“I’m indebted to you, Sir Mortimor,” he said heartily. “Indeed I am very glad to hear you tell me this. I’ve been concerned these last few days over the meteorological situation at this castle of yours, here; the dangerous possibilities that are always there whenever a large low-pressure cell approaches an even larger high-pressure one. But what you say reassures me.”

Sir Mortimor’s lips, which had begun to curl into something very closely resembling a sneer with James’s first few words, froze, then gradually collapsed into a baffled stare. Brian was staring at him with equal blankness.

“As you know,” Jim went along cheerfully, “events have fallen out so that I have ended up being involved with magic. So the concern was unavoidable. But, naturally, I didn’t wish to concern you or Sir Brian with any matters meteorological or astrophysical, unless absolutely necessary.”

Sir Mortimor’s stare sought Brian’s face. Brian frowned back at him severely.

“Sir James is a mage,” said Brian frostily. “I had thought you understood that, sir, since he mentioned his work in that art prevented him from taking part in any gaming.”

“I knew of his deeds, of course, but I had thought then he spoke only in regard to his changing into dragon-shape.”

“It is far more than that,” said Brian. “The rules of his Order are extremely strict. For one, he must sleep every night not in any bed, but on a pallet of penance he carries everywhere he goes.”

It was Jim’s turn to stare. He had never imagined Brian had put this interpretation on his carefully deverminized, decontaminated, traveling bedroll. Sir Mortimor’s face had gone ashen. He turned to Jim.

“Sir James!” His voice was lowered. “I crave your pardon if some hasty word of mine may perhaps have sounded improper or unrespectful; but I only knew of your deeds-your deeds as a knight, that is-I had no real notion of you as also a mage...”

It would have been impossible for Jim to have imagined such a thing a few moments before, but the tall knight was actually stammering.

“You mustn’t call me a mage,” said Jim hastily. “I’m really only experienced in lower levels of magic. Only the very top levels of magicians, those like my Master, Carolinus, should be addressed as mage. As for any hasty words from you, I have heard none, Sir Mortimor. In any case, tut! We are all three knights, here together. Pray let us forget this business of my magic, except as I referred to it a moment ago-a problem now settled. I shall speak to you, sir, as a knight; and I will be gratified if you will speak to me as merely another.”

“That-that is most gentle of you, Sir James,” said Sir Mortimor. “You must understand how, living here away from normal European society, and being rather a rough fellow to begin with, I have become even rougher, and I do not guard my tongue the way I should. It is so difficult these days to get your orders executed properly. I have fallen into the habit of being more outspoken to my equals than I should be, to anyone except those of lesser worth. I will be most grateful to you, Sir James, if you will correct any tendency like that in me, which you see or hear in the future, so that I may amend my ways at once and make proper apology for them.”

“Tut,” said Jim again, at the moment totally unable to think of what else to say.

The color flowed back into Sir Mortimor’s face.

“I am most grateful to you, Sir James-well, damn your black liver and lights!” These last words were delivered to Beaupré, who had come up the stairs during the knight’s final words and was standing by his elbow, silent and waiting. “What kind of trouble are you bringing me now?”

Beaupré showed no more sign of being affected by Sir Mortimor’s outburst than if he had been carved out of stone.

“Your pardon, my Lord,” he said in exactly the same tone of voice Jim had heard him use every time he had spoken, “but there is some activity down in the village, which may be connected with our just driving off those who had attacked the front door. The fire from the straw and the oil in front of the castle has now burned down, and all is darkness before the door. I could let one of our men out the small panel in the door; or go myself, and creep a small distance down the slope to see what I could hear and find out about what they may be doing, or beginning to do.”

“Ignore it, Beaupré!” said Sir Mortimor. “They will do nothing until daylight at least, when we may see them trying to find a safe way from the village to the door. But not in darkness. Not tonight”

Beaupré hesitated.

“You may go!” said Sir Mortimor. Beaupré disappeared down the stairs. Sir Mortimor turned back to Jim.

“You are, indeed, satisfied, Sir James,” he said, “that I meant no ill will? Then or now?”

“It never crossed my mind,” said Jim.

