Maia

city increasing, she came upon a flight of steps, ramshackle and with no outer handrail, and started nervously groping her way down, one foot and then the other, leaning inward against the wall. As she neared the bottom a man's voice from the shadows below said sharply, "Who's that? Stay where y'are!"

This pulled her together. Maia-with good reason-possessed confidence in her ability to conciliate strangers. Besides, Occula had told her whom to ask for.

"I'm looking for N'Kasit," she answered.

After a few moments the voice said, "A woman, eh? Are y'alone?"

"Yes."

"Who are you? What were you doing on the roof?"

"I've come along the ramparts from the upper city. I'll explain everything if only you'll take me to N'Kasit."

"He expecting you?"

"I was told to come here and ask for him," answered Maia.

At this moment there was the sound of a door opening, and a flicker of light revealed, just ahead of her, the black, vertical line of the corner of the building. Another voice said, "What is it, Malendik?"

"A woman, sir, asking for you."

"What's your name?" said the other voice.

"Maia Serrelinda."

There was a whistle of surprise. "The Serrelinda? Are you telling the truth?"

This annoyed Maia. It was months since anyone had spoken to her like this and she had become unused to it.

"Yes, I damn' well am; and what's more, I'm getting tired of standing up here. If you're N'Kasit-"

"You'd better come down."

Maia fumbled and clutched her way down the last of the steps. Two figures, one disconcertingly huge, the other- who was holding the lamp-small, compact and intent, stood outlined in an open doorway.

"Come on in quick!" said the smaller figure, himself turning to lead the way.

Maia, following them through the door, found herself in an immense, cavernous, echoing building, everywhere divided by walls and partitions. There was an all-pervading smell of leather and hides, together with a spur, acrid odor-perhaps some sort of fluid used in treating them.

The lamp, bobbing on ahead of her, threw great, jumping shadows into the invisible roof.

The men, without looking round to see whether she was following or not, were walking briskly along a sanded pathway running between the bays. She had almost to run to avoid losing them. At length they turned aside into a kind of shed constructed against one corner of the warehouse; a lean-to hut, with two wooden walls, two stone walls and a ceiling of sagging planks laid atop. There was a rickety table, on which were some tallies, a few papers and an abacus; two or three benches, some clay bowls and cups on a shelf and in one corner a narrow, untidy bed on which a big, square-headed tabby cat lay dozing. This was evidently both the warehouse office and the cubby-hole of anyone who had to sleep on the premises.

As she followed them in, the two stood regarding Maia. The big man, she could now perceive, was obviously some sort of workman or hired hand of the other. He was not only tall but plainly immensely strong, with shoulders and arms that looked as though they could lift an ox. He was dressed in sacking and his hands were rough and dirt-ingrained-the hands of a laborer.

N'Kasit himself looked about thirty-five; quick-glancing, yet with a shrewd, prudent, unexcitable air; a typical merchant, she thought, both circumspect and enterpising. She could imagine everything in his life, including his marriage, his friends and his amusements, being subordinated to an over-riding ambition for gain: yet not only, perhaps, material gain; this was a man who might well be aspiring to social-even political-advancement as well. He seemed a younger, more mundane version of Sarget, and had no doubt a similar, though as yet unfulfilled, desire to reach the upper city. Could he, of all people, really be a secret agent of the heldril? If so, he had certainly contrived a most convincing front. Anyone would have thought him a mercantile Leopard of Leopards.

"You'd better sit down, saiyett," he said, pushing forward an old chair with two dirty cushions-the only one in the room. "I'm sure it's not what you're used to, but come to that, we don't often have visitors like you, either."

She sat down wearily and gratefully. And good cause she had to be weary, she thought. Yet for the first time that day she felt secure: these men, she felt intuitively, were not going to betray or harm her.

N'Kasit poured wine. It was rough, bitter stuff, but she was glad of it and drank off her cup almost at once. Having refilled it, he offered her bread and cheese, but this she declined. All she wanted now was to get on. How quickly could she reach the gaol? If she was to save Zenka and Anda-Nokomis every minute might be vital.

"I suppose you need quite a few cats in a place like this," she said, nodding towards the tabby on the bed. "I'm fond of cats myself; I've got a beauty at home. She's called Colonna, like the one in the old story, you know."

"I remember," answered N'Kasit, "but I always thought the one in the story was called Bakris."