"my family taught me." i hung my head. i was telling the truth.

"and why did they turn you out?"

"my father had many sons. i wasn't necessary," i said. well, it had actually been my grandfather-i knew that now.

"then we will be glad of the surplus," the prince declared, eating the rest of his fowl with delight. the dessert was a plus-he liked that very much. as did the wizard. i was allowed to return to my bed as soon as the plates and utensils had been cleaned and put away.

"re, wake up." the voice was whispering right next to my ear, causing me to gasp and sit up in alarm. i was crushed against a uniform i recognized. "re, hush," delvin held me tightly against him so i wouldn't scream.

chapter 4

"little girl, be still," delvin gripped me tightly against him, whispering the words. "come now, get dressed, the prince wants his errand boy."

i wanted a bath, but that wasn't to be. i was set to running errands immediately, before i got breakfast, even. i was hungry, too-i hadn't gotten any of the food i'd cooked the night before, and i hadn't gotten dinner, either. that's why my stomach was growling as i handed a message to alvis.

"you haven't eaten, and my guess is you haven't gotten a bath, either." alvis had given me a good sniff when i arrived at his quarters. he had a small room down the hall from the prince's suite.

"yes on both, master alvis," i ducked my head respectfully. he was older, with silver in his dark hair. his brown eyes, too, looked wise to me, as if he'd seen many things during his life.

"then come, we will go to the private bath together." that frightened me into immobility. alvis took one look at me, grabbed my hand and led me along. we went into the prince's private bath, which was decorated with beautiful tiling and gold fixtures. the bath was large-at least twenty people might have fit around the edges comfortably. a bit of steam wisped up from the surface of the water.

"little girl," alvis hissed, "never let those wizards know you're female." he shot the bolt behind us, locking us in. if i'd been inside the bath alone, that might have frightened me. alvis was there, so that helped.

"how did you know?" i muttered, keeping my eyes down and not looking at him.

"i know a great deal. the others are fools and do not look past the surface of things. that will be their downfall. come, we will bathe and then i will take you for breakfast. the prince only thinks of his own belly, most of the time."

the bath felt good to my still-aching muscles. if i were anywhere except where i was, i might have fallen asleep. i stayed awake, cleaned myself and dressed right alongside master alvis. we walked out of the baths together and down to the kitchens, where servants were busily preparing the noon meal. alvis and i were served a decent breakfast, cooked fresh just for us. i carried a message from alvis to the prince when we were done.

"ah, alvis, you are my conscience," the prince muttered after reading the note. "re, you will remind me from now on if you have not eaten." i nodded at the prince royal.

"these are the fields." bel swept his arm out as tory and ry stared. the drakus seed plants seemed to go on forever.

"and this is only one of many villages doing the same thing?" ry attempted to keep the shock from his voice. he couldn't see the end of the drakus seed fields. citrus trees were off to the side, but those were the only other fields he could see.

"this is the largest, but there are other fields nearly as big," bel answered.

"how many?" tory didn't like what he was seeing.

"hundreds. some of the villages were emptied by the demons that we fought, but the high commander sent out others to take their place as soon as the danger was eliminated. they have worked to revive the crops. there will be a yield from those fields as well."

"not demons-spawn," tory corrected absently.

"how do you know they were not demons?" bel was curious.

"he knows," ry provided the answer.

"with the weather here, the fields can be replanted in a moon-turn, with another yield in two. that means four harvests per full turn," bel whispered. "the plants need sun and a lot of water. we have both."

"were the plants native to this world?" tory asked.

"no. they were brought in. the high commander and his wizards, i think." bel didn't sound happy about that.

"what do you know about the wizards? the ones who were imported?" ry wanted to learn as much as he could about them-he might be forced to fight them and needed to know what their strengths and talents were.

"we don't know much except they can do blasts of power when they want-they'll execute someone that way if they're angry."

"and they can move about like i can-perhaps farther, even," max offered. "i don't know if they must have specific targets as i do-i can't take people far and i have to have a fixed target in my mind. moving objects is much easier than moving people. if i'm too tired, it's useless."

