Chapter 15

Blade soon learned there were two factions in Doimar's army. One was led by the Seekers. These rule-of-thumb scientists and engineers had rediscovered most of the military Oltec. Their faction included the men and women trained to operate the waldoes, and certain others with rare technical skills.

The second faction was led by the older officers, who'd learned warfare before Feragga became ruler of Doimar.

They had the support of the infantry, who would fight with nothing but rifles, grenades, and some mortars.

The infantry faction should have won by sheer weight of numbers. Doimar's infantry counted at least seven thousand men and women, while the Seekers could call on the support of no more than five or six hundred. However, even the infantrymen usually admitted that the waldoes would be nearly indispensable in the war against the other cities of the Land. They resented this fact, but they didn't deny it. By the time Blade reached Doimar, the two factions had signed an uneasy truce. This didn't keep either one from seeking to gain whatever advantage it could over the other, by fair means or foul.

It helped keep the peace that Feragga and Nungor both tried to be impartial, at least in public. Both learned swordsmanship, became experts with rifles, and could handle grenades and mortars. Both also knew how to operate the waldoes and put them through their paces. But it was still no secret that Feragga's sympathies lay with the Seekers, and Nungor's lay with the infantry.

None of this surprised Blade at all. In any army, those who do their fighting with machinery seldom get along with those who expose their own bodies to the enemy's weapons. The machine operators think the infantrymen are stupid. The infantrymen think the machine operators are cowards. In Doimar matters were even worse than usual. Blade had learned that the waldoes were operated by some sort of remote control, and thus the waldo operators would be many miles from the battlefield, doing their work with all the comforts of home around them. The infantry would be out in front, hungry, cold, thirsty, stinking, and dying in the mud like the infantry of every army in every Dimension throughout history. Blade was quite sure that each side in the feud would try to win him over. When this happened, he was almost as sure he could get some advantage from it.

The training room was two hundred feet long and a hundred feet wide, with an arched roof eighty feet high. At the far end one of the waldoes stood to the right of a tall steel door. At the near end stood Blade, a female Seeker, one of the control chairs for the waldoes, and several electronic consoles. The chair and the consoles stood on a rubber-tired cart.

Blade contemplated the control chair. It reminded him of the equipment once used to send him into Dimension X, before the invention of the KALI capsule. There was the same chair with a polished steel frame and black leather seat and back. There was the same tangle of multicolored wires crawling all over it like demented snakes. It looked like something you'd expect to find in the dungeons of the Spanish Inquisition.

There were also a few differences. The chair and its wiring stood in the middle of a steel frame eight feet high. From the frame hung long metallic mesh gloves and a helmet which covered the whole head and bulged with electronic and optical gear. Knee-high mesh boots stood on the base of the frame.

"Now listen carefully, Blade of England," said the Seeker sharply. "To work the Fighting Machines is not as simple as it looks. Many have thought so. Their mistakes have damaged many machines. We do not often let fighters of Doimar near a Voice Chair until we have tested them in many ways. But it is Feragga's order that you are to be taught everything you want to learn. We obey her orders." She shook her fist in his face. "But if you wreck a Machine, nothing Feragga says will save you from me."

The Seeker had to reach up to shake her fist in Blade's face. She was hardly more than five feet tall, with a trim figure showing through a sort of uniform of green leather trousers and shirt. Her dark eyes were enormous.

"I will listen and not wreck a Machine," said Blade. "In England the best warriors are trained to use both the weapons of their bodies and the weapons of Oltec. Only those who know both can command in war."

"If that is truly the case in England, you are wiser than we," said the woman. "As it is, we who know the Machines must often give way to those who know nothing but a child's weapons. If Feragga was not wise, we would be as badly off as the people of Kaldak, chained by the Law."

She started explaining the operation of the waldoes. It was very much as Blade had expected, a masterpiece of simplicity. The waldo operator put his hands into the gloves and his feet into the boots. Then every motion of his arms and legs was transmitted by radio to the waldo, which matched those movements. The helmet contained video and sound pickups so the operator could see and hear what the waldo saw and heard. Still other controls fired the laser-or Fire Beam, as the Doimari called it.

"Don't the Fighting Machines have any other weapons than the Fire Beam?" asked Blade.

"No, curse it," said the woman. "We know they have throwers for fire bombs, like the ones the foot soldiers carry. But the throwers need a special kind of bomb, and we have found no such bombs in any city of the Land."

