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commands and operates estates, castles, industries, for his master. He looked at me, and I did not know,
at first, if joy or sorrow was the predominant emotion he felt.
Then: I thank you, master. I shall be a loyal Crebent. I joy in that and in your trust in me. He scowled.
But, by Havil the Green, I wish you were returning yourself!
That cannot be. You know, Nulty. But I fancy we have nowhere near enough money to finance a
return.
No, Amak.
In that case, Nulty, I really think that Hamun ham Farthytu will have to forget what he told you at the
shrine of Beng Salter.
A fierce and unholy satisfaction lit Nulty s hairy face then. He brushed his mop of hair back and glared
with joy upon me. And we will inscribe the name of ham Farthytu on a fine marble monument in the
Palace of Names!
We will, Nulty.
This we did, in all pomp and ceremony, after the events I am about to relate. In addition to Nulty s clear
excitement at recruiting people to go to Paline Valley, a long distance, and there put the estates back into
order, I sensed that these people who would go with him, guls and clums, were also quite anxious to
pitch it no higher to leave Ruathytu at this moment. The army would be out recruiting in full force,
soon. There were many of the poorer folk who would be willingly admitted to the army, where previously
that career would have been closed to them. Mind you, I was realistic enough to realize that no gul, let
alone a clum, stood any chance of making promotion past the rank of so-Deldar, and that only after he
was extraordinarily lucky and had survived battles enough to have made a more fortunately placed man
an ord-Hikdar at the least.
How much money do we have left, Nulty?
He made a face and went and fetched the lenken chest with the brass hinges and locks. He took out four
golden deldys, five silver sinvers, and a leather bag of obs.
Is that all?
You took everything with you, Amak, when you went away.
So I did. And I sold the voller, too.
Nulty was not to know that all that money had been used to bribe my way to the secrets of the vollers. I
cleared my throat and lifted the cup and the tea was cold. I could use that fact to clear the moment, and I
bellowed: Nulty! Tea, Nulty, tea!
Yes, master!
So that was what he thought of my gambling habits.
I quite agreed with him.
The plan, then, when it was formed, came out of necessity and vicissitude. It was not foolproof, but it
was serviceable.
Unlike some men who would have jumped up right away and gone roaring off to find their friends of the
sacred quarter and start the ball rolling, I sat and drank the tea Nulty brought. No tea, and especially
Kregan tea, can be taken lightly or without due thought.
The fates of nations hung on my actions here in Hamal this is true and yet I spent time working a
petty little gamble in order to send a pack of folk a bare step above slaves to a distant estate to renovate
it. Truly, I wondered if I was quite sane, and fretted over just how I could explain my foolish actions to
Delia.
Would she say that a true Vallian would consign all these cramphs of Hamalians to the Ice Floes of
Sicce? Somehow, I thought my Delia would not say that, would understand what I was doing and
applaud.
Thus with Delia uppermost in my mind the most usual and loving place in my thoughts, in any case
I said to Nulty: Listen and mark me well. You take these new people. They are free, you tell me. Well,
there will be no slaves in Paline Valley. No slaves, ever again. You understand?
I hear you, master. He rubbed his ear. I cannot say I understand. Some work is hard for a man, and
it is fitting that a slave should do this work.
However fitting it is, there will be no slaves in Paline Valley.
As you say, Amak. Then he fixed his shrewd eyes on me. And if we are raided again and we take
some prisoners. Must we then not put them to slavery, but kill them all?
Of course, that was an old ethical poser.
If they cannot be exchanged they will be ransomed. If not, you must talk to them and set them free and
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