"Still, they might not be entirely successful," Gar pointed out. "If the watchmen and foresters actually did manage to catch every bandit sooner or later, the peasants wouldn't have rumors about outlaws and highwaymen."
"Big forests are notoriously hard to police," Dirk sighed, "and I take your point-so are the warrens of alleys in a big city."
"Big city, yes." Gar looked back at Miles. "How big is the capitol, Miles?"
"Capitol, sir?" Miles frowned.
"The Protector's town," Dirk explained. "Oh! Milton?"
Dirk and Gar exchanged a glance. "Cromwell's secretary," Dirk said.
"Old Olly's ghost is alive and well." Gar turned back to Miles. "Yes, how big is Milton?"
"Oh, so very big, sir! Why, I've heard it holds fifty thousand people!"
"Yes, immense," Gar sighed. "I hope they don't all work for the government.... Well, let's see what the Badlands look like."
"Bound to be an improvement over Milton," Dirk said. Miles could only hold on and stare, scandalized.
CHAPTER 5
They went under the canopy of leaves, Ciletha and Orgoru, amazed that it could be so far overhead. "Thirty feet and more above our heads!" Orgoru marveled. "Why are there no leaves closer down?"
"Because the sunlight can't reach them," a hard voice said, amused.
Orgoru's gaze snapped down to the leathery face before him, and the bow the man held casually at his side, arrow nocked and ready. Ciletha gasped and clasped Orgoru tightly, trying to edge behind him for protection. The half-dozen younger men behind the leathery man eyed her lasciviously, chuckling deep in their throats. Ciletha stared in sheer surprise-no boy had ever looked at her with lust before--then began to tremble when she realized what sort of courtship they had in mind.
They wore an assortment of ragged, threadbare clothing, but what chilled Orgoru to the marrow was that two of them wore the livery of watchmen, two more the livery of reeve's guards, and the last two the livery of foresters. The leathery man wore a bailiff's breeches and short robe, though not his chain of office. He saw the horror come into his victims' eyes and gave them a gloating smile. "Yes, they had to be dead before we took their uniforms, these Protector's men. Well, we have protected ourselves against the Protector, and ask no man's leave to come or go, to wed . . ." His eyes flicked over Ciletha, and his voice grew husky. ". . . or not to wed." He nodded to one of his henchmen, who advanced, hand outstretched. "We don't see women very often," Leatherface explained. "It gets so a she-bear looks pretty."
Ciletha cried out in indignation, but the outlaw's hand touched her arm, and she shrank away behind Orgoru with a gasp that was half a sob.
The sound galvanized Orgoru. He shoved his fear into the back of his mind and held up a palm, looking down his nose at the man and proclaiming, "Stop! I forbid you to touch her!"
"Oh, you do, do you?" the young outlaw snarled, and shook a fist right under Orgoru's nose. "Who do you think you are, to forbid me anything?"
Terror shrieked through him, but Orgoru held his ground, only pulling away from the fist with a look of disgust, as though it stank. In his most haughty manner, he commanded, "Don't dare to come near my exalted person! Know that I am the Prince of Paradime, and that one so lowly as you may not touch me!"
"Lowly, am I?' the outlaw cried. "Well, touch you I will, fellow, and very hard, too." The fist lashed out and cracked into Orgoru's face. He fell back with a cry of outrage and fear.
Ciletha cried out with him and dropped to her knees, cradling his head to her. The young outlaw snarled in jealousy and lifted his fist again, but Leatherface stopped him with an upraised palm. "Let them be," he said in disgust. "Don't even bother with her, for he's another one of them, and what he is, she likely is, too."
Disgust showed on all the other outlaws' faces, but the one who had hit Orgoru snapped, "So what if she is? We're talking bodies here!"
"It might be catching," one of the other outlaws muttered, and the disgust flooded the young one's face too. "Aye, leave them alone indeed!" He turned away.
"When will we get one with some wits?" another outlaw grumbled as he turned away, too.
"If a woman had wits, would she come this far into the wood?" Leatherface retorted, as he led his band back into the trees. They stepped in among the trunks, strode a step or two-and were gone.
