I should have been relieved; I don’t know why I wasn’t. Instead, my first reaction was bewilderment and angry annoyance. How could he tell that? I was as furiously embarrassed as if I’d been accused of wearing stolen clothing. My beefy captor was as angry as I was. “What do you mean, this isn’t Adric?” he demanded belligerently, “We took him right out of their accursed cavalcade! If it isn’t Adric, who is it?”
“I wish I knew,” Narayan muttered under his breath. His eyes, still fixed on my face, were level, disconcerting. He was tall and straightly built, with pale blond hair cut square around his shoulders like a squire from a Provencal ballad, and grey eyes that looked grave, but friendly. I liked his looks, but he had a trace of the uncanny stillness I’d noticed in old Rhys, in Gamine. For a moment I decided to tell my whole fantastic story to this man with the grave eyes. He would surely believe it. But to my surprise, he spoke and called me Adric; definitely, as if he had forgotten his doubts. “Adric,” he said, “Do you still remember me? Or did Karamy take that too?”
I sighed. I didn’t dare tell the truth, and I felt too chilled and exhausted and disoriented to lie convincingly. Yet lie I must, and do it well.
The fat man scowled and fronted Narayan. “Karamy—Zandru’s eyelashes!” he growled. “Look you, did Brennan come back this afternoon? He knows his way around Rainbow City. Ask Adric what happened to Brennan!”
The clamoring broke out around us again, but Narayan never took his eyes from my face as he answered gently “There is always danger, Raif. Blame no man unjustly. Brennan knew he faced all the dangers of Rainbow City. And even Adric is not to blame if a she-witch has him under her spells.” “Traitor!” Raif snarled at me and spat.
I loosed the saddle-horn and stepped dizzily forward. “You might try asking me,” I said with a weary anger.
“Are you Adric of the Crimson Tower?” fat Raif snapped.
“I don’t know—” I said tiredly. “I don’t know, I don’t know!”
Narayan’s eyes met mine in puzzlement. Abruptly he put out one hand and took my wrist in a firm grip. “We can’t talk here, whoever you are,” he said. “Come along.”
He led me through the thinning crowd into the frame house at the grove’s edge; Raif and one other man trailed after us, the rest clustering hive-fashion around the door. Inside, in a great timbered room, a fire burned and glowing globes chased away darkness. I went gratefully toward the fire; I was stiff with riding and I felt chilled and stupid and empty with the cold. From a wood settle near the fire, a woman rose. She was slight and dark and around her shoulders the luminescent shimmer of her winged cloak flowed like another flame. Cynara.
“Adric—” she said half-aloud, holding out her hands. I took them, partly because she seemed to expect it, partly because the girl seemed the only thing real in a world gone haywire. She flung her arms suddenly around my neck and held herself to me with a shy deliberation. “Adric, Adric, Adric—” she begged, “I slipped away in the dark—I suppose Gamine knows—but they’ll never find me here, no, never—”
Narayan’s hand pulled the girl sternly away from me; she shrank before the annoyance in his eyes. “Please—Narayan, no—”
The blond man looked at her without speaking for long moments. At last he said gravely “Sister, you must go back to Narabedla. I would not make you go if there was another way; but you must, for a time.” He beckoned to one of the men. “Kerrel—” he commanded, “Take Cynara back to Rainbow City, but don’t get caught. Cynara; tell them you were lost in the woods, or that you were caught and escaped.”
The childish mouth trembled, and she turned to me appealingly, but I gave a little shrug. What was I supposed to do? Narayan gave Cynara a gentle push. “Go with Kerrel, little sister,” he ordered in a quiet voice; Kerrel took her arm and they hurried out of the room, the winged cloak she wore fluttering on her shoulders. Narayan motioned to Raif to follow them through the door. “I’ll talk with him alone.”
Raif’s thick lips set stubbornly. He looked as if he’d be nasty in a fight. “If he’s Adric, and if he’s under Karamy’s devilments, then—”
“I have faced Adric, and Karamy too,” said Narayan with a friendly grin at the man. “Get out, Raif; you’re not my bodyguard, or even my nurse!”
The fat man accepted dismissal reluctantly, and Narayan came to my side. There was real friendliness in his grin. “Well,” he said, “Now we will talk. You cannot kill me, any more than I could kill you, so we may as well be truthful with each other. Why did you leave us, Adric? What has Karamy done to you this time?”
The room reeled around me. I put out a hand to steady myself—when the dizziness cleared, Narayan’s arm was around my shoulders and he was holding me up with a strength surprising in his slight frame. He let me settle down on the seat Cynara had left. “You have been roughly handled,” he said in apology, “Just sit still a minute. My men—” he made a deprecating little gesture, “have had orders. And if I know Karamy’s ways, you’ve been heavily drugged for a long time.” His eyes studied me intently. “Better come and have a drink. And—when did you eat last? You look half starved. That’s the way of the sharig—”
I rubbed my forehead. “I can’t remember,” I told him honestly.
“I thought so. Come along.” Narayan went into the next room, assuming that I would follow and that I knew my way around. After the insanely furnished rooms in Rainbow City, I was a little surprised when the next room proved to be a strictly functional and ordinary kitchen, equipped with the usual items. Out of a relatively un-extraordinary icebox he assembled something that looked rather like the food I was accustomed to from the 20th century, and poured some kind of liquid into an oddly shaped glass. He motioned me into a chair and set the things on the table. “Here, eat this. I know the drugs they give you; you’ll have more sense when you’ve eaten. We’ve plenty of time to talk, all night if we choose.” He saw me glance sidewise at the glass, laughed sketchily, and from the same bottle poured himself a drink and sat down opposite me, sipping it slowly. “Go ahead. I won’t poison you till I find out what Karamy’s up to.”
I laughed apologetically and started eating, with a mental shrug. It had been at least forty-eight hours since I had last tasted food, and I did justice to the plateful before me. Narayan sipped his drink—which, when I tasted mine, appeared to be excellent cognac—and watched me; and when I finally pushed the empty plate aside, he put back his glass and said “Now. Who are you, and what happened?”
I felt better and stronger; more like myself than I’d felt since Rhys had catapulted me into this world. But now that I was on the carpet, I felt I must talk fast and convincingly before those searching grey eyes.
“Karamy had me shut in the Tower,” I told him, “I was freed today, and we were on our way to the Dreamers Keep. Then your men came along. I didn’t know if I was being rescued or captured. I still don’t.” I stared with purposeful blankness at Narayan; he stared back and I could feel him debating what to do and say. Obviously, an Adric sane and glib and possibly untruthful was a different thing than an Adric too bewildered and shaken to tell anything but the truth. Finally Narayan said “I’m not sure what I ought to do or say, Adric. The bond between us isn’t as strong as it was. You know that.”
I nodded, perturbed. Adric’s thoughts seemed to be surging back, insidiously, as if Narayan held the key to unlock them. What crazy drama was going to be unfolded in my mind now?
Narayan said, low; “Karamy did it, I think.”
“Yes.” My own voice was as quiet as his own. “Karamy sent me on the Time Ellipse. She knew I’d come back changed—or mad—or not at all. I think—I think she wanted me to betray you again.”
“Adric!” Narayan reached out quickly and grabbed my arm, hard, above the elbow, till I cried out with the pain of that steely grip and twisted away, rubbing numbed flesh. “Adric—” Narayan repeated, unsteadily,