THE BAREFOOT GIRLS

Chapter Six

The next morning they again assembled in the corridor, having been inform'd that they would have breakfast, and indeed all their meals that day (if one could, with any sense, distinguish separate meals within the continuous buffets) with the Regnalka. The men had been told the previous evening that if they wisht to actually receive her blessing they would have to refrain from wearing tights.

Dupa made sure that he was the last to be drest and out, so that he could see that Regis and Conrad were going barefoot before deciding to do so himself, as appearing unshod was very much against his nature. His little cousin's habit of calling him "Tatus'" led the others to call him "Tat" -- and the pun was certainly intended, as his praise of the previous day's mass had left no doubt as to his love of ceremony. He would go to almost any lengths to have such an exalted being as the Regnalka give him her personal blessing; but what he wore, or did not wear was very important to him, as his clothing was his dignity, and he was having a deal of difficulty appropriately vesting his persona in this new and different context. The cold marble floor was an unpleasant reminder of his unease, and he did not feel comfortable until Andrew led them to the bottom of the stairs where they met the magnificent Regnalka. She was very tall for a woman. Dupa himself was over six feet tall; yet standing erect after a deep bow, he found her beautiful green eyes dead level with his, even as he felt, with an almost visible shiver, the royal touch of her cold bare toes atop his own. He then genuflected, along with all the others, at Andrew's prompt, and found himself staring down transfixt at the purple magnificence that markt those bare feet as belonging to a princess.

A green footed girl in the same Katharinian armour open'd the Regnalka's door, genuflected to her mistress, and was dismist down the hall with a few words and a nod. The Regnalka preceded her guests and welcomed them into her sitting room before seating herself on a large sumptuous cushion under the centre window, while the others, watching Andrew, remain'd standing and beheld her. Even seated cross-leggèd on a cushion, she managed to look regal. She wore a white tunic embroider'd in gold over an undertop of purple silk that matcht exactly the colour of her bare feet. She wore minimal dress armour, which might almost as well have been described as jewellery. About her neck she wore a gorgett of gold, whereupon were represented the prints of two bare feet in purple enamel. A fringe of fine gold chain, hanging from its lower edge fell over her breasts in a suggestion of mail. Attacht to the gorgett was a purple mantle in material somewhat reminiscent of Andrew's cloak. Upon her legs she wore golden greaves set with amethysts. These were chain'd to similarly decorated pieces of gold plate that cover'd her insteps, and which in turn were chain'd to gold and amethyst rings that graced the longest of her perfectly form'd toes. Her forearms and hands were armour'd in exactly the same way. She removed the arm pieces and set them on a small cushion to her right, and began to undo the leg pieces with her nimble toes, calling anon upon Harriet to assist her.

Andrew had taken the time to brief them on the various courtesies appropriate to a Regnalka, and so Harriet had been prepared for the possibility of being chosen for this honour. Removing the greaves, she arranged them carefully on the cushion; and then knelt and kist the cross of midnight blue that she found tatoo'd upon the sole of each purple foot -- upon the very spot, in fact, where the thorn had enter'd her own bare foot the night she had met Andrew. She then genuflected and backt away.

Comfortable now with nothing on her legs but the tightly fitting silk trousers that so perfectly matcht the purple of her proud bare feet, the Regnalka requested that they each pull up one of the many cushions that lay scatter'd about and sit in a circle on the carpet in front of her. Andrew and Nikonor sat on two fairly large cushions on either side of the Regnalka, and, each taking one of the girls gently by the shoulder, moved Harriet and Sarah respectively into the positions closest to themselves. Conrad sat next to Harriet on Andrew's -- and therefore ultimately on the Regnalka's -- right side, then sat Pilár, Regis, Halka, and finally Thaddæus next to Sarah, who was now still more or less celebrating her post eucharistic acceptance of him as a brother -- at least in the Christian sense.

Within minutes the porters came with the trolley and set the breakfast trays and the coffee urn on a very low table which occupy'd the centre of the circle.

The Rrgnalka stood up and set the toes of her right foot upon the edge of this table as she said a few words in her own language. She then blest herself and smiled approvingly as her guests did likewise and whisper'd a tentative "amen".

"Well," said the Regnalka, "We have had our formalities, so now we can relax and enjoy our breakfast together as friends." She herself then pour'd and served the coffee. For the rest of the day she would sit among them casually, even as an equal.

They enjoy'd perhaps half an hour of leisurely breakfasting before Nikonor arose to get their attention: "It is time to begin," he said, "and I propose to do so with a very general outline of the nature and history of our world here, and -- to the limited extent that I am at liberty in such matters -- the history of my own order as well. Later in the day you will begin to learn something about our language. Your first lesson in that subject will be Andrew's pleasure. Last of all you will hear from the Regnalka the first of a series of talks that she has most graciously offer'd to give us on the history of the Order of St. Katharine the Barefooted and of the lands now ruled by the Katharinians.

"I must, however, begin with a warning: The things that I am going to tell you now are for your ears only. Most of the several million souls who inhabit our world are never permitted to know half of what I am prepared to tell you about the work of my order, and you must never discuss these things except among yourselves. You must also, as Andrew has told you, never discuss anything at all about the world whence you came, unless you are given leave to do so by Andrew, myself, or another member of my order of at least consular rank. Among those born here, only princes, apart from members of my order, are ever told anything about the Parent World -- as the world whence you came is call'd among us -- beyond what is contain'd in scripture.

In just four weeks from yesterday, exactly one lunar month in our world, we shall be celebrating, the feast of our Lord's Resurrection, the first day of spring, and the start of the 3521^st year since the day that my predecessors in the Order of Preservers (one of our many names, and, I suppose, the one that I, myself, prefer) brought the first of my ancestors here from the world wherein you were born. Who these remote predecessors were, or whence they came, I can not say; but I can tell you that the people whom they brought here (we are given to understand that there were only about 600) were a small, and at the time apparently rather distrest tribe of what we might call Proto-Aryans, who spoke, in an as yet undifferentiated form , the parent language of almost all those spoken in Europe today, and also of our own language. It must therefore be assumed that -- as time is recorded in the world whence you ame -- more than twice -- perhaps more than thrice -- as many years must have past between their departure and yours, as we here would count between the respective arrivals. I understand, however, that Andrew has already begun to explain to you that our world is not in any way linkt to that one either in space or in time. All of this, so far, is common knowledge here, as is the fact that over the years many others -- though generally in much smaller groups -- have, through the agency of my order, been similarly translated, as it were, from that world to this. We have always been most carefull, as is also common knowledge, and indeed a matter of trust between our order and our people, that all of those subsequently brought here have been fully compatible with them. We have, in order to avoid the needless misfortunes of ethnic pluralism, selected our subsequent settlers only from good European stock. We have also carefully avoided the acquisition of anyone whose religious or political outlook might cause distress here. You have all been very carefully selected, and I am quite sure that you will all be quite happy here once you have learnt our language and customs -- so long as you remember always to avoid any mention of your origins and simply say, when questioned, that you are from some place far enough away that your speech will seem totally unremarkable considering the great number of local spoken variants that rise and fall within our language despite my orders vigilance in maintaining the purity of the litterary form.

It was never our intention to rule over the people whom we brought here. All of the rulers of all of the states that exist in our world today are descended from the original prince of the first people that were brought here. In the early centuries they had only one ruler -- whose senior direct male descendant now rules the central lands to the south of us, and whose title, PANREGETS, might best be translated as "Emperor" -- and they occupy'd only a fraction of the land that their descendants now occupy. In time, however, they multiply'd greatly, untill their original homeland could hardly contain them.

We are, all of us, members of a fallen species, children of a fallen world. This is true of all men and of all nations. In matters of religion, however, this people had not managed to fall as far as many of their neighbours. They worshipt a pantheon of gods, but saw these more or less as angelic powers who were themselves only creatures of a Creator who was beyond approach. They made sacrifices to their gods but only of such things as they themselves were accustomed to eating, and under such circumstances that the sacrificial element in their feasts could be seen as no more than a somewhat more dramatick form of what the Regnalka did for us at the start of our breakfast. They did not suppose that their gods actually partook of their feasts in any sense, but only that they gave their blessings to them. They had been aware, before my predecessors arranged their departure, that other peoples attempted to buy the help of dæmons by practicing human sacrifice, ritual cannibalism, mutilations, and other things too obscene to be spoken of; and they regarded such peoples with horror and disgust.

I suppose that they saw the founders of my order as angelic beings who saved them from being devour'd by one of the worst examples of such an unclean people. Their benefactors prepared them for their eventual acceptance of the Christian faith by telling them that many years thence, when a king came to reign over them who was so good as to be worthy, he would be visited by holy men who would shew him how his people could know their Creator even as a father.

This actually came to pass upon the accession of the king now remember'd as Iohanets Zanktets, John the Holy. Seeing that the time was right, my predecessors acquired an VIIIth century European bishop -- now remember'd as Ponderus, our first Patriarch -- and the entire court agreed to be baptised on the day of the coronation, which was to be Midsummer Day of our year 420. Bishop Ponderus did indeed baptise the king, and was to crown him, but just before he was to do so, our Heavenly Lord Himself appear'd in an explosion of light, and, taking the crown from the bishop's hand, Himself placed it on the head of the monarch. The miracle is celebrated among us every year by a feast ranking second only to the feast of the Resurrection. The building wherein this took place is now the Imperial Cathedral, and the imprint of the feet of Christ can yet be seen, burnt as they were into the stone floor.

By this time the people had multiply'd from the original 600 to more than 60,000, and had doubled again by the end of John's 60 year reign -- easy numbers to remember. The saintly monarch had 6 sons and 4 daughters, and it was decided that while the eldest son would reign where he was as John II, and be given the title PANREGETS, or Emperor, each of the other nine would take a few hundred families and found a kingdom of his or her own in the outer lands.

The eldest daughter, Alexandra, went North and became the ancestress of our gracious hostess here -- but that shall be the Regnalka's story. The subsequent history of the Imperial line and of the other subsidiary kingdoms will keep me busy with you for a good many weeks to come.

It is time now that I tell you something more about the order to which Andrew and I belong. I cannot tell you who, or what, the ultimate founders of our order were, or what they were up to before the start of our history. There are things, as I have said, which we may not prudently discuss, things which we could not rationally discuss, and things which we ourselves do not fully know. Daunting as that may seem, however, there are nonetheless, a few things about us that I can, may, and shall tell you.

Our lives tend to be quite long, perhaps on average twice as long as other men's, but we must nonetheless continually replenish our numbers, and we do so from among the general population. You know that we have a number of what you would call monopolies over various things in our world. We also have a virtual monopoly over the education of the young. Almost all boys from all social classes are with us from about the age of 5 untill they are at least 8 or 9, and those who shew more promise, or whose rank and destiny demand it, remain with us a few years longer. At the age of 12 we determine which of these are suitable to be invited to join our order. When there is a genuine and mutual interest, the boy in question is given another 2 or 3 years of intense preparation during which he lives with us at a facility like this one, and then at about the age of 14 he makes his final choice, and, if he be acceptable to us and we to him, is initiated into our order and spends a great many years learning its mysteries. Only a very few are capable of learning all that we have to teach. Many more work within our order at jobs which, while marvelous from the point of view of those outside, are quite mundane to us.

I realise that you are somewhat disturb'd by the knowledge that we are, in your words, eunuchs. This was not always so. For most of our first 4 centuries a simple vow of celibacy seemed enough to serve the needs of our order. Late in our 4th century, however, a very wicked individual managed to gain control of our order through a series of manœuvres which included several murders. He packt the ruling council of the order with week and frivolous men who should never have even been taken into the ranks of the order, and he also all but supplanted the rather ineffectual prince who had inherited the kingdom. He took the kings sister as his openly acknowledged mistress and begat a bastard who was even more wicked than himself. This man, remember'd in our history as Timthrets -- the name might be translated as "Dreaded Majesty" -- not only succeded his father as grand master of our order, but also took to himself the titles of king and high priest, and at the last insisted on being worshipt as a god. Master as he was of all the powers of our order's greatest adepts, he was quite definitely what you would call a black magician, and in large measure had succeded in joining the ranks of the dæmons whose services he freely call'd upon. "Fortunately there were a good many senior members of the order left who were loyal to the principles of our founders, and who, with the help of the WALPTREINA -- a class of powerfull beings whose place in our world I have yet to explain -- were able to challenge the power of this monster.