“I am relieved,” said Sir Mortimor. “Well, gentlemen, shall we sit and talk and drink a bit and then perhaps seek our beds for what rest we may have the remainder of this night? Mayhap we may need it tomorrow. One thought does occur to me, however, Sir James. If you will excuse me from any further offense I may give through ignorance, I do not suppose you would be willing to put your magic to use in the defense of my castle? I am not without certain resources. By that I mean that I would be more than willing to consider any price you might think right for your assistance in that direction-I mean to offer no offense in suggesting payment to a fellow knight, none at all. It is merely a thought”

“In any case,” said Jim, “I’d have to disappoint you. As you just guessed, Sir Mortimor, my magic is not for sale.”

“Oh, of course-“ Sir Mortimor broke off. “So let us drop that matter, gentlemen, and talk of other things. Between the three of us, I am enheartened by the speed and easiness with which we repelled tonight’s attempt on the castle’s entrance. It may well be that whatever reward was promised or given these sea rovers was not enough to encourage them to a fully serious effort against the castle. There are fish in the sea and there will have been some food left in the village; but they will soon run out of provender; and it may be that after a few other small attempts, they may simply take ship and leave. I have known it to happen before.”

“I told Sir James about the fishing you told me of and then took me out on,” said Brian, avoiding Jim’s eye with a faint pinkening of the flesh over his lean cheekbones, “and the pleasure in bringing to boat a fish of the size you had then spoken of. I would that he could have the experience as well. If these pirates leave, certainly it would be possible to take Sir James out and find him a like fish?”

“Easily, easily,” said Sir Mortimor, taking a hearty drink from his mazer. “I have never forgotten my first experience in such fishing with an angle, myself, on coming to this island-more wine here!” He lowered his voice, which had been pitched up on the last three words, and went on. “Until that time I had boated only small fish, the kind that come like obedient dogs when you pull on the line. I would be happy to take you out, Sir James, as soon as we are no longer under siege.”

“Thank you, Sir Mortimor,” said Jim, “but we’ll have to see about that when the time comes. Brian, you remember we must be about our business, and you have been some time on Cyprus, already.”

“Surely, you could spare a few more days,” said Sir Mortimor. “We deserve a certain amount of rest and enjoyment once these intruders are gone in any case. Tell me, Sir James-I honor your resolve not to sell the use of your magic, but surely if a magician should so choose, I should assume there would be a good deal of wealth to be gained by it? I have thought from time to time how useful it might be if I could work some magic myself; but I never had time to sit down and learn it. I imagine it takes a couple of weeks or more to really master a spell? But, on the other hand, once you have mastered it, I imagine it is no more than snapping your fingers; and then all things obey you?”

“Not exactly,” said Jim, thinking of his hard work and the small progress in magic it had won him during the last several years, even with the help of Carolinus. “It’s a little more difficult than just learning a spell.”

“Say you so!” Sir Mortimor looked at him thoughtfully. “Not the sort of thing a gentleman could pick up, to an extent at least, in a few months? I must tell you, sir, that I am reckoned to be very fast with my hands. I have small tricks with which I have amused company before now, in which things seem to appear or disappear-like magic, but tricks only, of course-and my friends have often said that I might easily make myself a famous magician with a bit of effort. But you think it would require more than, say, a year or so of work-when I had the time?”

“I’m sure it would,” said Jim firmly.

“Ah, well,” said Sir Mortimor, but the polite belief he tried to put into his words rang false on Jim’s ear.

“How many years does it take to make a knight, Sir Mortimor?” asked Jim.

“Eh?” said Sir Mortimor. “But you must already know that. A lifetime, from boyhood upward of course.”

“That is why a magician must live much longer than any knight,” said Jim. “Because it takes a lifetime for him, also, to make him a full master of his craft.”

Sir Mortimor stared back at him, puzzled. Slowly, Jim saw understanding begin to dawn as the little frown line between his eyebrows erased, and something of a flush colored his face. But before he could say anything in answer, Beaupré was again at his elbow.

“Forgive me, m’lord,” said Beaupré in the same unvarying voice. “But I have had the carpenter from the village listening at the escape panel in the front door; and he says that they are now pounding stakes in somewhere partway down the steps; and in addition they are building something, or some things, in the houses of the village. He swears he can hear his long-saw at work; and he begs permission to go out and listen more closely to what is going on.”