"That is unfortunate for the Seekers," said Blade. "If the Fighting Machines could throw their own bombs, they might not need the help of the men on foot. They could win the war by themselves."

The Seeker's eyes became still larger. "You think so?" Blade nodded. "Then perhaps we could ask that the war be put off, until we learned how to make the special bombs...." Her voice trailed off, and she shook her head. "No. Feragga is too eager to begin the conquest of the Land. She would not allow it, and Nungor's friends would see it as weakness."

"Perhaps," said Blade and left the matter there. He hoped he'd sown a little more disagreement in Doimar, without giving the Doimari an idea they could use against Kaldak. He was going to have the same delicate problem time after time as long as he was in Doimar. He had to appear to be helpful without actually giving any help. He couldn't be sure of still being in this Dimension to help Kaldak defeat any schemes he'd suggested to the Doimari. Advising both sides in a war was fun in theory, but in practice it was more often than not a bloody headache!

Blade had to strip naked to use the control chair. As he did he was very aware of the woman's eyes roaming up and down his body. But she was still as thoroughly businesslike as Lord Leighton when it came time to get him hooked up.

The gloves and boots opened down the back, so they would fit almost any size of hand and foot, or at least almost any size of hand and foot in Doimar. Blade found them uncomfortably snug, although he could still move all his essential joints and muscles.

When the girl was sure of this, she pressed a green button on the frame. Blade heard a faint hum from the consoles, saw lights glowing on several of the consoles, and stood up. A second button made the chair swing back out of Blade's way. "All right, Blade. The Machine lives. Now start walking in place slowly, as if you'd just got up from being sick-no, no, not that slowly, you're not a baby!" and she clutched at her thick brown hair with both hands.

At the far end of the training room the waldo gave off a metallic squealing noise which set Blade's teeth on edge. Then slowly it started walking, with little shuffling steps very unlike the six-foot strides Blade knew the waldoes could take. He stopped, and it stopped, swaying so that for a moment Blade was afraid it would fall over. The Seeker winced. Then Blade cautiously turned his body to the left and started walking in place again. The waldo started off, this time heading for a point along the right wall of the room. Another stop, another turn, and it was heading to the left. Blade zig-zagged the waldo all the way down the training room until he could practically reach out and touch it, then sent it back to the far end and started all over again.

Within half an hour Blade felt confident he could make the robot do anything its mechanism could stand. After another half-hour, even the Seeker was convinced Blade knew how to handle the Fighting Machine safely. She cut off the power and showed Blade how the helmet worked.

"This mouthpiece is the basic control for the head and the laser. Bite down on the left end, and it turns the head. Bite down on the right, and it fires the laser. Don't get the two confused, or you might wind up killing yourself!"

Blade didn't kill himself, but he did take a chunk out of the wall of the training room by accident. Judging from the number of holes in the wall, he wasn't the first man to have such an accident. The woman made a great show of pounding her head against the consoles in frustration, but she was laughing as she did. Blade knew that he'd begun to impress her.

The video and audio systems had the same essential simplicity as the rest of the waldo. Padded earphones gave Blade stereo hearing, and padded eyepieces gave him a three-dimensional view complete with a sighting grid for aiming the laser. When Blade finally pulled off the helmet he was dripping sweat. He was also more than ever impressed with the technological gifts of the Tower Builders.

In fact he couldn't help wondering why they'd used these gifts to build the waldoes. They were an expensive and complicated way of getting armored firepower into battle. A remote-controlled tank would have been easier to build and probably more effective. The waldoes were deadly against any sort of primitive opponent, but they could hardly have been designed for action against one.

Not that Blade was unhappy with things as they were. A more effective kind of Fighting Machine would have meant a longer and harder war, with more dead among Doimar's enemies and more destruction in the Land. It might also have been harder for Doimar's enemies to learn to use, if they could find any in their own cities.

As it was, an intelligent child could almost learn to use one of the waldoes. The Seekers were talking nonsense when they spoke of their complexity, and Blade thought he knew why. They wanted to keep Nungor's infantrymen from realizing that almost anyone could use a waldo, and that the Seekers were basing their reputations on a lie. Blade wondered if he shouldn't reveal this secret to make real trouble between the two factions. Then he decided against it. He didn't know how many waldoes Doimar had. If it was only a hundred, it wouldn't make much difference how many men could use them. If it was a thousand, then increasing the number of men who could use them would make Doimar more powerful and dangerous.

