“It’s too bad I don’t have others like her, to reward my chief lieutenants with. Sometimes I wonder if I should share her. It was to me she was given of course, and a gift like that should not be used carelessly. But on the other hand I am the consul, and a man of great power. I can take or give as I see fit.”

Kamal said nothing, and his face remained sober, but when he stood at the railing to begin the ceremonies he was licking dry lips.

Yes, old comrade, Draco thought behind his screen, I know you well. I know your strengths and I remember your weaknesses. You and your legion are as valuable as a pinnace, if used correctly, and I believe you’ll be mine. You’re no fool; you saw through my words. But you won’t be able to forget them.

But the Philistines took him, and put out his eyes, and brought him down to Gaza; and bound him with fetters of brass…

HOLY BIBLE, Judges 16:22.

Three kilometers below, the nightbound prairie registered mostly featureless gray to the infrared scanner. Darker patches were marshes, with the black lines of creeks here and there. A half-dozen night flights and several sessions with the two starmen had made the pilot a fair novice infrared interpreter, and the consul relied on him.

Ahmed stared morosely without seeing. Capture of the pinnace had seemed an important victory. Certainly it had involved a major risk. But he’d been unable to take real advantage of it. Or perhaps unwilling to, he thought. When a man has a resource like the pinnace he may become too cautious, afraid to risk, hesitant to make the next move.

Major decisions usually were difficult for him, and he preferred to delay them. He could always see a score of possible disasters waiting. Draco was different; he jumped to decisions. To a disgusting degree the man ignored possible side effects, complications, uncertainties. That was his major strength and major weakness.

It was less comfortable to sense countless unknowns, to try logically and objectively to balance a score of unpredictables, staring fruitlessly at a half-seen web leading to various possible results, many of which were intolerable. And when he could delay no longer, Ahmed recognized, too often he had to ignore the complications anyway and, like Draco, act regardless.

The plan he’d decided on was more dangerous than any he’d seriously considered before. It could well abort, of course, and nothing would be lost but time. The odds were strong that the Northmen wouldn’t agree. Perhaps it had been a subtle way of postponing longer, for if they refused, he’d have to come up with something else-a new plan, another perhaps slow decision.

But if they did agree-if they did-a course of action would begin that would end either in quick victory or utter defeat. The numerous small dangers of indefinite maneuver would be replaced by the stark danger of an early showdown. Success would depend on timing, secrecy, and more than anything else on the reaction of his legions.

He hoped the Northmen would agree. It occurred to him that something inside him might be seeking a quick end instead of a quick victory, release instead of success.

His always stiff spine became fractionally stiffer. When he finally decided, he did not hesitate to act. And his decisions, if slow, were none the less likely to be bold, unpredictable by a clod like Draco.

The gray on the viewscreen darkened, marking the canopy of a forest rooted below drought and rich in cellular water, its irregular upper level and countless billions of needles an intense complexity of evaporating-radiating surfaces. A lighter strip marked an open valley in their line of flight.

The pilot zoomed the viewer, and in seconds found the men they were to meet, a cluster of white dots in the grayness. They were waiting a little distance from their small signal fire, away from its small light. It would be good, he thought, to swoop down and chop them to pieces in the darkness; what a surprise that would give them.

Instead he raised the commast and started settling earthward.

Nikko sensed the quickening of the chiefs and the men who waited with them. It was a slight straightening of backs, a movement of heads, an awareness and heightened readiness that required no psi to sense. But when she strained her ears and peered upward she saw nothing.

And then it was there, fifty meters from them, settling to the ground, a blacker darkness in the moonless night. They got up quietly and started toward it, spreading out a little in caution. She followed close behind until they formed an open semicircle not far outside the force shield.

The voice from the commast was quiet in the waiting night, speaking Anglic. Its softness surprised Nikko.

“I am Ahmed, consul of the orcs. I have an offer to make you, one you will find hard to refuse.”

Sten Vannaren translated for the gathering-primarily the Council of Chiefs and the War Council, which in part were the same men. His reply was terse: “Tell us your offer.”

“I rule a strong army, half of all the Northern orcs. My enemy, Draco, rules the other half. Soon he and I will war with one another, and I want your help. He hates Northmen. If he defeats me, he will march against you and destroy you.”

When Sten finished the translation, old Axel Stornave spoke. His words were dry and bored, and Sten put the same quality into his Anglic. “Orcs have marched on us before, and many did not live to regret it. Why should we be concerned if they march again?”

“When we fought before,” Ahmed replied, “you were only an army of warriors. You could move freely, and we didn’t succeed in trapping you, although we came close. Now you have your women and children with you, and many others who aren’t warriors, whom you must protect. And you must protect your cattle or starve.

“And if Draco defeats me he’ll have the sky chariot to attack you with. Unfortunately it will be of little use to me against him if he keeps the fighting within the City. As he knows.”

This time it was the deep growl of Kniv Listi that Sten translated. “If orcs fight orcs until one side wins, there will be many dead orcs. We don’t object to that. And after you have butchered one another, how will you destroy us?”

“You don’t appreciate our numbers,” Ahmed replied. “Only one of our armies was in the Ukraine. Our soldiers are as numerous as all your people together, including your women and infants. And if Draco wins, there will be the sky chariot. Also, we know now how you fight, the kind of tactics you use. If Draco makes war against you, he will not be ignorant and careless as we were at first in the Ukraine.

“And finally, though Draco and I hate each other, our men do not. Before our losses become great, one side will win a clear advantage. When that happens, the soldiers of the weaker side will throw down their leader and acknowledge the rule of the other.

“But if you ally yourself with me, I will surely win, for although you are not numerous, you are skilled and savage fighters. And if you help me, I will reward you. When I have won, I’ll take my army away and leave this country to you. Our empire is very large, and much of it lies south of the Black Sea and the Great Sea. For a long time our soldiers have grumbled at the winters here, and for me, I do not love this land.”

The chiefs drew back a bit, dim in the darkness, talking quietly, Nikko listening at the fringe. After a bit Sten spoke again to the orc. “To fight at your city we first have to get there across the Great Meadow. How do you propose we do that without being trapped in the open?”

“Since I have the sky chariot, Draco dares not send out patrols, even at night. The sky chariot can see in the darkness. So he probably will not know you are coming. If his spies find out, and he is foolish enough to go out to attack you, I can scatter his legions with fear and death. My sky chariot will be your protection until you get there. Then, of course, you’ll have to fight.”