to the courtyard entrance. Richard looked out from the sheltering gloom of the doorway. Stable Blocks filled in the corners of the castle’s square courtyard. The cross-shaped open space was the Kepta’s Path: two broad, intersecting avenues running between the centers of opposite walls. Richard was standing near the center of the west wall.

The dull boom of the iron gong thudded out from the old castle, telling the city that the working day was over. It was echoed by the new castle’s bronze bell. “That’s it,” Kel said. “Let’s go.” He led them out onto the north-south branch of the Kepta’s Path. Richard heard a shuffling hum, the sound of the castle’s population rushing to supper. Workmen, grooms, and servant women came out of the stable blocks and crossed the courtyard, hurrying to their messes in the south wall. Kel, Richard and the others joined the crowd.

Richard went into a large hall. The covering mass of people funneled through doors to either side: most of the castle’s messes were on the first floor. Richard went straight ahead. A flight of stairs rose into the darkness above the hall. A few dim figures were already going up. Richard saw Kel’s large shape among them.

The second and third floors seemed to be taken up by barracks. As Richard went up the stairs, a body of men came rushing out of an almost invisible doorway. Richard stepped aside and let them go past. None of them looked at him; the unlighted stairwell was so dark that they might not have seen him. Richard saw Kel waiting and hurried over. “I thought the whole castle was after me.”

“A punishment squad late for supper ,” Kel said. “More likely they’d foot you under than catch you.” They climbed up to the castle’s roof. It was a forest of chimney pots of all sizes and shapes, with sinkholes made by ventilation shafts and skylights, and rocky outcroppings formed by domes and barrel vaults. Broad walkways ran behind the chest high walls at the outer and inner edges of the roof, but Kel led them into the masonry  jungle.

 A party of armed men came up to the roof. They marched down the walkways in pairs.  “”Constabs,” Kel whispered. “They guard the south, west, and east walls. The corner of the north wall where himself lives is guarded by the Personals; but there ain’t any man but the kepta himself allowed on top of the rest of the north wall, because that’s where the honeycomb is. It’s blocked off by high fences, but they ain’t all that hard to get over. When I first come to work here, there was stories that the women in the honeycomb liked to come out on their roof to sun themselves. So me and some of the other fellows snuck up to the fence and stood on one another’s shoulders to peek over, hoping to get a good look at all the beautiful girls the kepta was supposed to have. We didn’t see anybody at all, but it showed me how easy it’d be to get onto the honeycomb – though I never thought I’d be crazy enough to really try it.”

Kel watched the roof guards until they settled into a bored routine. Then he and the others crept through the chimney pot forest. They clambered over oddly humped bits of roof, squeezed between tightly packed chimneys, and dared the dark, irregularly spaced air shafts. Skylights and windows set in domes gave them intriguing glimpses of the castle’s people. Kel had to shoo his men away from an especially diverting window. He stared down for a long moment and joined Richard. “Sweet life,” he muttered. “It’s a wonder there ain’t a whole crowd of people up here seeing the sights. If they catch us, maybe we can say we was just peeping.”

 They reached the barrier dividing the west wing from the honeycomb. It was a high stone wall tipped with iron spikes. Kel and Richard stood against the wall and helped one of the men climb to the top. He pressed a board onto the sharp spikes. The rest of the party followed him over. Richard climbed up Kel’s back and reached down to haul him to the top.

 They walked over the roof of the honeycomb to the wall that separated  it from the roof of Morik’s personal apartments. Plott looked over the side of the building. The regular openings of the dark window showed against the white stone. “The guards could see you when you climb down to those windows.”

 Kel nodded. “They might. But we’re going when their backs’re turned. Richard, you’re the tallest. Climb up on this dome thing till you can just see over the wall… Count your pulse for as long as they do a turn.”

Richard could see the guards’ path running just behind the edge of the parapet. Two men with spears turned the corner of the east face of the building, marching in step down the north wall. Richard counted his pulse. The guards disappeared behind the nearby wall. He heard them do a formal about-face, thumping their spear butts into the stone pathway. They appeared beyond the wall and marched east. Richard counted till they were out of sight.

“One hundred and twenty beats,” he said.

“Plenty of time,” Kel said. “Tell me when they start their next turn.”

They belayed a rope around a convenient chimney and fed it over the outer side. Richard signaled Kel. He went over the side. After a long pause, the rope whipped against the wall. All clear. As the counter, Richard went last.

He pulled himself through the window. A dim oil lamp showed him Kel and his men. And a young woman.

Kel introduced her. “Miry Ayvens. Morik’s…”

“Cousin,” she said.

Richard and the others couldn’t see her very well, but they could sense her determination. “If you’re trying to get those people from above the sky, I’ll help you if you’ll get me out of here.”

“Deal,” Kel said. “Where are they?”

“Right under us. At first, I was living on the floor under Morik’s own sleeping place. But they moved me ‘cause they were putting those people in the second row; the ones they say come from above the sky. I hear he’s treating them real good, but they’re locked just like me.”

Kel pushed on the door. “This let out into Morik’s own place? You notice what kind of lock it has on it?”

“Big iron hook. Goes into like an iron slot on the door frame.”

“Who’s got the thinnest knife?” One of the Lastablener scouts had a dagger worn down to a sliver by generations of honing. Kel slipped it between the door and the frame. He pushed the door open. “Same kind of latch they had when I was here before.”

