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  "I couldn't say. I helped her escape from the Priestesses of the Female Mystery; thereafter she was secure and under my protection. She was anxious to return to Cath and urged me to accompany her, assuring me of your friendship and gratitude. But as soon as we started eastward she became gloomy, and, as I say, halfway across the Draschade she threw herself overboard."

  While Reith spoke Cizante's face had shifted through phases and degrees of various emotions. "So now," he said in a clipped voice, "with my daughter dead, after circumstances I do not care to imagine, you come hurrying here to claim the boon."

  Reith said coldly, "I knew then and know nothing now of this 'boon.' I came to Cath for several reasons, the least important of which was to make myself known to you. I find you indisposed to what I consider civilized standards of courtesy and I will now leave." Reith gave a curt nod and started for the door. He turned back. "If you wish to learn further details regarding your daughter, consult Dordolio, whom we found stranded at Coad."

  Reith left the room. The Lord's sibilant murmur reached his ears: "You are an uncouth fellow."

  In the hall waited the majordomo, who greeted Reith with the faintest of smiles.

  He indicated a rather dim passageway painted red and blue. "This way, sir."

  Reith paid him no heed. Crossing into the grand foyer, he left the way he had come.

  CHAPTER SEVEN

  REITH WALKED BACK toward the Oval, pondering the city Settra and the curious temperament of its people. He was forced to admit that the scheme to build a small spaceboat, which in far-off Pera had appeared at least feasible, now seemed impractical. He had expected gratitude and friendship from the Blue Jade Lord; he had encountered hostility. As to the technical abilities of the Yao, he was inclined to pessimism, and he fell to appraising the vehicles which passed along the street. They appeared to function satisfactorily, though giving the impression that flair and elegance, rather than efficiency, had been first in the minds of the designers. Energy derived from the ubiquitious power cells produced by the Dirdir; the coupling was not altogether quiet: an indication, so Reith considered, of careless or incompetent engineering. No two were alike; each seemed an individual construction.

  Almost certainly, reflected Reith, the Yao technology was inadequate to his purposes. Without access to standard components, maxima-minima sets, integrated circuit blocks, structural forms, computers, Fourier analyzers, macro-gauss generators, a thousand other instruments, tools, gauges, standards, not to mention clever and dedicated technical personnel, the construction of even the crudest spaceboat became a stupendous task, impossible in a single lifetime ...

  He came to a small circular park, shadowed under tall psillas with shaggy black bark and leaves of russet paper. At the center rose a massive monument. A dozen male figures, each carrying an instrument or tool, danced in a dreadful ritual grace around a female form, who stood with arms raised high, upturned face twisted in some overpowering emotion. Reith could not identify her expression.

  Exultation? Agony? Grief? Beatification? Whatever the case, the monument was disturbing, and rasped at a dark corner of his mind like a mouse in the woodwork. The monument seemed very old, thousands of years? Reith could not be sure. A small girl and a somewhat younger boy came past. They paused first to study Reith; then gave fascinated attention to the gliding figures and their macabre instruments. Reith, in a somber mood, continued on his way and presently came to the Travelers' Inn. Neither Traz nor the Dirdirman were on the premises.

  They had, however, hired accommodations: a suite of four rooms overlooking the Oval.

  Reith bathed, changed his linen. When he went down to the foyer, twilight had come to the Oval, which was now lit by a ring of great luminous globes in a variety of pastel colors. Traz and Anacho appeared on the other side of the Oval. Reith watched them with a wry grin. They were basically alien, like cat and dog; yet, when circumstances threw them together, they conducted themselves with cautious good-fellowship.

  Anacho and Traz, so it developed, had chanced upon an area known as "the Mall," where cavaliers settled affairs of honor. In the course of the afternoon the two had watched three bouts: near-bloodless affairs, Traz reported with a sniff of scorn. "The ceremonies exhaust their energy," said Anacho. "After the addresses and the punctilio there is little time for fighting."

  "The Yao, if anything, are more peculiar than the Dirdirman," said Reith.

