THE YNGLING AND THE CIRCLE OF POWER by John Dalmas

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they could get to the palace before daylight, and won­dered if that was possible. He also wondered if the sol­diers were there yet, with Nils.

And the yetis— He shivered at the thought of them. By now he was sure it was one of their babies he’d eaten, and wondered if somehow they’d know.

Behind him he heard a distant rumbling, and realized it was hooves, many hooves, crossing a heavy plank bridge. There was a hay field on his left, and speaking sharply to Chen, he turned his horse off the road. They crossed the field and sat their horses in the dark shadows of the forest edge.

“What’s the matter?” Chen asked. He was a strong old man, and daughty, but his voice reflected weariness.

“Horses are coming. Many of them.”

“From behind or ahead?”

“Behind.”

Chen wagged his head, not in disbelief, but at the youth having heard what he hadn’t. He’d felt proud that is hearing had remained sharp while that of many others his age had not. Perhaps these Northmen had sharper ears than others, or perhaps his own ears were tired like the rest of him.

The night was crystal clear, and visibility good in the open field, enhanced a bit by a newly risen sickle moon. In a minute or so they saw horsemen approaching up the road to their right, just now walking their horses. They passed not a hundred and fifty meters in front of the two, led by a very tall figure on foot, who was followed by horsemen—fewer than ten, Hans thought—with two other very tall figures on foot. Yetis and soldiers, he guessed. He couldn’t be sure, in the night, but one of the horsemen seemed too large to be anyone but Nils.

Chen had interpreted it as Hans had. “That’s them,” he murmured. “The other soldiers must have stayed at the army post. They were only along to help catch Nils and Jampa.”

Meanwhile they waited, their horses grazing as best they could with bits in their mouths. Hans heard the

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sound of grasses tearing. When the mounted party was out of sight, he nudged his horse with callused heels, and they returned to the road. They were hardly behind at all. But with the newly risen moon thin as it was, dawn wouldn’t be far off.

FORTY-FIVE

Songtsan Gampo awoke with a start, not knowing what had wakened him. Vaguely he remembered troubled dreams, but nothing that seemed to account for his wak­ing. Swinging his legs from the bed, he put his feet on the floor. Outside his balcony doors was black night.

He’d had trouble going to sleep in the first place. Fi­nally, toward midnight, he’d had a serving girl sent to him, one he’d noticed and had had instructed. The cause of his wakefulness, he had no doubt, was his unsolved problem: the demon in the fabric of the Tao. Clearly he couldn’t rely on Tenzin to handle it, but in the middle of the night, what could he do? So he’d had sex to satia­tion and soreness, and fell asleep before he could send the girl back to the maids’ quarters.

He wondered how long he’d slept. Not long enough, he thought wryly, and getting out of bed, started toward his balcony. To better feel the night. A strange-feeling night, he told himself. As if something is waiting to happen.

Before he reached the balcony doors, the light of the oil lamp showed him the star man’s weapon on his dress-

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ing table. The star man! He’d had him put in a cell beneath the guard building, and then forgot him. Not entirely—he’d thought of him a time or two—but always in passing, when he was busy with other matters.

He picked the weapon up and looked it over again, wondering how effective it could possibly be. It was so small, and hadn’t even a blade!

What had the man said? When the right button is pushed, and the right lever—touched? No, squeezed . . . He examined it closely but cautiously. There seemed to be only one button and one lever.

Then a piece of metal was supposed to fly out of the little hole. It sounded like a fairy tale.

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