They walked into a suite of imperial elegance. “Leave that stuff alone!” Kel said sharply. We got to find these people first. You can steal some stuff on the way out.”

“His place is in the very corner,” Miry said.

Morik’s room was more austere than the rest of his apartments. Miry pulled back a rug in the center, revealing a trapdoor.

“Unlocked,” Kel said. “Looks like he’s been using this one.”

They went down into an apartment of several rooms. It was empty, but they found a black coverall with thin silver rings on the cuff: a second officer’s work uniform. “Second Officer Mele’s,” Plott said. “But where is she?”

“Maybe with Morik,” Kel said. “I believe he’s rode out to catch a certain bunch of raiders that stole a strange foreign woman from a Nakalyn trading post. He’ll have done everything he can to find out what happened to every one of you, so he wouldn’t have much trouble guessing where you and Richard are. It figures that he’d take this Mele along, hoping she could talk you two into giving in.”

“Yes,” Plott said. He looked at the ladder to Morik’s rooms. It was new, but the rungs were scuffed. “Apparently they’ve gotten friendly… Let’s go back up and look for more doors. Maybe we can find some of the others.”

 They found many doors, but only one opened onto the lower floor. They pulled it up and looked down into the bedroom of Peter and Helen Sandow, a husband-and-wife team of exo-agronomists. Plott eagerly awakened the surprised Sandows, but it was an awkward meeting. The Sandows didn’t want to leave the castle. “Morik protects us,” Sandow said. “He’s given us facilities for our work and the best quarters in the castle. He seems to understand everything we tell him, and he wants to use our knowledge to develop his country. He’s a good man.”

Miry was listening. “What’s he saying? That Morik’s good?”

Richard translated for her. “You two there. You understand the way I talk? You say Morik’s good? Maybe he is for an Ayvens and a Hastab Kepta. But I used to have any number of cousins, uncles, and half-brothers. He killed them all. He locked all the women he’s related to in the castle.”

“I’m not going,” Helen said. “I don’t care what you say. If Morik really did things like that it was because he had to. This is a terrible world. Before Morik came for us, those men were raping all the women. They took some of us every night. They killed the men who tried to stop them. And they… They hurt us.”

Sandow’s face was haunted. “Second Officer Mele told us we should help Morik. And we’re supposed to obey the highest-ranking officer, aren’t we? Isn’t that the law? Mele says that the combination of our knowledge and Morik’s resources could be the start of real civilization here. She says that Morik’s a genius.”

 Plott was troubled. “Mele’s the senior officer? What happened to the others? The captain…”

“They killed him,” Helen said. “Everybody who fought back. The captain tried to stop them from taking the women.”

“What’re they saying?” Kel asked. Richard explained. “This Mele’s the boss? Ask them if Morik’s laid her. Is she in love with him?”

 “What difference does that make?” Sandow said. He seemed uneasy. “Mele’s admiration for Morik is perfectly understandable. For someone of his background he’s done remarkable things.”

Kel nudged Richard. “This ain’t working out,” he whispered. “We’ve got to get out of here quick. Talk to them.”

“Look, chief,” Richard said. “We’ve got to go. We’ll just have to leave the Sandows and the others.”

“If Mele’s the senior officer…”

“I don’t think the regs were meant to cover this mess, chief.” Richard looked at the Sandows. “I don’t think we’ll be seeing you again. Good luck.”

They left the Sandows and returned to the roof. Plott hesitated, then followed Richard and Kel.

They moved to the western corner and looked over. The river was a long way down. A number of cantilevered platforms projected from the building below them. Kel said that they were for throwing garbage into the river. The best climbers went down a doubled rope to the first thrash-throwing porch. The others removed their clothes and weapons and put them in their river-floating bladders. They puffed air into the bladders, tightly laced the openings, and smeared thick grease over the laces.

 Richard saw Miry looking down at the river. “If you’ll just give me something to hang onto I’ll get by. I’ll make it somehow.”

 “I’m sure you will. You can go down between Kel and me. We make a sizable pair of pontoons. But you’d better take your clothes off. “

 Miry hesitated. “Well, I guess it’s pretty dark… “

Richard put her clothes in with his and laced the swim-bladder. “Can you go down the ropes by yourself?”

“Sure. I’m strong for my size. I can do it.” She was firmly instructing herself.

Richard went over the side. Kel helped Miry over and followed her. The matte surface of the castle’s covering slabs gave their bare feet a secure, comfortable grip. Men on the trash platforms below held the two ropes taut. Richard walked backwards down the wall, using the ropes as handrails. It was easy – if you didn’t look down. So Richard looked at Miry.

They moved to the river platform by platform, pulling the doubled ropes down behind them. They watched the top of the west wall, expecting the patrolling guards to raise the alarm. “Bound to see us,” Kel muttered.

But the guards never looked down. Richard reached the river. He held out his hand to Miry. She gripped his wrist with anxious strength and lowered herself into the water. A swimmer came to tie Richard’s bladder to the others. “Here,” Richard said. “Hold on to this.” He moved over so she could rest on the bladder. Her hip touched him, and he felt the warmth of her skin.

Kel waited until the last of his men was linked to the others. He cast off. “Sweet life,” he said. “We really did it. In and out of the castle, and we’re still alive. So far, anyway.”