h to the point where they could see it clearly.

If Hoddan had been a student of early terrestrial history, he might have
remarked upon the re-emergence of ancient architectural forms to match
the revival of primitive social systems. As it was, he noted in this
feudal castle the use of bastions for flanking fire upon attackers, he
recognized the value of battlements for the protection of defenders
while allowing them to shoot, and the tricky positioning of sally ports.
He even grasped the reason for the massive, stark, unornamented keep.
But his eyes did not stay on the castle for long. He saw the spaceboat
in which Derec and his more authoritative companion had arrived.

It lay on the ground a half mile from the castle walls. It was a clumsy,
obese, flattened shape some forty feet long and nearly fifteen wide. The
ground about it was scorched where it had descended upon its rocket
flames. There were several horses tethered near it, and men who were
plainly retainers of the nearby castle reposed in its shade.

Hoddan reined in.

"Here we part," he told Thal. "When we first met I enabled you to pick
the pockets of a good many of your fellow-countrymen. I never asked for
my split of the take. I expect you to remember me with affection."

Thal clasped both of Hoddan's hands in his.

"If you ever return," he said with mournful warmth, "I am your friend!"

* * * * *

Hoddan nodded and rode out of the brushwood toward the spaceboat--the
lifeboat--that had landed the emissaries from Walden. That it landed so
close to the spaceport, of course, was no accident. It was known on
Walden that Hoddan had taken space passage to Darth. He'd have landed
only two days before his pursuers could reach the planet. And on a
roadless, primitive world like Darth he couldn't have gotten far from
the spaceport. So his pursuers would have landed close by, also. But it
must have taken considerable courage. When the landing grid failed to
answer, it must have seemed likely that Hoddan's deathrays had been at
work.

Here and now, though, there was no uneasiness. Hoddan rode heavily,
without haste, through the slanting sunshine. He was seen from a
distance and watched without apprehension by the loafing guards about
the boat. He looked hot and thirsty. He was both. So the posted guard
merely looked at him without too much interest when he brought his dusty
mount up to the shadow the lifeboat cast, and apparentl