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The captain wakened him next morning. He had been lying there half awake, trying to ignore the racket made by the rising warriors. "Pack your things, Entertainer," he ordered. "You're coming with us."
"Eh? Hai! Not into desert. Am bound for... "
The captain glared. "So you'll make a detour. The one you were were fishing for. That's what last night was all about, wasn't it? So drop the pretense. Pack your things. You've found your new sponsor."
Mocker stared at the ground. He fought fear. This man was dangerously perceptive.
The captain leaned closer. "The Lord Sidi and Lady Yasmid insist on having you. I won't defy them. But I'll be watching, fat man. One misstep and you're dead."
Mocker shook all over. He had had no illusions before, but with the captain having voiced his suspicion he became more terrified than ever. He rushed to his donkey. He irritated the captain further when the party got under way. He was the only one walking. But Sidi took a proprietary interest in him, shielding him from the Invincible, acting like a child with a new pet.
Mocker faked smiles and mumbled to himself, "Am going to repay this patronization with compound interest, Lord."
The Sahel he liked even less than he did Sidi. Between Hammad al Nakir proper and the domains of the coastal states lay a strip of land which made the interior desert attractive by comparison. A legacy of the Fall, a natural killing zone, it varied in depth from forty to one hundred miles. Virtually waterless and lifeless, it consisted almost entirely of sharp, low mountains and tortuous, rocky gorges. It was the crudest of lands. The few people who survived there were among the poorest and most primitive alive. They hated outsiders.
And they were El Murid's, heart and soul. Most of the current crop of Invincibles sprang from the Sahel. The sons of the Sahel saw more promise in El Murid's dreams than did the Children of Hammad al Nakir proper.
Mocker walked that barren land and wept for himself. However was he going to win his way back through this maze of dead hills and unseen sentinels? The watchful Sahel tribesmen were everywhere. Lean, ragged savages, they scared hell out of him each time they visited their brethren of the bodyguard.
He tried to keep them out of mind. Sufficient unto the day the evil thereof.
After three thoughtful days he selected the girl as his primary target. El Murid's movement would miss her more than it would Sidi. The heart of the insane beast would not miss a beat if she were to take over when the Disciple's last day came.
The boy was a useless little snot. If he assumed the mantle his father's movement would rush headlong toward the graveyard of history.
The fat man had begun, occasionally, to think politically. Haroun bin Yousif had set his feet upon the path.
He wanted to cause his enemies all the pain he could. Removing their future prophetess seemed the surest way.
He could not get close to the girl. His usual wi
She had to be an inhuman monster. A child with no child in her at all. That was spooky enough in a grownup. In a kid it was horribly u
He worked hard with Sidi. The boy had no talent and a lot of impatience. He had to praise him constantly to keep him interested. Sidi was the only cha
"Self, have decided," he a
He had been priming it from the begi
Sidi had been voluntering his sister for almost as long as Mocker had been tempting him.
"Now?" Sidi demanded. He was excited. Mocker watched the green burn in his eyes. Damo Sparen certainly had been a student of the human race, the fat man reflected. He had been guiding the Disciple's son according to the Sparen precepts, letting the boy do all the work. He was ready. A lust for power over people boiled within him.
"Soon, Lord. If same can be managed unbeknownst to white-clad savages. Same being simple skill learnable by anyones, but subject to gross misinterpretation by superstitious, self must protect self... "
"Tonight. Come to my tent tonight. My sister will be there. I promise."
Mocker nodded. He kept his mouth shut, let the boy have his head.
Sidi was the perfect mark, so avaricious and self-centered that he had no time for suspicions. Mocker was ashamed. This was like robbing a blind man.
But the stakes! Oh, the stakes!
He worried about the captain all day. That man was the essence of vigilance. He would have to be the first to die...
He dared leave no one like the captain alive on his backtrail. The captain had that same abiding quality exemplified by Haroun's man Beloul. He would come till he had gotten his revenge.
Not all the Invincibles remained cold and aloof. Several of Mocker's pupils became quite friendly. He swapped jokes and quips with them, and regaled them with endlessly shifting, slippery lies about his misadventures in the east. They answered him with lies of their own.
Darkness finally fell. He let a few hours drag past. Finally, heart hammering, he crept to Sidi's tent. No one challenged him.
It was a night without a moon, but he knew the guard only pretended not to notice him. What if the man suffered a fit of conscience and reported this to his commander?
"Lord?" Mocker whispered, his nerves howling. "Is self. Can same enter?"
"Come on! It's about time. Where have you been?"
Mocker slipped into the tent. "Waiting for camp to fall asleep." He smiled. Yasmid was there.
She had brought one of her handmaidens. That was a complication he had not foreseen.
Could he hypnotize three at one time? He had never tried. And a life or death situation made it a hell of a time to start.
As if to soothe his nerves, he began tumbling a coin amongst his chubby fingers, making it appear and disappear. "All is ready?" he asked. "All are agreed? Lady? Self, will not undertake task if same offends... "
"Get on with it." Yasmid smiled thinly. "Entertainer, I'm here because I'm interested. But we have to finish before the guards change watches."
"Is not so simple like ski
"So set it."
There was no doubt who was in charge here. Not Sidi. Mocker smiled wanly. Had the girl been using her brother all along?
He assumed the lotus position. "If Lady will sit facing self? All right. Lord, will do same here?" He patted the carpeted earth with his left hand. Beckoning the handmaiden, "You, sit here, please." He patted with his right hand. "Lord Sidi, and you, Miss, you must watch self close. See what self does. Is impossible of explaining, but easy to show. Lady Yasmid, you concentrate on coin here. Put all else out of mind. Never let eyes wander from same. See same turn in candlelight? Bright, dark, bright, like day, like night... " His voice became a low monotone. She strained to hear. He stared into her eyes, droning about the coin, and secretly prayed that the other two would be trapped by it as well.
"Now sleep comes. Blessed sleep. Respite from all trials of daytimes. Sleep." He went on far longer than Sparen had deemed necessary. He wanted to be sure. The stakes were high. "Eyelids feel like same are weighted with lead. Unable to open eyes." It began to get to him.