There were a thousand different things for which a Hashom might be punished-talking during the hours of meditation, taking more than his share of the food, crying out or giving other signs of pain during weapons training. A long and dreary list that in Blade's mind added up to a thoroughly grim way of life. The Hashomi were dedicated, but Blade wondered how many of them, after years of such dedication, were entirely sane.

After ten years without any serious misconduct a Hashom might become a Treas-one of the leaders who wore the blue tunics and were entrusted with the drug-laden staves. For a Treas some of the rigorous discipline was slightly relaxed. He could drink weak beer four times a year, have a woman as often as once a week (if he hadn't given up sex entirely, as the average Treas did), and spend one day a month outside the Houses of the Iron Flower, with no one to give him orders or judge his conduct.

Blade suspected that last privilege was the one most valued. He knew that if he'd spent ten years under the iron discipline of the Hashomi, he would have gladly given his right arm to have one day a month entirely to himself.

A Hashom normally entered the Houses of the Iron Flower at the age of fourteen. He seldom left alive before he was sixty, and then only if he'd rendered exceptional service to the order or become disabled in honorable battle.

This did not mean that the ranks of the Hashomi were top-heavy with worn-out graybeards. Far from it. Blade knew certain Oriental martial-arts teachers who, in their sixties, had been able to mop up the floor with opponents young enough to be their grandsons. Old age was always as much in the mind as in the body.

Those Hashomi who had reached the rank of Treas were often admitted to the Ephraimini, and spent their last years cultivating and processing the handr and performing the burial rites over their former comrades. There was a good deal of burying, for as the Master said, «Like fish drawn from the stream onto the bank, the Hashom who leaves the Houses of the Iron Flower often leaves the only place where he can exist.»

Blade could hardly think of a sadder end to forty-odd years of dedicated self-denying service and constant danger. He couldn't help feeling that those Hashomi who died in training accidents or in battle were lucky. He was also sure of one thing: he would choose almost any form of death rather than life as one of the sworn, drugged, and disciplined Hashomi.

Blade understood much more about the Hashomi after his visit to the Houses of the Iron Flower, but there were still several mysteries. What did the Hashomi do with their hard-earned, lethal skills, for their friends and against their enemies? Who were their friends (if they had any), and who were their enemies? Blade was certain that Dahaura was considered an enemy, but why and what were the Hashomi fighting against?

Finally, where were many of the Hashomi? The Houses of the Iron Flower were square, squat buildings of stone blocks, with iron doors cast in the shape of a handr flower-thus their name. There were only enough of them to hold the five thousand Hashomi of which the Master spoke so often. Yet nearly half the Houses seemed to be empty. Doubtless some of the Hashomi were guarding the valley, like the men Blade had fought. Still, more than a thousand of them must be completely gone from the valley. Where had they gone; and why? Dahaura? Perhaps, but that was only a guess.

Blade was certain of one thing. The Hashomi were approaching a great moment, perhaps a crisis, in their history. The Master dropped too many hints of that for Blade to have any doubts on the matter. The Master was willing for Blade to know how valuable his assistance could be to the Hashomi, even if not precisely why.

Blade didn't blame the Master. In the man's position he would have done the same thing. It did mean one more mystery about the Hashomi that he would have to explore on his own, with the danger of discovery nipping at his heels.

It was not just curiosity that now drove Blade. Now he considered himself an enemy of the Hashomi. To be sure, he would not seek to destroy them entirely, even if by some chance he acquired the power to do so. That was not his affair. He would do almost anything to keep them from extending their power and their grim way of life beyond their home valley.

Unfortunately he had no idea of how to do this. He couldn't safely do much until he was out of the valley, yet he had to stay there until he'd learned a good deal more. It was a familiar dilemma, one that every secret agent faced a dozen times in his career. To learn what you needed to know, you had to expose yourself to so much danger that you might not live to pass on or use what you'd learned!

Blade was undressing for bed one night a few weeks after the testing when he heard a faint tapping on his door. The door could not be locked, so he shifted position until he had the bed between him and the door. He pulled out the knife he kept under his pillow, crouched beside the bed, and called softly.

«Come in.»

The heavy wooden door slid back on its greased rails, and a robed figure was silhouetted against the dim light in the hallway outside. Blade saw that it was small, slim, with a long, bound tail of hair trailing halfway down its back. One of the women of the hospital staff, apparently. Was she old or young, and, in any case, why was she paying him a visit in his room at this hour? There was nothing written down to prohibit it, but there was nothing written down to prohibit a great many of the things for which he'd seen men and women severely punished. The woman was risking dismissal for certain, perhaps a flogging and branding.

The woman stood motionless in the doorway. Blade realized that she was waiting for him to let her come in. He was putting her in danger every minute he made her stand in the open doorway, visible to anyone who might pass along the hallway.

«Come on in, I said,» repeated Blade, gesturing urgently. The woman nodded, heaved the door shut, and approached Blade. He picked up the oil lamp on the floor beside the bed and held it out in front of him as the woman approached the bed.

Blade now recognized her. She was one of the younger women whose eyes had followed his comings and goings with interest. In fact, she was the only one he knew by name. Her name was Mirna, and she seemed to be a leader among the younger women. It was hard to judge her age, but she was certainly no fresh-faced girl.

«Welcome, Mirna,» said Blade. «I have only water to offer you, but-«

She laughed softly, and her face twisted into a wry smile. «You need not tell me how little there can be of hospitality, here in this valley. But you can make me welcome, with only water or indeed with no drink at all. I am not thirsty.»

She sat down on the bed, pulled her bound hair around over her shoulder, and began undoing the bindings. Slowly she worked at her hair, until it flowed down freely. Like most of the women of the valley, Mirna was dark-haired, but her hair was so black that it held distinct tints of blue. She shook her head, and the hair tossed in a cloud that framed her narrow olive-skinned face with the prominent arched nose. Blade found that he wanted to stroke that hair, feeling its silkiness on his skin, and then move on to stroke Mirna's face. He also suspected that Mirna would not object. Blade was an experienced man who seldom failed to detect a willing woman, and a lusty man who seldom turned one down unless there was a very good reason to do so.

There might be a reason now. Was Mirna coming to him out of desire for him, or on the Master's orders, to surround Blade with scandal? That could give the Master a perfect excuse for breaking his agreement with Blade and having him drugged or slain.

On the other hand, the scandal the Master could spread would be nothing compared to the scandal Mirna could cause, if she felt herself rejected and humiliated for no good reason. Blade had no desire whatever to find himself considered an enemy by any of the women of the valley.