“He is the only master carpenter we have,” said Sir Mortimor irritably. “Is there not someone else who could go out and listen and be more easily spared if he did not come back?”

“I can send a man with good ears, who has some knowledge of the sounds in a carpenter shop, m’lord,” said Beaupré.

“Then take care of it, Beaupré” said Sir Mortimor. “Take care of it yourself; and stop bothering me about minor matters like this.”

The servant whom Sir Mortimor had called for some moments before to refill their mazers was now doing so. Beaupré went downstairs and Sir Mortimor soothed his nerves with some of the newly poured wine.

“Well, gentlemen,” he said, “perhaps we shall have some peace now. It is a misfortune that you cannot indulge in play with the dice, Sir James; since I hesitate to suggest to Sir Brian that we pass a little of our time now in that sport, so that we may the more quietly go to sleep when we retire. I know not what else I can suggest by way of amusement; but it would be ill-mannered of us to play while you merely sat idle.”

“Not at all,” said Jim. “I enjoy watching. It is the next best thing to being able to play myself. The two of you go ahead. I’ll just sit here and enjoy myself.”

“Well then,” said Sir Mortimor, looking at Brian. “What do you say to a short bout, sir? As it falls out, I still have my dice in my purse here, along with my winnings of the last time we played. I had meant to set both away, but failed to get around to it.”

“All the better,” said Brian. “On my part, I happen to have a fair amount of my money with me; so that there need be no interrupting to fetch it from the room Sir James and I share.”

He reached into the broad purse attached to his belt and brought out a heavy handful of moutons d’or, broad French pieces in gold, that brought a gleam to Sir Mortimor’s face, although it was gone almost as quickly as it appeared. In his turn he brought up a handful of coins almost as large, but they were all in silver, with some lesser silver and brass change mixed with them.

“Shall we say ten silver to one gold?” he said to Sir Brian.

“Willingly,” answered Brian.

The dicing began; and to Jim’s surprise, Brian began to win immediately. In fact, he won the first four bouts before he had his first loss, and then he won three more. Both he and Sir Mortimor were becoming caught up in the game. Their eyes followed the dice with an avid eagerness, concentrating on the dancing cubes alone to the point where Jim began to feel he was next to invisible.

He also found that he was blaming himself for not having made plans for watching a dice game that might show him if Sir Mortimor cheated. He had made a mental note to find a way to use magic to test the matter; but he had not gone beyond that point.

Also, it was awkward that Brian was continuing to win, an average of something like three bouts out of five; and Sir Mortimor’s silver was swiftly moving to Brian’s side of the table. Letting Brian win could simply be a clever move on Sir Mortimor’s part to allay suspicion, particularly since he had come to realize that Jim had considerable magical powers which might make any cheating dangerous.

Sir Mortimor could simply be cheating against himself, to let Brian win; or he could be playing honestly at the moment; and Brian was having a legitimate run of luck.

It could even be that Jim’s suspicions were unfounded.

The whole business of Brian winning in Episcopi and losing here might have been the result of honest play after all, with Brian having a run of luck in Episcopi and Sir Mortimor having his here. If it had all been honest, then Brian’s only hope was to get lucky again.

The dicing went on. For a little time, luck seemed to flow against Brian after all; but this did not last. After a short run in which he lost, he began to win again and continued. They were approaching a point of decisions, since the money Sir Mortimor had on the table was now down to a few pieces. He would soon either have to call an end to dice-play for the evening or go to wherever in the castle his wealth was stored, and bring back a fresh supply of coins.

“Well, well,” said Sir Mortimor, pushing his last few coins together. “The dice have not been my friend this evening. Heigh-ho, but so it goes. At any rate, we have gotten away from our present problems and mayhap we will all sleep well. We should probably call it quits for the moment, Sir Brian.”