  "Ha ha! I dispute that! You know a single Dirdirman. I can show you a thousand and confuse you totally. But come; the refectory is around the corner. If nothing else, the Yao cuisine is satisfactory."

  The three dined in a wide room hung with tapestries. As usual Reith could not identify what he ate, and did not care to learn. There was yellow broth, faintly sweet, with floating flakes of pickled bark; slices of pale meat layered with flower petals; a celery-like vegetable crusted with crumbs of a fiery-hot spice; cakes flavored with musk and resin; black berries with a flavor of the swamp; clear white wine which tingled the mouth.

  In an adjacent tavern the three took after-dinner liquors. The clientele included many non-Yao folk, who seemed to use the place as a rendezvous. One of these, a tall old man in a leather bonnet, somewhat the worse for drink, peered into Reith's face. "But I'm wrong, for a fact. I thought you a Vect of Holangar; then I asked myself, where are his tongs? And I said, no, it is just another of the anomes who creep into Travelers' Inn for a sight of their own kind."

  "I'd like a sight of my own kind," said Reith. "Nothing would please me more."

  "Yes, isn't this the case? What sort are you, then? I can't put a name to your face."

  "A wanderer from far lands."

  "No farther than mine, which is the far coast of Vord, where Cape Dread holds back the Schanizade. I have seen sights, I tell you! Raids on Arkady! Battles with sea-folk! I remember an occasion when we drove into the mountains and destroyed the bandits ... I was a young man then and a great soldier; now I toil for the ease of the Yao, and earn my own ease thereby, and it is not so hard a life."

  "I should suppose not. You are a technician?"

  "Nothing so grand. I inspect wheels at the car yard."

  "Many foreign technicians are at work in Settra?"

  "True. Cath is comfortable enough, if you can overlook the vagaries of the Yao."

  "What about Wankhmen? Are there any such in Settra?"

  "At work? Never. When I sojourned at Ao Zalil, to the east of Lake Falas, I saw how it went. The Wankhmen will not even work for the Wankh; they have sufficient exertion pronouncing the Wankh chimes. Though usually they play the chords on remarkable little instruments."

  "Who works in the Wankh shops? Blacks and Purples?"

  "Bah! One might be forced to handle an article the other had touched.

  Back-country Lokhars for the most part work in the shops. For ten or twenty years, or longer, they toil, then they return to their villages rich men.

  Wankhmen at work in the shops? What a joke! They are as proud as Dirdirman Immaculates! I see a Dirdirman beside you tonight."

  "Yes, he is my comrade."

  "Odd to find a Dirdirman so common!" marveled the old man. "I have seen only three previously and all treated me like dirt." He drained his goblet, set it down with a rap. "Now I must leave; I bid all good evening, Dirdirman as well."

  The old man departed. With almost the same swing of the door a pale black-haired young man dressed unobtrusively in dark blue broadcloth entered the tavern.

  Somewhere, thought Reith, he had seen this young man, and recently....here?

  The man walked slowly, almost absentmindedly, along the passage beside the wall.

  He went to the serving counter, was poured a goblet of sharp syrup. As he turned away his gaze met that of Reith's. He nodded politely and after a moment's hesitation approached. Reith now recognized him for Cizante's pallid young aide.

  "Good evening," said the young man. "Perhaps you recognize me? I am Helsse of Isan, a Blue jade connection. I belie
ve that we met today."

  "I had a few words with your master, true enough."

  Helsse sipped from his goblet, made a fastidious grimace, placed the goblet on the bar. "Let's move to a more secluded place, where we can talk."

  Reith spoke to Traz and Anacho, then turned back to Helsse. "Lead the way."

  Helsse glanced casually toward the front entrance but chose to leave through the restaurant. As they departed Reith glimpsed a man thrusting into the tavern, to glare wildly around the room: Dordolio.

  Helsse appeared not to notice. "Nearby is a little cabaret, not overly genteel, but as good as anywhere else for our talk."

  The cabaret was a low-ceilinged room, lit by red and blue lamps with blue-painted booths around the periphery. A number of musicians sat on a platform, two of whom played small gongs and drum, while a male dancer strode sinuously this way and that. Helsse selected a booth near the door, as far as possible from the musicians; the two seated themselves on blue cushions. Helsse ordered two drams of "Wildwood Tincture" which were presently brought to the table.