"Oh, thank you!" Ciletha gasped with a catch in her voice. "However did you scare them away, Orgoru?"
But Orgoru was glaring after the outlaws, quivering with anger. "How dared they call me `another one'!" He scrambled to his feet, storming, "I, the Prince of Paradime! How dare they. . . . " Then his voice trailed off and his eyes widened as realization struck. "They recognized my quality! They knew me for my kind!"
"What ... what do you mean?" Ciletha stammered.
" `Another one,' they said!" Orgoru spun to face her. "They must have been speaking of other noblemen and princes whom they dared not touch! They have seen them, they know of them!"
Ciletha's eyes widened as she realized what he was saying. "We must be near them, then!"
"Yes, near the lords and ladies and their Lost City!" Orgoru caught her hand and turned, hurrying deeper into the forest. "They must be here, they must be near! Only a few more hours, Ciletha! Then, surely, we'll find them!"
Miles couldn't understand why, when they took the first of their brief rests, Gar took out paper and ink and spent a fair amount of time carefully drawing. Miles glanced over his shoulder and saw no picture, only lines of odd shapes that he knew were letters. He couldn't read them, though, so he shrugged and left his new friend to his amusements. But half an hour later, when two reeve's guards hailed them and flagged them down, Miles was amazed to discover what Gar had done.
"Greetings, fellow guardsmen!" the first guard cried. "What brings you here?"
"Greetings," Gar replied with a smile. "We're being sent to Milton Town, friend."
Miles stared, and fear gibbered flailing up within him.
The reeve's man stared, somewhat taken aback, then said carefully, "Your pardon, but you know our duty. We must see your travel permits, friends."
"Of course." Dirk took out one of Gar's papers and held it out. Gar held out two.
The guard took them and studied, frowning. "These don't have the look I'm used to."
"No," Gar agreed. "Our reeve was rather cross at having two men taken from him, and told us that our orders would have to do for travel permits."
"Well, they should do that," the guard admitted, "but I'm not used to a scribbled note as an order. Not even the Protector's crest, hey?"
"No," Gar agreed, "only the signature and title of the official who wrote them. It seemed odd to me, too, but it's not my place to argue."
"No, nor mine," the guard said, with sudden decision, and handed the papers back with an air of relief. Then he nodded at Miles. "What about him?"
Miles felt his heart stop.
"He's the third letter, though the clerk who read it to me said it didn't give a name-only that we could take a servant. The reeve was even more cross about that, I can tell you."
"Yes, I'll bet he was," the other guard said with a grin. "When are you supposed to be in Milton?" .
"They didn't give a date." Gar returned the grin, and they were off into ten minutes of idle chitchat. Miles, sweating, noticed that Gar and Dirk managed to stay very vague about everything they said, though they certainly sounded open and forthcoming. After a few minutes, though, they were doing most of the asking, and the guards most of the answering. But soon enough the reeve's man said, with regret, "Well, we'd better be on our way. Can't exactly go drinking your health at a pub while we're on patrol, you know."
"I certainly do," Gar said with a smile. "Good riding to i you!"
"Odd greeting, that," the second guard said with a smile of his own, "but it has a good ring to it. Yes, good riding to you, too, strangers!"
And they rode off, with loud farewells on both sides. As soon as they were out of earshot,
Gar said, "Interesting that the guardsmen can't read."
Miles looked up, startled. "Of course not. Only officials, and students studying to be officials, can."
"Even more interesting," Dirk said.
"You didn't know that? Then how did you guess it?"
"Because the guard didn't say anything about what the note said-only about how odd it looked," Gar told him. "Risky, putting a man in his job who can't sound out the words. I could have handed him someone else's travel permit, and he never would have known it was the wrong name."
Miles stared in amazement. "But how could you get someone else's permit?"
"I'm sure the outlaws have lots of chances," Dirk said dryly. Miles realized what he meant; his stomach sank.
"Why aren't the guards taught to read and write, Miles?" Dirk asked.
"Oh, it costs a great deal, sir, far more than any peasant can scrape up! Our village didn't even have a school, and we're almost big enough to be a town."
"So." Dirk scowled. "Expensive, and even if you can afford it, you have to move to a town that has a school."