"The great prince of the WALPTREINA, ?UNG the Shining, at last devoured the evil Timthrets and instantly burst into flames which completely consumed them both. Only the great creature's headstone remain'd, and that precious relic now surmounts the crown wherewith all the emperors from Iohanets on down have been crown'd.

"Those of Timthrets' henchmen who remain'd, including almost the whole of the order's ruling council, were condemn'd to be executed. They were led bound onto an huge platform and beheaded, and their heads were thrown into the waiting mouths of the three highest ranking WALPTREINA, of whom the awestricken masses were assured that they had nothing to fear on that occasion. More than 300 other members of the order, having judged in their own hearts that they had defiled themselves during Timthrets' evil reign, then queued up to the block that their heads might likewise be cut off and thrown to the WALPTREINA, who then fell upon the pile of bodies.

"At last there were left but a dozen dozen who had been true to their vows, and these, who would ever after be known as our Second Founders, stood now alone upon the platform. Having sworn a terrible oath before all the people, they cut off their own testicles as a pledge of their resolve that none of them would ever beget another Timthrets. Legend has it that these grim relicks were carefully preserved in a golden urn, but that they disappeared some 19 centuries ago. It has been suggested," Nikonor concluded, with a cautiously respectfull nod to the Regnalka, "that they were stolen by the Katharinians and eaten by Isidora the Fat, their then Sovereign Mother."

The faces of Nikonor's listeners turn'd white as ash, while his own face shone with triumph. Andrew wanted to kick him. Nikonor had a taste for the lurid and the macabre and a nasty bent for trying to shock his listeners when he knew that he could. Now, however, he had gone too far. Harriet and Sara sat gaping, and Dupa lookt as though he were going to be sick. Andrew, knowing that in more than just the last lurid suggestion he had stray'd from proper history into the realm of folklore, thumpt the table and glared at his younger colleague, who then hid a blushing face in his hands. Regis and Conrad regarded each other with 'glad-it's-not-me' grimaces. Pour little Halka wisht that she knew more English. Pilár was asleep.

"Whatever the details of this dreadfull spectacle," mitigated a chasten'd Nikonor,"nothing like it has been seen since."

"When we join the order now, we pass through what we know as the 'Great Dream', wherein our bodies are suspended for 40 days in a state not unlike hibernation, while our souls learn many things. When we awake we are changed, and are thenceforth sexless beings. This is not a surgical process, nor is there any actual loss of tissue; but rather in much the same way as the organs of a caterpillar dissolve in the chrysalis before the creature is miraculously granted the privilege of being vested in its redeem'd form while still in a fallen world, our testicles are caused to be drawn back into our bodies and dissolved, only to be reassembled into totally different organs which, among other things, produce a substance which causes our bodies to age much more slowly, so that we live, as I have told you, about twice as long as other men. I am 56 years old. Andrew is 126, yet he may well live to see, even as he foresaw, that youngest grandson of young Conrad here.

"We are the costodians of great knowledge. What Andrew did in bringing you here is only a small example of what our adepts can do.

"All that was ever known in our world, and all that was ever known, or ever will be known in the world whence you came, is known to us now, and has been known to us since our order began. We know virtuall all the secrets of creation, while our brothers, who live ordinary lives in this world, know little more about it than their beasts know. They will never see other worlds, nor will they ever have the power to destroy their own.

"Do you see this sphere?" he askt, lightly tossing one of the lamps in the air and catching it again. "It is our pleasure to sell these at a modest profit. No such thing will be made in the world whence you came untill almost a century after the time you left. Our people take them for granted. They are a perfectly safe technology. They quite safely store the sunlight that falls on them by day. They cannot be made into anything hazardous, and no matter what is done to them they will yield neither knowledge nor power. They are, in a way, a perfect symbol both of what we enjoy giving to our people, and of the limits which we impose.

"Our great power and knowledge place upon us great responsibilities. We are, in a very real sense the custodians of our world, and as such we can never again run the risk of any of us falling prey to our human passions. It is for this reason that we become eunuchs, and for this reason that we follow strict rules both to keep ourselves from temptation, and to avoid any jealousy against us among the people at large. We are permitted to visit the families or our birth only once a year for a single day. The order sees to it that our kin are well blest and free from want, but we as individuals may grant them no favours."

* * * * *

At this point Nikonor excused himself with a request that the table be clear'd while he went to fetch something. When he return'd he was holding a roll of parchment in one hand and holding the door open with the other as if in preparation to close it again when someone else had come through. The Regnalka's guests expected another dignitary to grace their presence, but instead they were favour'd with a visit from a very strange animal, who calmly walkt into the room and sat down in the middle of their circle.

"I am now going to tell you a few general facts about our world and its inhabitants," continued Nikonor, when he had position'd himself beside his pet, exhibit, or perhaps guest, as the case might have been, and set his hand upon the creature's shoulder. "This is a BHLITSWERG, take a good look at him. Come up and pet him if you like. He will not mind. He uses no spoken language, but I call him 'Orange Flame', as that is, in a way, what he calls himself."

The creature's overall appearance was like that of a very large white baboon. He appear'd to be a mammal with very unusual hair -- silky and iridescent with the same overall shine of Nikonor's cloak. The most remarkable thing about him was a strange glassy sphere, like a very large marble, which nature had set in the top of his skull. When first beheld, this sphere had shewn a dark midnight blue colour, so that it seem'd to be a sort of third eye; but when Nikonor had said the creature's name, it flasht and held a pattern of orange flames on its surface.

"This creature is, as you may have guest, a warm blooded vertebrate, but he is not, despite appearances, a mammal, but rather a member of a quite separate order, unknown in the parent world, and indeed represented here only by two widely divergent species, which have little in common besides their silky hairlike covering and the much more distinctive head stone. This remarkable structure, although a development of the pineum, is not an eye but an organ of communication. It displays light and colour and at times even clear images of what the creature is thinking. The stone itself is not dissimilar to clear crystal. It is extremely hard and almost indestructible. It is a mystery even to us how it is produced, and we would consider it an abomination to try to penetrate such mysteries by any destructive experimentation. We do, however understand enough about the Bhlitswergeina to act as physicians to them.

"These creatures live with us in the embassy compound. They are quite intelligent, and our relationship to them is complex. They could not adequately be described either as livestock or as pets, but we do, to an extent provide for their needs, and they quite willingly provide us with the silky wool from which our robes are made, and from which we also make textiles for sale. They do not, apart from our compounds, permit themselves to coexist with humans, but they do also live in the lands reserved for the Walptreina. "The Blitswergeina are omnivorous, but they do not eat humans, nor do we eat them. They are oviparous, have a lifespan of about 60 years, and care for their young for about a dozen years. They have among themselves a very peacefull social structure, and breed only sufficiently to maintain their numbers, having but a few years wherein they are capable of breeding. They mate for life, and are absolutely monogamous. Both sexes are capable of nourishing the young with a fluid from their bodies analogous to mammalian milk. There are a half dozen of what you might call tits on each side here." Nikonor took Sarah's hand and placed it on the creature's flank so that she could feel these projections under the silky hair in a line running from the last of the floating ribs to the pelvis."

The others also came up and examined the creature.

"They are by nature very clean and respectfull of our living areas and our possessions," Nikonor continued. "This fellow will cause no problems for the Regnalka."

The creature sat down quietly on the carpet while his headstone continued to produce a succession of colourfull displays. None however had the brilliance nor the duration of what all assumed, in the light of Nikonor's statement, to be his usual, and probably unique self introduction.

"Can you understand what he is saying?" askt Dupa, pointing to the pulsating head stone.

"No," answer'd Nikonor, somewhat reluctantly, "but there are some among us who can. I have, however, begun to make a study of it since this fellow and I have become friends. His language is not all that complex. I am told, however, that that of the WALPTREINA is much more so. In fact only a few of our adepts can communicate with them.

"I would not dare to bring you into the presence of a WALPTR, but the Regnalka has very graciously agreed to shew us her coronett, wherein is set the headstone of a WALPTRÁ."

Nikonor bow'd to the Regnalka, who arose and motion'd to the group to follow her into one of the bed rooms. There on a table was what lookt like a very splendid hat box. She open'd the lid and motion'd to them to come around and look inside. Within the box, upon a purple cushion, they beheld a golden coronett, set with amethysts, and surmounted by a 5" sphere of what appear'd to be light blue crystal.

"This fell from the head of the WALPTRÁ INGMÁ, when she consumed herself in flames after eating the Sovereign Mother Margaret III, who was known as the Belovèd, and reign'd about 800 years ago. Every Regnalka -- there are 28 of us at present -- has one of these for state occasions. It would not be proper for me to put it on now, although I may shew it you," said the Regnalka (somewhat stiffly, but proud of her English).

Nikonor then continued: "The WALPTREINA are huge, wingèd creatures, somewhat resembling the ancient flying reptiles of the parent world, but cover'd with the same silky hair as the Bhlitswergeina. "They serve our world as predators, keeping the human population in check. Unlike ourselves, they are unfallen creatures, doing the will of the Creator in perfect knowledge, and without question. Intelligent beings, they are wise and mercifull in their killing. Averaging their predation over the centuries, they have perhaps ended the lives of two humans in five. They can go for many weeks without eating, but often gorge themselves by swarming and devouring an entire village at once. They crush their victims instantly in their jaws and then swallow them whole. They have extremely powerfull gastrick juices and normally cough up the bones of their victims within minutes of swallowing them."

"How dreadfull," quoth Dupa, "to be eaten alive!"

"Surely it is better than dying of a filthy disease after months of pain," answer'd Andrew, or being eaten up from within by unclean life forms. To be eaten by a WALPTR is consider'd one of the best ways to die, and many pray that such an end might be theirs."

"There is virtually no infectious disease in our world," added Nikonor, "and very little of what you would term organic disease. Were it not for the WALPTREINA, the human population would soon be far greater than the land could upport. What horrors might we have then?"

"But to take whole villages," protested Sarah, "that's...."

"Mercifull!" finish Nikonor. "Whole families, whole communities together -- there is less pain that way; and the eternal law which binds the WALPTREINA commands that they bring as little pain into our world as possible while taking surplus people out of it."

"Do any escape them?" askt Regis.

"No, never, not once they are chosen as prey, but the WALPTREINA always allow their victims time enough to make their peace with God. That is also their law," answer'd Nikonor solemnly.

"They live about 300 years, and there are never more than about 300 of them in our world at any one time. When they die they normally burst into flames which consume not only their flesh but often their bones as well. Sometimes only the indestructible headstone remains.

"A WALPTR always knows when his time has come, and chooses his last meal with great care from among the greatest of men. It is normally a prince or great noble and often an anointed monarch. Sometimes it is a high ranking prelate or a member of the ruling council of our order.

"The headstone is normally intrusted either to the successor or to the overlord of the one so doom'd. On this occasion the WALPTR is heard to speak in his own terrible voice, both to his last victim and to the trustee of this precious jewel. This is a dreadfull thing and all who hear it fall on their knees. The headstone seems, in some sense, to be the seat of the creature's soul, and to retain some such function even after death. In any case it has been known to bestow the gift of prophesy upon its custodian."

The Regnalka nodded. "Even so," she affirm'd rather nervously, "INGMÁ speaks to me sometimes when I wear the coronett. It is a fearsome thing." She lookt about nervously, as if wondering if she had said too much, and seem'd relieved that her revelation drew no questions.

Nikonor went on: "The strange personal names of the WALPTREINA have nothing to do with our language, but have meaning in a language of their own which is unknown even to our greatest adepts. Their usual mode of communication, however, is a visual one dependant on their headstones.

"Now," he continued, after a long breath, "before I hand you over to Andrew I must tell you something about the geography of our world, so let us go back to the main room."

When the Regnalka had closed the box, they all returned to their places around the table whereupon Nikonor now spread the parchment.

