“I sent the others away three days ago.” At the sound of Yin’s voice Ganil stopped, stared at the old man’s creased, quiet face, and then said childishly, “Look,” holding out his right hand, “look, like yours.”

“Yes. Come sit down, Ganil.”

“They condemned him. Not me, they let me go. He said he couldn’t teach me, I couldn’t learn. To save me—”

“And your mathematics. Come here now, sit down.”

Ganil got control of himself, and obeyed. Yin made him lie down, then did what he could about cleaning and bandaging his hand. Then, sitting down between Ganil and the glowing fire, he gave a wheezy sigh. “Well,” he said, “now you’re a heresy suspect. I’ve been one for twenty years. You get used to it. . . . Don’t worry about our friends. But if the girl tells Lee and your name gets linked with mine . . . We’d better leave Edun. Separately. But tonight.”

Ganil said nothing. To leave his shop without the Overmaster’s permission meant excommunication, the loss of his Mastership. He would be barred from his own trade. What could he do, with his crippled hand, where could he go? He had never been out of Edun in his life.

The silence of the house spread out above and below them. Ganil strained to hear sounds down in the street, the tramping of a troop of guards come to re-arrest him. He had to get out, to get away, tonight— “I can’t,” he said abruptly. “I have to be—to be at the College tomorrow, at noon.”

Yin knew what he meant. Again the silence closed round them. The old man’s voice was very dry and weary when he finally spoke. “That’s the condition of your release, en? All right; go do it; you don’t want them hunting you through the Forty Towns as a condemned heretic. A suspect isn’t hunted, merely outcast. It’s preferable. Get some sleep now, Ganil. Before I go I’ll tell you where to meet me. Leave as soon as you can; and travel light. . . .”