Cautiously she moved down the corridor and peered into the room at the end. Dark. Fragrant. A dais at one side and what looked like two small dried sea dragons mounted like flagpoles at either end of it. A Liiman standing between them, somber, silent, triple eyes burning like smouldering coals. Millilain thought she recognized him: the street vendor who once had sold her a skewer of sausages for five crowns. But maybe not. It was hard to tell one Liiman from the next, after all.

A hooded figure who smelled like a Ghayrog came up to her and whispered, "You are in time for communion, sister. Welcome and the peace of the water-kings be upon you."

The water-kings?

The Ghayrog took her gently by the elbow and just as gently propelled her into the room, so that she could take her place among the kneeling, murmuring congregation. No one looked at her; no one was looking at anyone else; all eyes were on the Liiman between the two little dried sea dragons. Millilain looked toward him too. She dared not glance about at those alongside her, for fear she might find friends of hers here.

"Take—drink—join—" the Liiman commanded.

They were passing wine-bowls from aisle to aisle. Out of the corner of her eye Millilain saw that each worshiper, when the bowl came to him, put it to his lips and drank deeply, so that the bowls had constantly to be refilled as they moved through the room. The closest one was four or five rows ahead of her just then.

The Liiman said, "We drink. We join. We go forth and embrace the water-king."

Water-kings were what the Liimen called the sea dragons. Millilain remembered. They worshipped the dragons, so it was reported. Well, she thought, maybe there's something to it. Everything else has failed: give the world to the sea dragons. The wine-bowl, she saw, was two rows ahead of her now, but moving slowly.

"We went among the water-kings and hunted them and took them from the sea," said the Liiman. "We ate their flesh and drank their milk. And this was their gift to us and their great willing sacrifice, for they are gods and it is right and proper for gods to give their flesh and their milk to lesser folk, to nurture them and make them like gods themselves. And now the time of the water-kings is coming. Take. Drink. Join."

The bowl was passing down Millilain's row.

"They are the great ones of the world," the Liiman intoned. "They are the masters. They are the monarchs. They are the true Powers, and we belong to them. We and all others who live on Majipoor.

Take. Drink. Join."

The woman at Millilain's left was drinking from the wine-bowl now. A savage impatience came over her—she was so hungry, she was so thirsty!—and she was barely able to restrain herself from pulling the bowl from the woman's grasp, fearing none would be left for her. But she waited; and then the bowl was in her hands. She stared down into it: a dark wine, thick, glossy. It looked strange. Hesitantly she took a sip. It was sweet and spicy, and heavy on her tongue, and at first she thought it was like no wine she had ever tasted, but then it seemed that there was something familiar about it. She took another sip.