Maia

Kembri frowned. "But you can't put just any girl on a job like seducing messengers. She'd have to have a lot more than looks. Looks would be essential, of course, but on top of that she'd need to have all her wits about her; to be sharp enough to ask the right questions without being suspected and understand the gist of anything she managed to get hold of. I doubt we could find anyone capable of it."

Sencho smiled. It so happened that he had in his household the very girl who had acted as decoy for the Belishban gang. She was an unusually attractive and wanton young woman-both Han-Glat and himself had had a good deal of pleasure from her-and she was not only quick-witted, but also very much on the make. His notion was to promise her her freedom, together with enough money to set herself up as a shearna, in return for finding out what they needed to know.

"All very fine," objected Kembri, "but you say the girl's a Belishban, and you want to plant her in Chalcon to seduce local messengers. She'd be far too obviously a stranger. Besides, she couldn't live in the province on her own, indoors or out. Who'd look after her?"

Sencho explained his scheme. The girl had recently neglected her duty and been well whipped for it. Nothing would seem more natural to his own household than a decision on his part to sell her. Lalloc could sell her, by

arrangement, to the woman Domris, who owned the Lily Pool in Thettit-Tonilda. At this moment he was making use as an agent of a Tonildan pedlar, a man thoroughly familiar with the whole province. Under cover of selling his wares, he reported regularly to the High Counselor in the course of periodic visits to Bekla. This man, acting on instructions, would, as soon as the rains ended, unobtrusively convey the girl from Domris's house, after which she would simply appear as his own doxy, traveling with him. In this role she could, of course, be as Belishban as she liked. Once they reached Chalcon the two would act on their own initiative, by the kind of methods he had described, to find out what messages were passing to and from Erketlis. In point of fact the pedlar had already told him the names of two men who were acting as messengers; one a man called Tharrin, and the other-

To Durakkon's disgust Kembri, bellowing with delighted laughter, pushed aside the deaf-mute slave and himself took over the task of rubbing the High Counselor's belly while complimenting him on the ingenuity of the plan. Provided Sencho's assessment of the girl was as shrewd as most of his judgements, it seemed to offer an excellent chance of success. He would like to see this remarkable girl for himself.

He had recently done so, replied Sencho, at his own Rains banquet two nights before.

Kembri was surprised. What, the very pretty child with golden hair? No, not her, said the High Counselor; the other.

Ah, yes: Kembri remembered her now: a handsome girl. If only she could avoid arousing suspicion, she should prove virtually irresistible in a back-of-beyond spot like Chalcon. And as long as she was apparently chance-met on a road, or at some wayside inn, the fact that she was a Belishban would add to her attraction rather than make her suspect, as it would if she were a servant in some baron's house.

"But it occurs to me," went on Kembri, "that whatever you may think, Sencho, of the drawbacks to family servants as spies, it couldn't do us any harm to plant a local girl in Erketlis's house as well. Haven't you got any Tonildan girls?"

Sencho replied that he had indeed, but it was certainly not his intention to send back to Tonilda a young woman who had just cost him fifteen thousand meld and worth

every trug. He could not resist enlarging a little on the subject. The girl had already shown every sign of a pleasingly carnal disposition. She was a sharp little thing, too- had a good head'on her shoulders. As a concubine she was, of course, immature but already capable of a good deal, with a certain capacity for invention to compensate for her rough edges.

"Rough edges?" Kembri, recalling the girl he had seen at the banquet, chuckled. "That's what you call them, is it? Well, you must let me borrow her some time." (In point of fact the Lord General, irritated at Sencho's having brushed aside his suspicions and anxieties about the Ur-tans, had just been visited by an idea for pursuing the matter on his own account, but this he did not disclose to the High Counselor.)

"On the usual terms." Sencho began helping himself to buttered crayfish and plovers' eggs, which the slave had just carried in.

"Of course. Yes, I'd fancy her: I'll send someone to see your saiyett-Terebinthia, isn't it?-about an arrangement. But now we'll eat."

Getting up from beside the High Counselor, he made his way across to the table.

"Let me pour you some wine, sir," he said to Durakkon. "It's no good troubling yourself with doubts and regrets about Enka-Mordet: it's an essential part of the High Baron's job to be ruthless when necessary, you know."