in three days, when the Grand Combat Truce would begin and Tanu and Firvulag would forswear fighting until the start of the ritual war- Aiken demanded that he be allowed those three days; and supported by his partisans, he was given his chance. Using his psychocreative power, Aiken turned himself and Stein into bats and they flew into the depths.
They encountered Delbaeth two days later and killed him by means of the secret device Mayvar had given Aiken. Just before they left the Firvulag's cave. Stein pointed out to Aiken that the waters of the Atlantic were pounding against the western wall. The narrow Gibraltar Isthmus, forming a sill between Spain and Africa, was all that separated the ocean from the deep empty basin of the Mediterranean.
With the start of the month-long Truce, both Tanu and Firvulag from all parts of the Many-Colored Land began to converge on Muriah's White Silver Plain, a large salt flat where tent cities, grandstands, lists, and the battlefield for the Combat proper were located. Because they had adopted war-mounts and other human innovations, the Tanu had won the Grand Combat for forty years running, and the Firvulag had become more and more bitter. However, the recent fall of Finiah cheered the Little People, and inspired them to adopt a few Lowlife fighting customs themselves in hopes of changing their luck. The new tactics were opposed by the old Firvulag Battlemaster, Paliol One-Eye; but he was forced to bow to the will of the younger generals Sharn and Ayfa, a husband-and-wife team.
In the Lowlife village of Hidden Springs, Madame Guderian discussed her plan for liberating humanity from the Tanu yoke. Phase One had been successful. Finiah with its barium mine was a deserted ruin.
Phase Two would be more audacious. Under cover of the Truce, a small group of Lowlives would infiltrate the torc factory down in Muriah and sabotage the irreplaceable machinery. The undertaking would be hazardous in the extreme, since the factory was situated inside the fortresslike Coercer Guild complex, presided over by the renegade human. Lord Gomnol.
Phase Three involved the permanent closing of the timegate. Madame had a plan for doing this herself, and Claude insisted upon helping her.
An implied fourth phase of the liberation involved the making of iron weapons by humanity. It was arranged that the freed human population of Finiah, as well as some of the Lowlives who had come from other parts of Europe to join in the Finiah fight, would found several Iron Villages. They would mine. smelt, and forge the "blood metal" in preparation for the ultimate bid for human freedom.
Eleven people, including Madame and the Group Green survivors, left Hidden Springs to implement Phases Two and Three. They were disguised as loyalist human refugees from Finiah. At the city of Roman, Madame and Claude separated from the others and went off to hide near Castle Gateway, while the others proceeded south to the capital The two groups would try to synchronize strikes against the time-gale and torc factory.
The Muriah-bound group included Felice, Sister Amerie, Chief Burke, the alpinist don Basil Wimbome (liberated from a Finiah prison), and five other dedicated Lowlives. Felice's metapsychic powers were developing nicely and the longer she wore her golden torc, the stronger her mental faculties became. She also carried the photonic Spear- It had been totally discharged in the Finiah fight, but the saboteurs hoped that their former Group Green companion, Aiken Drum, would find some way of putting it back into action. As the group approached the Tanu capital, a telepathic call was sent to Aiken, telling him of the Lowlife conspiracy. The saboteurs took for granted that Aiken would be loyal to humanity and eager to assist them. But they were wrong.
Down in Muriah, Aiken and Stem and Elizabeth learned at the same lime of the impending assaults on the torc works and the time-gate. Elizabeth had reluctantly helped Brede attain