"This does not sound like the Valentine I know," said Stasilaine darkly. "Whatever else he may be, irrational he is not. It sounds almost as though some fever has come over him."

"Or that he's been made a changeling again," Divvis said.

"What does Tunigorn fear?" Hissune asked.

Elidath shrugged. "He doesn't know. He thinks Valentine may be hatching some very bizarre idea indeed, one that he and Sleet would be likely to oppose. But he's giving no clues." Elidath went to the world globe, and tapped the bright red sphere that marked the Coronal's whereabouts. "Valentine is still on the Isle, but he'll sail shortly for the mainland. He'll land in Piliplok, and he's scheduled to head up the Zimr to Ni-moya and then keep going into the famine-stricken regions out west. But Tunigorn suspects that he's changed his mind about that, that he's obsessed with this notion that we're suffering the vengeance of the Divine and might be planning some spiritual event, a fast, a pilgrimage, a restructuring of society in a direction away from purely secular values—"

"What if he's involved with this sea-dragon cult?" Stasilaine said.

"I don't know," said Elidath. "It could be anything. I tell you only that Tunigorn seemed deeply troubled, and urged me to join the Coronal on the processional as quickly as I could, in the hope that I'll be able to prevent him from doing something rash. I think I could succeed where others, even Tunigorn, would fail."

"What?" Divvis cried. "He's thousands of miles from here! How can you possibly—"

"I leave in two hours," Elidath answered. "A relay of fast floaters will carry me westward through the Glayge Valley to Treymone, where I've requisitioned a cruiser to take me to Zimroel via the southern route and the Rodamaunt Archipelago. Tunigorn, meanwhile, will attempt to delay Valentine's departure from the Isle as long as he can, and if he can get any cooperation from Admiral Asenhart he'll see to it that the voyage from the Isle to Piliplok is a slow one. With any luck, I might reach Piliplok only a week or so after Valentine does, and perhaps it won't be too late to bring him back to his senses."

"You'll never make it in time," said Divvis. "He'll be halfway to Ni-moya before you can cross the Inner Sea."

"I must attempt it," Elidath said. "I have no choice. If you knew how concerned Tunigorn is, how fearful that Valentine is about to commit himself to some mad and perilous course of action—"

"And the government?" Stasilaine said softly. "What of that? You are the regent, Elidath. We have no Pontifex, you tell us that the Coronal has become some sort of visionary madman, and now you propose to leave the Castle leaderless?"

"In the event that a regent is called away from the Castle," said Elidath, "it's within his powers to appoint a Council of Regency to deal with all business that would fall within the Coronal's jurisdiction. This is what I intend."