On the other hand, if Kaldak could find some waldoes of its own, it would not take long for the Kaldakans to learn to use them. Blade knew that if he could get away and find waldoes in Kaldak, intelligent warriors like Sidas and Kareena would be using them effectively within a few weeks. Then Doimar's Fighting Machines would be meeting their own kind of battle, instead of walking over nearly helpless infantrymen.

Blade swung the seat back into place and sat down while the woman wiped him off with a towel. As she did, she chattered on about the problems of using the Fighting Machines without enough cooperation from Nungor's infantrymen.

"-all the sight and sound is much clearer here in the training room than out in the field. The Sky Voice reaches the Machines much more easily over short distances than over long ones."

"That must be why the Machine in Gilmarg did so poorly," said Blade helpfully. "The Voices were not reaching it clearly. The man in the chair could not see or hear clearly either."

The woman looked alarmed. "I hope you haven't told Nungor about the Machine's poor work."

This called for a polite lie. "Not yet. You think I should not?"

"Oh, yes, please. Knowing how poorly the Machine did will be a weapon for him against the Seekers. And it's all his fault that we can't take the Voice machines close to the battles."

She started massaging Blade's back and shoulders. It felt good but didn't take his mind off pumping the Seeker for more details. With only a little prompting, she told him practically everything he wanted to know, although he had to mentally translate many of the terms she used.

The Seekers knew they could not move the main control center for the waldoes. That was fixed in its underground complex three hundred feet below Doimar. They also knew enough about radio to understand the solution to the problem. If they had a network of mobile relay stations moving with the army, the radio signals (or "Voices") from the command center could reach and control waldoes all over the Land.

Unfortunately there was no way of moving Voice machines out of Doimar. "Can't you put them on munfans?" asked Blade.

She shook her head. "The strong Voice machines are too heavy to carry on munfans, and there is nothing else. There will be nothing else, thanks to Nungor, curse his black heart!"

"What has he done?"

"What hasn't he done, you mean? There are three whole rooms larger than this full of Oltec machines which could carry anything all over the Land. Not like the Fighting Machines, but other kinds, with wheels and other things. We of the Seekers could learn how to make them run, then carry voice machines into battle. It would be easy."

"But Nungor won't let you?"

"No! He says those machines belong to his army, the foot soldiers. He says this, and Feragga lets him say it, even though she knows the foot fighters have no knowledge of such machines. They talked about making the machines live someday, but they do not know how. Meanwhile the machines sit dead, while we who could make them live are not allowed near them." Her voice was getting shrill. "Nungor is like a dog who pisses on food he cannot eat himself." She leaned against Blade's back, shaking with rage or perhaps grief for her city.

"I am not surprised to hear this," said Blade quietly. "Nungor seems to be that sort of man. But maybe I can help you. Some of these machines might be like those I have used in England. If Nungor showed them to me, I might know how to make them live. After that, who could stop me from teaching the Seekers what I have learned? Not Nungor, certainly, and possibly not even Feragga." He smiled. "Of course the Seekers could not be too proud to learn from a stranger, but that-"

Her laughter held a slight note of hysteria. "Proud? Blade, I myself would eat dung if it would give us all the knowledge we must have. There are others who would do the same. If you can see the machines, and learn to use them...." She sighed. "We will all be grateful." She ran her hands down Blade's chest and across his belly to his groin. "I will be grateful."

As Blade stood up, she peeled off her shirt and stood before him, naked to the waist. Her breasts were small but her nipples were large. As he soon discovered, they were also exquisitely sensitive. He used his fingers and lips on them until she was moaning happily even before they lay down together on a pile of clothing. Although she was small she lay down underneath, but his weight on top of her didn't keep her from thrashing wildly when she reached her climax.

Blade was glad he'd given her this much happiness, and with so little effort that he could keep half his thoughts on other matters. He didn't know what the other Oltec machines might be, but they certainly sounded worth investigating. They might even be the vehicles he and Kareena would need for a quick escape. He would still have to be careful not to teach Doimar too much. He would have to be even more careful in speaking to the ever-suspicious Nungor.

Blade turned back to the girl, and this time he gave their lovemaking all his attention.

Chapter 16

Blade wasn't surprised by Nungor's reaction to his request, and he wasn't disappointed by the Oltec vehicles.

"The Seekers must have bought you," were Nungor's first words.

Blade shrugged. "You may say that if you wish. I will not take it as an insult, as I would have from a man of England. Yet I think you are not wise to say it, even though I will not have your blood for it."

"Why?"

