I awoke lying on a platform so that with my head on the platform my feet dangled off it. I felt rather than saw that I was still dressed. It was beyond belief that they had not discovered my body's secret-- surely they had searched me for weapons-- yet I still felt some hope that a sense of generous modesty had preserved the secret of Mueller.

Two Nkumai guards were standing nearby. When they saw that I was awake, they quickly threaded their way to me along narrow branches. We were so high that leaves were thick around us, and I could see patches of sky. The branches were so slender that my platform bounced wildly as the guards walked toward me.

When they were standing on the branch that passed under my platform, they reached out hooks and snagged two ropes dangling from even higher, thinner branches. On the ends of the ropes were the most ingenious manacles I had ever seen. Instead of the clumsy and quick-to-rot wooden manacles we used in Mueller, these were made of glass bound in rope. Two half-cylinders of glass were slipped around my wrists. They did not quite meet on either side. Then the rope was tied tightly around them, held in place by a groove in the glass. When the guards were through tying the ropes, the glass half-cylinders met tightly.

As a parting gesture in our wordless interplay, the guards jerked the manacles on my arms. The guard on the fight pulled the manacle down, toward my elbow. The other pulled his manacle up, toward my hand. The pain was sharp and immediate. I looked at them in surprise. They smiled grimly and left.

Around my right forearm and around my left hand the manacles had cut deep enough to draw blood. The glass had been ground or chipped to have a sharp edge. It was easy enough to get out of these manacles-- as long as you were willing to lose half a hand in the process, and even if you were, it would make climbing down from the tree rather difficult.

The manacles were also tied just far enough apart that I couldn't strike them against each other or anything else, not even my head. There was no way to shatter them. Furthermore, because they were tied to branches with a great deal of spring, when I pulled them down, they had a tendency to spring back, cutting me. As it was, there was such constant tension on them that any movement at all sliced me a little. I couldn't lie down-- couldn't even kneel.

They didn't want me to get away, and they didn't want me to enjoy staying with them. I've visited with hosts like that before and since, but none who were so obnoxious about it.

I looked around. It was early evening-- the sun was still visible, low amid the leaves to the west, shining under the clouds that were rolling in from the northwest. I must have been out for hours.

My platform rested on a single branch, but it was connected to or rested on many others, making one intertwining network. I bounced lightly on my platform. Immediately the guards felt the movement and looked around.

There were other platforms near me, none occupied. Farther away I thought I could see someone else standing in manacles, but I couldn't be sure. Leaves kept me from seeing very far.

It began to rain. I was immediately soaked; and here, where, fewer leaves and branches could dissipate the storm, the heavy drops battered me savagely. Worse, it fell with such force that every gust of wind jerked and jiggled the branches, and it felt like the first time I had walked on a rope bridge-- worse than seasickness. During the rain I could see that the guards huddled under two small roofs, watching no one.

My plan formed quickly and easily, but it would only get me away from this prison area. How I would get to the ground alive-- and from there, how I would get through the forest to safety (and where was that?) --those were matters too arcane to be investigated right then.

"Lady Lark," said a distant voice I recognized. Mwabao Mawa was making her way along the network of small branches. The guards stood and nodded to her as she approached me.

"Mwabao Mawa," I said. "I've changed my mind. I'd rather continue living with you after all."

She pursed her lips, then said, "We've had the full report from our informants. They're a rather treacherous pair-- mercenaries from Allison-- and they had the mistaken notion that we'd continue to pay more and more for every bit of information they eked out. I hope you don't have any such mistaken notion, Lark, or whoever you are. We will do no bargaining, except for your life."

I smiled, but I'm sure I didn't look particularly jovial.

"Lady Lark, you are not from Bird. Not only that, but the absurd stones you told us about that Family's culture were so far from the truth as to imply that you have never even been there. Nevertheless, it's obvious from your accent that you are from the Rebel River plain. It's also plain from the iron coin you used that you are from a Family that uses money. And since the iron could not have come from us, it must have come from some other Family that has something to sell to the Ambassador. Who is it?"

I smiled more widely.

"Oh well," she said. "I can guess with confidence that you're from Mueller. Precisely who you are I will know within a week, from more reliable spies than the pair of Allisons we used before. Let's get to more practical things. What are your people selling to the Ambassador?"

"Air," I answered, "from the swamps at the mouth of the Rebel River."

She glared at me. "I truly did like you."

"And I truly did like you, " I responded. "My liking for you, however, ended night before last, when I found out how widely our sexual tastes diverge." An out-and-out lie-- we both liked women.

"I still like you, Lark," she said. "I'm not a sadist, and you aren't here out of spite. So you'll understand if I don't stay to watch."

When she was gone, the guards came and lifted me into the air. I thought at first they would simply drop me, letting the manacles do the work. But apparently not-- if they accidently cut off a major portion of my hand, manacles couldn't hold me anymore. Instead, as I was in the air, they spoke for the first time and urged me to take hold of the ropes, which were now slack enough for me to do so.

I held on to the ropes as they swung my feet forward. In that position I couldn't let go of the ropes without slashing my wrists on the manacles, and the ropes were tied to such bouncy branches that I couldn't get leverage to kick at the guards. They proceeded to carve up my feet in a delightful criss-cross pattern about an inch deep, getting to bone in several places. It was agonizing, of course, but I had gone through worse in traming. Still, I knew what was expected of me and moaned and screamed. I must have given a convincing performance, because they soon stopped cutting, lifted me again, told me to let go of the ropes, and set me gently down.

On my feet, of course, and the manacles still forced me to stand. I thought of what happened to spies in the dungeons of Mueller, and decided that in that aspect of civilization, Nkumai and Mueller were about even. Mueller had a higher technology for inducing pain, but Nkumai understood how to evoke despair.

Thinking about that, I forgot to scream for a moment or two, but once I remembered that I was supposed to be suffering, I moaned a lot. They went away.

In half an hour the simple cuts on my feet were gone, and the pain and the tickle of healing quickly ended, too. However, the trouble with healing so fast was that my would-be tormentors would surely notice it, and there would be no further need for me to hide what it was that Mueller sold to the Ambassador.

I began to pray for rain. Or at least wish for it, since my pantheon didn't include anyone in charge of weather.