stress. His field was the study of the evolution of ideals in government, especially the monolithic state trying to survive by adapting to the changing perceptions of subjects believed to be politically disenfranchised. It was a subtle and tricky area of study, and one’s conclusions were always subject to attack.
His deal with Yousif had been accounted a great coup at his college, the Rebsamen. The secretive people of Hammad al Nakir were a virgin territory for academic exploitation. Radetic had begun to doubt the opportunity was worth the pain.
Only little Haroun remained attentive. The others jostled Ali for vantage points.
“Oh, go on,” Radetic told his one remaining pupil.
Haroun was the sole intellectual candle Radetic had found in this benighted wasteland. Haroun was the only reason Radetic did not tell Yousif to pack up his prejudices and head for Hell. The child had shown tremendous promise.
The rest? Haroun’s brothers and cousins, and the children of Yousif’s favored followers? Doomed. They would become copies of their fathers. Ignorant, superstitious, bloodthirsty savages. New swordbearers in the endless pavane of raid and skirmish these wild men accounted a worthy life.
Radetic would have confessed it to no man, and least of all himself. He loved the imp called Haroun. He followed the boy and for the thousandth time pondered the mystery of the Wahlig.
Yousif’s station roughly equated with that of a duke. He was a cousin of King Aboud. He had every reason to defend the status quo, and much to lose by change. Yet he dreamed of ending the old killing ways, the traditional desert ways, at least in his own demense. In his quieter, less abrasive way, he was as revolutionary as El Murid.
One of the older boys boosted Haroun to the top of the wall. He stared as if smitten by some great wonder.
Radetic’s favorite was slight, dusky, dark-eyed, and hawk-nosed, a child-image of his sire. Even at six he knew his station.
Because he was only a fourth son, Haroun was fated to become his province’s chief
Yousif’s Wahligate was vast. His forces were numerous, for they nominally included every man able to bear arms. Haroun’s responsibilities would be large, his immersion in wizardry deep.
Already Radetic had to share his pupil with witch-teachers from Jebal al Alf Dhulquarneni, the appropriately named Mountains of a Thousand Sorcerers. The great adepts almost always began their studies at the time they were learning to talk, yet seldom came into the fullness of their power till they had passed their prime mating years. The young years were critical to the learning of self-discipline, which had to be attained before the onset of puberty and accompanying distractions.
Radetic wriggled his way into the pack of children. “I’ll be damned!”
Fuad pulled him back. “Of that there’s no doubt.” He assumed Radetic’s place. “Holy!... A bare-faced woman! Teacher, you might as well turn them loose. They’ll never settle down now. I’d better go tell Yousif that they’re here.” Fuad’s face had taken on the glassy look of a man in rut. Radetic did not doubt that he had an erection.
The ways of the desert were strange, he thought.
Speculation had haunted the Royal Compound for days. Would El Murid really dare come to the Shrines?
Radetic shoved himself into the gap again, staring.
The woman was younger than he had expected. She rode a tall white camel. The fact of her facial nakedness completely eclipsed the presence of the wild-eyed youth on the white mare.
El Murid was, for that matter, overshadowed by the man riding the big black stallion.
That would be Nassef, wouldn’t it? Radetic thought. The brawler who led El Murid’s dramatically named bodyguard, the Invincibles, and who was the brother of the Disciple’s wife.
“El Murid. You’re a bold bandit, son,” Radetic murmured. He found himself admiring the youth’s arrogance. Anyone who thumbed his nose at priesthoods rated with Megelin Radetic.
“Boys. Get down. Go find your fathers. Do you want a whipping?”
Such was the punishment for gazing on a woman’s naked face. His pupils fled.
All but Haroun. “Is that really El Murid? The one Father calls Little Devil?”
Radetic nodded. “That’s him.”
Haroun scampered after his brothers and cousins. “Ali! Wait. Remember when Sabbah came to el Aswad?”
Megelin suspected imminent deviltry. Nothing but bad blood had come of that ill-starred peace conference with Sabbah i Hassan. He stalked his pupils.
He had warned Yousif. He had cast horoscope after horoscope, and each had been blacker than the last. But Yousif had rejected the scientific approach in his own life.
There was a natural yet innocent cruelty in the Children of Hammad al Nakir. Their very language lacked a means of expressing the concept “cruelty to an enemy.”
Haroun looked back. He paused when he noticed Radetic watching him. But the urge to impress his brothers overcame good sense. He seized his rudimentary shaghun’s kit and joined their rush into the street.
Radetic followed. He would not be able to prevent their prank, but might finally penetrate the veil of mystery that surrounded the collapse of the negotiations with Sabbah i Hassan.
Its simplicity was frightening.
A shaghun was as much stage magician as true sorcerer. Haroun spent an hour a day practicing sleight of hand