Miles shrugged. "The schoolmaster has a right to a living, too, sir."
"And the government doesn't provide it for him," Dirk replied. "Interesting, eh, Gar?"
"Fascinating," the giant answered from a granite face.
The towers rose majestic in the golden light of late afternoon, smooth-surfaced and slightly tapering, their sheen nacreous, as though they were made of mother-of-pearl. At their tops, they were pierced with windows under pyramidal roofs. For half their height, creepers and vines cloaked them so thoroughly that they might have been dead and decaying tree trunks. "Oh, Orgoru!" Ciletha clutched his arm.
"Yes." He clasped a hand over hers. "Beautiful, isn't it? My rightful home! I feel it within me! Never was there a place so right for me! Hurry, hurry! I ache to see them, these noble men and women who must live here!"
It was hard to hurry through a forest, where trees roots bulged up unexpectedly to trip the passersby and thorns leaned out to catch clothing-but they went as quickly as they could, stumbling as often as they strode, until they parted a screen of brush and beheld a blank expanse of pearly wall. They froze, staring, then stepped forward to gaze upward with wonder.
The wall was only six feet away, but it rose high, high, thirty feet or more, with the towers rising that much higher again, a hundred yards apart. Looking down, they saw a tangle of weeds and vines, of ivy and fallen saplings that had tried to take root and tumble the wall-but the strange, pearly substance had tumbled the saplings instead, and repelled the ivy.
Marveling, Orgoru stepped forward, reaching out.
"Oh, no, Orgoru!" Ciletha cried. "It might . . ." Her voice trailed off.
"Hurt me, as it has hurt these little trees?" Orgoru shook his head. "It has only repelled the hurt they sought to give it, Ciletha, by being too smooth to gain a hold-and too deep and hard for their roots to burrow under. It won't hurt me-I feel that deep within, I'm sure of it!" His hand touched the wall, and he let out a gust of breath. "It's smooth, it's warm, it feels as though it might yield . . ." He pressed hard, harder. "But it doesn't."
He looked up, wondering. "Where could the vines have come from, that cloak the towers? ... Ah! There!"
Ciletha crept forward, craning her neck to look upward. For two long strides, the ground was clear all along the wall except for spreading, shade-loving plants like clover making a lawn. But huge trees rose beyond that range, spreading thick limbs toward the wall and over it. Ivy climbed along bole and bough, wrapping from leaf to leaf about the tower. It rose as high as the trees could reach to the strange pearly stone, but no farther. "No seams," Orgoru whispered, eyes alight.
Ciletha looked down and saw him running his palm over the wall. She stepped forward and mimicked him, feeling nothing but smoothness. "They have joined the stones so cleverly that we can't even see the cracks!"
"If they used stones." Orgoru stepped back, looking upward. A thrill of dread encompassed Ciletha. "Of course they used stones! How else could they have built this wall?"
"Maybe they poured it, as we pour pewter into a mold." Orgoru shrugged. "Maybe they grew it. We can't know how, Ciletha. This is a magical thing, made by the wizards who first came down from the stars."
The dread gathered and coiled down her spine. "That's only legend, fable, an old wives' tale!"
"I don't think so." Orgoru brought his gaze down, smiling at her, but she almost recoiled. There was something uncanny about the way his eyes burned, something eerie about his excitement. "They told us it was just a story, Ciletha, but they told us that about this city, too, and the others like it that legend spoke of! Let's go find the rest of the truth!" He caught her hand and set off along the curving strip of lawn.
Ciletha stumbled, then had to run to catch up with him. "Wait, Orgoru! What truth are you talking about?"
"Why, the rest of the city, of course! There must be a gate, a door, a way in! Aren't you burning to see what's inside?" Ghosts and bones, she thought, but only said, "What will you do if you find the gate?"
"Why, knock, of course, and demand to be admitted!" Orgoru cried. "I have a right to be in there, after all!" And he strode on down the path.
Ciletha hurried to keep up with him anyway, though the dread was mounting.
Finally they found it=a gate twice as tall as either of them, or a gateway, rather. The portals themselves were only a mound of dust and crumbling wood along the threshold.
