computer button. Sutha listened without once interrupting. Nor did the High Priestess, who was listening somewhere in the Palace, send her voice into the room.
Blade finished. Sutha stroked his chin and stared, but with nothing of amazement. There was even a hint of boredom in his voice.
'Our scientists, our astronomers and physicists, and all the other disciplines, suspected for many kronos that there was intelligent life in the universe. Other than here in Tharn. But all efforts of communication failed and after a time it hardly seemed worth while. We had domestic problems, also. We became a one crop economy. Mani. To produce enough mani for all our needs we had to control the weather, and the sky, and so shut ourselves off from the universe. But we know it is there, Lord. We know it is there!' And Sutha smiled.
'I,' said Blade, 'am living proof of that.' Sutha was speaking again. 'In a sense, you are Mazda! HE WHO COMES TO THEY. We shall accept you as such, Richard Blade. I will call you that in private. And though we know, you and I and Isma, that you are not a God, yet it may well be that you are sent to save Tharn. Now to business. You will find that we in Urcit, as apart from certain other parts of Tharn, are an eminently practical people.'
Blade asked the question that had been bothering him.
'You speak always and only of Isma. What of Astar? In the books I have read...'
Sutha held up a hand. 'Yes. You have a right to know. Our religion is based on duality and as Mazda you will have to consort with both of them. Astar represents power, Isma death. So it is written and so it has to be, for all power structures need a religion. But in Tharn, Isma must carry the whole burden. Astar is a child. Has been a child since birth. Her brain did not develop as it should have. She is capable of going through the outward motions of being Astar, no more. Now, about this neuter in the North Provo. Honcho?'
'That is the name I know him by.'
'It is enough. I will show you a picture. You will tell me if it is a likeness of the neuter Honcho.'
Sutha pressed one of the many switches set into the flat wall. An image leaped into being on the screen. It was Honcho, his arms folded, his green eyes staring out into the room. Below the picture was a medallion bearing an inscription.
Honcho. Kronos 4006, Tier 1, Decantment 1. Destruct Kronos 800.
Below the medallion, in cursive Tharnian, someone had scrawled with a stylus: 14th Level...?...investigate.
Sutha looked at Blade. 'That is the neuter?'
'Yes.'
Sutha pressed another switch and the picture faded.
'We have suspected Honcho for some time,' Sutha said. 'We could never be quite sure. He is very clever and has always been able to conceal his true intelligence, which is far above the 14th level. We knew there was an abort in the 4006 group, but we have never been able to find it. Now we know for sure.'
Blade said: 'He has one great weakness. Sex. What you people call coi. I have told you about Totha. It is possible that she will destroy Honcho for us. I tried to arrange it so.'
Sutha shook his head. 'That would not be good. We prefer that Honcho remain alive, and that he lead the Pethcines into Tharn. We plan to destroy them once and for all, forever. This we cannot do unless we can entice them out of the Gorge. Our powers are of no avail in the Gorge. I hope that this woman, this Totha, will fail. I consider it likely that she will. Honcho is far too intelligent to be destroyed by a woman.'
Blade' kept silent. He was not sure, knowing Totha. And this old Sutha had not seen the torment in Honcho's eyes when he spoke of sex. Coi. This was one department, Blade thought, in which he knew more than the Tharnians. And Sutha, as a neuter, could not begin to understand.
Sutha's next words shattered that illusion.
'I was also an abort,' said the old neuter. 'Something went wrong in my conditioning and decanting process and I was given intelligence far above my station. I am very nearly homid, as Honcho must be. I understand the torture of coi when one is not equipped for coi. I feel sympathy for this Honcho. Still, he must be destroyed, after he has served his purpose and led the Pethcines into the trap that we shall lay for them.'
Blade was slightly awe-stricken. The old neuter might have been looking into his mind.
Now Isma interrupted for the first time. Her voice came into the room. 'You have talked enough for now, Sutha. I would speak with Mazda, with Blade, in person. See that his comforts are attended to, that he has everything he wishes, then send him to me. Alone in the Sacred Chamber. No one must know, of course. If he is to be Mazda the exact letter of the prophecy must be followed.'
Sutha shook his head and held up a hand. Isma could see them, then? Blade had been on the verge of producing the little cylinder he had taken from Zulekia's body. Now he did not.
Sutha was still shaking his head. 'In all respect and obedience, Isma, I wish that you would not. It would be a violation of the Book. Neither you nor Astar should see him until the Ceremony of Ravishment. It is so written and I think it should so be. Tharn is in peril, Isma. Even though you may not believe it. Tharn is and will be, in great peril. I make all humble slaveface, as any neuter must, but I ask you, High Priestess, to trust me in this matter. Wait!'
Silence. Then Isma said a word that Blade did not understand. But he understood the tone, the disappointment. More silence and an emptiness in the room that had been missing before.
Sutha shrugged. 'She does not listen now. She is angry with me and you. No matter. She will get over it. She is only impatient for a real man at last, and who can blame her? But there are more important things at the moment, at least for neuters and would-be Mazdas.'
Sutha's smile was open and lacking in deceit. He seemed to be saying that he and Blade were partners now and must somehow muddle through together, but it was not going to be easy.
Blade took the little cylinder from his tunic. He rolled it between his fingers, feeling the raised inscription on it. It was much too fine for him to read with the naked eye. He held it up for the old neuter to see.
That it meant something to Sutha was immediately apparent. The green eyes snapped and he extended a withered hand. 'Where did you come by this, Blade? There is something you have not told me, then?'
