"Who are you to judge us?" called a voice from behind me, dripping with hostility but speaking in my language. I turned back to face the bright copper Dragon I had merely glanced at before. ''Rishkaan,'' whispered Akor in my mind.

"I have told you. I am Lanen Maransdatter, beloved of Akor the Silver King, and whatever you do you cannot unmake that which already is. You could crush me with a fraction of a thought, with the lightest breath of fire, but you cannot destroy the change that I bring.''

I turned back to the assembly. "Don't you understand? Have you not heard? How can you censure your King when he is caught in the web of the gods? Yours and mine! How absurd, for us to be so devoted after so short a time. Can you imagine we do not know it? We are not fools. When we came to ourselves after the joining of our souls, we stood apart and called on our gods for understanding, each to each. And the Winds and the Lady spoke to us.

"I did not come here to fall in love with one of the Kindred: Blessed Lady, what a pointless thing to do! I suffer from the same ferrinshadik that is so deep a part of my beloved; I longed only to speak with another soul that felt as I did, once in my life to hear the thoughts of the only other race in this world that can speak and reason. Why should I not? I had no idea. I knew nothing of the ban until Akor told me of the Lost Ones. That tale itself is long forgotten by my people.

"I speak with you now as I have a thousand times before in my heart. I left my home gladly to follow the merest rumour of you, for I knew in my soul you were no legend. I gave up my home to find you, to learn of the Greater Dragons who lived apart from my people. You were the old ones, the wise ones, and I desired to learn from you.''

I spoke now aloud and let my voice rise, partly from some memory of the tricks of the bards, partly because I was now hard put to it to keep stray thoughts out of my truespeech and I wanted this clear.

"And thanks to your King, I have indeed learned. I ask you now, do you not remember your own history? Kantri and Gedri are meant to be together, to live in harmony. Yes, you had reason to be angry at the death of Aidrishaan—but he was only one. By that time the Demonlord had destroyed several villages full of my people. You are creatures of Fire, I can understand that you would be driven to too great an anger, to too-hasty action—but that is what it was. And is.

"I believe you never accepted my people as your equals, even in the days of the Peace. Always we have been the Gedri. the Silent Ones, our very name in your language a dismissal, a cause for contempt. We are smaller, weaker, we live a fraction of your lives, we cannot fly—but you have never admitted that we have a greatness that you do not possess."

There was much muttering at that. More stood in Anger. I had no plan, no idea of what to say, but the words came for all that. I still did not understand why I sought to anger the Kindred. I trusted in whatever was leading me and followed as best I could. But the hall had begun to hum, low and deep, with murmuring, and the beginning of the most unsettling melody I had ever heard.

"What of the Gedri is worthy the name of greatness, Maran's daughter?" growled Rishkaan from behind me. "They have brought only darkness and blight on the world. My mother's granddam was changed by the Demonlord in the iower of her youth, she was riven from her daughter when she could barely fly, along with all the rest of my family that ever was. I shall bear the Gedri ill will always.''

"That is your choice, Rishkaan of the Kantrishalcrim, but you do not speak for all the Kindred." Akor's truespeech rang clear and firm. "Now silence all, by our own laws, and let her continue.''

I took a deep breath. ''I have never heard of a Healer among your people," I said calmly. "Has there ever been one?"

All was silent.

"No, Lady,'' said Shikrar, trying to keep a quiet delight out of his voice, ''you are correct. None of us has ever had that gift-"

"Many of my people are Healers now. They are better than you remember, if the last you knew was what Akor told me in the Tale of the Demonlord. Not a full day past he carried me to the camp nearly dead, my hands and arms so badly burned I thought I should never use them again. A Healer came to me and, I am told, spent his whole strength on me— but this very morning I was recovered and nearly managed to escape from captivity. A captivity in which I was being held for dark reasons I had nothing to do with. I could have made my life easier by betraying you to the Merchant Marik, but I did not, and some time before I warned you to beware of him."

"Your people have Healers and you are not traitors," came a voice (translated by Akor). "The first is a gift of the Winds, the second but the lack of a weakness, and neither of them true achievements of your Kindred. What else have you to recommend your kind?''

"Generosity and courage!" I shouted back. "I know you have heard how near I came to death. I saved the lives of Mirazhe and her son, I drew the child—the youngling—our of her body with my hands when I already knew that pain would be my only reward."

I stopped a moment. "Why do you think I did that?"' asked calmly. I turned to Akor. "Even you, Akor my hear-Why do you think I did what I did?"

He drew breath to answer, changed his mind, stood in what I guessed was Curiosity and said,

"I do not know, littling. Why did you?"

"She is besotted with you, Akhor, she would throw herself into the fire if you asked her," growled Rishkaan from behind me in the speech of the Gedri.

"No, I would not!" she cried. Her eyes were blazing, were she one of us she would stand in Defiance and Instruction, "I am no child. I am a woman grown, no young fool to kill myself for love. Not even for one so dear to me as Akor." She glanced at me briefly as I translated, almost an apology, but her warrior's blood was afire and she had no time for delicacy.

"I helped Mirazhe because I wanted to, not because Akor asked me. I have learned the midwife's skills with the females of my race, I have helped bring forth newborns before. I would do the same for any soul who suffered in childbirth. It was because I saw Mirazhe as a fellow creature in need that I risked burned hands and sickness to save her and her littling."

She lifted her voice, all her frustration and anger ringing in the Council chamber. "Who among you would do as much for one of my own? And how? You could not, you cannot assist so, your hands are made for rending and killing. Those claws, so formidable as weapons, can barely touch one of my people without wounding. That is a thing you must learn, O people of my beloved. How to touch without destroying!"

The murmur of discontent grew swiftly louder, the unsettling melody now easily heard. My people began to stir, fluttering their wings in anger. ''How dare you speak so, we are the Eldest of the Four Peoples and have you in our charge!"cried Rishkaan in truespeech, ignoring Shikrar's commands to be silent. "All know it. Why else are you made so much smaller and weaker, with only your short lives to live and no re:membrance of others to guide you? You should hold us in reverence!''

"Reverence must be earned!" she yelled back. "Let you learn of my people before you condemn. You would have sentenced me to death or exile without ever hearing my voice. How dare you take such judgement upon yourselves! Who made you the keepers of life and death over us? Are we so terrifying, so evil, that we must be killed on sight? Dear Goddess! What courage!

"A few nights past, one of my people was killed for daring to cross the Boundary. Akor tells me the idiot had had dealings with the Rakshasa; I am sure he did, in some way at least— an amulet for luck, perhaps. Perhaps more. But is death the only answer? His name was Perrin, and though I did not know him we had travelled together. He was a youth and foolish in the way of youth. Youth makes mistakes.