"This magical wall, and they had to build the gates out of ordinary wood!" Orgoru breathed, his eyes shining as he stared inward. "See, Ciletha! The buildings are of mere stone, ordinary stone! You can see the joins between the blocks!"
Ciletha looked. Sure enough, the buildings within were made of courses of stone, though cut so exactly like one another that she marveled at the masonry. They were all of stone, taller than the wall, each wide as a village, with huge dark portals and staring, empty windows. Several had rows of pillars holding up projecting roofs; others were perfect domes, held up by ... magic? She shivered, awed, thrilled, and fearful, all at the same time.
"I had meant to announce myself and demand to be let in," Orgoru said, "but there are no gates to keep me out, and no one to bar me."
"You may go in whenever you please," Ciletha whispered. She felt a trembling within. "Oh, Orgoru, I'm afraid to!" Orgoru took her hand and stroked it gently, reassuring her. "I'd have to go alone anyway, Ciletha-it's me who's their kind, not you. Wait for me, though. I want to come back and tell you how wonderful it all is."
"Of course I'll wait," Ciletha assured him, tears in her voice. She hesitated a moment, then lunged up on tiptoe and kissed his cheek. "Go now, and good luck!"
Somewhat dazed, Orgoru turned toward the gate. Then, heart pounding with excitement, he went in.
They stopped for lunch, and for a few minutes every two hours to stretch their legs, but other than that, Miles rode with Gar and Dirk all day, his legs aching worse and worse with every hour. How could soldiers stand it?
In mid-afternoon, they were challenged a second time, and this guard didn't even comment on the "permit" not being on a standard form. He only looked at it and said, "Gar Pike? That really your name?"
Gar stared in surprise, then recovered quickly and said, "My parents tried to be funny now and then."
"The rest of it looks good enough," the guard said, "though I wish this `Jonathan Esque, Clerk' would have said who he was writing for."
"You can read!" Dirk blurted.
"Can't I just, though," the guard said bitterly. "My parents scrimped and saved to send me to school. Much good it did me, though."
"They must have been well-off," Gar said.
"Only peasants, friend, same as you and I--but the magistrate thought I had promise, so the whole village went without and scraped up enough to send me to the school at the reeve's town-and what came of it? I failed the examination! They've forgiven me, though-I think."
"Failed
?" Gar frowned. "Odd, when you had the talent and so many years' schooling. What happened?"
Miles stared at him in surprise. Surely he had to know he was asking about something painful! He was startled that Gar should be so rude.
But the guard didn't seem to mind talking about it, though . his mouth twisted with bitterness. "Oh, I knew the law well enough, had high marks on that day-but the second day was essays, and though I did well enough explaining why we need a civil service, and why peasants mustn't have weapons, my explanation of why we need a Protector didn't satisfy the judges. Odd, because I only said what the books did, with just one idea of my own to show I could think."
Gar, frowning, said, "That's odd. What was your reasoning?"
"Why," said the reeve's man, "that we needed a Protector to protect us from kings and noblemen, who might too easily grow weak and corrupt, because they inherited their titles and power instead of earning them, so didn't know their true value."
"Good as far as you went," Gar said judiciously, "but you ignored the reason why there must be a head of state in the first place."
"Oh?" The guard frowned dangerously. "Why is that?"
"Why, because without a head of state, the reeves and magistrates would keep things running along, but their superiors would wrangle and debate and never decide anything. After a while, they'd grow so frustrated that they'd order their armies to take the field against each other, and as their men killed one another off, they'd conscript peasants out of the field, then more peasants, and more, until there was no one left to raise crops-and famine would stalk the land. Then the few peasants who were left would charge the armies, crazy with hunger, and die fighting-and the whole commonwealth would collapse and dissolve."
The guard shuddered. "You paint a horrifying picture, sir, but you may well be right. What you're saying, though, is that a government without a head is no government at all."
Miles looked up, alert-the guard had called Gar "sir."
"You can make a good case for it, yes," Gar said. "I'd hate to try it in practice just to find out, though."
"Wouldn't we all! But why are you and your bailiff disguised as reeve's soldiers, sir, and your clerk as a peasant? For you must be a magistrate yourself, to have such knowledge!"
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