believed in it. Sometimes she dreamed of doing to another what had been done toher, and woke moaning with shame, and she could not explain why to the otherapprentice scribes sharing the dormitory that once had been the bedroom of thenoble who now snored and vomited and groaned and snored under a shelter fitrather for hogs than humans the wrong side of his magnificently painted ceiling.

She regretted that. She liked most other companions; some were from respectablefamilies, for there were no schools here apart from temple schools whose priestshad the bad habit of stuffing children's heads with myth and legend as thoughthey were to live in a world of make-believe instead of fending for themselves.Without learning to read and write at least their own language they would be atrisk of cheating by every smart operator in the city. But how could she befriendthose who had led soft, secure lives, who at the advanced age of fifteen orsixteen had never yet had to scrape a living from gutters and garbage piles?

Captain Aye-Gophlan was in mufti. Or thought.he was. He was by no means so richas to be able to afford clothing apart from his uniforms, of which it wascompulsory for the guards to own several - this one for the Emperor'sbirthday, that one for the feast of the regiment's patron deity, anotherfor day-watch duty, yet another for night-watch duty, another for funeraldrill... The common soldiers were luckier. If they failed in their attire,the officers were blamed for stinginess. But how long was it since there hadbeen enough caravans through here for the guard to keep up the fineryrequired of them out of bribes? Times indeed were hard when the best disguise anofficer on private business could contrive was a plum-blue overcloak with a holein it exactly where his crotch-armour could glint through.

Seeing him, Jarveena thought suddenly about justice. Or more nearly, about