He gave up on it and sat with elbows on his knees, balled fists on either side of his chin, looking down. Then he smiled and turned to her.

"But you do have the cutest feet," he laughed, trying to break the tension somehow. She chuckled, letting her toes play with the carpet. She got up, stood before him, and grabbed his forearms with her hands.

"Let's go dancing," she cried, taking Serrin utterly by surprise.

"What? In the middle of the afternoon? Hell, I can't dance. I've got a shot-up leg, Kristen."

Her grip tightened. "Let's just do it," she begged.

"Oh, what the frag," he said, smiling broadly. "Let's go dancing." She took him by the hand and led him through the door.

"I had a word with one of the tour people," Michael said quietly to Tom as they sat at the lace-covered table. "Gave them a few bucks. We'll be able to get into the less, er, authorized places. I didn't want to mention any names, just told him we were looking for some authentic shamanism, not just the tourist stuff. Of course, he'll think that we just want the next-to-tourist stuff rather than the real thing. But it gives us a start. I'll drop this Shakala's name later and see what reaction I get."

"Hmmm," the troll replied. He knew Michael was making an effort to keep him involved, keeping him up on everything that was going on. But Tom felt almost superfluous. He was here as Serrin's bodyguard, but still hadn't needed to raise so much as a fist. Michael seemed to be doing everything that needed doing. Not that he'd have expected someone with such an obsession for control to be any other way.

He looked around toward the doorway, saw Kristen and Serrin coming in behind a liveried waiter struggling with an indecently large soup tureen. As soon as the limping elf came into view, he noticed something different. From this distance there was no way Tom could have seen the details, but he sensed them anyway. The lines around Serrin's eyes were less strained, the tremor in his hands virtually gone. Though he was limping a little more than usual, he seemed almost, well, carefree.

Kristen and Serrin came up to the table, sharing some whispered words that left them both smiling. Serrin made to pull out a chair for her to sit, but she gave him a reproachful look and he left her to it, sitting down opposite her.

"Have a good time?" Michael asked innocently.

Serrin looked sheepish and told him what they'd been doing.

"You should have told me. I'd have lent you a tux," Michael smiled.

"No need, old boy," Serrin mocked him. "The waltz isn't the favored dance around here. I don't think I'd look good in one anyway."

"You'll see how you look in khaki tomorrow. For all the technology of this wonderful century, nothing has replaced it for trekking in heat," Michael replied. "Now, let's eat. Apart from the pumpkin, which is habitually boiled into submission, everything looks good. Oh, avoid the farmed hippo. Texture of old boots and it tastes greasy and fishy."

"But is the crocodile as good as Louisiana gator?" Serrin asked.

About the time his quarry was turning in for the night, Magellan landed in Cape Town, where it took only a couple of hours on the street to find out what they'd been up to. They'd flashed in, picked up some street girl, and taken off again. Magellan hardly needed to inquire where, though he checked with the airport just in case. Then the Tir elf booked a room for the night in a suitable anonymous airport hotel, needing to snatch a few hours of sleep before his own flight to the Zulu Nation. Serrin was getting warmer now, and if he got to the Babanango plant, he might get too close to the truth.

What will he do with it, though? Magellan wondered. I don't want to kill him, not one of my own blood. And the decker, he's too smart to be fooled and lied to. Spirits, the decker just might be good enough to make the trace, to find out who owns the plant, and then he's just one little step away from the heart of it all. Luther will destroy him first, but that's not what worries me. If he finds out the truth, he'll make sure that everything he knows will automatically be relayed to someone else in case anything happens to him. He's got some friends who can cause real trouble. Damn, maybe he's even told someone already. The English lord? That journalist who splashed the elf all over Newsweek? No, not yet, surely. He isn't certain enough. One thing I can be sure about is that he's overcautious. He'll want to know more before he blows the whistle.

Fretting, Magellan tried to sleep in the early hours, but

his brain buzzing with plans and schemes kept him awake almost until dawn. He overslept and missed his flight, cursing himself for not requesting a wakeup call. Then he remembered the one person in the Zulu Nation who owed him a favor. He made the call from the airport. It was only a contingency, might not be necessary after all, but the price was fair and a pack of Zulu samurai were always useful. Maybe his earlier idea would turn out to be the correct one after all.

Feeling a lot better, he picked up his tickets and made for the departure gate.

Serrin tottered off the plane at Nkandla feeling very groggy. Mistakenly, he'd thought the luxurious coach had arrived at the Imperial to take them to the Umfolozi reserve, but all it did was deposit them back at the airport. The plane, which made the 777 they'd flown in earlier seem like the height of luxury and safety, wasn't any make Serrin recognized, and had little better than bucket seats inside. The flight was less than sixty miles, but it might have been to Mars for how long it seemed. Serrin had never heard of clear air turbulence before, and suspected it was an invention to disguise the fact that the plane was in the process of falling apart. He only barely managed to retain the contents of his stomach during the trip. Michael had told them they were going to one of the less popular, more out-of-the-way campsites, but he hadn't expected the transport to be quite so awful.

Michael was appallingly unflappable, resplendent in khaki shorts, shirt, walking boots, and a pith helmet. With his thin white legs and knobby knees, he looked the perfect English tourist. The zinc cream smeared over his nose and lips, added to a generous dosing of lighter sun block over every inch of exposed flesh, looked more than faintly ridiculous. He was clearly loving every minute of it.

"If you haven't sprayed yourself with repellent, now's the time to do it," he said cheerfully, squinting through his shades along the red-brown dirt strip that passed for Nkandla's runway. "And don't forget to spray that talc inside your underwear. Sweat chafing can take off a layer of skin in hours out here, even in dry heat. And Tom,

even though you're a troll, in this climate you need sun block. Really. Trust me."

Tom grunted and hurriedly attempted to extract some of the cream from his plastic bottle as the jeeps roared into sight in a great cloud of dust. He managed to deposit roughly three-quarters of its contents into his huge hands and began busily smearing himself. The heat of the brilliant yellow sun was intense enough for him to feel even through a skin thicker than anyone else's around, black or white.

Serrin looked around at the handful of other people along for the safari. Most of them, he was pleased to see, looked as absurd in shorts as he might have if he hadn't opted for long khaki pants instead. Two Americans, a trio of dumpling-shaped Germans, and a pair of Japanese; the standard mix. Only Kristen looked as if she was at home here, neither uncomfortable nor out of place. The half-dozen touf guides pointedly avoided speaking to her, though they were short on conversation anyway. Ruanmi, the leader of the group, was the one who'd done almost all the talking, but most of what he had to say consisted of the standard warnings and reminders to sign the usual disclaimer forms.