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doubted that he whom it might strike, or scratch, would suffer much, or long, perhaps no more than a moment, one of comprehension and misery, not that such matters would be of much concern to those who might mix and brew the coating. The important thing was that the matter would be quickly done, that there would be no time to search out an antidote, even to cry out, or summon help. This would allow the assassin the time to slip away and board the waiting hoverer.
    She knew the blade need not be driven into the victim’s body. It would be enough for it to touch the skin or be drawn across it, just enough to open the skin. Indeed, the blade was so sharp that, if things were lightly done, the victim might even be unaware, for a moment, that he was dying.
    But she hated this Ottonius, for he had put her to a slave’s work on the Narcona , she, of the patricians, and had silenced her with bands of tape, and tied her to the foot of his couch.
    Perhaps she might drive the blade into his body to the hilt!
    The blade’s guard would permit this. It would protect her.
    But she wondered what it might be, to be taken into the arms of such a man, to be held there, helplessly, crushed with the same passion, possessiveness, and indifference which might be accorded a slave.
    She did not understand the likely repercussions and consequences of her task, but she gathered it was important.
    It had to do with politics, and power, and perhaps even with the fate of an empire.
    She knew the empire was eternal, but there were rumors, far off, of crumbling walls, of crossed borders, of lapsed, lost, or surrendered worlds, of transgressed spacelanes, of remote smithies in which alien ships, in their hundreds, were being built and fueled.
    Who, or what, might stand against the darkness, like night, rising over far worlds?
    What forces, what men, in a thousand effete worlds, devoted to luxury and pleasure, might be strong enough to stand against storms of hungry wolves, their eyes burning in the night, now prowling just beyond watch fires of civilization?
    She knew her task.
    That was enough.
    Its implications were for others to assess.
    We have little reason to suppose that she knew, or much cared, what might ride on the stroke of a tiny blade, and a drop of poison.
    The empire was eternal.
    At that moment, a gong sounded, and she rose to her feet, turned, and hurried to the kitchen.
    It would not do to dally.
    The brunette, the first girl, carried a switch.

Chapter Two
    â€œWe are surely lost,” said Tuvo Ausonius.
    â€œNo,” said Julian, he of the Aureliani, kin even to the emperor.
    â€œThe snow has concealed the tracks of the tractor sleds, of the expedition trying to make contact with Captain Ottonius,” said Tuvo.
    â€œI am not now concerned with the tracks,” said Julian. “In Venitzia, I determined the route of the expedition. The sky is unfamiliar, but I am using the appropriate star sighting.”
    â€œThat is why we have moved primarily at night,” said Ausonius, “after the snow.”
    â€œYes,” said Julian.
    I gather from the manuscript that Tangara lacked a magnetic pole.
    â€œHow close is the forest?” said Tuvo.
    â€œI do not know,” said Julian. “I hope it is not far. There may be little time.”
    It may be recalled that Otto, now king of the Otungs, to the consternation of many, had left Venitzia alone to make contact with the Otungs, even though it was the Killing Time. This had been in direct contradiction to the clearly expressed, urgent wishes of Julian whose departure from Lisle had been delayed, quite possibly deliberately, that he wait in Venitzia before proceeding. Julian fully expected that he would do so. But he had left, alone. Before the arrival of Julian in Venitzia, an expedition had been hastily organized to follow and, presumably, support Otto, an expedition, as far as we know, nominally under the command of Phidias, captain of the Narcona .