“I feel distressed, sir,” said Brian. “It seems less than gentlemanly of me to stop without giving you a chance to win back what you have lost just now. If you are weary, yourself, I would not keep you from your rest. But I assure you-“

“Oh,” said Sir Mortimor, “I spoke only out of courtesy. Myself, I am not sleepy at all; and, in fact, I would be up and around in the castle for the rest of the night from time to time, anyway. If you wish, I will be glad to dice on. I own, I would not be loath to win back what you just took from me. Give me but a few moments to fetch more coin, so that we can play like gentlemen with the worth of our wagers openly upon the table-“

“By all means!” cried Brian, determinedly ignoring Jim’s attempts to signal him that quitting now would be a good idea. “I will be happy to wait. So, I’m sure, will be Sir James.”

“Then I shall be right back,” said Sir Mortimor.

“Brian,” said Jim, in a low voice, after the tall knight had gone, “you really should have stopped. Even this much ahead must have recouped you for at least part of your losses.”

“It does, of course,” said Brian. “But, James, it is unthinkable that I should not give the man the chance to have his revenge. It is as unthinkable as if I was in a tourney, and the saddle girth of he who is to ride against me broke before we had even a chance to cross lances. I were no gentleman at all, then, if I did not lift my lance point in the air, rein in my horse, and ride back to my end of the list, to wait until he could be resaddled and ready to come again with full force.”

“Well, now,” said Sir Mortimor, sitting down at the table with them once more. “Since you offered to wager tonight with gold, Sir Brian, I thought it only fair to match your coins with those of the same metal.”

He poured from his wallet a double handful of English rose nobles, such as Brian had won at the Christmas tournament a few months before. Almost undoubtedly, thought Jim, they had been Brian’s. But now the value of the money at play on both sides was considerable.

The dicing began again. At first, Brian continued to win. Then the tide turned against him for a short time before he began to win again. But his second session of winning with the rose nobles on the table was shorter than the one before, and very soon the play settled down to an exchange that seesawed back and forth, first in one man’s favor, then the other, but gradually-and, Jim noticed, steadily-Brian’s pile of coins began to diminish, and Sir Mortimor’s to grow.

Both men were deep in the game, oblivious to anything outside it; and Jim found himself being drawn into each pass of the dice with the same sort of tension. He was growing more and more certain that somehow Sir Mortimor was controlling the fall of the dice, one way or another. But, though he stared carefully at the way Sir Mortimor threw the cubes, he could see nothing strange about either the throws, or the dice themselves, when Sir Mortimor won; nothing different in them from the times Brian won.

Still, his feeling that Sir Mortimor was controlling the game somehow continued to grow from a suspicion to a near-certainty. There was something artificial about the rhythm of the way the winning went back and forth, with Brian regaining the lead for a moment, only to lose it again, and then to lose more deeply than Sir Mortimor had lost the time before.

Jim wished he knew more about cheating and gambling in general. All he could remember were little tags of information floating around in his memory.

Two things only floated to the surface of his mind from among these tags. One was something he was almost sure he had read in a story, rather than in knowledgeable nonfiction: a reference to some gambler putting the “happy hop” on dice when he threw them. The other was something else that he was more sure he had read; something about the edges of dice being shaved, so that when set rolling they always ended with certain sides upward.

But if his memory was not playing tricks on him, and Sir Mortimor’s dice were shaved, Brian would also be winning with them every time he used them.

That is, unless there actually was something like a “happy hop”-but it could only be put on shaved dice by an experienced player with them... some special way of throwing...

However, the idea of the skill involved to make such dice work for Sir Mortimor and not for Brian rang a little far-fetched to Jim’s mind. His mind, hunting for an answer, stumbled over a very obvious one. Sir Mortimor could have more than one set of dice. He could be throwing one set himself and making sure that Brian threw the other.

But this sounded almost as unbelievable as the idea of the “happy hop.” Jim frowned internally. If Sir Mortimor was switching the sets of dice, he had to do it before their very eyes, without the exchange being noticeable-arid that was impossible.

Or was it?

Something was tickling that memory of his again, someone, perhaps some fictional detective had said it-when all reasonable answers fail, and only one unreasonable possibility is left, then the unreasonable possibility is possible-or words to that effect. The thing to do here was to simply start from the assumption that Sir Mortimor was somehow switching two pairs of dice back and forth, and try to figure out how he was doing it.