"If the Seekers get any advantage from this, it will be your fault more than mine." Nungor's face set hard but Blade continued. "You did not say a single word to me about these vehicles. You left me ignorant until the Seekers chose to speak. If you had spoken first, I could have gone to see the vehicles with you many days ago. The Seekers would not have known anything until we finished our work and laid matters before Feragga. As it is, they will be watching and listening. This is your fault."

There was silence, while Blade mentally crossed his fingers. A strong attack was often the best defense in a situation like this, but he might have pushed Nungor too far. Certainly the man's fingers were twitching, as if they yearned to grip the hilt of his sword.

Then Nungor gave a quick, jerky nod. "All right. You make sense. We haven't had any luck with getting the machines to live ourselves. So we don't have anything to lose." He glared at Blade. "But don't breathe a word of how we failed to the Seekers. Otherwise Feragga herself won't be able to save you!"

"The Seekers will learn nothing from me," said Blade smoothly. It was a small concession to make, considering that the Seekers already knew practically everything about how the infantry had failed to make the Oltec vehicles run.

"Good. We'll go to the machine rooms tomorrow."

Each of the "machine rooms" was twice the size of the Seekers' training room for the waldoes. All three were filled with exotic military vehicles of at least twenty different kinds. They were parked in long rows on either side of wide aisles, which gave access to ramps leading to the surface at either end of the complex.

It looked like the vehicle park of an armored division whose vehicles were designed by madmen and assembled by drunks. Even the types of vehicles Blade could recognize at all were parodies of their Home Dimension counterparts. With others he couldn't even be sure what they were, let alone how they moved or how to operate them. Had the Tower Builders kept an experimental station in Doimar? Or had the last commander of the garrison before the war simply been part pack rat?

Trying to show more confidence than he felt, Blade lectured Nungor on the vehicles he thought he recognized or at least understood. The first one looked like the hull and turret of a small tank, but mounted on twelve stumpy articulated legs instead of on tracks.

"-not much use out of this unless there is ammunition for its weapon," he concluded. He couldn't tell what the weapon was, although it didn't look like a gun, a laser, or a grenade launcher. "Also, you would need two or three men to make this one work in battle."

"You have said that the war machines of England use four or five men," Nungor pointed out. "Could you not teach the men of Doimar to do the same?"

"I could, if you gave me the time," said Blade. "I would have to teach each man his work, then teach each crew to work together. It might take as much as half a year. Do we have that much time?"

Nungor hesitated for a moment, clearly reluctant to reveal such a vital part of Doimar's war plans. Then he shook his head. "No. I would not even want to ask for it. Feragga would refuse it and not think well of either of us for asking."

"I thought so," said Blade. "Well, then we'll have to look at something else."

They spent the rest of a long day looking at one "something else" after another. Some vehicles Blade rejected because he couldn't even guess what they were, although he tried to hide his ignorance. One machine looked like a ferris wheel mounted on a tracked carriage twenty feet long and ten feet wide. Blade somehow doubted that the Tower Builders' army held carnivals for its men.

Blade rejected other machines because they were obviously no more than junk. Still, others he rejected because they would be quite useless in Doimar's wars. A lot of engineering equipment fell into that category. Doimar's army wasn't going to build pontoon bridges, dig ditches, lay down fuel lines, or do many other engineering jobs a Home Dimension mechanized army faced in war.

Blade rejected some vehicles because he not only recognized them but knew they would be far too useful to Doimar and far too dangerous to Kaldak. There were a dozen or so tracked vehicles which could be nothing but armored personnel carriers. These could carry raiding parties of Doimari infantry deep into enemy territory. They could also carry the Seekers' radios, making the waldoes far more effective. Used either way they could mean disaster for Kaldak in the coming war.

Blade had to be particularly careful in explaining the uselessness of the more useful vehicles. Nungor was no fool. Catching Blade in even a small lie might make him so suspicious that Blade's position-and Kareena's-would become impossible.

Fortunately Nungor's dislike of the Seekers did much of Blade's work for him. Most of the time Blade had only to mention that a certain vehicle might be useful to the infantry "-but would be far more useful to the Seekers, I'm afraid." Then Nungor would immediately start talking about ways of hiding this fact from the Seekers.

After a while he would always remember that this was hardly possible, as long as Feragga was sympathetic to the Seekers. Then he would finish with more or less the same words: "We'd better keep quiet about this one for a while."

