pleasantries as he passed.
'My dear, Lord Timura,' the Queen said after he'd reached her and bowed his respects. 'Please know that we've given your proposal our full attention. We've discussed it for many hours. But, frankly we find ourselves in a great quandary.'
'What could be so difficult, Majesty?' Safar asked, keeping his tone as formal and distantly polite as hers. They'd met many times since his arrival, but always in more intimate surroundings. 'I only want to make a casting- under the close guidance and full assistance of your best mages-to determine when we can expect Iraj Protarus.
'I've not only promised, but shown magical proof that he will be unaware of this casting. It will in no way draw his attention, or the attention of his wizards.'
Safar raised his hands, turning them palm up. 'What could be simpler than that?' he asked. 'Or more vital? After all, you must be as concerned as I am that an army will soon show up to knock on your doors.'
'I don't agree,' the Queen said. 'We are well hidden. How will this Protarus find us through the secret gate? You saw for yourself how well hidden it is. Only the cleverest wizard would ever find it, much less unravel the spell locks.'
'Don't make that mistake!' Safar said, emphatic. 'Believe me when I say that Iraj will find the way. It may take him awhile, but he has more than enough magical resources at his command.'
'You forget the Guardians,' the Queen said. 'They will protect us now, as they always have. Nothing has ever managed to get past them! Only those we favor are permitted through, such as pilgrims and innocent wayfarers escaping the Black Lands.'
'And I'm telling you that you don't know what you're facing,' Safar said, deliberately letting some of his anger show. 'Iraj Protarus is an enemy who once conquered all of Esmir. And he's quickly bringing it back under his command. He will hammer your Guardians into ghostly dust and crack your gates open and spill you out like an egg.
'Finally, Your Highness, this something I simply must insist on. If no one here will take the threat seriously, I'll have to gather my people and leave before Protarus arrives. And there will be no meeting of Safar Timura and your blessed Oracle of Hadin, a meeting that I am now beginning to think was a big mistake on my part for ever even thinking about.'
Safar's bluff got the result he intended. There were gasps in the courtroom. The Queen gave him a look of great concern, clutching her robe at the breast. 'But you don't understand, my dear Lord Timura,' she said. 'We aren't refusing you out of some mean-spirited motivation. Our survival is at stake as much as yours, after all. The real fear is that the casting will ruin everything we've done. You're almost ready for your meeting with the Oracle. What if your spell conflicts with the magical preparations we've already made?'
'Why didn't someone say that was the worry, Your Highness?' Safar asked, bewildered. 'Why all this unnecessary secrecy? Let me meet now with your best scholars and we'll have the answer within the hour.'
The Queen shook her head, no. 'I'm sorry,' she said. 'That isn't possible. You would have to delve into things that are forbidden for you know in advance.'
'I've never seen a situation in which ignorance is good for anyone, Majesty,' Safar said sharply. 'And if this decision is final, I really must take my leave. My people and I will be on the march again by tomorrow at dawn.'
'But where will you march to, my dear?' the Queen said, finally calling his bluff. 'There is only one way out of Caluz. And that's the way you came. Back through the Black Lands to face an oncoming army. As I said before, the road ahead is blocked. What I kept from you then was that we sealed it because it leads right into the heart of the real Caluz, the mad Caluz, the Caluz where no mortal could possibly exist for more than a few moments.'
He caught an odd note in her tone as she spoke the last, but when he tried to catch her eyes she averted them.
'So you see, Lord Timura,' she said, 'there is no escape for your people. They are trapped here, it grieves me deeply to say, along with my own subjects. And what happens to us will happen to them.'
At that moment Safar fully understood the nature of the trap he'd been drawn into. And if he failed in his mission here, there was no getting out.
'I'm sorry, Safar, my dear,' Hantilia said, low. 'But you see how it is?'
Safar saw. Just as he saw there was no malice intended by Hantilia or anyone here. It was just so.
'All of us came here at great cost,' she went on. 'It was and still is a holy mission. We must trust and we must believe, or everything is lost. Not just for us, but for the world itself. Perhaps it's made us a bit mad.
I'm sure you think that when you see us smile when there is only reason to weep.'
Safar thought they probably all were mad, including Hantilia. Then it came to him there was more to it than that.
'When we cast the spell that made this place,' Hantilia said, 'the Oracle warned us we would not be the same as before. She said we would leave part of ourselves in the real Caluz, the city we fled.'
Somewhere in the courtroom someone giggled. There was an hysterical edge to it. Hantilia nodded toward the sound. 'It's easier to bear than weeping,' she said, 'so I suppose we can't complain.'
Safar knew he was defeated. He had no choice but to go on. 'When will I see the Oracle?' he asked.
'In three more days,' the Queen answered. 'After I have undergone my own purification. I won't be able to see you until then.'
'What about the boy?' Safar asked. 'I'll need Palimak, you know.'
'When I send for you,' she answered, 'bring him along. He'll only need a few hours of preparation.'
Safar stared at her, realizing there was still a great deal more he didn't know.
He made one more attempt. 'There is one other thing I'd like to ask,' he said. 'Something that has mystified me more than anything else.'
'And what is that, my lord?' the Queen asked.
'You are all adherents of Asper,' Safar said. 'You wear robes with his symbol-the two-headed snake.
You speak his name with zealous reverence. You even describe yourselves as members of the Cult of Asper. True?'
'Quite true,' Hantilia said. 'But what is the question?'
'Why is it none of your are curious about what I know of Asper?' he asked, noting the sharp reactions all about. 'I have studied him most of my adult life. I doubt there is a mage in all Esmir who knows as much about his teachings as I do. I've even shown some of you his book, which I have in my possession.'
He slipped the little book of Asper from his sleeve and held it up. 'This is quite rare, you know,' Safar said. 'I got it at great personal cost. And yet none of you have asked to see it. I would have thought you'd have a team of scholars and clerks awaiting my arrival so you could copy down his words.'
Hantilia sighed wearily, then said, 'We are forbidden to speak of it to you. I can say no more.'
'Yes, but do you have anything like it?' Safar pressed, waving the book. 'If not, do you possess any artifacts from Asper at all?'
Another long silence, another shake of the Queen's head. 'Again,' she said, 'I am forbidden to answer.'
'Yes, yes, I know,' Safar said, not hiding his disgust. 'Have patience and all will be revealed.'
Hantilia sighed, then leaned forward from her throne. Safar felt her cast the gentle spell that made her perfume headier, her presence soothing with just a hint of sensuality. But he pushed it away. She drew back and for a moment he thought she was offended. Good, he thought. That's how I meant it.
Then she sighed again. 'It's the best I can do, Safar,' she whispered. 'Please trust me.'
Safar was in a dark mood when he entered the Kyranian encampment. It was made fouler by the holiday spirit in the air, music and dance and hilarious chatter in the face of what he knew to be a most questionable future. Khysmet caught his bad temper, laid his ears back and nipped at the barking dogs.
They made a gloomy pair riding through the camp and when people saw them they stopped what they were doing-music and laughter cutting off in mid-peal-and stared as they passed, faces turning dark with worry. His kinsmen's plummeting emotions startled Safar from his mood and he felt guilty for being the cause of it.
He could see the dread in their eyes that maybe he'd returned to announce their brief stay in paradise was ended and they must once again resume their fearful journey.
Safar hastily pulled on his old entertainer's personality, waving and laughing and shouting jokes and words of
