Weak, I shuddered.

“So you see how you must welcome us,” said my host. “There’ll be no ravaging here, no screaming bonfires, no little girls tossed on spears spitted through their nicest parts—But justice, sweet, clear’n impartial.”

His stupendous stupid Momentity the boy with the sunfire head, the noble, innocent Atlan counsellors—they rode on gladly before us. The land, older and wiser than its inhabitants, shuddered and wailed and rumbled in great relief and great wrath at our passing.

We camped for the last hours of the night in a very damp dell at the foot of a hill on the far side of that valley. Every man had his own pack of food, most of it furnished, like the horses, by the Atlanteans as soon as they got through the tunnel—wherever the cache was I’d missed it—and my—host, captor, whatever he was—shared dried peas and meat with me, and then expected to roll me up with him in his blanket. “No.” I said firmly. “Atlan girls aren’t like that. Why, I’ve not even seen you, and you’ve not seen me.”

“You sound sweet enough,” he said nicely.

Oh, this was so much the last kind of familiar dialogue I’d expected in Atlan! “Well, I’ve not formed that opinion of you,” I said. I was going to refuse. I had business of my own. I didn’t feel guilty over taking his food: he’d get plenty when he was the guest-conqueror in the Great City. But it seemed Atlan was no longer Atlan before I’d spent even a day there.

“Come and feel me,” he said persuasively. “Beyond a bit of stubble, you’ll find me fine. I’m twenty-nine, brown eyes, five foot ten—”

“Oh, you’re spoiling all the mystery,” I said. I got up and wandered, ignoring his calls. Used to the lay-out of camps, I guessed where the General would be and presently found out I was right. Nobody took any notice of a cloaked figure wandering in the dark rains, Atlan’s weeping sky. I saw him. He was talking with Juzd. I waited till Juzd left. I didn’t want Juzd to see me again so soon, crawling to the Dragon.

He sprawled back against the bank, where a little overhang made the rain sputter on to his boots, leaving his head to dry from the journey.

I went softly up to him. Through the drum and patter I said, “Zerd.”

He leapt to his feet (nearly banging his head) sprang at me and seized my wrist. He said, “You!”

I was pleased.

“Yes, it’s me—Emperor.”

“Juzd said a girl—You—What are you doing here? How do you know to call me that?”