LITMIR.BIZ

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pulled the skiff up onto the beach and then walked directly up to Aracia’s temple.

      When they reached the entrance, however, Sorgan’s heart almost stopped beating. ‘Is that door made out of what I think it is?’ he gasped.

      ‘Oh, yes,’ Veltan replied. ‘There might be a bit of bracing here and there, but most of it is gold.’

      ‘There must be a ton of it!’ Sorgan exclaimed.

      ‘More than that, I’d say,’ Veltan replied. ‘Gold is very heavy, and that’s quite a large door.’

      ‘Are you saying that your sister just leaves it right out in the open like that?’

      ‘It’s fairly safe, Sorgan. I doubt if a hundred men – or even two hundred – would be able to pick it up and carry it. Let’s go on inside and have our little chat with my sister, shall we?’

      ‘Who are you, and why have you profaned the temple of Holy Aracia with your presence?’ an officious-sounding young lady demanded as Veltan and Sorgan entered the corridor beyond the golden door.

      ‘My name is Veltan,’ Sorgan’s friend replied. ‘You may have heard of me – assuming that my sister remembers the rest of her family. You can go tell her that I’m here – or step aside and I’ll go tell her myself.’

      ‘You would not dare. I am Alcevan, the priestess of Holy Aracia, and I speak for her in all matters.’

      ‘Aracia has women priests now?’ Veltan said, sounding more than a little startled. ‘Does Bersla know about this?’

      The young lady sneered. ‘Fat Bersla only knows what Holy

      Aracia and I want him to know. He might think that he’s the most important person in Aracia’s Domain, but that’s no longer true. I am the one who speaks for Holy Aracia now, for I am her High Priestess and always will be.’

      ‘That’s very nice, I suppose,’ Sorgan told her, ‘but you’re going to be a doormat if you don’t get out of the way.’ He put his hand on his sword-hilt in a threatening gesture.

      Her eyes went very wide, and she turned and fled.

      ‘Now that’s something I wouldn’t have expected,’ Veltan said. ‘It seems that things are getting more and more complicated here in Aracia’s Domain.’

      ‘The little lady could have been just making this up,’ Sorgan said.

      ‘It’s possible, maybe,’ Veltan replied. ‘I think we’d better keep our eyes open, though. If the young woman was telling us the truth, Aracia’s playing a different game now.’ He squinted slightly. ‘I think maybe you should hold onto this attitude you just threw into Alcevan’s face. Be sort of rough and abrupt. Let’s keep Aracia off balance if we possibly can.’

      Sorgan was somewhat startled by the sheer size of the room at the end of the corridor. At the very center, of course, was a massive marble pedestal topped by a golden throne and backed with dark red drapes. Zelana’s sister was sitting on the throne, and the little lady Alcevan was kneeling before her and babbling.

      Veltan went directly to the pedestal. ‘I wouldn’t pay too much attention to anything the young lady’s telling you, dear sister,’ he said. ‘We had a slight misunderstanding out in the corridor. I wasn’t aware of the fact that you were now accepting women as members of your priesthood.’

      Aracia straightened, glaring at her younger brother. ‘Who is this pagan, Veltan?’ she demanded. ‘And why have you profaned my holy temple with his presence?’

      ‘You know who I am, sister of Zelana,’ Sorgan declared. ‘We met in Veltan’s Domain last summer. He brought me here to defend you and your people when the bug-things invade, but since you and your stupid priests don’t appreciate that, I’ll just go back out to the harbor and sail away. From what I’ve seen so far here in the Land of Dhrall, I’d imagine that the Vlagh will have you for breakfast some day very soon.’ And then he stormed out of the room, winking at Veltan as he went by.

      ‘Maybe just a trifle extreme there, Sorgan,’ Veltan’s voice came softly out of nowhere.

      ‘I think maybe I got carried away just a bit,’ Sorgan admitted. ‘Your sister and that uppity lady-priest of hers irritated me more than a little.’

      Veltan’s laugh came out of nowhere. ‘On second thought, Sorgan, don’t change a thing. I’m quite sure that my sister will come around fairly soon. Go on back out to your ship and wait. I’m almost certain that she’ll send someone out to talk with you before long.’

      ‘I hope you’re right, Veltan,’ Sorgan replied. ‘I didn’t leave myself very much room to wiggle out of this.’

       2

      The husky oarsman from Bersla’s log-canoe was leaning over the rail of the Ascension when Sorgan rowed his skiff out from the beach. ‘How did things go in the silly temple?’ he asked when Sorgan pulled the skiff neatly in beside the ship.

      ‘Things are sort of up in the air right now,’ Sorgan replied.

      ‘If I understood what your signal meant a while back, you wanted to talk with me about something.’

      ‘I’ll be right with you,’ Sorgan replied starting up the rope ladder hanging down from the rail.

      ‘This is a real fancy boat you’ve got here,’ the native said.

      ‘It’s not mine,’ Sorgan replied, swinging his leg over the rail. ‘I borrowed it from a friend.’ Then he squinted at the beefy native. ‘I’m just guessing here,’ he said, ‘but I take it that you don’t have much use for that fat priest.’

      ‘He might make pretty good bait if I wanted to go fishing for sharks.’

      ‘It’d take a very big shark to eat that much,’ Sorgan said with a grin. ‘If that’s the way you feel about him, why did you go to work for him?’

      ‘Free food. I don’t have to work very hard, and Fat Bersla makes sure that we get fed regularly. We don’t eat as much as he does, but nobody else in the whole world eats as much as Bersla does.’

      ‘It definitely shows,’ Sorgan agreed. ‘You seem to keep track of how often that log-canoe of his rolls over.’

      ‘That’s only natural, since I’m the one who rolls it.’

      ‘Do you want to run that past me again? I didn’t quite follow you.’

      ‘It’s the easiest thing in the world to do,’ the native said with a broad grin. ‘All I have to do to get poor fat Bersla soaking wet is lean toward one side or the other. As long as everybody is sitting up straight, the canoe will keep on sitting upright in the water. One quick lean toward one side or the other rolls that thing in the blink of an eye. Any time Bersla starts to relax, I tip his canoe over.’

      ‘What for?’

      ‘I don’t like him. Nobody really likes him. If I don’t roll his canoe every now and then, one of the other paddlers will. Bersla hasn’t gone home dry for about three years now. We get wet, too, but our clothes dry in a hurry. Bersla’s clothes are thick and fancy, so they take at least a week to dry out. That’s a big part of what this is all about. He has to keep on giving us food to eat, whether he goes out in his canoe or not.’

      ‘You and I are going to get along just fine,’ Sorgan said with a broad grin. ‘What’s your favorite kind of food?’

      ‘Meat. Everybody likes meat.’

      ‘I’ll see what I can do to chase down some meat for you.’

      ‘What will you want in exchange?’

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