Keirthlin replied that it was not necessarily the case that witnessing such cold and deliberate violence influenced the psychology for the worse. Coming to the aid of her argument, Vulpina bragged that she herself had seen such things on the playground nearly every day of her life, and twice on Dueling Day; and it had not affected her fertility, or the ability of the Eugenic Board to send a stud to beat her into submission in preparation for the mating assault.

Montrose, at that point, said simply that this was man’s business, and no matter what the customs or rules of their ages might be, his death, or his victory, must be done by the rules he knew. He did not speak to either one about what had happened when his own mother, watching in secret, had seen his father shot dead in a duel.

Montrose shook his head, trying to clear it of such thought. Why did he ponder of his mother now, who had been gone some eight thousand years? Then he recalled that she regarded the profession of gunfighting shameful, and would not take the money Montrose had brought in. To his brothers it went, but not a dime to her.

She had told him: “You think you can kill and make that be an end of it? There is no end! The men you kill will come out of the ground and come back for you, or sure as like. There is always one more.”

There was always one more. One more what? He had never had the nerve to ask.

Montrose was uneasy because his experience as a duelist told him that any man who dwelt on the shame brought to his mother when he walked onto the field of honor was not the one who walked away again, but was the one carried away in a box. He hid his uneasiness behind his best poker face, but he knew Del Azarchel sensed it, for the man’s twinkling eyes narrowed, and a look of confidence was in them.

Mickey introduced himself as Mictlanagualzin of the Dark Science Coven, which made Del Azarchel smile in contempt and Montrose smile in appreciation for the gesture, which was a noble one.

The Warlock said, “Such is my true name, and I depart of half my power by speaking it: and yet that power I place into this deadly ground, and across this deadly hour, that there be no trace, no shadow, of the least dishonor. I bind your souls to it.”

4. The Hooded Men

The five who stood behind Del Azarchel now came forth into the light shed from the gleaming many-eyed cloak of Alalloel. Menelaus tried to betray no expression on his face, but as he had so often found before, his more powerful intellect lent more power to his passions, intuitions, and reactions. Now his passion was fear, his intuition was supernatural dread, and his reaction was a trembling in his innards.

His brain had not allowed him to recognize them from afar, despite that their identity was obvious even in silhouette. What was it Soorm had said about more intelligent people being more able to fool themselves, whereas animals saw things clear and far off?

The gigantic one was Sarmento i Illa d’Or, who pointed his finger at Montrose, and closed one eye and twitched his thumb. He pointed at the spot where the scar was, marking the wound Sarmento left that should have killed Montrose.

And next to him …

The stoop-shouldered boyish one was De Ulloa, as handsome as he ever had been, smiling sheepishly, wearing a cross of Nero around his neck: an upside-down cross with the arms broken to slant as the letter Y reversed, all within a circle.

The slim and rigid-spined one was Narcís D’Aragó, wearing a rapier, and standing as stiffly as the Chimerae whom he had made in his own image.

The one with the tendrils was Jaume Coronimas.

The final one, his face young and unlined, and his tendrils waving in rhythm with Coronimas as they passed radioneural messages back and forth, was Mentor Ull, dressed in a miniature version of the black shipsuit and hood. And his skin was an onyx dark as his silk.

Sarmento was delighted, and he laughed. “No, in one way these are not quite who you think, Fifty-One! What, are we afraid the old madness is coming back? No, this is not Melchor de Ulloa. This is Exulloa, or, rather, the remote body, operated by quantum entanglement, from where he rests in the Noösphere. He does not remember being shot by you, because there was no time for an additional communion. The others, you have guessed, are Exarago, Excoronimas, and I don’t believe you have met Exynglingas, our newest crewmate! He does recall his death, because his savant circuits were activated by the biometric failure that accompanies death trauma. Once, we only had enough computer resources to bring us out one at a time. Now, you have given us so much more calculation space—the entire core of the planet!—we need not fear such penury again!”

Mickey said sternly, “It is only the inner core. Do not be ridiculous.”

The young, jet-dark version of Mentor Ull, or, rather, Exynglingas, still had the same half-lidded, wholly reptilian eyes of his previous incarnation. “It happens that all your absurdities of bloodshed and striving have yielded nothing. The Hermeticists have finally achieved the ultimate secret: life beyond bodily death.”

But the judge of honor held up her empty hand in a brusque gesture, saying, “The Seconds may not address the primaries, only the Seconds brought by him. Such is the convention.”

Illiance, or, rather, Squire Lagniappe, stepped forward. His skin color changed suddenly, passing from blue to become the silvery-gray of a Linderling. His eyes lost their color, and became silver throughout, eerie and beautiful.

Exynglingas, the Ghost of Ull, seemed startled, and shrank back with alarm. Menelaus was puzzled by this—until he recalled that the Linderlings had hunted and herded the Blue Men, and all other Inquiline form of Locust, into extinction.

The gray-shimmering, silver-eyed Squire said to the Ghost of Ull, “Tell me. Does Coronimas the Hermeticist recall being shot to death on the toilet, nay, shot in the back while he fled, by an assailant he could not see? The terror and shame of that download is now in his permanent mind records, and touches all related thoughts. Is this accomplishment as nothing? It is meaningful to defy even an evil one cannot destroy.”

But Montrose said to Mickey, “Witness Mictlanagualzin—is the honorable party facing me willing to program, with an irrevocable code, an unstoppable self-destruct sequence into his machine half of his soul, Exarchel, to initiate the moment their biometric link shows the principle, Learned Del Azarchel, has indeed died?”

Excoronimas flicked his gold tendrils and said to Mickey, “Ask your principle how he could verify? We cannot give you the access to the inner workings of the thoughts of Exarchel.”

Del Azarchel held up his hand. “There is no need to debate. It is disquietingly easy to establish a suicide reflex tied to a deadman switch for beings of such architecture, prone as they are in any case to Divarication cascade. Indeed, I expected this request, and spent many hours last night preparing exactly such a combination. Before these witnesses, I vow that I will remove the safety from the deadman switch to obliterate every copy of myself, wheresoever situate, the moment we take our positions and claim ready, showing the black palm, but not before. Nor is there need for verification. Learned Montrose will trust me to keep my word. He knows me. I know him. The meeting is without honor if I am not exposed to the risk of death. Shall we begin?”

The judge of honor raised a baton, which she held in lieu of the more traditional handkerchief. The red dawnlight was sliding rapidly down the towerside, and too swiftly to be seen, a sliver of red was to the east above the hill crests, and on the high hilltop where they stood, their shadows stretched thin and weak toward the darkened west, where brighter stars still twinkled.