  The dancer departed, the musicians undertook a new selection, with instruments similar to oboe, flute, cello, and a kettledrum. Reith listened for a moment, puzzled by the plaintive scraping, the thumps of the kettledrum, the sudden excited trills of the flute.

  Helsse leaned solicitously forward. "You are unfamiliar with Yao music? I thought as much. This is one of the traditional forms: a lament."

  "It could never be mistaken for a cheerful composition."

  "A question of degree." Helsse went on to list a series of musical forms, of decreasing optimism. "I do not mean to imply that the Yao are a dour folk; you need only attend one of the season balls to appreciate this."

  "I doubt if I will be invited," said Reith.

  The orchestra embarked upon another selection, a series of passionate phrases, taken up by each instrument at varying instants, to terminate in a wild sustained quaver. By some cross sensoral stimulus, Reith thought of the monument in the circular park. "The music bears some connection with your ritual of expiation?"

  Helsse smiled distantly. "I have heard it said that the spirit of Pathetic Communion permeates the Yao psyche."

  "Interesting." Reith waited. Helsse had not brought him here to discuss music.

  "I trust that the events of this afternoon caused you no inconvenience?" asked Helsse.

  "None whatever, other than irritation."

  "You did not expect the boon?"

  "I knew nothing of it. I expected ordinary courtesy, certainly. My reception by Lord Cizante, in retrospect, seems remarkable."

  Helsse nodded sagely. "He is a remarkable man. But now he finds himself in an awkward position. Immediately upon your departure the cavalier Dordolio presented himself to denounce you as an interloper, and to demand the boon for himself. To be quite candid, such a proceeding, on Dordolio's terms, would embarrass Lord Cizante, when one takes all into consideration. You perhaps would not be aware that Blue Jade and Gold-Carnelian are rival houses. Lord Cizante suspects that Dordolio would use the boon to humiliate Blue Jade, with what consequences no one can foresee."

  Reith asked: "Exactly what was the boon promised by Cizante?"

  "Emotion overcame his reserve," said Helsse. "He declared: 'Whoever returns me my daughter or so much as brings me news, let him ask and I will fulfill as best I can.' Strong language, as you see, uttered only for the ears of Blue Jade, but the news circulated."

  "It appears," said Reith, "that I do Cizante a favor by accepting his bounty."

  "This is what we wish to ascertain," said Helsse carefully. "Dordolio has made a number of scurrilous statements in regard to you. He declares you a superstitious barbarian intent on reviving the 'cult.' If you demanded that Lord Cizante convert his palace into a temple and himself join the 'cult,' he might well prefer Dordolio's terms."

  "Even though I appeared first on the scene?"

  "Dordolio claims trickery, and is violently angry. But all this to the side, what might you demand of Lord Cizante, in light of the circumstances?"

  Reith considered. Unfortunately, he could not afford the prideful luxury of refusal. "I'm not sure. I could use some unprejudiced advice, but I don't know where to find it."

  "Try me," suggested Helsse.

  "You are hardly unprejudiced."

  "Much more than you might think."

  Reith studied the pale handsome face, the still black eyes. A puzzling man was Helsse, the more so for his impersonality, neither cordial nor cold. He spoke with ostensible candor but permitted no inadvertent or unconscious signals to advertise the state of his inner self.

  The orchestra had dispersed. To the platform came a somewhat obese man in a long maroon robe. Behind him sat a woman with long black hair plucking a lute. The man produced an ululating wail: half-words which Reith was unable to comprehend.

  "Another traditional melody?" he inquired.

  Helsse shrugged. "A special mode of singing. It is not altogether without value.

  If everyone belabored themselves thusly, there would be far less awaile.'

  Reith listened. "Judge me harshly, all," moaned the singer. "I have performed a terrible crime; it is because of my despair."

  "Offhand," said Reith, "it seems absurd to discuss my best advantage over Lord Cizante with Cizante's aide."

