JANISSARIES

Now, she thought. Say it now. But she couldn't. She had sworn. And how could she host her husband's murderer in his own home? Receive Chelm as a telast of Sarakos? It was unthinkable.

Yet-how do else? If the chief captain had no stomach for a fight, there was no chance at all. She fingered her braids restlessly.

"Yet honor demands that we fight," Camithon said. He looked down the length of the council table. "Do any dare dispute that?"

Some may have wanted to, but none spoke..,

"I have never been one to fight merely for honor," Camithon said. "I prefer to win. But we can do no good elsewhere, so if we fight, we must hold Dravan. We sit astride the only good road south. Until we are taken, Sarakos can take no great force in search of our young Wanax. We buy time for the Protector."

"Yatar knows what he'll do with it," Bheroman Trakon said. His voice was overly loud, nervous, yet

Trakon was a good man who had stood by the old Wanax in his troubles, and had lost much for doing it.

"Unfair, my lord," Camithon protested. "The Protector is the greatest soldier of Draсtos, and he has won before when all seemed darkest."

"And the Dayfather may produce a miracle," Trakon said. He did not turn to see the red face of Yanulf, Archpriest of Yatar. "Yet what else can we do? I trust Sarakos not at all. Of the bheromen who have gone over to him, more than half have lost all to his favorites."

"Which hasn't stopped dozens more from joining him anyway," the weavers' guildmaster muttered. "Half the bheromen-no, three parts of four-have welcomed Sarakos. We fight to no purpose."

"Do you counsel surrender?" Camithon demanded.

The portly guildmaster shrugged. "It would do no good. Sarakos has his own weavers, and they like not our competition. But it's a forlorn fight all the same."

"It is more than forlorn." Yanulf had stood silent and impassive thus far; now the priest drew himself to full height and spoke with contempt. "Fools. The Time approaches, and you babble of petty dynastic wars."

"Legends," Trakon said.

Yanulf smiled thinly. "Legends. Is it legend that the Demon grows in the night sky? Is it legend that the waters rise along the shore? That the lamils breed, and the madweed flourishes in your very fields? Is it legend that we sit in council hall with no fire burning, yet we are not cold?"

"A warm summer," Trakon said. "No more than that. The Firestealer has been banished from the vault of the sky and stands at zenith each midnight. Of course it is warm."

There were murmurs from the yeomanry and guildmasters. Yanulf's voice rose. "And in the Time of Burning," he intoned, "then shall the seas smoke and the lands melt as wax. The waters of ocean shall lap the mountains. Woe to them who have not prepared. Woe to the unbeliever." He laughed. "Woe to you, Bheroman. But Yatar will forgive you. My lady, this is not a time for war. It is a time to gather food, to fill the holy caves. Do you not smell the breath of the Preserver? When the Stormbringer approaches, Yatar takes care of his own; and his first sign is the breath of the Preserver."

"Aye," one of the yeomen muttered. "My nephew's an acolyte, and he says the ice has grown half a foot in the past forty-day. Grown, when the Firestealer stands overhead at midnight!"

"How long?" Tylara demanded. "How long until the Time?"

"The writings are not clear," Yanulf admitted. "The worst may not come for a dozen years. There will be other signs first. The Demon Gods will visit and offer magic in exchange for soma. Strangers will come, with strange weapons and a strange language."

Trakon laughed.

Yanulf gave him a look of contempt. "It is written," he said. "Thus came the Christians, and thus came the Legions; and thus came your forefathers. It matters not whether you believe. Before the Fire-stealer plunges through, the True Sun five times, these things will have come to pass."

"Plenty of time, then," Trakon said.

"Nay," Yanulf said. "When the signs are seen, all will seek refuge in the great castles. The petty wars you fight now will be forgotten as those who have built castles upon bare rock know their folly and bring their armies to strike. Soon, soon all will know that there is no safety beyond the caves of the Protectors."

Tylara let them talk, half-listening in case one said something new. There was little chance of that. The situation was simple enough, if you left out religion.

But dared she? The priesthood of Yatar was universal. Whatever local gods might hold this land or that, Yatar was everywhere that humans lived. In her own land were ice caves, deep beneath the rocks, and sacrifices of grain and meat were taken there to be preserved against the days of Burning, even though few believed in the tales carried by the priesthood. If the Time approached-a time of storms when no ship sailed, and the seas rose to lap at the foothills; when Tamaerthon itself became an island; when fire fell from the sky; a time when rains would not fall, and then deadly rains fell in torrents -She had heard the tales. No one she knew believed them except for the priesthood. Yet everyone knew of them.

But there was time. Religion could wait. And for the rest the situation was simple enough. Wanax Loron had not been a good ruler, and three years before his death civil war had broken out. The bheromen who fought him had justice on their side. Even Chelm had wavered, closing the gates of Dravan against Wanax Loron when he sought refuge from the bheromen, yet never quite joining the revolt either. That had been under Lamil's father, before plague took him.

(Plague. The legends said that as the Demon Star approached, the plague ran through the land; and certainly the plague struck every year now, with more killed each time…

But Loron had hired mercenaries and had driven the bheromen back and back, until the great ones of the land had done the unpardonable thing and invited outside help. They had offered the crown of Drantos to Sarakos son of Tons, Sarakos in his own right one of the Five Wanaxxae, and son of Tons High Rexja of the Five.

Before the invasion began, Loron died; but Drantos was left with a boy king and depleted treasury. When the bheromen rallied to their new Wanax with one of their number as Protector, they were too late. Sarakos continued to press his claims. Twentyyears before, the council of Drantos had arranged a royal marriage between Lana of Drantos, sister to Wanax Loron's father, and Tons Vanax High Rexja of the Five. It had been a brilliant diplomatic stroke, but now Sarakos could claim the throne of Drantos by blood, as the most legitimate adult claimant. A few minutes with a pillow would make him the only possible claimant.

And who could blame some of the bheromen for preferring Sarakos and peace to a boy king and war? Especially now, with the Demon growing visibly brighter in the night sky, and the priests of Yatar reading from their musty books and telling of the Time which would come. These were no times for a boy king. If only Lamil had joined Sarakos! He would be alive, and he- "I say we fight." The accent was uncultured-the blacksmith at the foot of the table. "I have heard how they live in the Five. Better be dead for one such as me. Is my forge to be used to hammer slave collars for my friends?"

"Well said," Bheroman Trakon said. "Aye. Well said. For our honor, then. Yet-honor does not demand that we hold after all is lost. I say fight, and I will be on the walls; but when Sarakos brings up towers and siege engines, I say make the best bargain we can. For all of us."

"You may bargain, my lord," the blacksmith said. "But when the Demon stands high in the day sky, what do we folk do? Sarakos would like well enough to hold Castle Dravan for his people, but will he take my family into the cool of the donjon?"

"If he will not swear to that, then I make no bargain with him," Trakon said. "We of Chelm protect our own, even against the gods. But I think you fear too much the tales of the priesthood."