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together, we drifted slowly downward.
Our faces were quite close now, naturally enough, and the priest's was full of
triumphant excitement. I had an idea that I had given myself hopelessly away and
that this was just what he'd expected. The look on his face said he knew I was
from New York, knew I'd come through Falvi's forbidden Earth-Gates, whatever
they were, and the next stop would be the ecclesiastical firing squad.
Just to clinch the matter he spoke to me. It was, of course, Malescan and it meant
nothing at all. My ears were ringing anyhow and I was shaking all over with shock
and sheer un-heroic fright. The shaft below us looked bottomless. I breathed hard
and stared into the bright triumphant eyes about six inches from mine.
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He repeated himself more slowly and this time I understood.
"You're lucky I caught you," he said. "You might get reported."
I had heard enough of the spoken Malescan tongue to catch the right emphasis
and accent. But I still wasn't sure I could speak it naturally. I had to try though.
My words came out in a series of gasps an excellent way of disguising
unfamiliarity with a language, by the way.
"I was thinking of something else," I said.
The effect on him was tremendous. I think if I hadn't been clutching him so
tightly he might have let me drop in his surprise. For a moment I wondered if I'd
made some astounding error in speech. Then I realized that the fact I'd spoken at
all in Malescan was what startled him so much. He hadn't expected it. His face
went perfectly blank for a moment.
When expression came back to it he allowed only the slightest glimmer of what
must have been great disappointment to show through before he pulled himself
together and spoke again. This time the malicious expectancy and the penetrating
intentness of his look had vanished.
"What did you say?" he asked politely.
"I said I was thinking of something else."
A flicker of the keen suspicion came back into the quick gaze he turned on me. I
realized then that I simply didn't know Malescan well enough to pass as a native.
"Well, you'd better think of the Hierarch next time," the priest said, his eyes never
swerving from mine. "What are you talking like that for?"
"I bit my tongue," I said hastily.
"Bit your nose?" he asked. "How could you do that? Oh, your tongue."
I met his bright stare briefly and then glanced aside at the walls, slipping up
slowly around us. Was he simply amusing himself with me? I wasn't sure and I
didn't think he was either. Certainly he was suspicious, but he had nothing
definite to go on. The fact that I could speak Malescan even passably seemed to
knock the bottom out of whatever theory he had formulated about me. Still...
"Where do you want out?" he asked, still politely, his tone making a rather
insolent contrast to the look on his face.
"I'm going to the Baths," I hazarded.
"Oh, are you? I'll let you off at the main floor, then. I don't know you, do I? You
must be fresh from the Crucible."
I nodded.
"No?" the priest said. "But "
"I mean yes," I corrected, making a mental note on the permutations of symbolic
gestures in various cultures. "I'm still fresh from the Crucible."
"A little too fresh," he told me. "You must be from Ferae. Nothing personal but
the Feraen dialect is suitable only for talking to dogs. I'm Dio and I know the
best" he used a word I didn't catch "in the city if you need advice."
"Thanks," I said, wondering if I should tell him my name and'finding my mind
totally blank when it came to choosing a Malescan nom-de-guerre. I didn't know
enough about proper nouns. I might ignorantly call myself the equivalent of
Santa Claus or Little Bo Peep.
I grimaced and said my tongue hurt.
He seemed to be thinking. "Did / bite your nose?" he asked suddenly. "I don't
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remember doing it. But when you fell on me that way "
"It's all right," I said.
"Where's your pouch?"
"I forgot it."
"Don't they teach you anything at the Ferae Crucible?" He glanced up the shaft.
"Here we are." He lunged forward, carrying me, and we found ourselves standing
in a room the size of Grand Central, quite as noisy and crowded and busy. To the
left was a great open archway with darkness beyond. The fresh wind blowing in
told me it was the open air.
"No use going back for your pouch now," the priest Dio said, reaching toward his
belt. "I'll lend you some grain." He put a few coins into my hand. "Don't forget to
pay it back. I'm Dio, remember, on the twenty-third Goose of Hermogenes at the
fifth Cherub."
"Well thanks," I said. He looked at me blandly. His dissipated young face had
lost its brilliant intentness now and was a little sleepy, as if with satisfaction.
Sometime during our brief conversation he had come to a decision about me.
I couldn't understand him at all. If Falvi's prognosis were right any priest who
recognized me for a newcomer from Earth was pretty certain to shoot first and
ask questions later. Why, I didn't know yet.
Dio's behavior was simply confusing the issue still further. If he knew me for a
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