"What?"
"Play the game with us!" Her eyes sparkled mischievously.
"A very dangerous game, I’d say."
"All the best games are dangerous. Here!" Without warning, she flipped a dagger toward him. "What’s your name, fellow?"
"Valentine," he said in a sort of gasp, and desperately nipped the dagger by its haft as it went shooting past his ear.
"Nicely caught," said the white-haired man. "Try this!"
He tossed a blade too. Valentine laughed and caught it, a little less awkwardly, and stood there with one in each hand. The aliens, wholly ignoring the byplay, continued methodically to send cascades of weapons flashing back and forth.
"Return the throw," the girl called.
Valentine frowned. He tossed it too carefully, absurdly fearful of skewering her, and the dagger described a limp arc; and landed at her feet.
"You can do better," she said scornfully.
"Sorry," he said.
He threw the other one with more vigor. She plucked it calmly, and took another from the white-haired man, and sent first one, then the other, toward Valentine. There was no time to think. Snap and snap and he caught them both. Sweat broke out on his forehead, but he was getting into the rhythm of it.
"Here," he called. He gave one to her and took another from the white-haired one, and sent a third through the air, and found one coming at him and then another, and he wished that these were play daggers, blunt of blade, but he knew that they were not and he stopped fretting about it. The thing to do was to make oneself into a kind of automaton, keeping the body centered and aware, looking always toward the incoming dagger and letting the outgoing one fly of its own accord. He moved steadily, catching, throwing, catching, throwing, always one blade coming toward him and one departing. Valentine realized that a true juggler would be using both hands at once, but he was no juggler and it was all he could manage to coordinate catching and throwing. Yet he was doing well. He wondered how soon it would be before the inevitable blunder came and he was cut. The jugglers laughed as the tempo increased. He laughed with them, easily, and went on catching and throwing for a good two or three minutes before he felt his reflexes blurring from the strain. This was the moment to stop. He caught and deliberately dropped each of the blades in turn, until all three lay at his feet, and he bent over, chuckling, slapping his thighs, breathing hard.
The two human jugglers applauded. The Skandars had not ceased their formidable whirling of blades, but now one cried another "Hup," and the sextet of aliens reeled in their daggers and moved off without a further word, disappearing in the direction of the sleeping-quarters.
The young woman danced over to Valentine.
"I’m Carabella," she said. She was no taller than Shanamir, and could not have been more than a few years out of girlhood. There was an irrepressible vitality bubbling within her small, muscular frame. She wore a light green doublet of close weave and a triple strand of polished quanna-shells at her throat, and her eyes were as dark as her hair. Her smile was warm and inviting. "Where have you juggled before, fellow?" she asked.
"Never," said Valentine. He dabbed at his sweaty forehead. "A tricky sport. I don’t know why I wasn’t cut."
"Never?" cried the white-haired one. "Never juggled before? That was a show of natural skill and nothing else?"
"I suppose it has to be called that," Valentine said with a shrug.
"Can we believe that?" the white-haired man asked.
"I think so," Carabella said. "He was good, Sleet, but he had no form. Did you see how his hands moved after the daggers, out to here, across to here, a little nervous, a little eager, never waiting for the hafts to come to the proper I place? And his throws, how hurried, how wild? No one who has been trained in the art could easily have pretended to such clumsiness, and why should he? This Valentine’s eye is good, Sleet, but he tells the truth. He’s never thrown."
"His eye is more than good," Sleet muttered. "He has a quickness I envy greatly. He has a gift."
"Where are you from?" Carabella asked.
"The east," said Valentine obliquely.
"I thought so. Your speech is somewhat odd. You come from Velathys? Khyntor, maybe?"
"From that direction, yes."
Valentine’s lack of specificity was not lost on Carabella, nor on Sleet: they exchanged quick glances. Valentine wondered if they could be father and daughter. Probably not. Sleet, Valentine saw, was not nearly as old as he had seemed at first. Of middle years, yes, but hardly old; the bleached look of his skin and of his hair exaggerated his age. He was a compact, taut man with thin lips and a short, pointed white beard. A scar, pale now but once no doubt quite vivid, ran across one cheek from ear to chin.
Carabella said, "We are from the south, I from Til-omon, Sleet from Narabal."
"Here to perform at the Coronal’s festival?"
"Indeed. Newly hired by the troupe of Zalzan Kavol the Skandar, to help them fulfill the Coronal’s recent decree concerning employment of humans. And you? What has brought you to Pidruid?"
"The festival," said Valentine.
"To do business?"
"Merely to see the games and parades."
Sleet laughed knowingly. "No need to be coy with us, friend. Hardly a disgrace to be selling mounts in the market. We saw you come in with the boy last night."
"No," Valentine said. "I met the young herdsman only yesterday, as I was approaching the city. The animals are his. I merely accompanied him to the inn, because I was a stranger here. I have no trade of my own."
One of the Skandars reappeared in a doorway. He was of giant size, half again as tall as Valentine, a formidable hulking creature, heavy-jawed and fierce, with narrow yellow eyes. His four arms hung well below his knees and terminated in hands like great baskets. "Come inside!" he called brusquely.
Sleet saluted and trotted off. Carabella lingered a moment, grinning at Valentine.
"You are very peculiar," she said. "You speak no lies, yet nothing you say sounds right. I think you yourself have little knowledge of your own soul. But I like you. You give off a glow, do you know that, Valentine? A glow of innocence, of simplicity, of warmth, or — of something else. I don’t know." Almost shyly she touched two fingers to the side of his arm. "I do like you. Perhaps we’ll juggle again."
And she was gone, scampering off after Sleet.
—5—
HE WAS ALONE, and there was no sign of Shanamir, and although he found himself wishing mightily he could spend the day with the jugglers, with Carabella, there was no way he could do that. And the morning was still young. He was without plan, and that troubled him, but not excessively. There was all of Pidruid for him to explore.
Out he went, down winding streets heavy with foliage. Lush vines and trees with thick weeping limbs sprouted everywhere, thriving in the moist warm salt air. From far away came band music, a gay if somewhat strident wheezing and pumping melody, maybe a rehearsal for the grand parade. A small river of foaming water rushed along the gutter, and the wildlings of Pidruid frolicked in it, mintuns and mangy dogs and little prickly-nosed droles. Busy, busy, busy, a teeming city where everyone and everything, even the stray animals, had something important to do and were doing it in a hurry. All but Valentine, who strolled aimlessly. following no particular route. He paused now to peer into some dark shop festooned with bolts and swatches of fabric, now into some musty repository of spices, now into some choice and elegant garden of rich-hued blossoms sandwiched between two tall narrow buildings. Occasionally people glanced at him as though marveling that he could allow himself the luxury of sauntering.