  "Ah, but your best advantage is not necessarily Lord Cizante's disadvantage," said Helsse. "With Dordolio the case is different."

  "Lord Cizante showed me no great courtesy," mused Reith. "I am not anxious to do him a favor. On the other hand, I do not care to assist Dordolio, who calls me a superstitious barbarian."

  "Lord Cizante was perhaps shocked by your news," suggested Helsse. "As for Dordolio's charge, it is obviously inaccurate and need no longer be considered."

  Reith grinned. "Dordolio has known me a month; can you dispute him on the basis of such short acquaintance?"

  If he had hoped to discomfit Helsse, he was unsuccessful. Helsse's smile was bland. "I am usually correct in my appraisals."

  "Suppose that I were to make a set of apparently wild assertions: that Tschai was flat, that the tenets of the 'cult' were correct, that men could live underwater-what would become of your opinion?"

  Helsse considered soberly. "Each case is different. If you told me Tschai was flat, I would certainly revise my judgment. If you argued the creed of the

  'cult,' I would suspend a decision and listen to your remarks, for here is a matter of opinion and no evidence exists, at least to my knowledge. If you insisted that men could live underwater I might be inclined to accept the statement as a working premise. After all, the Pnume submerge, as do the Wankh; why not men, perhaps with special equipment?"

  "Tschai is not flat," said Reith. "Men are able to live underwater for short periods using artificial gills. I know nothing of the 'cult' or its doctrines."

  Helsse sipped from his goblet of essence. The singer had departed; a dance troupe now came forth: men in black leggings and sleeves, nude from upper thigh to rib cage. Reith stared in fascination for a moment or two, then looked away.

  "Traditional dances," explained Helsse, "relating to Pathetic Communion. This is

  'Precursory Movement of the Ministrants toward the Expiator."'

  "The 'ministrants' are torturers?"

  "They are those who provide latitude for absolute expiation. Many become popular heroes because of their passionate techniques." Helsse rose to his feet. "Come.

  You have implied at least a mild interest in the 'cult.' As it happens, I know the location of their meeting place, which is not far from here. If you are interested, I will take you there."

  "If the visit is not contrary to the laws of Cath."

  "No fear of that. Cath has no laws, only customs, which seems to suit the Yao well enough."

  "Peculiar," said Reith. "Killing is not proscribed?"

  "It offends custom, at least under certain circumstances. However, the professional assassins of th
e Guild and the Service Company work without public reproach. In general the folk of Cath do what they see fit and suffer more or less opprobrium. So you may visit the 'cult' and incur, at the worse, invective."

  Reith rose to his feet. "Very well; lead the way."

  They walked across the Oval, through a winding alley into a dim avenue. The eccentric silhouettes of the houses opposite leaned across the sky, where Az and Braz both ranged. Helsse rapped at a door displaying a pale blue phosphor. The two men waited in silence. The door opened a crack; a long-nosed face peered forth.

  "Visitors," said Helsse. "May we come in?"

  "You are associates? I must inform you that here is the district center for the Society of Yearning Refluxives."

  "We are not associates. This gentleman is an outlander who wishes to learn something of the 'cult."'

  "He is welcome and yourself as well, since you seem to have no concern for

  'place.' "

  "None whatever."

  "Which marks you either the highest of the high or the lowest of the low. Enter then. We have little entertainment to offer-convictions, a few theories, fewer facts." The Refluxive swept aside a curtain. "Enter."

  Helsse and Reith stepped into a large low room. To one side, forlorn in so much vacant space, two men and two women sat drinking tea from iron pots.

  The Refluxive made a half-obsequious, half-sardonic gesture. "Here we are; stare yourself full at the dreadful 'cult.' Have you ever seen anything less obstreperous?"

  "The 'cult,"' said Helsse, somewhat sententiously, "is despised not for the look of its meeting halls, but for its provocative assumptions."

  "'Assumptions' bah!" declared the Refluxive in a voice of peevish complaint.

  "The others persecute us but we are the chosen in knowledge."

  Reith asked: "What, precisely, do you know?"

  "We know that men are strangers to Tschai."

  "How can you know this?" demanded Helsse. "Human history fades into murk."