105

Christopher Stasheff

Magnus stared at her, frozen with shock. She had named his father’s organization! Had they followed him here from Gramarye? Had the time-travel organization that worked with SCENT alerted them to his presence here?

But no, she had asked his name, had said he was unidentified. Suddenly, Magnus was very glad he had given a false name, had left his identification aboard his ship. She was interested in him for himself alone—or at least, for his ability as a fighter.

If she was telling the truth.

“You seem shocked,” Allouene said. “I assure you, we’re not a bunch of bloodthirsty sadists. We’re rather idealistic—our mission is to help backward planets develop the institutions that will enable them to eventually evolve some form of democratic government, and make it last. We have a strict code of ethics, and we work hard at maintaining it.”

Magnus nodded. “I have … heard of you.”

“We are a legitimate department of the Decentralized Democratic Tribunal,” Allouene went on, “and if the government of the Terran Sphere isn’t enough of a recommendation, I don’t know what is.”

Magnus had plenty of recommendations of his own to bring. He had known SCENT from birth, at least by what his father and Fess had told him of it, and had secretly treasured the notion of someday joining them himself, and going forth to free the oppressed. But as he’d grown older, he’d begun to be concerned about living in his father’s shadow.

Now, however, he was being recruited in his own right—perhaps. “Is SCENT so hard-pressed for 106

agents that you must recruit every brawler you find?”

“Certainly not,” Allouene said, with a contemptuous smile. “You’re a rather exceptional brawler, you know, and not just because of your size. You show a great deal of skill—and there’s an intensity about you that speaks of the disillusioned idealist.”

Magnus sat rigid, amazed. Had the woman some psionic gift of her own, that let her see into his heart?

Or was she just unusually perceptive? “I have become bitter of late,” he admitted.

Allouene nodded with satisfaction. “You have seen too much of human selfishness and self-seeking. But we try to use those urges, to channel them into some sort of system that makes people protect the rights of everyone, in order to protect their own interests.”

Magnus frowned. “An interesting goal. Have you ever succeeded?”

“Never perfectly,” Allouene admitted, “but we have managed to harness self-interest into workable systems again and again. We console ourselves with the thought that no system can be perfect, and we have made progress.”

“Fascinating,” Magnus murmured, holding himself very carefully. All his own near-despair, his disgust with his relatives, his disillusionment in discovering how few people really seemed to care for anyone else’s good—it all came together and stabbed, white-hot, toward an organization that was at least trying to put ideals into action. But some lingering 107

caution made him say, “I should think you would find a great number of recruits.”

Allouene’s expression showed some bitterness of her own. “It would be wonderful—but very few people seem to be interested in working toward anyone’s welfare but their own. Of those who are, many of them aren’t strong enough, either emotionally or physically, to last through our training. The rewards, after all, are only in knowing that you have left a world better off than you found it—and we aren’t even always successful in that.”

“You must have been recruiting for a long time, to have seen enough cases to generalize,” Magnus said.

“Every time I put together a new mission team,”

Allouene assured him. “When we are appointed Mission Leaders, you see, we are given the responsibility of finding our own agents, of recruiting them and training them.”

Magnus stared. “You mean that if I join SCENT, I will be working with you?”

“After your training,” Allouene said, “yes.”

And that, of course, decided the matter.

108

lan froze. Then, before he could catch up his staff and bolt, the man smiled and laughed. It was a warm, friendly laugh, and lan relaxed a little. Surely the man could not be an enemy if he behaved in so friendly a fashion. Besides, he wore no livery; he could not be a keeper, or any other servant of Lord Murthren—at least, no more than anyone was. He was a broad-shouldered man, and his arms and legs were thick with muscles. lan could see this easily, for he wore a tight-fitting jerkin and leggings. His body looked very hard underneath the gray, belted tunic, and his leggings were so smooth they might have been a lord’s hose. His black hair was cut short, no longer than his collar. His face was craggy, with a long, straight nose and lantern jaw. His eyes were large, but above them, his brows seemed knit in a perpetual frown. It was a harsh face, and grim—but when he smiled, as he did now, it turned into friend-109

liness. Somehow, lan felt he could not fear such a man, or had no cause to—this, in spite of the sword that hung belted at his hip, and the dagger across from it. These, and his short hair, told lan the man’s profession, as surely as though it had been written on his forehead. He was a freelance, a soldier who wandered about the country and sold his services to whatever lord needed him that month. He was not a serf, but a gentleman, free to travel where he wished, as long as he did not offend the great lords. His boots came up to his calves and had high, thick heels—a horseman, then. But where was his horse?

Dead, of course—or the property of some lord.

Like as not, he owned no mount of his own, but rode whatever nag was given him by the nobleman who employed him. He might leave, but the horse would stay.

“Look carefully before you drink,” he said to lan,

“and listen more closely. If you had, you would have heard me step up to the stream and sit down.” Then he frowned, and lan shrank back from the sudden grimness of his face. “What are you doing, out here in the middle of the forest, alone at night? Your parents will be worried.”

lan heaved a sigh of relief. This soldier did not even know that his parents were dead, so he could not have been sent here to search for a runaway serf boy.

The soldier was looking impatient. “Come, boy—

how is it you are out here late, and alone?”

“I…” lan bit his lip. “I came out to … to gather nuts.” He didn’t even sound convincing to himself.