Jim had never diced in his life, even back in the twentieth century. He was one of those unusual people who get bored by gambling, with anything less than his own life as a stake. Whatever pattern of play Sir Mortimor and Brian were using with their two cubes at a time, it was a game that involved the one who was winning holding on to the dice and calling for a certain number, and then throwing the dice a certain number of times to achieve what he had called for.

If he did so within the number of throws allowed him, he won; if he did not, he lost. If he lost, then the dice changed hands and the other player had his chance to throw, name a number and try to achieve it within the same certain number of throws.

Jim concentrated on Sir Mortimor’s hands. They were very long hands, longer even than they were large; and he had not been exaggerating when he said that they were unusually quick. He would shake the dice in his fist and then release them just above the table top with his hand palm down and his fingers flicking out to start them rolling. The minute the dice had flown, his fingers curled back toward his palm almost reflexively-not into a tight fist but one almost so.

He was able to throw these dice with either hand. In fact, Jim decided, the man must be ambidextrous, because he handled the dice equally well with both hands; and both hands released dice with the same palm-down, finger-flicking motion.

Brian, by contrast, shook his dice with his fist in the same position in which he would have pounded a table, little finger bottommost; and then turned his hand palm down only slightly, to let the dice out.

By contrast, there was something unusually skillful about the way Sir Mortimor released the little white cubes from his hand. It had the flowing sort of perfection about it that Brian showed in his use of weapons-a movement that seemed to have been stripped down to its absolute essentials, and become almost a single, graceful, unthinking action. Brian’s handling of the dice was nowhere nearly as graceful. He threw the dice, in fact, about the way Jim assumed that he himself would have thrown them.

The one thing in particular that riveted Jim’s attention was the fact that Sir Mortimor’s release and recapture of the dice, out of his hand and back again, was so swift as to make the movement of his fingers almost a blur before Jim’s eyes. A suspicion crept into Jim’s mind. It could be that speed was intentional, to hide something. If so, here was something where even a small amount of magic could help him investigate.

He visualized his eyes as lenses of a camera capable of high-speed recording, so that it could play back Sir Mortimor’s throw in slow motion.

He concentrated on Sir Mortimor’s release of the dice, then mentally reran it inside his own head. In his visualization, he saw the hand move out over the table, only the back of the hand and the knuckles visible; then they opened, with the thumb dropping away from the other fingers and the other fingers beginning to uncurl outward.

Now, for the first time in this slow-motion version, he saw that they did not open up all the way, and no dice came out from them. Instead, the two dice were held by the top joints only of the four ringers that had enclosed them; and now that he saw the whole image instead of concentrating on Sir Mortimor’s one active hand, he caught sight of another pair of dice that dropped from the under part of Sir Mortimor’s other sleeve, hidden beneath his outstretched wrist and hand; and it was these dice that rattled and rolled on the table top a moment later, for Brian to pick up and use.

In the same instant the fingers that held the unreleased dice closed back toward his wrist; and as Jim watched, the original dice they held, thrown by the quick action of the fingertips, flicked back up into the sleeve behind them.

Brian’s hand went forward to the dice. This had been Sir Mortimor’s last attempt to throw the winning point. Brian picked up, shook and threw the second pair of dice.

Jim put the visualization out of his mind, and concentrated once more on what was going on at the table.

Brian rolled the dice he had picked up, got a five showing on one and a two on the other, tried to match this point of seven and failed. Sir Mortimor swiftly scooped up the dice; and Jim, watching-even without the need for magic slow motion now-noticed that Sir Mortimor gathered them in with his other hand and flicked them back into the empty sleeve they had left only seconds before. At the same time, Jim saw the original dice, hidden from Brian by the palm-down position, drop secretly into Sir Mortimor’s other hand.

Sir Mortimor shook the dice with both hands like a boxer congratulating himself. Then with his right hand again, he threw and made a point of eight; which, three throws later, he matched to win his point and another of Brian’s rose nobles. The second set of dice would be the ones shaved to win-the first set shaved to lose. Sir Mortimor was controlling Brian’s winning or losing by choosing which dice Brian used.

Well, Jim told himself with satisfaction, that explained how Sir Mortimor was able to win at will with the dice. Finding that out had been the hard part. Now it was simply a matter of using his magic to cure the situation so that Brian had his money back-and that should be the easy part.

No it won’t, said Carolinus’s voice in his head.