Nungor might not be willing to see Doimar defeated rather than let the Seekers get the credit for a victory. But he was certainly willing to risk many things to reduce the Seekers' share of glory, including the lives of his own men. Blade was perfectly happy to encourage this desire. It not only made his own job of sabotaging Doimar's war effort a great deal easier, it made it considerably safer as well. If the Seekers and the infantry ever got together and compared notes on what Blade was telling them, he'd be finished. Thanks to Nungor's stubborn prejudices, that meeting would probably never take place.

They were halfway through the last room when Blade's eyes widened. The next six vehicles were identical-light Hovercraft with a large shrouded propeller in the rear and a domed passenger compartment in front. They didn't look heavily armed, so they were probably scout vehicles of some sort, relying on speed rather than firepower.

Nungor had noticed Blade's expression. "Ah, you think these are worth studying? So do we. We have even made one of them live for a short time." He pointed to the fourth Hovercraft.

"Why didn't you keep it alive?"

"We could make it rise and move. We could not make it move in one direction for long. It was like a wounded munfan running wild."

Blade nodded. Hovercraft could move fast and cross any sort of surface, but they were hard to steer. In a crosswind it was almost impossible to keep them on a straight course, and even in a calm air they needed plenty of room to turn. Large Hovercraft like the ones used as ferries across the English Channel overcame the problem by sheer weight and power, but smaller machines simply needed careful handling.

Fortunately Blade was in a position to provide that careful handling. He'd learned to drive Hovercraft while taking his commando course with the Royal Marines. If the controls on the Tower Builders' machines were anything like those in Home Dimension... Blade hurried over to the fourth Hovercraft, scrambled up on the front, and peered in through the scratched and dusty windshield. A quick look was enough. He let out a shout of real pleasure, then dropped to the floor and hurried back to Nungor.

"Can you use this machine?" asked the War Captain.

Blade nodded. "We do not have such machines among the Oltec of England. But we did find books which spoke of them and how they were guided. I have read those books, and I think I can remember how to guide the machines. I will need a few days to practice, of course, and many large fire boxes to power the machines, but----"

"You can have anything you need, Blade, if-" Then he shook his head. "No. I must not promise too much. We shall have to get Ferraga's orders for what you need. She will insist that the Seekers learn of it, and then..." He sighed.

Blade grinned. "For once, this will make no difference. The Seekers will get no good from these machines, no matter how many we use." Nungor's mouth fell open and Blade continued smoothly. "To begin with, it will need strong and swift men and women to guide these machines. That means men and women like the foot soldiers, not like the weak and sickly Seekers." That did the Seekers an injustice, but it was what Nungor wanted to believe about them.

"Also, these machines cannot carry anything the Seekers need. They cannot carry the Fighting Machines or anything else heavy. They can easily carry foot soldiers or foot soldiers' weapons." That might even be the truth. The Hovercraft had a rear deck obviously able to hold cargo, but they were certainly too small to lift a three-ton waldo. Blade was prepared to take his chances that they could not carry the radios.

"So-the foot soldiers will have this Oltec all to themselves, whatever Feragga says?"

"I do not know what Feragga will say," Blade pointed out. "She may try to favor the Seekers. But you can certainly trust me to speak strongly for the foot soldiers. Even Feragga of Doimar cannot make an Oltec machine into something it is not."

"No." Nungor was staring at the Hovercraft like a starving man offered a seven-course banquet. Blade practically had to drag him away.

Like the other times Blade dined with Feragga, this meal ended with a huge bowl of fruit sliced up in honey. As usual, Feragga served herself the lion's share of the bowl. The chief of Doimar had a sweet tooth.

As she spooned up the dessert with childish pleasure, Blade watched the candlelight play on Feragga's smooth brown skin, showing the muscles rippling under it. There was more skin than usual on display tonight. Feragga wore her knee-length boots with knives in them, a skirt of blue leather reaching to her ankles but slit up to one hip, and nothing else except a heavy dose of perfume. The perfume could not entirely hide Feragga's reluctance to take a bath more than once a week.

Otherwise Blade had to admit that the less Feragga wore the better she looked. Her breasts were large, in proportion to the rest of her, but well shaped and solid. The curve of her belly told of muscle rather than flab, and her surprisingly graceful throat-

Blade realized he was staring at her a moment before Feragga laughed. "Ah, Blade. Sometimes I think I should bed you. Sometimes I think I should not. Sometimes I think I should ask you to decide for me. But if you are going to look at me like that, I know the answer you would give if I asked. So perhaps I should not trust you that much in matters where your prick might rule you."

