Only Sardia mocked.

"Look at them, Earl! Ten to one you could take them both with only one arm. Twenty, you would gut the pair within five minutes!"

She had indulged herself with wine and was, while not drunk, not so sober as she thought. Her voice rose again over the clash of steel.

"They want entertainment, Earl! Give it to them!

Give them real blood and real pain! Give them something to think about!"

"Sardia!"

"Shut up!" She threw off Cornelius's hand. "Don't try to stop my talking. I've had enough of that. Talk is for fools. Words to entertain the passengers you've bought and carried home like toys. Well, I'm not a toy. And I don't entertain for nothing. You want real entertainment? Ask Earl to give it to you. That man can fight He can fight as well as I can dance."

"Dance?" Ursula reared up in her chair. "You claim to be able to dance?"

"I make no claims." Sardia shook her head, suddenly aware of what she had done. "And I mean no offense. It was just that I was-"

"Bored?" Ursula's smile was devoid of humor. "You, bored? My dear, you don't know the meaning of the word. But you mentioned dancing."

"She's drunk too much," said Cornelius. "You have potent wine, Ursula. And the children were over-generous."

Children? Dumarest looked for the servants but they had gone. Had they been children? It was possible as most things were. Or was that just a euphemism?

"They do as they are ordered," said Elittia from where she sat at the captain's side. "But I am intrigued. A dancer, you say?"

"No. Not now. The wine-"

"Oiled your tongue. I understand. But once, surely, you could claim to know a little of the art."

Tuvey said, "Leave it, woman."

"Orders, Captain?"

"Sense. Drink some wine and sing us a song or something. Don't throw oil on a flame."

Advice she didn't follow and Dumarest sensed why. Jealousy showed in her painted face, in the glitter of her eyes, a flame which leaped and died but which he noticed before the bland mask was again in position.

"A dancer," she mused. "And, why not, a challenge? Now for the prize. This, perhaps?" Color glowed as she produced something from beneath her robe. "How about this?"

"My cube!" Sardia rose to her feet "My music cube."

Bought be Tuvey from Ahdram as a gift to his hostess or as an item of trade. Used now by its present owner as bait.

"Your cube? Not yet, my dear, but if you can dance better than Ursula it is yours. You agree?" Then, as Sardia hesitated, her voice grew harsh. "You had enough to say before and were eager enough to boast of the prowess of your friend. Are we to assume that it was only the wine at work? If so, an apology-"

"No!" The old woman had been clever with a cunning learned from her paramour or one he had learned from her. Sardia fell into the trap. "I've nothing to apologize for. If it will entertain the company I will dance. And if the cube is a prize I will try to win it."

But not too hard, thought Dumarest. Remember you are a guest. Don't try too hard.

Advice she didn't hear and, if she did, would have ignored.

Chapter Eight

The cube itself provided the music, a susurrating rhythm which held the sensuous beat of drums and the thin, frenzied wail of pipes. A tempo gaged to the beating of a heart so that, as it accelerated, so did the organ with the consequent release of adrenaline, the heightening of emotional fervor until pleasantry verged into hysteria.

Exciting music in a theater where space separated the audience from the stage and those performing. Insane to use a tavern where the dancer could be touched and men carried weapons and had the will to use them. Unwise even in this house before such people when it was played in the spirit of challenge.

Ursula said, "Will you dance first, Sardia, or shall I?"

"As you wish."

"Music repeated could be boring to those having to listen and if we dance one after the other the second will have the benefit of learning the other's interpretation. You have no objection to our both performing at the same time?"

"None."

"It won't detract from your concentration?"

Sardia almost laughed her contempt. How little this decorated and decadent fool really knew. She remembered the old days when she'd waited for hours dressed in her leotards, moving simply to retain warmth and muscular suppleness, running onto the stage to join a dozen others all eager to catch the producer's eye. A system which encouraged each to give of his best regardless of what another might be doing. To concentrate, to think of nothing, to feel nothing, to be nothing but a creature wedded to music. To become nothing but a priestess of the dance.

"No," she said. "It won't detract from my performance."

"Then let us begin."

A touch and the music died, another and it recommenced as the women took up their positions. Dumarest watched as around him rose a tide of murmured comment. Ursula was the younger and therefore should be more supple. Yet the other, older, could have gained the greater experience. Yet few offered to bet and those seeking wagers all wanted to back his hostess.

A matter of diplomacy?

Dumarest doubted it, the expressions in their eyes were enough to eliminate that consideration. Some of them, like Elittia, wanted Ursula to lose yet seemed to have no doubt of her ability to win. Others, interested more in the excitement of the dance rather than the challenge, settled down to drink and watch and drink again as they yielded themselves to the pulse of the music.

Listening to it, Dumarest studied the dancers.

Ursula was splendidly lithe, her gown a cerulean shimmer, darker hues accentuating the swell of breasts and the curve of hips, feet naked in thin sandals, the nails darkly painted. Her hair was a cloud touched with silver, her arms supple vines with extensions; fingers which flexed as did her thighs, her calves, the arches of her feet. A symphony in blue.

Sardia wore white and flame, the rich darkness of her skin a glowing contrast, her hair oiled jet which caught and held the light and transmuted it into ripples of flame. A goddess from the olden times when men had ventured into woods to worship trees and perform sacrifices to ancient deities.

A woman now reflecting her pride in the turn of her shoulder and the sweep of her hair. Hair which fell in a cascade as she freed it from its restraints. Cloth which ripped beneath her nails as she tore vents in the skirt to display the long, lovely curve of her thighs.

And yet, still, she did not dance.

The music was still relatively quiet, a thin wailing as of pipes beneath shadowed trees, the sonorous throb of drums in answer, the melodies building, blending, forming mental images of empty spaces and secret groves, of fires left abandoned to flare in guttering winds. Of the sound of distant seas and the relentless beat of natural forces.

Ursula moved to the rhythm as if it were a wind which gripped her and dictated the shift of her feet, the play of her arms, the sway of hips and shoulders, the jerk and thrust of breasts and buttocks. Sardia moved like a reed at the edge of a pond rippled by a gentle breeze, her eyes half closed, hands hanging lax, only the shimmer of light on her hair revealing the small movements of her body. A woman almost lost in a dream. A dancer, remembering.

An auditorium filled with waiting men and women, the air tense with expectation, the orchestra settled, the stage dressed, everything ready to go. And she, the prima ballerina, about to dance the difficult role of Hilda in Obert's Sacrifice to a Queen.

The part of a harlot who seduced men with the motions of her body as she danced in a tavern.

One who had to dance, finally, for life itself.

Again she remembered Obert's instructions.

"No techniques, no tricks, no pretty spinning on the points. Ballet training teaches you how to dance-now dance. With your body, with your mind, with your emotions-dance!"