Taking note of the curious stares that now fell on the spherical lamps that he was employing as paperweights, he felt the need for a footnote: "Incidently, I hasten to add that these lamps have nothing to do with any living creatures. They are only artifacts, made from a totally inorganic crystalline material."
"Here," he said, pointing to a symbol on the richly colour'd map which obviously represented a city, "is Katharintisten. That is where we are. All of this great landmass surrounding us -- let me think now -- perhaps it is three or four hundred of your English miles from east to west -- is here shewn in green as subject to the Sovereign Mother. Here within this large channel, known to us as the Break, are the seven islands of the WALPTREINA. They are here shewn in red, like the other forbidden lands. Here south of the Break, shewn in gold, lie the lands ruled by the Emperor, Ponderous II. Here in the centre, just south of the Imperial city of Iohanetisten, is Ierusalema Nova, an island city state ruled by the Patriarch of the Church. (There is in our world, you will be pleased to learn, only one Church, and one Patriarch; and there have really never been any heresies here to worry about.) Just to the west of this Patriarchal city is the original reservation of our order, an island stronghold the walls whereof are quite litterally as old as time as we count it.

"Further to the south are a number of more or less independant states, eight of whose princes rank as kings, and are represented, along with the Emperor, the Patriarch, our own Grand Master, and the Sovereign Mother, on a Grand Council, over which the Emperor presides.

"The large landmass in the far south, like the islands of the WALPTREINA, in the Break are forbidden to men, and this prohibition is likewise enforced by the WALPTREINA. This landmass to the west is also forbidden to men, but the WALPTREINA forbid it to themselves as well; and so some wicked men have gone to live there, without Church or Law. These renegades are now causing us a great deal of trouble.

"Finally, in the extreme west we come to the Foolish Lands. Their unique vegetation renders them worse than useless for ordinary settlement, as they are permeated with a substance that renders men not only docile, but witless and sterile. They are used as a place of exile for convicts who have served their time at forced labour -- especially from the Imperial Lands -- but the various judicial and punitive systems which obtain here will be the topic for another lecture on another day," Nikonor concluded, "so I shall now step aside and leave you to Andrew."

* * * * *

Instead of beginning his own lecture immediately, Andrew suggested that they all relax for a few minutes. Pilár left to attend to the needs of Henrietta, and in fact did not return; as Andrew, realising that it was pointless to have her sit through any more lectures, had decided to take her down to the kitchen and allow her to participate in things more to her taste. The necessary arraignments having been made, Andrew return'd and quietly took Conrad, Harriet, and Sarah off into another room.

"Since you were all rather recently at Stephendale," he confided, "I am hoping that at least one of you might be able to help me with something. Did any of you happen to know a student there who went by the name of Jeff Freeman?"

Conrad shot Andrew a glance of recognition, but waited to see if either of the girls would say anything first.

"I don't think I've ever heard that name," reply'd Harriet, "I'm sorry, but I don't think I can help you on that one."

"I know what he looks like," said Sarah, "but not much about him. For a while last year he was going with a girl I knew from one of my art classes, but I think she dumpt him."

"I see," said Andrew. "Can you tell me her name, or why she 'dumpt him', as you say, or anything else?"

"Robin, Robin Hillman. I may have spoken to her once or twice; but I really only overheard her talking about dumping Freeman. I think she said something about his wanting to get her involved in some sort of group sex that she wanted no part of, and that his friends were some sort of weird political types, S.D.S. or some such thing."

Andrew lookt at Conrad, who finally began: "Well, you could say I've known him since we were both about 12. We were in school together at St. Dunstan's Highbury. In fact, for two days at the start of our first year there we were in the same hall, but he was transfer'd to another. I can't say I knew him well though -- either at St. Dunstan's or at Stephendale. I don't think I ever spoke with him more than once or twice. We had nothing in common. I'll tell you this though: He's not the sort of chap you'd want here. Wouldn't fit in at all. Hard left. Nothing but trouble -- especially in this sort of world."

"The problem is," said Andrew gravely, "that he may already be here -- probably somewhere in the Lawless Lands if he is, although I can't be sure."

"How could he have got there?" askt Conrad. "Who could have brought him, except one of you?"

"I wish I knew," reply'd Andrew, "but I don't. All I do know is that someone from Stephendale left the Parent World about a month before you did. I have managed to account for almost everyone else at the College. It almost has to be Freeman, and I am almost positive that he is in this world now in our time. I dread to think by what means he might have got here."

"How can you know this?"

"I can't tell you how, Conrad, but I do know it."

"I suppose this is the `problem' you said you thought I could help you with," ventured Conrad rather uneasily.

"You suppose correctly," affirm'd Andrew. "If Freeman is here we must find him as quickly as we can."

"To do what with him?"

"To kill him," reply'd Andrew flatly. "That is the only thing we can do in a case like this. In fact, Conrad, you may have to kill him."

"Just how much damage could he do here?"

"In recent months men from the Lawless Lands have been invading the western territories of both the Katharinian realm and the Empire. Their have been a few fierce but so far indecisive battles -- fought with essentially the same weapons used in XIIth century Europe. Jeff Freeman was studying chemistry and physicks at Stephendale, or so I understand. How much damage do you think he might do?"

"Your powers would still be greater than his."

"That is true; but the very last thing we are prepared to do -- although ultimately we would be prepared to do it -- would be to use our power in open warfare. Doing so would, in itself, cause untold damage to our world."

"Yes, I think I can understand that," said Conrad thoughtfully. After a pause he posed another question: "Are you free to tell me anything more -- like how you think he might have got here?"

"I think I can share my thoughts on that subject with you -- to an extent anyway," reply'd Andrew. "As I see it, either he found his own way here -- which is most unlikely -- or someone brought him. If someone brought him, it would have to have been either someone train'd in the secrets of my order, or someone from the Parent World who happen'd to find his way here. There are always a few magicians in the Parent World with the power to leave that world and visit others. We, however, have ways of protecting our world from such an invasion. It would not be at all easy for such a magician to find his way to us and get through our defences. (I am speaking very metaphorically, you must understand) It would not, however, be impossible. I must say --though I don't like even to think it -- that it is more likely that someone from within my order is responsible. This has been one of our greatest fears throughout our history. We don't even like to talk about it. We tend to refer to it as the Prometheus Problem."

Conrad knew just enough about Classical mythology to understand what Andrew was talking about. He smiled wryly. Prometheus would be no hero to any of Andrew's order. "Well," he said at last, "as I see it, this 'Prometheus', whoever he may be, is far more dangerous to us than Freeman. If we kill Freeman -- and kill him we must, I agree -- our 'Prometheus' will just fetch another -- perhaps one even more dangerous. Whoever is responsible, we cannot rest untill both he and freeman are gone; and let's hope Freeman is his only such acquisition so far."

"Well, Conrad, I can see that you have a very good grasp of the situation -- at least of the possibilities. Remember, though, that we can not yet be sure of anything. We must not allow ourselves to assume anything before we know just what we are up against. If there be a renegade within my order, then perhaps I must see to that; but I have a very strong feeling that your destiny is tied to that of this Freeman. He is your enemy -- very much your opposite. You must prevail, and you must slay him."

"You do seem sure that he's here," prest Conrad.

"It's what you would call a `feeling'," explain'd Andrew, "but my 'feelings' are well train'd, and I trust them as I do my physical senses. Yes, he's here. I am becoming more sure of it even as we speak. It is almost as though I could see him. I only wish I had as clear a sense of how he might have got here, and who brought him."

"Is there any direct evidence of any improvement in the technology of our adversaries -- such as such a man might bring about?" askt Conrad.

"None as yet -- thank Heaven -- but we can hardly afford to wait untill there is. Every day is important. You must try to learn as much as you can as quickly as you can so we can get on with what we have to do. I shall expect the same of you girls," Andrew added, turning his face to Harriet and Sarah, who had been standing by in silence, "and of the others as well. We had better rejoin our friends now, and have some refreshment. I shall need something more to eat myself before I begin my talk."

* * * * *

They were soon to learn why Andrew needed the extra sustenance, as his introductory lecture on the basicks of the Changeless Speech lasted well past midday, and when it ended everyone was more than ready for yet another break.

* * * * *

The Regnalka rang for a porter and order'd more food and, after discussing the various choices with Andrew, some wine. For her talk she wanted her guests in the right mood. She had thought it funny that Nikonor had so obviously fallen from Andrew's good graces over his gratuitous embellishments of the story of Timthrets; but she now realised, as she prepared herself to give her guests a brief overview of her own order's history, that Nikonors impropriety was going to make her own task all the more difficult. During the course of Andrew's long lecture she had also time to repent of her amusement at Dupa's obvious discomfort at Nikonor's ridiculous suggestion that Isidora the Fat had devoured that dreadfull pot of preserves. Isidora IIII was definitely a ruler whom her order would like to forget, and she had indeed done some terrible things to supply herself with her favourite delicacy; but it was also a well known fact that she had always insisted on absolute freshness when it came to testicles, and as she always ate them raw, would hardly have been tolerant of a lapse of more than 12 centuries! "Wonderfull," she had confided in Andrew as she deliberated with him "just the argument to carry the day -- and just how would Dupa react to that? Faint dead away? Be sick on the carpet? Run out of the room holding his balls -- if he had any -- ? Then again -- with the right wine in him -- he might think it funny" She knew she had no need even to touch on the subject of Isidora IIII on the first day, but she could not long avoid a discussion of her order's peculiar customs concerning the castration of the eunuchs who currently accounted for close to a third of the order's strength. Her guests would all be hearing about such things soon enough -- and from storytellers whose embellishments would be far more lurid than Nikonor's -- and often malicious lies as well. She would be doing her order ill service if she did not let them hear these things first from her point of view.

A tray of cakes and sweets was set down along with an urn of boiling water and a selection of herbal teas, and there follow'd a very relaxt half hour of informal conversation and questions for Andrew. At the end of this the Regnalka personally and rather ceremoniously served them the carefully selected wine; and then, trusting in its good effects, adjusted herself into an upright but comfortable position on her cushion, motion'd Andrew to come closer so that he could provide discrete prompts and answer whisper'd questions on the finer points of English, and began her first ever lecture in that strange and to her, amusingly chaotic language:

"You will remember Nikonor telling you how, at the end of his good reign, the first of our Christian Emperors, John the Holy, decreed that his eldest son should reign after him in Iohanetisten, but that his other children should found subsidiary kingdoms of their own, as the people had been so blest of God and grown so numerous. His eldest daughter Alexandra, my ancestress, and indeed an ancestress of most of our people, took about a thousand young families along with her own household and set off to found a kingdom to the north. They settled about fourty miles south of here -- I believe that is how Andrew said you would reckon it -- am I correct?" -- Andrew nodded and whisper'd some encouragement to her, and she went on: "-- on the site of the old city of Alexandretisten. Her son, Alexander I reign'd after her, and his son Alexander II after him, and so on in an unbroken line for ten generations.

"During the reign of Alexander VII, however, there arose a sect of devil worshipers who try'd to overthrow both the kingdom and the Christian Church in these lands. It was to ombat this evil that the kings daughter, whom our history now knows as St. Katharine the Barefooted, founded the order which now bears her name. Her first followers were drawn from the royal court, but soon girls from all classes and all parts of the kingdom join'd themselves to them. They were a partly military and partly religious order, sworn to fight the devil worshipers both spiritually and on the field of battle. On the example of their foundress, and as a sign of their faith, they went barefoot, as we still do.

"St. Katharine waged her war for 25 years, and died in its last great battle. Her niece Iulia, succeded her as Mother General, and in the days following that victory hunted down and most their enemies and put them to death. Unfortunately a few survived and fled to the Lawless Lands, and became the ancestors of those who trouble us today.

"The Alexanders were all good and wise rulers, but when the last of them, Alexander X, died in our year 920, he had no sons; and so his eldest daughter, who was Mother General of the Order of St. Katharine, and in fact named for our foundress, took the throne as Katharine I."

The Regnalka consulted Andrew on the appropriateness of a few more English terms, and then continued: "Upon Katharine's death, her own niece Margaret, who was also a Katharinian, succeded her in both titles. Margaret I was in turn succeded in both positions by her niece Philippa I.

"From a legalistic point of view one might say that the Katharinian Order assumed formal control of the state at the start of our year 1000 when Philippa, in her now famous Millennial Edict, assumed the title PLENREGNA MATRA, or Sovereign Mother, as this would translate, and provided for the succession of her own niece as Katharine II according to a now codify'd system whereby the Sovereign Mother would henceforth always be succeded by a REGNALKA, which is to say, by a member of the royal family -- now defined by strict matriarchal linage -- being also an avowed member of the Order of St. Katharine the Barefooted.

