She had them out by then, taken down from her hair, and she twirled them, bluewhite and ominous, in her fingers.

He did not shrink from her, nor eye her weapons. He met her glance with his, andheld, willing to take either outcome-anything but go on the way he was.

Then he heard the hardness of her laugh, and prepared himself to face the tithecollectors who held the mortgage on his soul.

Her aspect of blond youthfulness fell away with her laughter, and she steppednear him, saying, "Love, you offer me? You know my curse, do you not?"

"I can lift it, if you but spend one year with me."

"You can lift it? Why should I believe you, father of magic? Not even gods musttell the truth, and you, I own, are beyond even the constraints of right andwrong which gods obey."

"Will you not help me, and help yourself? Your beauty will not fade; I can giveyouth unending, and heal your heart, if you but heal mine." His hand,outstretched to her, quivered. His eyes sparkled with unshed tears. "Shall youspend eternity as a murderer and a whore, for no reason? Take salvation, now itis offered. Take it for us both. Neither of us could claim such a boon frometernity again."

Cime shrugged, and the woman's eyes so much older than the three decades herbody showed impaled him. "Some kill politicians, some generals, foot soldiers inthe field. As for me, I think the mages are the problem, twisting times andworlds about like children play with string. And as for help, what makes youthink either you or I deserve it? How many have you aided, without commensurategain? When old Four-Eyes-Spitting-Fire-And-Four-Mouths-Spit-ting-Curses cameafter me, no one did anything, not my parents, or our priests or seers. They alljust looked at their feet, as if the key to my salvation was written in Azehur'ssand. But it was not! And oh, did I learn from my wizard! More than he thoughtto teach me, since he crumbled into dust on my account, and that is sure."

Yet, she stopped the rods twirling, and she did not start to sing.

They stared a time longer at each other, and while they saw themselves in oneanother, Cime began to cry, who had not wept in thrice a hundred years. And intime she turned her rods about, and butts first, she touched them to the shardsof the obsidian he held in a trembling palm.

When the rods made contact, a blinding flare of blue commenced to shine in hishand, and she heard him say, "I will make things right with us," as the room inwhich they stood began to fade away, and she heard a lapping sea and singingchildren and finger cymbals tinkling while lutes were strummed and pipes beganto play.

7

All hell breaking loose could not have caused more pandemonium than Jihan'sfather's blood-red orbs peering down through shredded clouds upon theMageguild's grounds. The fury of the father of a jilted bride was met byVashanka in his full manifestation, so that folk thrown to the ground laysilent, staring up at the battle in the sky with their fingers dug deep intochilling, spongy earth.

Vashanka's two feet were widespread, one upon his temple, due west, one upon theMage-guild's wall. His lightning bolts rocked the heavens, his golden lockswhipped by his adversary's black winds. Howls from the foreign Stormbringer'scloudy throat pummeled eardrums; people rolled to their stomachs and buriedtheir heads in their arms as the inconceivable cloud creature enveloped theirgod, and blackness reigned. Thunder bellowed; the black cloud pulsedspasmodically, lit from within.

In the tempest, Tempus shouted to Jihan, grabbed her arms in his hands: "Stopthis; you can do it. Your pride, and his, are not worth so many lives." Alightning bolt struck earth beside his foot, so close a blue sparklingaftercharge nuzzled his leg.

She jerked away, palmed her hair back, stood glaring at him with red flecks inher eyes. She shouted something back, her lips curled in a flash of light, butthe gods' roaring blotted out her words. Then she merely turned her back to him,raised her arms to heaven, and perhaps began to pray.

He had no more time for her; the god's war was his; he felt the claw-cold blowsStormbringer landed, felt Vashanka's substance leeching away. Yet he set offrunning, dodging cowerers upon the ground, adepts and nobles with their cloakswrapped about their heads, seeking his Stepsons: he knew what he must do.

He did not stop for arms or horses, when he found Niko and Janni, but set offthrough the raging din toward the Avenue of Temples, where the child the man andgod had begotten upon the First Consort was kept.

Handsigns got them through until speech was useful, when they had run westthrough the lawns and alleys, coming to Vashanka's temple grounds from the back.Inside the shrine's chancery, it was quieter, shielded from the sky that heavedwith light and dark.

Niko shared his weapons, those Askelon had given him: a dirk to Tempus, thesword to Janni. "But you have nothing left," Janni protested in the urgentundertone they were all employing in the shadowed corridors of their embattledgod's earthly home. "I have this," Niko replied, and tapped his armored chest.

Whether he meant the cuirass Askelon had given him, the heart underneath, or hismental skills, Tempus did not ask, just tossed the dirk contemptuously back, anddashed out into the murky temple hall.

They smelted sorcery before they saw the sick green light or felt the curdlingcold. Outside the door under which wizardsign leaked like sulphur from a yellowspring, Janni muttered blackly. Niko's lips were drawn back in a grin: "Afteryou, commander?"

Tempus wrenched the doors apart, once Janni had cut the leather strap where ithad been drawn within to secure the latch, and beheld Molin Torchholder in themidst of witchfire, wrestling with more than Tempus would have thought he couldhandle, and holding his own.

On the floor in the corner a honey-haired northern dancer hugged a man-child toher breast, her mouth an "ooh" of relief, as if now that Tempus was here, shewas surely saved.

He took time to grimace politely at the girl, who insisted in mistaking him forhis god-his senses were speeding much faster than even the green, stinkingwhirlwind in the middle of the room. He was not so sure that anything wassalvageable, here, or even if he cared if girl or priest or child or town ... orgod... were to be saved. But then he looked behind him, and saw his Stepsons,Niko on the left and Janni with sword drawn, both ready to advance on hellitself, would he but bid them, and he raised a hand and led them into thelightfight, eyes squinted nearly shut and all his body tingling as hispreternatural abilities came into play.

Molin's ouster was uppermost in his mind; he picked the glareblind priest upbodily and threw him, wrenching the god's golden icon from his frozen fist. Heheard a grunt, a snapping-in of breath, behind, but did not look around to seereality fade away. He was fighting by himself, now, in a higher, colder placefull of day held at bay and Vashanka's potent breath in his right ear. "It iswell you have come, manchild; I can use your help this day." The left is theplace of attack in team battle; a shield-holding line drifts right, each tryingto protect his open side. He had Vashanka on his right, to support him, and ashield, full-length and awful, came to be upon his own left arm. The thing hefought here, the Stormbringer's shape, was part cat, part manlike, and its swordcut as hard as an avalanche. Its claws chilled his breath away. Behind, blackand gray was split with sunrise colors, Vashanka's blazon snapping on a flag ofsky. He thrust at the clouds and was parried with cold that ran up his sword andseared the skin of his palm so that his sweat froze to ice and layers of hisflesh bonded to a sharkskin hilt... .That gave him pause, for it was his ownsword, come from where-ever the mages secreted it, which moved in his hand. Pinkglowed that blade, as always when his god sanctified His servant's labor. Hisright was un-tenanted, suddenly, but Vashanka's strength was in him, and it mustbe enough.