"so far, these wizards seem unimpressive," ry grumbled. "how did they get here to begin with? were they transported in a ship or did they arrive by other means? have you seen them? do you know their planet of origin?"

"we're not supposed to know they're from somewhere else, so the answer is no," bel snorted angrily. "and if you haven't guessed, we don't get a lot of space travel on mandil."

"so, how did you get to tulgalan?" tory crossed arms over his chest.

bel coughed. "we, uh, dug up reah's escape pod. we have a few people loyal to the prince who are good with technology. they recharged the pod and equipped it for us. we're not sure how nods made it to tulgalan-but when we caught up with him, we told him the high commander sent us. one of pell's talents, besides creating big holes in the ground for people to fall into, is convincing people that something was their idea. the high commander is pretty sure he told us to do exactly what we did."

tory almost choked, he was laughing so hard. ry, too, was grinning hugely. "man, that is epic," tory slapped bel on the back.

a hand was clapped over my mouth and i was hauled into the kitchen after i'd slept two clicks. the prince wasn't hungry but the wizards were. the high commander, too, had come with them. i was terrified the high commander would recognize me, but he barely noticed. someone else was there whom i hadn't seen before, and everyone was bowing to his every whim and calling him arvil. he seemed puffed up to me-like addah used to act around someone he felt was less important.

the wizards-three of them, plus the high commander and the one they called arvil, all received flat bread with sauce, cheese and vegetables. i had to cook it in a shallow iron skillet in the oven, and the trick was getting the crust to the right amount of crispness. i ended up making two at a time-they were eating the food faster than i could make it.

"this is excellent, i had no idea your food here was this good," arvil licked his fingers. the flat-breads were designed to be eaten with your fingers, after all. i'd served a light wine with the late meal, too, and it went over well.

"most of the food isn't this good," the night wizard grumbled. i called him the night wizard, since he hadn't given me his name-i didn't know the names of the others, either. nobody had introduced us. the night wizard was the one with the cruel mouth. another had reddish-brown hair-he was the day wizard, while the third had gray hair. he was the evening wizard. delvin had taken the day wizard's place that first morning when i woke. day wizard had something else to do then, i suppose.

"we expect you to invite us over if you are having a late snack from now on," gray-haired evening wizard grumbled.

"everything hinges on whether the prince is hungry or not, and if this one keeps his mouth closed." dark-haired, cruel-mouthed night wizard had a kitchen knife pointed at my throat.

"you don't threaten your cook-you get awful food," arvil took the last piece of flat bread.

"i'd better not get awful food," night wizard was still threatening me. i wanted to snatch the knife away from him and do some threatening myself. i'm sure the director and vice-director would be extremely angry if i killed anyone before they could spill information, so i held back and nodded meekly instead. when i was allowed to go back to bed after cleaning up, i sent tired mindspeech to tory.

reah, why are you up so late? tory's sending was weary. he'd had a long day, too.

tory, someone new came in tonight, and the others were calling him arvil. no last name or anything, and i still don't have names for the three wizards.

tory didn't reply for a while and i wondered if he'd fallen asleep. he hadn't. reah, don't give yourself away to that one-arvil. try not to come to his attention, all right, avilepha? promise me. somehow, that made me worry. tory had heard that name before, but he wasn't explaining it to me. maybe it was better if i didn't know.

all right, i returned, sounding grumpier than i'd intended.

go to sleep, baby, tory's mental voice faded.

you think she heard right? she didn't mistake that name for another? norian keef and lendill schaff both had mindspeech, and tory had sent the information as soon as he'd told reah to go to sleep.

i can't imagine why she'd mistake that name for another, tory was tired and didn't want to get into a debate with norian and lendill over it.

did she know how long he's staying, or where? lendill was getting in on the conversation.

ask her yourself-i think she gave me what she had. tory sent a mental yawn.

she won't talk to either of us, lendill insisted.

i wouldn't either, if i were in her place, tory returned.

"as you can see-the harvest is nearly ready." the high commander had brought his visitor to the drakus seed fields. ry's cameras were sending vid feeds directly to norian and lendill the following morning, and norian could see for himself that reah hadn't misheard-arvil san gerxon was on mandil.