"Normally the throne passes to the Sovereign Mother's closest relation among the REGNALKÁNA by strict female..." [She consulted Andrew again, as her English fail'd her in this technical area.]

"Primogeniture," supply'd the old Preserver. "You may consider the system as an exact reversal of Salic law."

Politely returning his deferential nod, the Regnalka resumed her lecture: "there can at times be some question, as when there is no really close relative, or when a princess who is not a REGNALKA tries to have herself quickly sworn into the Order in an attempt to capture the throne. Should the succession be in question, the judgement would rest with our Primate, the Archbishop of Alexandretisten, whose place it is to crown and anoint the Sovereign Mother. Following precedent, he would, however, pol the various ranks of the Order before rendering his decision, and would also consult with our Judicial Council -- but we will discuss more of these matters on another day. For now it is enough to say that this system has served us so well that only once has our Order been divided by anything like a war of succession. That was several centuries ago, and although it involved an argument of sufficient importance that we must take it up when the time comes, it was in fact settled within a matter of days. For now, however, I must return to our Order's early history:

"For three centuries after the time of Katharine I, the male military units which the Alexanders had establish'd continued to operate under the command of officers from the old patrician class. Our first twelve Sovereign Mothers found no reason to doubt their loyalty, and until the end of this period they were indeed loyal; but that was to change.

"When Helen III died in 1216, after a brief and, if the truth must be told, totally incompetent reign, she was succeded by her elderly and quite witless aunt Dorothy. This led to a widespread discontent among the people, which was exploited by a very powerfull, and, in many places, quite popular, prince now remember'd as Mark the Pretender. He was the commander of the largest of the old military units and had an even larger private army, as he had enormous land holdings and many vassals. Mark claim'd to be the legitimate successor to the Alexanders by Salic primogeniture, and persuaded a great many of the patricians, and most of the military commanders to recognise his claim.

"Fortunately Dorothy the Daft, as we may well refer to her in English, died within a month, and was succeded by Leona I, whom we remember as Leona the Great, for at the age of 17 she already possest the wisdom and the strength to save both her throne and the future of her Order. She was a tall, handsome woman, with a strength of will that inspired confidence and loyalty. She also had a very definite vision of what she wanted the Order and the State to be; and, for good or ill, or perhaps a bit of each, she made our Order what it is today. She design'd our armour in its present form, and instituted the dying of our feet. She gave us much for which we have been praised, and much for which we have been severely criticised. You can expect to hear a great deal about her and I intend that you hear it first from me."

The Regnalka refill'd the glasses of all her guests and encouraged them to drink up, using the respite to rehearse to herself her choice of words for the next, and for her the most dreaded, part of her lecture.

"Leona may have come to the throne at a difficult time, but she nevertheless had a few advantages. She had already, as First Regnalka, held responsibility for the Order's military preparedness; and she had been most effective in discharging that responsibility. She also managed to retain the loyalty of three of the best, if not the largest, of the old Alexandrian male regiments.

"When the war came, her soldiers, both male and female, fought with incredible courage; and after four terrible years of civil war they managed, despite the loss of more than half their numbers, to defeat Mark's armies and save her kingdom for her. She was determined to be as lavish in shewing her gratitude to those who had been loyal to her as she was ruthless in punishing those who had not been loyal. She had Mark and all of his followers, including a very large fraction of the ancient patrician class, beheaded. The lands she thus confiscated were so extensive that 2/3 of all the land in the kingdom came directly under her hand, and in she used such wisdom in disposing of it that she was able both to shew her favour and to insure the security of her successors for many centuries to come.

"She wisely determined that the Katharinian Order could no longer risk the presence of any separate but parallel military organisation; so she gave the surviving members of the three loyal male regiments a fair and generous choice: Each man could choose either to be retired from her service with patrician rank and a very generous feoff, or to castrate himself and actually join the Order of St. Katharine as a barefooted eunuch. As might be expected the vast majority chose retirement; but 480 declared that it would in fact be their pleasure to join the Order under the conditions stated and thus continue to serve their belovèd Sovereign.

"Moved as she was by their devotion to her both on the field of battle and in their present resolve to remain in her service, Leona determined that she would honour their devotion and their sacrifice by actually eating their sever'd testicles. Thus she order'd that a dozen of those so resolved -- by descending order of rank -- should castrate themselves each day for fourty days, during which time she vowed that she would touch no other food.

"In this she set a precedent which her successors have follow'd ever since. The details -- the mechanics, you might say -- of this unique, and, to some, as we are well aware, very disturbing practice, have vary'd enormously. Some of our Sovereign Mothers, her present majesty included, have distanced themselves from the practice, and some have try'd, without any permanent success, to suppress it. In other reigns it has unfortunately been the occasion of sinfull excesses and scandalous perversions. (I shall, on some other day, tell you the full story of Isidora IIII, whom Nikonor has mention'd, and of her bastard daughter, Isidora V, who, although quite exceptional in the death of there debauchery, were regrettably not unique in their sin.) The practice has often brought us into conflict with the Emperors, who have outlaw'd not only castration, but even the mere presence of eunuchs in their dominions since the Isidorian Wars all those centuries ago; and in fact our Order was forced into a terrible war with the forces of the Emperor Thadd‘us VI only about 40 years ago by the dreadfull excesses in this matter of Leona XXI, who may well have ended the popularity of that famous name."

Andrew toucht the Regnalka's shoulder to obtain her permission for an interruption. "I must say at this point that the Emperors have never regarded the members of my order as being eunuchs in the sense that they forbid. They understand that those organs which should, in the ordinary course of nature, have made us men are still very much with us, but reassign'd, as it were, to other, greater tasks.

"I must apologize for the fact that my younger colleague's choice of words tends to be compromised by his taste for the sensational. We are not, in any proper sense, a "castrated order", nor are we lookt upon as such by the rulers of our world, who know as much about us as we have told you," Andrew added, and Nikonor turn'd bright red.

"The Regnalka nodded, and continued: "I can well understand the association in the minds of many between the practices introduced by Leona the Great and the grotesque perversions of the two last Isidoras and some of her other unworthy successors. As I mention'd already, our present Sovereign Mother, taking the example of some of her more saintly (or perhaps only more fastidious) predecessors, is unwilling to participate in these unique rites in her own person. That, I am compell'd to say, is a duty that she leaves to the Regnalkana. As you might suppose, it is a duty which falls most frequently on those who take the most pleasure in it; but it falls on all of us from time to time, as a Regnalka does not always enjoy the luxury of indulging her private opinions. The recipient Regnalka is often requested by the soldier in question. It is a request that I would not in any case feel that I had a right to refuse," she concluded somewhat uneasily. "I try always to fulfill this duty with dignity and respect -- and I always fast before I eat them."

At this point, for the first time since she had brought up the subject whereof she had been so reticent, she forced herself to make eye contact with her guests. To her relief, the wine had workt well. She had their full attention, but none of them appear'd at all uncomfortable. In fact, they all seem'd to hang on her words with pleasure.

"What are they like?" askt a wide eyed Sarah, in a near whisper which betray'd her intense curiosity.

"Very strong -- hard to describe, really -- but I quite enjoy them fry'd in oil with garlick and a little salt." She was still scanning the faces of her audience, and when she said this, she rather mischievously stared directly at Dupa in the most predatory way that she could manage, and in a way calculated to be just noticeable, ran the tip of her tongue across her upper lip. She smiled sweetly as she watcht his jaw drop.

"Well," she said, pretending to change the subject, "it really is a good job I chose this wine. It is traditionally shared by both parties in the rites in question. Sensuous, spellbinding, totally anæsthetic..," she affirm'd with a nod.

Dupa stared into his glass and grimaced.

"Yes, Mr. Dupa," she continued rather wickedly, "you could join the Katharinian Order right now, and not feel the least discomfort. I'd be glad to arrange it," she smiled, snapping her perfect white teeth.

Little Halka lookt on as Duppa's jaw dropt yet again, and his hands dropt to his crotch. She tug'd at his sleeve demanding a translation, and when he provided a crude synopsis in vulgar Polish, she at first gaped, but then broke into uncontrollable laughter: "Ona? Obtnie jajka i je? O kurva! Obtnie jajka i je!" she howl'd, till everyone, including her cousin was howling with laughter as well.

Andrew jumpt to his feet at this point and began waving his hands at the disruptive polaks. Having halted the procedings, he went over to Halka, to take her by the arm, and do what he could to correct the gross mistranslations whereby her cousin had, not so accidentally, made the Regnalka appear as a gustatorial orchidophage of almost Isidorian wickedness. He then insisted that Halka change places with Harriet so that he could translate for her himself. He shook an angry finger at Dupa.

The Regnalka realised what had happened, and realised as well that she herself had been very largely at fault. She had fallen prey to the same temptation that had ensnared Nikonor, and she now felt both sympathy for Nikonor and shame for herself. She nonetheless decided that she must continue by grasping, as it were, the other nettle, while the wine yet held them in its spell. Thus she began again: "Leona the Great is also credited, though less properly, with the establishment of an ancillary order existing within, or perhaps beside, our own. These ancillaries are known as the Lengna, and I must say that they are a great help to us. I must also say, however, that they are also somewhat controversial in their practices. They are almost never seen in publick, as they are placed not only under a vow of celibacy, as we are, but, with few exceptions, under a rule of enclosure as well, and so confine themselves within the Palace. A læng is permitted only a single garment, a black, hooded cloak, which she may wear in chapel or, under such rare circumstances as permit her to do so, when travelling abroad in cold weather: but she is ordinarily expected to go completely naked.

"A læng may be train'd in any number of specialised skills, but almost all lengna are train'd as musicians and dancers, and most are expert in wine. Many are train'd in manicure and massage. They care for our bare feet, they arrange our hair, and they who wear no clothing themselves help us with ours. Some are train'd in medicine by the physicians of Andrew's order so that they can nurse our sick and our wounded. In most cases it is they who castrate our eunuchs, and prepare their testicles. They are, in fact, the most excellent of cooks, and prepare all of our food in the palace. The lengna are very dedicated to their calling, and take great pride in their extensive training. They are far more than simple menials.

"I must now also mention, however, that the lengna, by the nature of their calling, are gravely tempted by the sins of the flesh, and although the best of them are vigilant against these temptations, the more frivolous ones are often ensnared. They take such sins so seriously, however that they insist on expiating them by having themselves beheaded, and when a læng is seen outside the palace, it is usually on such an occasion. Unfortunately, their insistence on going naked to the block, and the frequency wherewith they appear there has given rise to numerous malicious rumours concerning them, most of which, thankfully, are quite unfounded. As to their historical connection with Leona the Great, it does seem likely that she was responsible for codifying their position as an ancillary order, although they had their beginnings long before her time, and continued to evolve their customs for many centuries after her death. Leona, in fact, formalised and codify'd many things, including, most notably, our entire legal system.

"I have already mention'd," continued the Regnalka, "that Leona also instituted the dying of our feet. I would like to finish my talk for this afternoon with a bit more about this, as it is the principle means whereby we distinguish our various ranks.

"When St. Katharine herself determined that we would go barefoot, she ordain'd that each of us would have a cross imprinted on the sole of each foot just here, at the point which bears the greatest weight." She extended her legs so as to place her purple feet on the table, and with the great toe of her right foot pointed to the Maltese cross of midnight blue just discernable against the purple on the ball of her left. "The mark is what Andrew tells me you would call a `tattoo'. All of us, from Regnalkana on down, including the eunuchs, and also the lengna, receive these marks when we join the Order as novices, and swear to be thenceforth barefooted. That promise, I must add, is sacred and binding even on a novice who decides not to take the final vows -- a small imposition considering the fact that our people tend to follow our example and rarely wear shoes in any case.

"Our noviciate may be as short as 3 months, or as long as 3 years, depending on the age of the novice at entry, and the time needed to prepare her for the rank whereunto her parentage might entitle her. At the end of this time she goes to the vats, where she takes her final wows and receives her gorgett even as her feet are being dyed -- which can be an uncomfortable process (especially the first time, when it takes much longer) as her feet must be held very still to get a clean leg line, and some dyes can sting. When she comes out of the vat the lengna dress her, and she is given the rest of her armour.

