Svera raised her arms again and called out, «People of the Sea Cities! Listen to me! We have suffered greatly from the Fishmen's attack. This is true. I grieve with all those who have lost husbands, wives, sons, daughters, brothers, sisters! Only by the grace of the Goddess and a strong man's courage was my own father's ship not lost! Do not think my heart is hard.»

«Maybe it isn't,» bellowed Gershon. «But your head sure seems to be pretty damned soft. Soft as those pretty tits of yours!»

Blade could see Svera blush. But she didn't lose her nerve or stop. «My heart is not hard, I said. But I cannot see what we will get from vengeance, from hurling ourselves on the Fishmen's homes and works the way they have on ours!»

«Teach the damned slime-skins a lesson!» bellowed someone from behind Blade. He felt a shiver go through the crowd, and stiffened. His hand drifted down to the hilt of his sword.

«What lesson will it teach them, my friend?» replied Svera. «I think-we Conciliators think-it will only teach them that we are as bad as they are. It will teach them that we will never give them peace. It will-«

«It will teach them we won't let them kill our men and get away with it!» came a shrill scream from off to the right. A woman stepped forward from the crowd. She was poorly dressed, her dark hair hanging down in a ragged mess. On one arm she carried a baby, and with the other hand led a girl of about three. «Look at my children! Look at them! My man was a soldier who fought to defend the city. One of those filthy monsters bit his leg off, and he died when all the blood went out of him. There's nobody left to take care of me or my children. I want the Fishmen women to feel the same way! I don't want anybody in Talgar saying anything else. Smash the Conciliators, people, smash them the way you're going to smash the Fishmen!»

A quiver ran through the whole crowd as if the woman's words had been an electric shock-or an order to march. Blade had long since made up his mind what he would do if matters came to this point. Now he did it.

One arm snaked out and plucked Gershon's ax from the sailor's hand. Before the big man could even turn around, Blade burst through into the open space around the Conciliators, waving the ax.

«Run!» he shouted at them. «Into the Council House! I'll guard the door. Run, I tell you!» He pushed the nearest Conciliator hard enough to nearly send him flying up the steps like a soccer ball. The young man stared at Blade for a second, then bolted for the door. The rest of the Conciliators dropped their banners and scrambled up the steps after the first one. Svera lingered a last second to stare wonderingly at Blade, then she too hiked up her skirts and ran.

The rearmost of the Conciliators was halfway up the stairs before anyone in the crowd recovered from his surprise enough to act. Then it was Gershon himself who sprang forward, drawing his dagger, eyes blazing into Blade's face.

«Why you rotten-«he growled. Apparently he couldn't think of anything bad enough to call Blade.

Blade waved the ax in Gershon's face, stopping his forward rush. Then he took two quick steps backward and sprang up on the railing of the stairs, where Svera had been.

«People of Talgar! There's been enough bloodshed in your Cities already. Don't add to-«

«By the Goddess, we'll add yours to it!» roared Gershon. He stormed forward. But his rush was as furious and as blind as that of a mad bull. Blade sprang lightly down from the railing, sidestepped Gershon's lunge with his dagger, then brought the flat of the ax head down across the sailor's knife hand. Gershon bellowed in pain and flexed numb fingers, reaching out with the other hand for Blade.

He almost got a hold. Blade felt the sailor's thick fingers close in his hair and start to pull. He pulled hard in the opposite direction. He winced as he felt a handful of his hair pull out by the roots. Then he was free, pivoting to drive one heel hard into Gershon's stomach. The huge sailor folded up with a whoof of escaping air and sat down on nothing. He rolled down the stairs, knocking half a dozen of his followers off their feet, to land with a dull thump in the square.

For a moment no one in the square moved or spoke. Blade sensed that his repelling Gershon's attack had frozen the rest of the mob. For a moment he had the normal advantage of one man over a mob. That one man can always take somebody with him, and nobody in a mob usually wants, to risk being that somebody.

He used that moment to take a quick look up the stairs behind him. The last of the Conciliators was just vanishing into the Council House. Angry voices from inside suggested someone there wasn't too happy about their sudden arrival. Without turning his back on the crowd, Blade slowly began backing up the stairs, one at a time. He held the long ax ready to use either as a club or as a short quarterstaff. He was an expert with the latter. He did not want to kill or even seriously injure anybody if possible. That would excite the mob to bloodthirsty fury and probably lead to civil war in Talgar, with him as the first victim.

He reached the top step and looked about him. He was a good twenty feet above the level of the square now. No one could come at him except up the stairs. But the stairs themselves were a good fifteen feet wide. That could let far too many people up at him together. If they tried a rush-

The crowd continued to stand in motionless silence. Blade began to be aware of the smells rising from them as they stood packed together under the swelling heat of the sun-fish, sweat, other less identifiable ones. He began to feel sweat dripping down his own forehead.

Another flurry of movement in the crowd. Six brawny young men pushed through the crowd, shouldering people aside like Home Dimension gang members. That was probably what they were here, too. Tough young men, or at least young men who thought they were tough. With six of them, teaching them otherwise was going to be a risky business.

They came up the stairs in a wide line, flourishing clubs and daggers. Their plan was obvious-hold Blade in place on the front while a couple of them got around to his side. And they looked as if they would kill. So Blade launched his attack first.

He took four steps in a single bound, landing squarely in front of the two young toughs on the right. He swung the ax single-handed and flat headed into the first one's hip. That stopped him dead. Blade drove his left arm through the gap that had suddenly opened up and into the second man's jaw. Bone cracked and the man toppled backward. As he felt himself going over, he clutched at the third man. They both went down the stairs together, rolling over and over in a tangle of flying arms and legs. From the way they cursed each other when they hit bottom, Blade guessed they weren't seriously hurt.

There was a slight pause, which Blade used to tap the first man gently alongside the head with the ax handle. He reeled and clutched at the railing as though it were a beautiful woman. Then the remaining three young men got up their courage to rush Blade all together.

For a few seconds Blade faced a bad situation. One of the men was a knife fighter and a good one too. He came in low, knife reaching upward to tear into Blade's stomach. Blade had to give ground and kick the man hard in the knee, not worrying about how much damage he did. He must have done a good deal, because the knifeman dropped his weapon and dropped to the stairs. He moaned and clasped both hands around a smashed and blood-dripping kneecap.

Before his cries had died away, Blade was moving in on the other two. One raised a club to smash down on Blade's head. Blade ducked in under the club and drove the end of the ax handle hard up under the man's chin. His teeth slammed together with an explosive click and his eyes rolled up in his head. Before he could even start falling, Blade was turning to meet the last of the six.