Though starved and defenseless, the antinomials were inhumanly strong, and though unorganized, they had fought with bitter, happy courage, shouting and singing. But by afternoon it was over. Only a few hours, really. The red sun had glowered from the horizon all day, but still the time had seemed intolerably long, and he had stood with his father as the soldiers built a gallows twenty feet high, and he had stood and watched as they had mutilated children his own age and younger, and cut the mark of absolution into their faces, and strung them up. Behind him on the dais, the priests had sat in scarlet robes, old, blind, obese, whispering to each other in their castrate voices. It had been very, very cold, the end of winter, the beginning of spring, and the sun had barely risen. It had snowed all day. They had hung a boy of his own age, and he had started to cry. His father had cuffed him on the ear and knocked him down, to remind him of his duties.

“Yes,” he repeated, “I was there. I am ashamed to say it.”

The boy eyed him curiously. “Don’t be ashamed,” he said. “I want to be there. Have been. That’s not right. What do you say?”

“I would have liked to have been there.”

“I would like . . .” He laughed again. “I was born here in this room. I have no memories of freedom.” He sighed and raised the kitten to his ear. “Enough,” he said. “My brother wants you to go, though he is too polite to say.”

Prince Abu pulled Thanakar by the trouser cuff, and reflexively the doctor reached down to hoist him to his feet. The prince got up. “Can you come with us?” he asked.

The boy laughed. “Dressed like this? The bishop’s purge would shoot me in the street. No, I am going to bed. We are nocturnal, mostly, nowadays. But you will see me again. You will come to watch me dance.”

“When?” asked Abu.

“I’m not sure. Paradise is rising. When?”

“In fifteen days.”

“In fifteen days, then. On the first night of the festival, at midnight. I am dancing here, on the docks.

Pier . . . I don’t know. Follow the crowds. It’s a sight not to be missed.”

“We will certainly come,” promised the prince, but the boy was already walking away, the cats following.

Abu called after him. “I’ll bring you gifts. What gifts will I bring?”

The boy stopped and turned. “Just yourselves,” he said. “I am not like my brother. I have an audience of my own people. I am not a slave to hate. Not yet. Just come yourselves.”

“No. I want to bring something.”

The boy laughed and walked on, down along the row of pillars, among the mattresses, leaving them standing on the carpet, leaving his brother squatting, and fingering the silver pistols, and squinting after him, white circles in the middle of his black eyes. The girl had disappeared.