"For an eunuch it is somewhat different: He serves a similar noviciate, but takes his final wows just before he cuts off his testicles, and receives the gorgett of his chosen regiment from the Sovereign Mother herself (or, in the present reign, from the designated Regnalka) when she has eaten them; but a full month is allow'd to pass before his feet are dyed and he receives the rest of his armour."

Harriet raised a hand to interrupt: "But didn't you say that the...lengna...."(She wrestled with the word.)

The Regnalka nodded impatiently, and then attempted to explain: "Yes, the lengna are involved in various ways and to varying degrees; but talking about them complicates things enormously and I am trying to keep this simple." Then she and smiled. "Sorry, Harriet. Let's go on:"

"The various colours wherewith our feet are dyed indicate our ranks within the order. The first is yellow-green -- given to peasant girls who have join'd after the shortest noviciate. The higher ranks through which girls may be promoted are green, blue green, blue, and finally indigo. girls from better families, who are better educated, and better prepared generally, enter the Order at higher ranks. A girl from a patrician family has her feet dyed blue when she enters the order. Purple is reserved for REGNALKÁNA; and the Sovereign Mother, upon her ascension, has her feet dyed a red purple which is reserved for her alone.

"The feet of eunuchs are always dyed red, regardless of their rank, but patrician eunuchs have blue mantles and their armour is set with blue sapphires, rather than the rubies used for the ring stones of the lower ranks. Every eunuch belongs to one of three regiments which trace their history back to the time of Leona the Great; and there are variations in their armour, particularly in their dress gorgetts, which distinguish them.

"There are also regiments among the women. Currently there are seven such, each headed by a REGNALKA, but we shall form two more in the next few months, one of which I myself shall command. Our female regiments, however, are not in any way distinguisht in our armour.

"There are no princes among the eunuchs, as princes are not permitted to join the Order. Hm....Perhaps I should say something now about the nature of royalty as we define it, especially as there are in our world different practices concerning the naming of children than in the world whence you came. Boys here take the surnames of there fathers, and are thus identify'd according to their male ancestors; but girls are surnamed for their female ancestors, mother to daughter. This is generally true, not only in these Katharinian lands, but throughout our world. We count as royal any female having the Bhozetsa surname, and any of her sons; and likewise any male having the Alexandretsin surname, and any of his daughters. No royal male may join our order, nor may his daughter, unless her mother be a Bhozetsa. Girls from the closer branches of the Bhozetsa family become REGNALKÁNA if they join the Order; and those from the more distant branches become what are known as REGNALKALKÁNA, and rank, in most ways, as indigo level patricians. A Bhosetsa who chooses to be an ancestress, rather than a REGNALKA, may generally only marry an Alexandretsin prince (or, with the Sovereign Mother's permission, an Imperial, or other foreign prince). Mindfull that such intermarriage might invite the same sort of trouble as Mark the Pretender once caused us, we also bar our princes from any part in our civil affairs."

"Then your `princes' are just drones," observed Dupa.

The Regnalka question'd Andrew about this word, and then reply'd: "That may be true of some of them, but many are great lords with extensive feofs, and many still have private armies made up of their own vassals. They owe the service of these forces to the Sovereign Mother in time of war, and she is glad of them, but she does not permit them to hold any state offices. They are also not permitted to own any property within the walls of Katharintisten, nor within those of the old capital of Alexandretisten, nor, in fact, to reside in either city, it being the Sovereign Mother's intention that they attend to their own estates.

"Well -- that's enough for today," she announced, rising to her feet. "You will be my guests for the rest of the afternoon and evening, but we shall have no more lectures. We need some time to relax and enjoy each other's company. Help yourselves. I shall return in a moment."

*****

The Regnalka withdrew to her bedroom to freshen herself and regain a bit of her composure. She was still concern'd about the ultimate effect on her guests of the things that she had told them. Brief as her lecture may actually have been, it had nonetheless exhausted her. Returning at length to the main room she sat down next to Sarah, and sought to forget her troubled thoughts by working her royal fingers into the season'd soles of Sarah's feet. Sarah easily understood the unspoken request and happily accepted. Before any were really aware of the arrangement, Harriet and Halka had sidled up to complete the conspiratorial little sole circle that the Regnalka had silently intended. They kneaded each other's feet and chatted like sisters, making the most sisterly allowances to include the little Polka who was enjoying only her second barefoot day.

The Kingslynns and Dupa, meanwhile, were gather'd around the still generous remains of the cheese tray, talking about the pleasures of food and drink while they indulged in the same with Andrew and Nikonor. Nikonor was paying little attention to anything, but Andrew was aware of both conversations.

The girls conversation turn'd at length from a parallel discussion of the delights of the buffet to an attempt to press the Regnalka, in awed whispers, for every detail of the much more exotick, and perhaps somewhat erotick, culinary pleasure that she had been discussing with the entire group a short time earlier. It was not a morbid or a prurient curiosity, and it was certainly not primarily a culinary one -- although they did want to talk about that aspect of it. It was just the fact that the Regnalka was such a very nice lady, and they liked her so very much, and it troubled them that she engaged, by reason of her position, in a practice that would have been lookt upon as so barbarick in the world whence they had come. It was just something that they had to talk through with her.

The Regnalka had an instinctive understanding of such feelings, so she did indeed let them discuss the subject at length with her, and they all felt better for it. There was a definite bond developing within the little circle, and it was everything that Margarita Bhozetsa might have hoped for. She saw already that Harriet and Sarah would be right for the Katharinian Order, and at length informed them that she would be pleased to receive both of them into the Noviciate the following Sunday.

Limited as her English was, poor little Halka somehow understood, and she burn'd with envy.

Andrew had been watching Halka from across the room, and he knew exactly what was happening inside her. The Regnalka had also seen the longing in her eyes, and had spoken to Andrew about it. Dupa had not the least idea how, or what, she felt. It was not that he did not care, it was just that nothing in his far from normal life had prepared for the guardianship of a female. Separated from his parents at the age of two, and smuggled by a great uncle in Warsaw into the incompetent custody of a confirmed bachelor of a second cousin in London who sent him off to a series of boarding schools as soon as he could be trusted to remember whatever surname his family was using at the time, he had managed to grow up with virtually no female contact at all, and to become the very image of his absentee guardian. Knowing nothing of women, he both feared and avoided their company. Neither Halka nor the Regnalka felt able to talk to him, so Andrew agreed to do so, on condition that the Regnalka, whose position he knew Dupa respected, be willing to `back him up' as it were.

As it was , the words "The Regnalka and I would like to have a word with you in private, Thaddæus" made Dupa almost sick with apprehension; and when Andrew added the words "It's about Halka", he almost fell on his face apologizing for his earlier mistranslation.

The Regnalka, however, counter'd with an apology of her own for having got at him, and the three of them went out into the hallway to discuss the problem of little Halka.

*****

Her instincts told her to do so.

"Sarah," he said seriously, "I know Halka wants to go with you into the Katharinian Order. The Regnalka has told me it would be fine with her, and I intend to give her my permission. Sarah, I want you to look after her -- to be her big sister. I don't really know why I am asking you, but please say that you will."

Sarah stood with her warm bare feet on Dupa's, got up on her toes, and kist him. "Tat, she is my sister -- and you're my brother -- we were all born again together. Don't worry: I'll watch out for her," she answer'd. Then she embraced him with more warmth than he had felt in the arms of a woman since his mother had had to leave him more than twenty years before.

When he return'd to the room and inform'd Halka of his decision, he felt such warmth for a second time in her arms, and knew that his time in the chapel had been well spent.

Sara and Harriet ran up and embraced Halka. They pickt her up and danced about with her, their own joy being now complete. Then the Regnalka herself came up and embraced them all. They began to understand why they were already coming to love this princess: They had been call'd into a sisterhood, and this was the BIG SISTER.

The Regnalka's guests lost all track of time as they enjoy'd the evening together in her sitting room, and the party might have gone on for half the night had not Regis fallen into such a deep sleep that the men decided there was nothing for it but to carry him upstairs to bed, and the unbecoming spectacle reminded the girls how tired they themselves were growing.

All who were still awake enjoy'd a final honour as the Regnalka resumed her royal stature at their parting and gave each standing guest the blessing of her purple toes, and even those who bore the snoring burden went off to bed very happy indeed.

THE BAREFOOT GIRLS

Chapter Seven

The next morning's lectures were left entirely to Nikonor as Andrew had to be away untill the late afternoon; but when he at last return'd in time for theRegnalka's supper buffet, all of the guests were delighted to see that he was carrying Sarah's painting. They were also somewhat startled, for it shew'd not only excellent likenesses of Harriet and Sarah but a surprising good representation of Katharinian armour.

Andrew himself had been rather taken aback when he had found it, but mostly with annoyance with himself for not having known of it before he had actually acquired Harriet and Sarah. He wonder'd who else at Stephendale might have seen it, and was in fact not a little worried by it. He had not intended to communicate these worries to his guests, but was forced to do so when Conrad drew him into a conversation which toucht on them directly.

"Andrew," he began thoughtfully, "I've been giving some thought to this Freeman business. If someone wanted to make trouble here, I can see that bringing someone like Freeman would be a good way to start; but Freeman is certainly not unique, and even if he were, why would your adversary take him directly from Stephendale, from right under your nose, as it were? That would seem to be giving you a needless advantage, would it not?"

"I can only imagine," reply'd Andrew thoughtfully, "that it might be because whoever brought him was not such an adept as to be able to find his way back and forth between the two worlds without, as it were, 'following in my footsteps'. I am once again speaking metaphorically, you must understand."

Conrad shook his head. "But surely, if it were a member of your order...?"

Nikonor now put up a hand, and attempted to explain: "We are not all expert in those techniques. Learning to `navigate' between worlds, as on might say, is easy for some of us, but very difficult for others. I must confess that it is a test that I myself have not as yet been able to pass, despite having try'd for some years now."

"I must say here," said Andrew, in his prot‚g‚'s defence, "that I have not found the time to work with Nikonor on this as much as ought to have, for this is something one must generally learn at the side of a master. Perhaps I should also say, having said so much already, that one of our safeguards against the Prometheus possibility lies in the fact that during this process the thoughts and feelings of the apprentice become quite transparent to the master. This is a possible reason why a would be Prometheus might feel compel'd to leave his apprenticeship unfinisht and attempt such opperations without having attain'd full knowledge of them. Here, however, I must tell you that I have reacht the limit of what I may tell you."

Sarah, who, along with all the others, had been listening to this discussion, had a question of her own: "I suppose," she ventured, "that the reason you were so anxious to get that painting was that it might have provided your Prometheus with a link to me. Am I right?"

"More than that!" reply'd Andrew. "It might have been used as a link between the two worlds." He thought for a moment and added: "Well -- now that the subject is open -- I may as well ask you: Who else has seen it?"

"Royden, one or two of the students maybe -- I really don't know. I had to work on it in the art building. Mrs. deFyle caught me with paint in the room once and gave me hell about it. Bitch. She never liked anyone who went barefoot -- said it was the mark of a sneak. As if I...."

"Did Robin Hillman ever see it?" Andrew demanded.

"Yes, now that you mention it, she did. In fact she had Freeman with her, the bastard. He said only a fascist would paint such a thing -- as if I wanted his opinion."

"And you just remember'd this now! Shit!" he sware, banging his fist on a sideboard and making everyone jump. He then apologized to Sarah, kist her on the forehead, and paced off to think with his face to the wall.

THE BAREFOOT GIRLS

Chapter Eight

The rest of the week was rather uneventfull. Andrew was able to be with them all day again on Thursday, but usually he would be seeing them for an hour or so after supper. At these times he did what he could for Halka, and he was pleased to see that Dupa was trying much harder now to be of help to her.

Saturday was one of those warm days which could occur in the middle of winter as often in Katharintisten as in Stephendale, and so the Regnalka insisted on taking them out across the canal and into the city after lunch. They had fetcht Pil r and Henrietta so that they could enjoy the walk as well. All were glad of the chance to go outside and even Dupa soon lost any misgivings he might have had about going barefoot as the footfriendly path led them around the Palace walls. Pilár an Henrietta had been taking such walks since their first day, and Harriet and Sarah had twice run out briefly to feel the rare pleasure of melting snow under their bare feet; but for all the others this was the first time outside since their arrival the week before.

