Matt returned the gesture, and the Lemurian's eyes flicked to the sword at his side. Keje spoke quickly in Nakja-Mur's ear. While the Lemurian chief watched them, unblinking, Adar translated to Courtney Bradford.

"Never has he seen someone make the Sign of the Empty Hand when that person's hand wasn't empty. I believe he's referring to your sword, old boy."

Matt glanced with surprise at the sheathed ceremonial weapon. They'd worn the swords—as before—to seem less exotic. It hadn't occurred to him that it might cause trouble. Keje would have warned them if they were committing some terrible breach of convention. Wouldn't he? He thought quickly. "Tell him my hand is empty. Among our people, only the unsheathed weapon is a threat because it shows intent. The sign is given as a token of friendship and reflects more the intent than the actual fact."

"It is a lie, then?" came the question. Keje seemed uncomfortable and Adar radiated an air of vindication. Matt felt a surge of anger and wondered if they'd been set up. Sandra unobtrusively squeezed his arm.

"Tell him it's not a lie. We came here as friends, as we came to the aid of Salissa Home. We'd like to be the friends of all the People. Since our intentions are friendly, not making the sign would have been a lie. Among our people, friends may go among one another armed and still remain friends. Is that not the case among his?"

After the translation, Nakja-Mur just stared for a moment, but then slowly, his lips parted into a grin. Matt looked at Keje and saw he was already smiling. "I tell Nakja-Mur you people always armed because you always . . . warriors. Always. You ship made for fighting only. Not so?"

Finally, they'd come to the point. He'd never lied about it, but he had downplayed it. Now, Matt knew, there was only one possible answer. The truth.

"USS Walker is a ship of war," he admitted quietly.

"Who you fight?" Adar asked. "Who you fight all the time to need ship only for war?"

Matt realized it was the first time he'd heard the Sky Priest speak English. "We fight the enemies of our people . . . and the enemies of our friends."

"You fight Grik?" Adar translated for Nakja-Mur.

"We've already fought the Grik."

"You fight again?"

Matt glanced at Sandra and Bradford. They were both looking at him, realizing that what he said in the next few moments might have grave consequences for them all.

"If the Grik come and you can't fight them alone, we'll help. That's what friends do. But friends don't ask friends to do all their fighting for them."

Nakja-Mur spoke to Adar, all the while watching Matt's face as if curious how to interpret human expressions. Adar repeated his words as carefully as he could. "After battle tale of U-Amaki Ay Salissa"—he paused and looked at Matt—"Keje tell fight. Grik fight bad, but hard. Fight new way, bigger ship. More Grik than see before." He took a quick gulp from his tankard. "New thing," he said. "Different thing. Maybe Grik come . . . bigger, like long ago."

Matt was concerned about the Grik, of course, but he wasn't too worried about Walker's ability to handle several of their ships at once, if need be. They were the "Ancient Enemy," that much he understood, and he knew the 'Cats held them in almost superstitious dread—with good reason. But he guessed he'd begun to think of them more along the lines of his "Malay pirate" model than as an actual expansionist menace. They'd been "out there" for thousands of years, after all. His assessment was based on his limited conversations, as well as the lack of any evident preparations to meet a serious threat. Especially here. He'd shifted his primary concern to establishing good enough relations with the Lemurians that they would help with fuel and repairs. If a limited alliance, in which Walker chased off a few Grik now and then, was the only way to meet those needs, then he was prepared to agree to one, but he wanted to avoid an "entangling" alliance that left either too dependent on the other.

Now, though, it seemed they were actually afraid the Grik might attack here. That didn't fit the "pirate" model. He was dismayed how vulnerable the people of Baalkpan were, even compared to their seagoing cousins. They'd always referred to it as an "outpost" or "colony," and he supposed that description had left him thinking Baalkpan was small and possibly even transient. Certainly easily evacuated. Now, of course, he knew that the land colony of Baalkpan would be about as easy to evacuate as . . . Surabaya. But even against six Grik ships, Baalkpan had enough people—complacent as they were—to repel an assault with ease. Something had been lost in translation—or had they been "downplaying" too?

Adar continued. "If Grik come bigger, like long ago, there be . . . plenty? Plenty fight for all." Matt looked at Nakja-Mur and then at Keje who stood by his side, watching him. Then he glanced at Sandra and sighed.

"Tell me more about the Grik."

The party proceeded around them, loud with happy cries and chittering laughter. A troupe of dancers found enough space near the trunk of the great tree to perform feats of astonishing agility and admirable grace.

They were accompanied by haunting but festive music produced by drums and a woodwind/horn that sounded like a muted trumpet. All the while, a space was left surrounding the thronelike chair of Nakja-Mur and his guests while they discussed the peril they faced.

Nakja-Mur touched a chime. At the signal, a truly ancient Lemurian emerged—as if he'd been waiting—from a chamber behind his chief, dressed in the robes and stars of the Sky Priests. Around his neck was a simple brass pendant, tarnished with age but suspended by an ornate chain of gold. He clutched it when he suddenly spoke the same, but more polished, Latin that Adar had first used to communicate with them.

"You understand the Ancient Tongue," he grated.

"Yes! I mean, uh, that's true, Your . . . Eminence."

The old Lemurian gave a start when Bradford replied, but continued in his raspy voice. "I'm disquieted by that, but it's clearly true. I would learn how this can be. But that will wait." He seemed contemplative for a moment, but then visibly gathered himself to speak again.

"I'm Naga, High Sky Priest of Baalkpan. I will tell you of the Grik and of the People. The Scrolls are our ancient history, our guide, our way, our very life, but they are incomplete and there are gaps—great gaps— between their beginning and the now. Hundreds of generations passed between the beginning times and when we learned the Ancient Tongue.

The Truth was passed by word of mouth all that time before it was recorded." He blinked several times in a sequence that Bradford thought signified regret. "Perhaps, much was lost," he continued, "but the Scrolls clearly tell of a time when all the people lived together in happiness and peace on a land in the west. A land vast and beautiful, safe from the capricious sea. A land lush and green and covered with trees and protected by water. And the Maker of All Things, the Greatest of all the Stars above, filled the waters around the Ancient Home with wicked fishes that kept our people safe from the monsters across the water on the western land.

"And thus it was, for age upon age. The People lived and died, but were prosperous and happy and needed only the trees for their homes."

He shook his head in lament and blinked again, rapidly. "But for some, it wasn't enough. The fragile perfection of the People's existence was somehow lacking, it seemed. Some built boats, to range upon the sea and take fishes there. They wandered and explored, and finally it came to be that one of the boats was cast upon the western land of monsters. The Grik," he added darkly. "The Grik slew them and ate them, but then wondered from where did they come, this new prey?"