She pushed the empty dish away, lit a fresh candle from the dying one, and signaled to the maidservant at the door to leave them. When the door closed, Feragga's smile faded. "You are wiser in matters of war and Oltec, I think. So there I will trust you." She filled both their cups with beer from a jug on the floor beside her. "Nungor says you can make one of the Oltec carrying machines live again. Is this so?"

"If he says that I am sure of it, he is hoping for too much," began Blade cautiously. "If he says that I think I can learn the machine's ways, then teach them to others... " He shrugged. "I will not give you false hopes, Feragga."

"Good. I would not thank you for that." She gulped her beer noisily. "Nungor also says that the Seekers cannot use these machines."

Blade nodded. "There he says what I think, too. I know the Seekers' wisdom and do not think they lack courage. But I do not know what they could do with these machines. If I knew more of the Seekers' work-"

Feragga raised a hand. "You shall, Blade. You shall, as soon as you have learned how to guide these machines. You shall teach the Seekers as well as the footmen how to guide them. In return the Seekers will tell you everything they know."

"Thank you, Feragga. This will make my work easier. But-will Nungor-"

Feragga slammed her cup down on the table hard enough to knock spoons and knives off onto the floor. "I piss in Nungor's beer! He will like it, or I will find another War Captain. For too long the Seekers and the footmen have been fighting like tomcats. The Doimari will never rule the Land if we go on running off in different directions like a flock of sheep when a great-hawk swoops down!" She poured herself more beer. "But with your help, Blade, this can change."

"I will be glad to help," said Blade. He was still cautious. In spite of her coarse manners, Feragga was dangerously sensible. She might ask him to do something which would be fatal to Kaldak.

"Good." She explained. Once he'd proved he could make the Oltec vehicles live again, Blade would be named Doimar's Captain of Oltec, ranking equal to both the First Seeker and Nungor the War Captain. He would be given a staff of intelligent men and women, chosen equally from the Seekers and from the foot soldiers. With this staff, he would find, study, and learn to use any Oltec found in the cities Doimar conquered. Then he would teach what he'd learned to both the Seekers and the foot soldiers.

"How many people will I have under me?" Blade asked. So far, the plan didn't seem to present any immediate danger to Kaldak, but he wanted to be sure. "If I'm going to have to search each city in the Land from tower top to cellar-"

Feragga laughed, spraying beer into Blade's face. "Don't worry, Blade. We've got maps of at least a dozen of the cities, showing where all the Oltec is hidden. Those Lawbound fools have been sitting on treasures for centuries. That proves how unfit they are to hold it. In Doimar we've gone beyond the Law, and that proves we're the destined rulers of the Land!" Feragga seemed to be feeling the beer.

"You didn't have a map of Gilmarg, did you?" said Blade. He was fishing for more information about those maps.

Feragga grunted like a pig. "No, worse luck. If we had, we'd have stripped that storeroom empty long before you led the Kaldakans to it. Oh, well, we'll dig up that building you dropped on it someday, and we've got plenty of other maps." She laughed. "Would you believe we even have one of Kaldak?"

"I'll believe it if I see it," said Blade, trying hard to make a joke of the matter.

"You will, you will. You might as well start studying those maps while you're studying the machines. You've got to have something to do at night besides take slave girls to bed." She punched Blade in the shoulder. "I'm not jealous. I know you've got enough manhood to have some left for me. So don't look so worried about that."

Blade wasn't looking worried. He was trying desperately to hide his excitement. Feragga was offering him a map showing all Kaldak's hidden Oltec! That could save months in preparing the city for war, if he could get back there with the information. From now on, that was going to have to be his main goal-that, and making sure Kareena was not left to die horribly.

Feragga reached across the table, gripped Blade by both shoulders, and pulled him toward her as easily as if he'd been a child. He wound up with his face buried between her breasts. Then she ruffled his hair with one hand and kissed him on the forehead. It was rather like being kissed by an affectionate bear.

"This won't be our night, Blade," she said. "When you've done your work with the machines-ah, that will be the time. We can celebrate making you Captain of Oltec properly. Good night and skilled hands."

The ritual wish for anyone working with Oltec was Blade's dismissal. He left quickly, trying to stagger convincingly as if he'd drunk more than he actually had. It would do no harm if Feragga thought he was too drunk to remember all she'd said to him.

It would do even less harm if she kept her promise not to take him to bed until he'd finished his work with the Hovercraft. If she did it before then Nungor's jealousy could still wreck everything. If she waited, Blade didn't plan to be in Doimar, let alone ready to warm her bed.

He and Kareena would be either dead or on their way home to Kaldak.