Katharintisten was very obviously a pre plan'd city -- the dream of a single mind on a grand scale -- the dream, in fact, of Katharine XIIth, known to posterity as Katarina Walspeltsa, which Nikonor suggested might be translated as Katharine the Magnificent, or, to keep to the same root, Katharine the `Splendid'. Born at the start of her world's XIXth century and her Order's golden age, she had come to the throne at the age of 24 and had reign'd for 64 peacefull and prosperous years. Finding the Old Palace of Alexandra and the scatter'd houses of her Order in the quaint shambles that was Alexandretisten to be totally inadequate, she had proposed to construct a palace large enough to house not only the Sovereign Mother and the Regnalkana, but the entire Order, and soon decided that what was needed was not just a new palace, but a new city. She had had such a close and personal friendship with the Ambassador of the Order of Preservers that the trust and coöperation between the two orders had never been greater, and the Preservers had been willing to build the city for her to a design that she and the Ambassador had workt out together. In exchange for this service the Preservers were granted land for a compound greater than they held anywhere apart from their own island. The compound had in fact always stood largely empty, and been valued by its occupants as much for the huge park that it enclosed as for its quite substantial indoor comforts.

As Nikonor told then about the city, the Regnalka commented that she often thought of her own friendship with Andrew as reminiscent of that between Katharine XIIth and that ancient Ambassador who had been the first to reside in the Embassy almost 17 centuries earlier.

THE BAREFOOT GIRLS

Chapter Nine

The next day the men were to attend Mass in the Embassy Chapel with Andrew and Nikonor, but the girls were to go with the Regnalka to an early Mass in the Palace.

When Margarita had met her charges, she took along the ground floor of the Embassy, through the Chapel, where the vergers had only just begun preparations for their main high Mass, and on into the 'hospital' section, whereof the ground floor tended to be occupy'd by high ranking Katharinians quietly convalescing in such comfortable suites as might, in the parent world, have characterised a high class spa. They proceded halfway down the great corridor towards the next octagonal tower (which served as the Ambassador's residence) before turning to the right to pass the portals of the Embassy and cross the bridge over the twenty foot wide canal that separated them from those of the equally magnificent Palace of St. Katharine the Barefooted.

Although built to serve different needs, the Palace bare a quite obvious similarity to the Embassy in its general architectural style. Her chapel was also much like the Embassy's. The most striking difference, in fact, being that the Palace chapel contain'd no benches or chairs whatever, but had both her entire main floor and all of her balconies cover'd with a deep, sumptuous, and very thickly padded carpet.

As the main floor was reserved for fully avow'd members of the Order, the Regnalka took the girls upstairs to one of the balconies reserved for guests, and told them that there were other balconies reserved for novices -- both male and female (although quite separately), for those of the lengna who prefer'd to remain naked, and for those who due to infirmity, needed special arrangements such as chairs. When it came time for communion, she told them further, the Host would be brought to them by deacons, as only those on the main floor were permitted to go up to receive in both kinds. They stood at the rail of their balcony and watcht the members of the Order file in and fill the main floor from the front on back. They wore gorgetts and mantles but no greaves, and as each knelt down she kist the bare soles of the one kneeling in front of her.

Just before the start of the Mass, the girls were join'd in their section of the balcony (wherein they had been alone with the Regnalka and Karena, her greenfooted orderly) by a large, blond heavy set woman who was fully as tall as the Regnalka herself and at least a stone heavier, although she carry'd little fat. Her body, rather, was strong and hard, and her bare green toes gript the carpet with a defiance which suggested that they would have been just as comfortable gripping bare rock. The Regnalka introduced her as Olga. She spoke no English, but she did speak Russian, good, formal, book Russian, and a bit of Polish besides, in addition to her native Ukrainian, and had, at times, conversed with Andrew in Church Slavonick. One of Andrew's colleagues had brought her from Kiev a half dozen years earlier. Her ice blue eyes, somewhat reminiscent of Halka's, set as they were in her firm, nutcracker face, seem'd to have never been capable of shedding any tears; but in her soul she wept for the Tsar who had been murder'd 30 years before she had been born, and for whom her grandfather had quite willingly died. Olga was to be Halka's sponsor -- the Katharinian term also meant `aunt' -- and on this day would get her through the ceremonies of entering the noviciate of the Katharinian Order.

Olga and Halka turn'd out to be such a good match that the Regnalka had all she could do to quiet the hissing, shushing, sputtering barbarity that bubbled uncontrollably from their mouths.

When it came time for communion, two pair of bare feet padded up the stairs to their balcony; but while those of the female acolyte were green, those of the deacon were undyed; and while the acolyte departed when her duty was done, the deacon remain'd with them through the end of the Mass. He was a handsome young man; and he was obviously known to the Regnalka, who spoke to him for a few minutes in their own tongue, and then embraced and kist him warmly before turning to face the girls.

"Harriet, Sarah, Halka, Olga," she introduced them, "this is Fr. Philip. Fr. Philip was ordain'd a priest just before he began his Katharinian noviciate. That noviciate will end tomorrow, when I myself shall eat his testicles. Contrary to current custom, he has elected to forgo the services of the lengna and cut them off himself. I shall be very honour'd." She had spoken with calculated frankness, and now watcht carefully as Harriet and Sarah regarded each other with expressions of painfull concern.

After a moment, however, Sarah smiled and turn'd up her palms. "All right!" she affirm'd at last with a welcoming grin, and extended a warm hand to the young priest. The three other girls were equally affirmative in following her example; and when Fr. Philip happily extended both his own hand of friendship and the Katharinian blessing, they knew that he was finding his fulfillment even as they were.

To get to the chapel (which, in another echo of the Embassy plan, occupy'd the lower floors of one of the octagonal towers near the centre of the palace complex) they had past only through the magnificent palace gardens; but now in leaving it the Regnalka led them through a series of corridors reminiscent of those of the Embassy (although none were nearly so long) untill they eventually came to an area where the eunuchs and the women in Katharinian armour began to be outnumber'd by naked women. The Regnalka soon confirm'd the girls whisper'd surmises that these were in fact the lengna.

Anon they enter'd a large room wherein a nude læng led each of them to a low bed, holp her remove all of her clothing, and gave her some strong wine and a delightfully sensuous massage. On the floor in front of them a naked dancer play'd a flute, and was soon join'd by a whole troupe of her unclad sisters, some of whom danced and play'd, while others bore trays of sweets before the girls. Everything soon began to take on a surreal quality, as the girls fell into a state somewhere between sleeping and waking, and the songs of the lengna began to weave an incredible tapestry of dreams.

Sarah had by nature the powerfull imagination of an artist, and was accustom'd to having the most vivid dreams. She had also, in her time, smoked some outrageous pot. Nothing in her experience, however, had ever been comparable to this. She watcht, or thought she watcht, or dreamt she watcht the læng who play'd the flute dancing and prancing in front of her, and using her beautiful naked body to express every nuance of of her haunting musick. Then she found herself watching another lang playing an huge set of drums by dancing on them and beating them with her bare feet. Another lang yet walkt on Sarah's naked back and workt her strong toes into every muscle, while still another sank equally strong fingers into her tough leathery soles to knead and soften them for the tattoo, and at last took even to chewing those soles with her teeth. Waves of pleasure shook Sarah's body as if the whole Palace were being shaken with tremours underneath her. Then Sarah dreamt herself doing the same to Harriet's glorious bare feet, kneading and chewing the thick soles so as to actually taste at once all the delicious pleasure her friend had had in all her years of going Barefoot....She felt the word rolling over her like a tidal wave of sound....Was it in English? No, the lengna were chanting it in the Changeless speech: "BHOZA, BHOZA, BHOZA". Harriet's feet grew huge in Sarah's dream, and she seem'd herself to be so tiny that she could run back and forth over those wrinkles in her friend's souls that she knew as well as the wrinkles in her own palms. She danced on the lovely leather and felt it respond to her. She climb'd about on Harriet's toes as they moved in time to the wild lenxin musick, and leapt from pad to bad as between hillocks. She fell down between them and hug'd them and kist them. Then she was working the tattoo into the thickest part those sensuous soles, and at last rolling naked in the ink until she was midnight blue all over.

Then it all changed, and she was huge, and Harriet a tiny elf dancing naked over the soles of her feet, and doing all the same things. Then the waves of pleasure roll'd over her and shook her again, until she was as limp as a rag doll under the fingers of the lengna. She nestled the top of her foot into the hollow of Harriet's, and claspt her hand as well, as they drifted off into a deep, dreamless sleep.

Once they had drest and eaten, the Regnalka led them to a room prepared as a shrine to St. Katharine the Barefooted. Here they took the first vows of the noviciate, first in the Changeless Speech, and then in their own tongues -- Harriet and Sarah at the Regnalka's prompting, and Halka at Olga's. They had a Queen now, for whom they were ready to fight, and lay down their lives if need be.

The Regnalka askt the girls how they had found the experience, and when Sarah told her about her dream, she shook her head and smiled: "Sounds delicious," she said, "I'll tell you about mine some day -- when you're ready to hear it." She used her bare, purple foot to give Sarah's a conspiratorial pat. The Regnalka was growing very fond of Harriet and Sarah, but knowing how fond they were of each other, she would be watching them and praying for them. Now, however, it was time to celebrate. There was still a good part of the day left, and she proposed to spend it at the Palace, shewing the girls around and inviting them to supper at her state apartments.

They talkt about the lengna, and how skill'd they were at what they did -- how they seem'd, indeed, to have skills that went beyond wine and song, and into the realm of magick. All that the Regnalka could say was that the lengna had secrets of their own. They also had rules of their own, and although in a sense a part of the Katharinian Order, they were in many ways an order of their own, and a law unto themselves. They even had what amounted to a language of their own. Yet whatever the lengna were, the Regnalka assured them, they need never fear them, for they brought only pleasure and relaxation -- never pain nor harm; and even the eunuchs would attest that even in castration they brought only pleasant dreams.

Because it began to rain in the evening, the Regnalka decided to take them back to the Embassy by way of an ancient tunnel that ran under the canal. She brought them through parts of the palace that had become so labyrinthine as a result of centuries of remodeling that only an architectural detective could have discern'd anything of the simple order of the most ancient construction; and informed them, as they marvel'd at the confusion of corridors, that no one really knew even how many rooms the Palace actually contain'd, or, for that matter, how many people actually lived in it. There were even rumours of some disreputable members of the Order, who had not been seen at a general formation in so long that some supposed them dead, but who in fact continued their scandalous lives somewhere in the darker parts of the palace; and there were indeed some sounds and smells and even sights that seem'd to bear such rumours out.

* * * * *

The men had been pleased for their part to enjoy a day together in the absence of the women. Matriarchy was somewhat disconcerting to them in and of itself, but the Regnalka's revelation that she deputised for her sovereign as an orchidophage was even more so, and most difficult of all was the problem of reconciling this with her apparent piety. How, they demanded to know, could the Church ever condone such an outrageous barbarity in a Christian kingdom?

Andrew actually heard this uncomfortable question from Conrad, but it was obvious to him that Regis and Thaddæus were equally troubled by it. Wishing to avoid the distress of having to disavow any more disinformative Nikonorian embellishments, Andrew lost no time in answering this rather loaded question himself:

"Peter VI, who was patriarch at the time of Leona the Great, did not hear of her institution of this practice until all of her eunuchs had made the sacrifice required of them, and her 40 day feast was already at an end. When he did hear about it, he was so scandalized that he in fact consider'd excommunicating Leona and forcing her from the throne; but he might then have had to excommunicate the entire Katharinian Order, and the possibility that they might have been prepared to follow their Sovereign Mother into an open and irreconcilable schism was one that he could not ignore. He decided instead to send her a former letter expressing his disapproval, and his concern, and warning her, as her father in Christ, of the spiritual dangers which he felt the practice posed to herself, her Order, and her subjects generally.

"The Archbishop of Alexandretisten, being sympathetick to Leona, reply'd on her behalf that the practice she had instituted violated no sanction of Scripture generally held to apply to Christians, and that the Sovereign Mother had scrupulously avoided even the least suggestion of lewdness or frivolity on her own part.

"The Patriarch reply'd again that although it was true that the New Testament did not condemn, and in one place appear'd to bless eunuchs, Leona's institution would, by the standards of the Old Testament, be lookt upon as unclean. These standards were of course those of the ancient Hebrews of the Parent World only, and would not ordinarily be held to have any wider application. A part of the purpose of the Old Testament sanctions, however, had been to avoid any defilement with pagan religious practices; and, as Leona should have known, there was a very strong echo of a still well remember'd pagan practice in what she was doing.

