lord."

"He won't profit in this venture," Bram vowed.

The wind howled behind them. Six jeks ahead of them was Nadia City.

* * * * *

"Can't you see I'm busy? Can't you see I have no time for the likes of
you?" Prokliam the seneschal whined in self-pity.

"Then make time," B'ronth said boldly, his cowardice obscured by
dreams of avarice. "What I have brought through the Ice Gates is
important to your ruler."

"Bontarc of Nadia," said the seneschal haughtily, "does not waste his
time on every Utalian vagabond who reaches his court."

"True. But I assume Bontarc of Nadia wishes to know exactly how his
brother, the Prince Jlomec, died?"

Prokliam fought to keep his puckered old face impassive. But his mind
was racing and his heart throbbed painfully. Could the Utalian know
anything about that? If so, and if he, Prokliam, brought this B'ronth
before the Princess Volna as she had ordered....

"Wait here," Prokliam snapped arrogantly. "And keep your cloak on. We
don't want invisible Utalians floating about the palace."

B'ronth offered a mock bow. Prokliam turned to go, then whirled about
again. "If you're lying, wasting my time--"

B'ronth smiled unctuously. "In the ante-room, being amused by your
palace guards, is one who has been on the Plains of Ofrid quite
recently."

"So?"

"When the Prince Jlomec was there. She saw him slain."

"Wait here," said Prokliam a little breathlessly. He pushed the
hanging aside and stalked down a corridor, and around a bend, and up a
flight of stone stairs. He was busy, all right. That had been no lie.
Preparations must be made for the funeral games of the Prince Jlomec,
to which all the nobility of Tarth had been invited. But this,
obviously, was more important. On this Prokliam's life might
depend....

"Are they checking way-passes, lord?" Lulukee asked the big, silent
man at his side. Ahead of them, filing slowly through the Ice Gates,
were hundreds of visitors entering Nadia City for the funeral games. A
flat-bottomed air-car hovered overhead, peltasts leaning over its
sides, ready. Guards flanked the Ice Gates with drawn whip-swords, as
if admitting the superiority of Abarian weapons of war.

"We'll get through," Bram Forest vowed. "Tell me, Lulukee, if you
brought a prisoner to the city who might be worth much to the Abarians
but also to the Nadians, and if you were intent on getting the biggest
profit, where would you take her?"