“Lady, It is not possible! “pled Kat. “Perhaps the trickster told the aye—”

Clink!

They froze; turned as one to stare at the bag sitting, inviolate, on the high wooden table.

Beside it lay a solitary token of the type used to count score In gambling games.

“Where did it come from?” wondered Kat.

“The bag…”

“Lady, the bag is not open!”

‘Where else would it come from?” she cried. “Do you have such a thing? Do I? It must come from the bag!” She snatched at the clasp, swore; lifted the whole with fury’s strength and slammed it upon the table. “Open, damn you!”

The bag sat, shuttered and uncowed.

Lovely shoulders drooping, Lady Drudae turned away.

Plingplinkbinkplunk!

She spun. Rolling unhurriedly down the slope of the table, four bright pottery marbles: red, blue, green, yellow. Lady Drudae stared them to the edge of the table and watched them fall, one by one, to the dirt floor.

“Fetch the magician.”

* * *

MOONHAWK SAT AT the bottom of the pit and listened.

Lady Drudae’s voice she heard most—strident and scolding, then threatening. Less often came the undistinguished bass rumble of a man’s speaking. Least often, she heard Lute’s clear, trained voice. He spoke very few words for one who seemed to like them so well. Most of the words he spoke meant ‘No’.

“You will open that bag now,” Lady Drudae stormed. “If you do not, Kat will break your fingers.”

“If he does so, Lady, heed my warning! Run away from here as fast as you may. For the bag becomes its own master if I have no hands to lay upon it. Listen! And believe.”

Very nearly did Moonhawk in her pit believe, though straining Witch-sense brought no taste of power, other than the gall of evil.

“So…” hissed Lady Drudae. “Kat!”