"About a century and a half before Leona's time," Andrew explain'd, "members of my Order had brought a fairly large group of people from the Parent World -- something over a hundred, I believe -- who were by ancestry and language quite compatible with the people of our world generally, and particularly compatible with the society which seem'd to be developing in these lands, as they had been ruled by the priestess of a fertility goddess and thus largely accustom'd to matriarchy. They were then, however, only a remnant, as they had lost their High Priestess, along with most of their leaders, in a conflict with a people far more barbarous than themselves, who would soon have overrun them.

"These gratefull souls quite willingly accepted Christianity and the rule of the then Sovereign Mother, Katharine II. They were very loyal and made good soldiers, and in fact one of the three regiments which remain'd loyal to Leona was made up almost entirely of their descendants. There is also a strong and quite plausible tradition that their commander himself suggested to Leona the process whereby they were to be incorporated into the Katharinian Order. He, in any case, was by all accounts the very first to be granted this honour.

"The customs of their ancestors had made it necessary for their Queen, or High Priestess -- she seems to have had almost divine status -- to take a new consort each year, as it was expected that as soon as she had mated she would...."

-- Dupa snapt his teeth loudly and regarded Andrew with raised eyebrows and a questioning nod, which Andrew return'd with a smile of affirmation. --

"Yes, quite," he went on, relieved to have been spared the necessity of a verbal description, "but the point you must understand is that she was here playing out a fertility ritual -- acting, as it were, the part of a pagan goddess.

"The thrust of the Patriarch's argument to Leona here was that the Sovereign Mother might be seen as reviving the cult in question by receiving a similar sacrifice. He had a point, for some centuries later Isidora V quite deliberately revived the pagan cult of Panpá in its full form -- though on a daily rather than an annual cycle -- and her subsequent excommunication started the second Isidorian War -- but I will let the Regnalka tell you about that in due time.

"The Patriarch also observed that although he himself had no doubt that Leona remain'd true to her vows, her involvement in this might well suggest to others that her chastity was being compromised.

"Finally, the Patriarch reminded the Sovereign Mother that one of the guiding principles of Imperial law and practice was the notion that although it was often quite legitimately necessary to end the life of one of God's creatures, it was an offence to the Wisdom of the Creator to deprive any creature of any organ or faculty wherewith that Wisdom had been pleased to endow it. This was an idea found in the recorded meditations of John the Holy himself; and, as his royal descendant, the Sovereign Mother should certainly have been familiar with it. For this reason the Emperor's subjects did not geld, nor even dehorn their livestock unless necessary in individual cases. Apart from convicted sex offenders whose death sentences had been commuted to galley service and subsequent resettlement in the Foolish Lands, it was unheard of to turn men into eunuchs. In the Southern Kingdoms the members of a very few religious orders made eunuchs of themselves, but never within the Empire. Leona could thus expect that the judgements of the Emperor and his subjects would be very negative on her institution of such a frightfull practice.

"Nevertheless, the Patriarch reäffirm'd that however disturbing he found her decision, he remain'd in communion with her and would continue to pray for her.

"At the present time," Andrew concluded "the Emperor and the Sovereign Mother, despite their differences, are in fact on the best of terms as Ponderus II has as his royal consort the younger sister of the present Sovereign Mother. They will celebrate their 25th anniversary in a few months. The marriage itself had been arranged to mark the 25th anniversary of the treaty of Alexandretisten, whereby Ponderous I and Philippa's predecessor, Alexandra XV, ended the ten year war, which had, only days before, placed them both on their thrones by ending the lives of both Leona XXI and Thaddæus VII in a great battle fought, of all places, on the "Island of Peace", whose Abbot each side had accused the other of having murder'd the previous year. Both of these good and wise rulers lived to see not only the marriage which they had arranged to cement their bond of friendship, but also the subsequent birth of the Imperial Princess Alexandra, who, as the First Regnalka, will in all likelihood succede Philippa IX as Sovereign Mother, and of her brother Ponderpent who is heir to the Imperial Throne.

"Ponderous and Alexandra each reign'd for 40 years, and were eaten on the same day by the WALPTR ?OMPEI, who will'd his headstone to the Abbots of the Island of Peace.

"Many young women (and, I must say, even on occasion a few young men) from the Imperial Lands have join'd the Katharinian Order over the years with the Emperor's full blessing. Likewise, those of the Sovereign Mother's subjects who decide that they would be happier in the Imperial Lands, or even as Imperial soldiers, are given the Sovereign Mother's blessing on their departure. The two rulers allow free movement between their realms and treat each other's subjects as their own."

After Andrew had explain'd these things to them, the men felt much more at ease, and when the Regnalka return'd with the girls, they all join'd in a discussion of these things until well into the night.

THE BAREFOOT GIRLS

Chapter Ten

Monday brought them more of the same warm, sunny weather that they had enjoy'd for the past two days. This was enough to prompt the Regnalka to persuade Andrew that it was now time to add some physical training to the regimen of their guests; and he readily agreed to the proposal that she take charge of same herself. They would, she assured him, be able to further their other studies simultaneously.

She had, first of all, to teach most of them to ride.

Conrad's only clear memory of ever having been on any kind of horse took him back to the age of nine, when he had been led around a pasture on the back of a twenty year old mare belonging to a friend of his father. He remember'd having gone home quite in love with this gentle creature, but could not now remember her name.

Halka had once had her fingers bitten by an horse to whom she had try'd to give an apple.

Dupa's experience was no more promising.

Regis could remember riding with Don Edwardo in Spain, but that had been more than thirty years ago.

Sarah's equestrian experience had been the most extensive. Her grandfather had kept half a dozen horses, and she had also join'd the Riding Club with Harriet at Stephendale. Even she, however, would need a good deal of practice to bring her up to Katharinian standards.

Once they had begun to be able to control the mounts that she had carefully selected for them, the Regnalka determined to take them into the hills to the north of the city, where they could tie said beasts and get learn as well to scramble about on foot.

The Regnalka insisted that all of them go barefoot so that she could train them in the Katherinian way. Dupa, as she had expected, was quick to object, but she laught in his face and told him that what would do for little Halka would do for him as well.

It was seen from the first that something would have to be done to help Regis with his bad leg, so Andrew convinced him to place himself in the hands of the physicians of his order; and although they could not make a full repair of it, they were able to make enough of an improvement to allow him to ride quite comfortably and even participate in some of the less strenuous foot training.

The Regnalka arranged for Olga to be seconded to her personal service, and had her move into the suite next to her own and just below Dupa's in the Embassy building. Halka mowed downstairs to room with her a few days later, and thereafter the little Polka's progress in learning the Changeless Speech accelerated to the point where it surpast that of the others. Olga train'd with them as well; and much amusement was found in the enormous pride that the huge Ukrainian took in her very hard soles -- a self indulgence which Halka was quick to emulate as soon as her own tiny feet began to toughen. Sarah soon took it upon herself to teach Dupa to enjoy going barefoot safely; and Harriet likewise imprest upon the Kingslynns the importance of always stepping straight down.

The Regnalka began to make a point of addressing them in the Changeless Speech and insisted that they use it both to her and among themselves as much as they could. They soon began to get the 'flavour' of th language in their mouths, and the learning process became more and more interesting and enjoyable to them.

THE BAREFOOT GIRLS

Chapter Eleven

At the very last moment, however, the boat felt the weight of another; and before he knew what was happening, a very distrest George Kingslynn was enfolded in the cloak of what he took to be the Angel of Death.

Andrew, wishing to try a new approach to what had always presented itself to him as a very difficult problem, did not pause to answer any of this eldest Kingslynn's questions, but rather wiskt him off forthwith from his own suite on the first floor of the Embassy to the Regnalka's on the ground floor, saying only that while it was not strictly true, it would be most convenient for the present if George thought of himself as having been taken to Purgatory.

"Dad!" -- "Grandpa!" gaspt Regis and Conrad as Andrew led his latest acquisition through the Regnalk's door. They had just been listening to Nikonor's morning lecture on the development of the Grand Council during the early centuries, and were now putting questions to him about possible comparisons between the Grand council and institutions whereof they had read in the histories of the Parent World.

"Regis!...Conrad?...Who are all these other people? Where are we?" babbled George, shaking with confusion.

Andrew set him down on a cushion between Regis and Conrad; and, quickly placing a cup of coffee in his hand, insisted, with the authority of the angel he knew that he appear'd to be, that he relax and be quiet for a while. Meanwhile, Karena, the Regnalka's orderly, who had lately been spending her days with the group to help them practice the Changeless Speech, removed his wet boots and socks as if they had been contaminated.

The time displacement was very disconcerting for George: Regis was only slightly older looking at 59 than he had been at 48, and his limp was much reduced; Conrad, however, had grown from a boy short of 10 to a young man of 21 in what had not, from George's point of view, been even 3 months. George was burning with questions, but Andrew husht him, and handed him a glass of strong, delicious wine, after drinking which he sat through the lecture on linguisticks with the attention of one involved in a subject of lifelong interest. The Changeless Speech was the most fascinating thing that George Kingslynn might ever have wisht to hear about; for George was a linguist, and here was a language with such jewellike perfection as far surpast that of the Latin that had so imprest him as a schoolboy. When Andrew's lecture on moods and aspects was ended, he was in fact so captivated by it that he spent the intermission pestering the lecturer rather than his own descendants.

This behavior was, of course, an intended result of the wine that Andrew had given George. It would allow him to remember everything that he had been told quite clearly as it increased his attentiveness, but it so suspended his other faculties that he felt no inclination to ask about his whereabouts. The effect would wear off in a short time, but Andrew still found it so usefull that he often wisht that he could offer it to the students he dealt with at Stephendale.

The custom of a libation at the start of a lecture was one which the Regnalka was also delighted to keep. Hers was the lenxin wine of castration, and her guests were very fond of it. It was quite compatible with Andrew's choice, and of much the same base, but stronger, sweeter, more sensuous, and more enthralling. It had the power to shape mere words into the most vivid images, and therein lay its use in lenxin magick. The Regnalka had learnt, however, that it was a bad idea for the lecturer to indulge in it herself, as it tended, in its sensuousness, to tempt one to sensationalism; and thus her own glass typically held something less potent.

She had reason to be most carefull today. Her lecture plan, which she had carefully prepared, did not easily allow for deviation, especially at the last minute, and what she now had scheduled would not at all have been what she would have chosen to coincide with a new pupils first day. There was, in her mind, no helping that, however, and so, as she had plan'd, she led them out into the corridor.

Leading them towards the chapel, she past the portraits of all the Sovereign Mothers going back over many centuries. This was a visual aid whereof the Regnalka made frequent, if not daily use. She had shewn them the portrait of Queen Alexandra I, just outside the chapel, and those of the ten Alexanders; then those of Katharine I, and the long line of tall, proud, and handsome women who follow'd after her.

This time, however, the Regnalka stopt at the portrait of an hideously ugly creature, who, disgusting as it was to contemplate, must have been a Sovereign Mother, as she was wearing the crown of Alexandra, surmounted by the headstone of the Walptra Ailingà, by whom that Foundress of the Northern Realm had been eaten. On the heads of most of the other Sovereign Mothers whose portraits graced the great corridor this magnificent sphere appear'd a luminous sky blue, but on this ugly head it shew'd the dark grey of an angry storm. Most disgusting of all, however, was the sight of the very gorgett of St. Katharine the Barefooted half hidden under the wattle of this monster's double chin.

Her students had, of course, noticed this dreadfull portrait before -- they could hardly have not -- and, by now able to read the inscription, knew very well whose portrait it was; but the Regnalka had not yet been willing to speak of it. Now, much as she regretted it, the time had come.

She stood by in silence for a moment as they study'd the ugly portrait more carefully. As in all of the royal portraits, the Sovereign was surrounded the Regnalkana. Here, however although a few were painted looking at her, most were shewn with their heads turn'd away, as if to avoid the sight of her ugliness. A very young, but quite unlovely Regnalka was shewn kneeling before her and presenting a small plate that held a pair of raw, freshly sever'd testicles.

