The pincers tactics: inward then from both sides until the rebels were taken.

And what will those soldiers eat, Hissune wondered, in a world that is starving to death? Feed an army of many millions on roots and nuts and grass? He shook his head. We will eat roots and nuts and grass, if that is all there is. We will eat stones and mud. We will eat the devilish fanged creatures that the rebels hurl against us. We will eat our own dead, if need be. And we will prevail; and then this madness will end.

He rose and went to the window and stared out over ruined Ni-moya, more beautiful now that twilight was descending to hide the worst of the scars. He caught sight of his own reflection in the glass. Mockingly he bowed to it. Good evening, my lord! The Divine be with you, my lord! Lord Hissune: how strange that sounded. Yes, my lord; no, my lord; I will do it at once, my lord. They made the starburst at him.

They backed away in awe. They treated him, all of them, as though he really were Coronal. Perhaps he would become used to it before long. It was not as though any of this had come as a surprise, after all. And yet it still felt unreal to him. Possibly that was because he had spent his entire reign thus far journeying about Zimroel in this improvised way. It would not become real, Hissune decided, until he finally returned to Castle Mount—to Lord Hissune's Castle!—and took up that life of signing decrees and making appointments and presiding over grand ceremonies that was, he imagined, the true occupation of a Coronal in peacetime. But would that day ever come? He shrugged. A foolish question, like most questions. That day would come on the day that it came; in the meantime there was work to do. Hissune returned to his desk and for an hour more continued to annotate his maps.

After a time Alsimir returned. "I have spoken with the mayor, my lord. He promises complete cooperation now. He waits downstairs in the hope that you will allow him to tell you how cooperative he plans to be."

Hissune smiled. "Send him to me," he said.

2

When he reached Khyntor at last Valentine directed Asenhart to make his landfall not in the city proper, but across the river in the southern suburb of Hot Khyntor, where the geothermal wonders were, the geysers and fumaroles and simmering lakes. He wanted to enter the city in a slow and measured way, giving the so-called "Coronal" who ruled it full warning that he was coming.

Not that his arrival could be any surprise to the self-styled Lord Sempeturn. During his voyage up the Zimr from Ni-moya Valentine had made no secret of his identity, nor of his destination. He had halted again and again at the larger river towns along the way, meeting with whatever municipal leadership still survived in them, and obtaining pledges of backing for the armies that were being recruited to meet the Metamorph threat. And all along the river, even at towns where he did not stop, the populace turned out to see the imperial fleet pass by on its way to Khyntor, and to wave and shout, "Valentine Pontifex! Valentine Pontifex!"