Sheyan narrowed his eyes. "And that is?"
"A matter of dissension which needs to be settled."
"A trial?"
"That and perhaps more. I beg your indulgence for this imposition on a guest, but the matter must be settled im shy;mediately. You will form a tribunal?"
"Of course." Sheyan gestured towards Dumarest and Nim shy;ino. "These two officers will accompany me. When will you need us?"
"Two hours after sunset, captain. I shall send men to escort you to the meeting house."
"So late?" The captain's voice echoed his displeasure. "I could be loaded and ready to leave in an hour. Time is money to a trader."
"Two hours after sunset," repeated the chief elder firmly. "It will be dark and the workers will be in from the fields and the sea. You may load, captain, everything but the oil. That we shall deliver to you after the trial."
V
Night came with a thin wind gusting from the sea, a mist of cloud hiding the stars and intensifying the darkness. Men with torches came to escort the tribunal, their faces hard and solemn in the guttering light. Nimino's voice was low as he walked beside Dumarest, both men three paces behind the captain.
"We get this from time to time. As traders we're con shy;sidered to be impartial and when a hard decision has to be made we are asked to give it. That way no one has any reason to hold a grudge. A lot of these worlds have a tribal culture or large families locked in a struggle for power. A vendetta would ruin them and most are too proud or too wary to submit to the judgment of other residents." Nimino stumbled as his foot caught an obstruction and he grabbed at Dumarest's arm to save himself from falling. "I just hope that we don't have to execute anyone."
The meeting house was a long, low-roofed structure built of logs caulked with clay, lit by flaring torches, and hung with a clutter of various trophies. Benches accommodated the audience, the sour reek of their bodies rising to blend with the resinous smell of the torches, the odor of damp soil.
Dumarest studied them as he took his seat on the raised platform occupying one end of the hall. They wore either rough jerkins and trousers made of treated fish skins or som shy;ber garments of wool. The fishers and farmers, he decided; but aside from their clothes they seemed all cast from the same mold. Like the elderly guards, their faces were set in fanatical lines as if to laugh was to commit a sin. Hair was long and held back with fillets of skin or leather; those of hammered steel being obviously a badge of authority. There were no young women present but a double row of matrons, shapeless in voluminous dresses, sat at the extreme rear.
Nimino leaned towards Dumarest and said quietly, "Look at their eyes, Earl. Have you ever seen such an expression before?"
It was the blood-lust glare inherent to mobs and to those anticipating blood and pain. He had seen it a hundred times in the eyes of watchers clustered around a ring where men fought with ten-inch blades. At his side Sheyan moved restlessly on the hard wooden chair.
"Why the delay?" he said to the chief elder. "We are assembled, where is the prisoner?"
There was a stir at the far end of the hall. A dozen men, guards, hard-faced and no longer young, marched forward with someone in their midst. They halted before the raised platform and stepped back, their staves swinging horizontal before them to form a barrier. Isolated in the clear space before the platform, a girl looked coolly at the tribunal.
"By God," she said. "Men. Real men at last!"
"Silence!" Herkam's voice was harsh with anger. "There will be no blasphemy. Guards! If the woman Lallia speaks so again you will strike her down!"
Nimino drew in his breath with an audible hiss. "By the sacred mantras of the Dedla Vhal," he said. "That is a woman!"
She was tall, with a mane of lustrous black hair which swept from a high forehead and rested on her left shoulder. Beneath a rough dress of undyed wool the curves of her body strained under the fabric. Her skin was white, arms and feet bare, the long column of her throat unadorned. The long-lashed eyes were bold, challenging, and the full lips held a wealth of sensuous passion.
Herkam looked at Sheyan, at the others of the tribunal.
"This is the one on whom you must pass judgment," he said. "She came to us several months ago from a ship which called here. We gave her the guest offering of food and wine and accepted the stranger within our gates. In return she has sowed dissension, turning brother against brother, mocking our sacred ways and filling the young men with thoughts of evil.
We gave her work among the women and she dazzled their minds with tales of orgies, dancing, fine raiment, and decadent living.
We put her to work alone and then had to set guards to keep the young men away from the enticement of her body."
"A moment." Sheyan lifted his hand. "What is the charge against her?"
"That of witchcraft! Of consorting with the Evil One!"
"The evidence?"
It was as Dumarest expected; a list of petty incidents inconsequential in themselves, but in this in-bred, neurotic community, swollen to grotesque proportions. A woman had pricked her thumb while cleaning fish skins, the resultant infection was wholly due to the accused's evil eye. A young man had died while fishing-a spell must have been laid on his spear so that it broke at a critical time. Crops had withered after she had walked among them. A baby had sickened after she had spoken to it.
Dumarest looked at the chief elder during the interminable list of complaints and accusations. Herkam was no fool and must know the real value of what was being said. Lallia was guilty of arousing nothing more than jealously and re shy;sentment among the women, desire and frustration among the men. And yet, in such a community, such emotions were dangerous. He began to understand why the case had been given to outsiders to judge.
"This is a bad one, Earl." Nimino's voice was barely a whisper. "We're dealing with fanaticism and aberrated fears — an ugly combination."
It was more than that. Dumarest leaned back, watching the faces of the girl, the men and women seated on the benches. Herkam was playing a shrewd game of politics and playing it well. There would be factions for and against the girl. Young men of high family would be enamored of her beauty, each snarling like a dog over a favored bone, each determined that if he could not win the prize then it should fall to no other. The women would be banded in a common determination to bring her down. Herkam would be trying to both maintain the peace and his own authority.
And shortly would come the time of festival when the wine flowed and old scores were settled. A time of unleashed pas shy;sion and explosive violence. In such an atmosphere the girl would be a match to tinder and, no matter what happened, the chief elder would be held to blame.
Dumarest leaned forward as the accusations ceased and said to Sheyan. "Let us hear from the girl herself."
"There's no need," the captain was sharp. "She'd deny everything, what else would you expect?"
"He's right, Earl." Nimino joined the low conversation. "We're not dealing with justice here. The girl is innocent, of course, but we daren't say so. They wouldn't accept it. They want her to be found guilty and destroyed. Herkam wants that, too, but he doesn't want her blood on his hands." The navigator frowned, thinking. "We could take her with us but I doubt if they would let her go. They have to be proved right and they want to see her suffer."
"We could execute her," said Sheyan. "At least that would be quick."
"No," said Dumarest.
"What else?" The captain's face was bunched, knotted with anger. "Do you want her to be burned? Or have you got some crazy idea of rescuing her? If you have forget it. We're three against an entire community and we wouldn't even get out of this hall. And we'd lose the oil," he added. "Unless we play this Herkam's way he won't release it."