uddenly, "why you should not be killed
at once?"

"We are your slaves, Hertug, we are your slaves," everyone in the room
shouted in unison, waving their hands in the air at the same time.
Jason missed the first chorus, but came in on the second. Only Mikah
did not join in the chant-and-wave, speaking instead in a solitary
voice after the pledge of allegiance was completed.

"I am no man's slave."

The commander of the soldiers swung his thick bow in a short arc that
terminated on the top of Mikah's head: he dropped stunned to the
floor.

"You have a new slave, oh Hertug," the commander said.

"Which is the one who knows the secrets of the _caroj_?" the Hertug
asked and Snarbi pointed at Jason.

"Him there, oh mightiness. He can make _caroj_ and he can make the
monster that burns and moves them, I know because I watched him do it.
He also made balls of fire that burned the D'zertanoj and many other
things. I brought him to be your slave so that he could make _caroj_
for the Perssonoj. Here are the pieces of the _caroj_ we traveled in,
after it was consumed by its own fire." Snarbi shook the tools and
burnt fragments out onto the floor and the Hertug curled his lip at
them.

"What proof is this?" he asked, and turned to Jason. "These things
mean nothing. How can you prove to me, slave, that you can do the
things he says?"

Jason entertained briefly the idea to deny all knowledge of the
matter, which would be a neat revenge against Snarbi who would
certainly meet a sticky end for causing all this trouble for nothing,
but he discarded the thought as fast as it came. Partly for
humanitarian reasons, Snarbi could not help being what he was, but
mostly because he had no particular desire to be put to the question.
He knew nothing about the local torture methods, and he wanted to keep
it that way.

"Proof is easy, Hertug of all the Perssonoj, because I know everything
about everything. I can build machines that walk, that talk, that run,
fly, swim, bark like a dog and roll on their backs."

"You will build a _caroj_ for me?"

"It could be arranged, if you have the right kind of tools I could
use. But I must first know what is the specialty of your clan, if you
know what I mean. Like the Trozelligoj make _caroj_ and the D'zertanoj
pump oil. What do your people do?"

"You cannot know as much as you say if you do not know of the glories
of the Perssonoj!"

"I come from a distant land and as you know news travels