Maia

Tescon: A young Suban, adherent of Lenkrit.

Tharrin: Maia's stepfather.

Thel: A young Suban, adherent of Lenkrit.

Tolis: A junior officer in Elleroth's force: lieutenant to

Mollo. "Zai": Occula's name for her father (actually named Baru):

a jewel-merchant.

Zen-Kurel: A Katrian staff officer of King Karnat. Zirek: A pedlar.

Zuno: A young man in Lalloc's, later in Fornis's employ.

PART I THE PEASANT

1: THE FALLS

Three hundred yards downstream the noise of the falls, muffled by intervening trees and undergrowth in the crook of the bend, was reduced to a quiet murmur of pouring water, a natural sound more smoothly continuous than any other-than wind, insects or even night frogs in the marshes. In winter it might increase to the heavy roar of spate: in summer drought, diminish to a mere splashing among fern at lip and weed at base. It never ceased.

Below the bend the river ran strongly under the further bank, where its uneven bed of stones, gravel and sunken logs made the surface ripple and undulate, so that the tilted planes glittered in the late afternoon sun. Under the overgrown, nearer bank it was deeper and stiller, dully reflecting sky and trees. All about, on either side, masses of plants were in vivid bloom; some forming wide beds in the shallows, others lining the banks waist-high or trailing from the trees in festoons of saffron, crimson and greenish-white. Their honey-sweet or citrus scents filled the air, as did the hum of insects hovering and gliding, hunting prey or themselves darting in flight. Here and there a fish rose, gulped down a floating fly and vanished, leaving widening circles that died away on the surface.

Taller than the rushes and swamp-grass filling a marshy inlet on the further bank, a keriot-the green, frog-hunting heron of the Tonildan Waste-stood motionless, watching the few feet of slow-moving water around it with alert, voracious eyes. From time to time it would bend its long neck and stab, gobbling quickly before resuming its still posture.

At length, as the sun, declining, dipped behind the tops of the trees, throwing their shadows across the river, the keriot became restless. Wary even beyond the common run of wild creatures, it was alerted and made uneasy by such slight intrusions as the change of light, the movement of shadows and the breeze now sprung up among the creepers. Having taken a few restless steps this way and that through the plumed reeds, it rose into the air and flew upstream, its long legs trailing behind the slow beat of its wings. Flying directly up the line of the river, it was making for the still-sunlit falls.

The big bird was high enough above the river to see,

over the lip of the falls, the lake beyond lying calm in the sun, its blue expanse contrasting with the tumult and white water of the twenty-foot-high outfall. There were in fact two falls, each about fifteen yards wide, separated by a little, green island bordered, at this time of year, with forget-me-not and golden water-lilies, some nodding and dipping upon the very edge, as though peering down into the welter below.

The keriot had circled twice and was just about to glide down to the flat stones at the foot of the falls when suddenly it rose again, turned and made heavily off across the nearby thickets of scrub willow, disappearing at length into the recesses of the swamp. Something had evidently decided it to go elsewhere.

Here, at close quarters, the noise of the falls was made up of all manner of sounds: boomings, gurglings, patterings of spray, sudden spurts and bubblings here and gone above the steady beat of water falling into water and the higher, smacking note of water falling upon flat stones. And amongst this tumult a girl was singing, her voice rising clearly above the plunging boil.

"Why was I born? Ah, tell me, tell me, Lord Cran! Isthar, isthal a steer. Thou wast born, my daughter, to bear the weight of a man. Isthar a steer, na ro, isthal a rondu."

The singer was nowhere to be seen. Though her song had alarmed the keriot, a human listener (supposing there to be one at hand) must surely have been affected otherwise, for it possessed not only youthful gladness, but also a kind of tentative, wondering quality of which the singer herself could hardly have been conscious, just as no bird or animal can be aware of its own beauty. Her voice, common and beautiful as any of the flowers by the pool, fell silent, leaving only the water-noises, but still there was no one to be seen along the verge or on the stones beneath the green-and-white stretch of the falls. Then, as though a spirit's, the song resumed from a different place, close to the further bank.

" 'Fill thou my purse, great Cran; my purse is cut.' Isthar, isthal a steer.

'Seek, daughter, that horn of plenty with which men

butt.' Isthar a steer, na ro, isthal a rondu."