llowed him a moment or two of noisy grief and then limped over to
grasp his topknot and pull up his head. Lal's eyes were screwed tightly
shut, but there were tears on his cheeks, and his mouth twisted in
another wail.

"Be quiet!" Ashe shook him, but not too harshly. "Have you yet felt the
bite of my sharp knife? Has an arrow holed your skin? You are alive, and
you could be dead. Show that you are glad you live and continue to
breathe by telling us what you know, Lal."

The woman Cassca had displayed a measure of intelligence and ease at
their meeting upon the road. But it was very plain that Lal was of
different stuff, a simple man in whose head few ideas could find house
room at one time. And to him the present was all black. Little by little
they dragged the story out of him.

Lal was poor, so poor that he had never dared dream of owning for
himself some of the precious things the hill traders displayed to the
wealthy of Nodren's town. But he was also a follower of the Great
Mother's, rather than one who made sacrifices to Lurgha. Lurgha was the
god for warriors and great men; he was too high to concern himself with
such as Lal.

So when Nodren reported the end of the hill post under the storm fist of
Lurgha, Lal had been impressed only to a point. He was still convinced
it was none of his concern, and instead he began thinking of the
treasures which might lie hidden in the destroyed buildings. It occurred
to him that Lurgha's Wrath had been laid upon the men who had owned
them, but perhaps it would not stretch to the fine things themselves. So
he had gone secretly to the hill to explore.

What he had seen there had utterly converted him to a belief in the fury
of Lurgha and he had been frightened out of his simple wits, fleeing
without making the search he had intended. But Lurgha had seen him
there, had read his impious thoughts....

At that point Ashe interrupted the stream of Lal's story. How had Lurgha
seen Lal?

Because--Lal shuddered, began to cry again, and spoke the next few
sentences haltingly--that very morning when he had gone out to hunt wild
fowl in the marshes Lurgha had spoken to _him_, to Lal, who was less
than a flea creeping upon a worn-out fur rug.

And how had Lurgha spoken? Ashe's voice was softer, gentle.

Out of the air, even as he had spoken to Nodren, who was a chief. He
said that he had seen Lal in the hill post, and so Lal was his meat. But
not yet would he eat him, not if Lal