The only other portrait to shew such a thing was the one in the very next panel, wherein the same sly creature here shewn kneeling was herself enthroned and crown'd.

Regis and Conrad nodded to each other as they both recall'd a passing reference to an infamous bastard daughter.

"The portrait before which we are now standing," announced the Regnalkanot at all unexpectedly, "is that of Isidora IIII, a woman of ugly habits that were soon reflected in an ugly face. That face has haunted us now for 19 centuries. You might as well take a good look at it."

Represented here as an extremely fat creature of indeterminate sex, this Isidora apparently had the same dark chestnut hair and green eyes as were common to most of the Bhozetsa line, but she had other features quite unique to herself. The most prominent of these was a long voluptuous mustache whose ends hung past her foremost and presumably original chin. This was complimented by what one might suppose she fancy'd a cute little tuft of hair in the hard to shave place just under her pouting lower lip which was painted blood red like its superior from which it was separated just enough to reveal a set of vicious white teeth and a sensuous tongue caressing the corner of the overlarge mouth in obvious anticipation of the dainties on the plate at which her green eyes stared from under lids painted a vulgar purple and surmounted by grotesquely accentuated brows which the artist had cleverly indicated as being quite luxuriant enough without any help from her tasteless cosmeticks. Her cheeks hung like bags from her square jaws and appear'd hastily daub'd in a white paste which hardly hid the shadow of a beard.

"That...that's a woman?" gaspt Sarah, giving voice to everyones question and being join'd in her outburst by their mingled expressions of dismay.

"When she came to the throne, yes, and a not at all unattractive one from what we are told, but only God really knows what kind of a monster she finally became," reply'd the Regnalka, shaking her head in disgust.

"But how?" prest Regis, "How the hell...?"

"By eating them raw, night and day, by the hundreds, for 14 horrible years, until the poison that rob'd her of her womanhood finally took her life as well," came the dreadfull reply.

"Isidora IIII came to the throne in our year 1610 at the age of 14. She reacht the throne by poisoning her elder sister, Helen V, who had herself occupy'd it for less than a year. She had been given the honour of bringing her sister the testicles of an eunuch whose self castration she had, after much begging, been allow'd to watch; and soakt them in poison on the way. The perverse obsession that drove her to this crime was all consuming, and ultimately it was fatal. She could not, it seems, ever get close enough to the sacrifice, whereof as Sovereign Mother she partook. Perhaps that is why she felt the need to eat the testicles raw even though she knew full well that doing so was killing her just as surely as she had kill'd her sister. Perhaps she wanted to die that way. I don't know," the Regnalkamused. "I don't claim to know the ways of a poison'd mind.

"She did not allow the lengna to perform their ordinary functions in the process, but insisted on either castrating her victims with her own hands or having them castrate themselves in her presence. Soon even this scandalous intimacy was not enough for her and she began having sex with her victims beforehand. Isidora V was the result of one of these abominable unions, but fortunately the androgens which she ingested made it impossible for her body to bear any more such bastards.

"When her appetites exceeded what could be supply'd by legitimate vocations to the order, she plotted to entice new victims by turning one of the Katharinian houses into a virtual brothel wherein sinfull parodies of the lengna made whores of themselves and participated with their Sovereign Mother in every conceivable perversion. Despite what was reputed to be a very imaginative commitment to variety, these scenes always ended with the monstrous monarch getting her favourite treat.

"At last even this disgracefull stratagem could no longer supply her needs and she resorted to kidnapping and finally war. In the spring of 1616 she attackt the northernmost outposts of the Emperor Simon I on the most indefensible grounds, protesting the Imperial occupation, more than a century earlier, of what is now call'd the Island of Peace.

"Isidora maintain'd, rather tenuously, that since the island had been first settled by subjects of Alexander III, it was by rights a Katharinian possession. She was neglecting the small fact that the WALPTREINA had eaten all of the descendants of these settlers as part of some celebration of their own on a single day half a century later, and that although the WALPTREINA neither had nor shew'd any further interest in the island, the subsequent rulers of Alexandretisten made no attempt to resettle it, and in fact were happy to allow the Emperors to maintain the road through it; but this from Isidora's point of view was of no consequence whatever; nor did it matter that she did not even present this foolish argument until after her armies had overrun not only the island itself, but the whole peninsula north of St. Ponderus bay, which had never been spoken of as anything other than Imperial territory. She did not want the island anyway, but only the testicles of its hapless defenders. She took more than 3000 prisoners, brought to Alexandretisten in chains, and sent them back as eunuchs when, within the course of less than a year, she had had her wicked way with each and every one of them.

"Simon I had been a lifelong pacifist. He had been on his throne for 60 of his 80 years, and up until then his realm had known only prosperity and peace. He was horrify'd by the very thought of war, but after months of foolishly trying to negotiate with Isidora, he was finally forced to send an army against her, or face rebellion at home.

"As a loyal Katharinian I hate to say this, but he should never have rested while either of the dreadfull Isidoras lived," pronounced the Regnalka heavily. "Perhaps, however, another Emperor might have pursued a righteous vengeance until our entire Order were destroy'd, and we should count ourselves fortunate. In any case, he order'd his armies to halt once they had recaptured the island.

"Isidora, for her part, knowing that her forces were far outnumber'd, order'd them to fall back without fighting. Then seeing that the Emperor's forces had halted, she offer'd him terms of peace. Simon, fool that he was, and willing to do anything to insure the peace which he had, to his mind, won without any bloodshed, agreed that the Island in question, now to be known as the `Island of Peace', was to be neutral territory ruled by the Abbot of an order of monks who would seek their novices within the Empire. Isidora's part of the pact would be to insure the chastity of these good monks by personally eating their testicles.

"Simon died two years later, and was succeded by his grandson, Simon II, who was neither a fool nor a pacifist, and whom Isidora durst not offend. Half a dozen years after the elder Simon's passing, Isidora herself died of a violent seizure at the age of only 28, and her bastard daughter, who was 12 at the time, succeded her as Isidora V."

The Regnalka then drew their attention to the next panel in the series, which depicted the younger Isidora receiving at the hands of a kneeling læng the same offering which she was seen holding before her mother in the previous panel. Isidora V had none of her mother's physical ugliness, but her physical perfection served only to better display the cruel, vain arrogance of a spoilt child whose only goal was to surpass her mother's wickedness before ending her own life on her 16th birthday by the same means whereby her mother had disposed of the reputedly virtuous aunt whom she had never known. Having thus introduced her next subject, the Regnalka determined that it were best to lead her pupils back to her own rooms for some more wine.

"Isidora V managed to preserve her appearance because, declining to indulge in the most ruinous of her mothers practices, she generally allow'd the lengna to safely prepare the testicles of her consorts before she consumed them. This was hardly a case of her fearing for her life, for she had foremeasured the days that she wisht to reign. She had determined, however, that for such time as she predestined, she would reign not just as a queen, but as a goddess.

"As I am sure you can all understand, Isidora IIII had been abhor'd as a monster by most of her subjects and by most of her kin as well, and they had no wish to see her bastard daughter take the throne after her. They did not, however, believe that they could effectively oppose her. They dreaded the possibility of civil war, as they knew that the younger Isidora would have the unquestion'd loyalty of the vast armies of eunuchs among whom she doubtless had a father, and that there was no military force in the entire realm that could to oppose these. What is more, the elder Isidora had elevated a totally worthless and sinfull creature to the position of Archbishop of Alexandretisten, and he, having been allow'd to keep his testicles and indulge his vices during her lifetime, was quite happy upon her death to cut them off and send them to the Palace in token of his support of the younger monster's claim, and in hope of being granted even greater favours as an eunuch. She ate them in quite genuine gratitude, and shew'd him even more gratitude once he had anointed her as Sovereign Mother.

She shew'd no such gratitude, however, to the Church which this sinfull prelate so disgracefully represented. She openly reintroduced the full -- nay even augmented -- cult of the pagan goddess Panpá, the Orchidophage. In doing so she virtually became the goddess, and insisted on being addrest by her abominable name. She did not try to suppress Christianity, but reduced the church to an almost vestigial institution of minimal importance. At last the Archbishop himself, seeing the position he had sacrificed so much for reduced to insignificance, and finding himself thus excluded from the royal cultus, complain'd to the Patriarch demanding the excommunication of his erstwhile benefactrix, so that a more worthy Bhozetsa might replace her on the throne and restore the dignity of the Church.

"The Patriarch -- Timothy I, I believe -- was not willing to do anything purely on the self serving advice of the unworthy Archbishop Zachary; but when his own agents reported to him that the Sovereign Mother was indeed an apostate and the promulgator of a pagan cult, he did finally declare her excommunicated, and invited the Emperor to invade Alexandretisten and depose her.

"While the number of eunuchs had grown by the thousands, female vocations had declined to the point that there were fewer than 4,000 females left within the Order, and only 17 Regnalkana. Of these, however, only two were willing to have such a sovereign as the young 'Panpá'. The other 15 met in secret and agreed that they would support the claim of the most senior of their number, and that she would travel in secret to Ierusalema Nova with a small escort including four other Regnalkana, so that the Patriarch might anoint her as Leona VI. Their mission was successful, but when Isidora learnt of it she had 7 of the other 10 Regnalkana who had pledged themselves to Leona arrested and chain'd naked to the outer wall of the Palace of Alexandra. There, before an appall'd assembly of her unwilling subjects, she disembowel'd them with her own hands; and having thus fetcht forth, ate raw the ovaries of her own cousins, even as her mother had almost certainly eaten the testicles of her father, moments after he had begotten her. The 7 Regnalkana died bravely, confessing their Christian faith and denouncing Isidora's paganism. The Patriarch would later declare them to be saints, and Leona VI would later build a shrine to their memory against the wall where they were martyr'd. I would be proud to shew it to you sometime when we visit Alexandretisten." The Regnalka paused for a moment, as if in memory of these ancient martyrs, and then continued:

"Differing as he did from his timid predecessor of the same name, Simon II was eager to avenge the atrocities that the elder Isidora had committed against his grandfather's subjects; but thanks to that same grandfather's distaste for the military, the armies which he had inherited were nowhere near a match for the vast eunuch hordes that Isidora had created. He did not, however, fully realise this, as the task force that Simon I had sent out to recover the lands that Isidora IIII had overrun had represented almost the entire military strength of the Empire, while the invaders whom they so easily routed had been nothing to Isidora.

"The Emperor formally recognised Leona as the sole legitimate successor of Alexander I, and therefore Queen of the Northern Realm. [He would not endorse the Katharinian Order by saluting her with the title "PLENREGNA MATRA,"; but neither, on the other hand, did he suggest that she become his vassal, but merely reaffirm'd his own Imperial right to be regarded as Primus in pares.]

"Having received the Patriarch's blessing, he sent his armies to take Alexandretisten the following spring, but was forced to pull them back after a disastrous encounter with Isidora's eunuchs some 20 miles south of the city. Simon was fortunate in that his losses were not heavy, but he would need two years to prepare for another attempt.

"This time, with at least token support from the rulers of the South, he was more successfull. Join'd by the 3 Regnalkana who had remain'd in the North but managed to both avoid capture by Isidora and raise substantial forces from among both escaped Katharinians and the nobility of the countryside, Simon and Leona were able to lay siege to Alexandretisten. They were expecting a long wait.

"That was not, however, the will of the goddess Panpá , who, intent on going ahead with the long plan'd celebration of her 16th birthday which she hoped would be remember'd for centuries to come. At the end of a day long feast featuring the most pagan of entertainments, the erstwhile Isidora took her penultimate consort; and when they had mated high up on a balcony in full view of her subjects, she cut off his testicles and ate them, but only after soaking them in the same black poison whereby her mother had ended the life of Helen V. Her final pleasure was to die under the weight of her very last lover, who then cut off his own testicles, dipt them in the frightfull bowl, and dropt them into the lifeless mouth that had beg'd for them only a moment before.

"Our history records that among those in attendance on that day was a young peasant girl who had just taken her final vows. Coming from the provinces, such girls must have had their ideals horribly shatter'd at the dreadfull court of the Isidoras, but this little girl was a true Katharinian. Burning with righteous anger, she ran foreward, and, drawing strength from her faith, threw the dead Isidora and the two eunuchs over the low rail of the balcony with a loud shout of <<Burn in hell Isidora! God save Leona VI!>>. The crowd below took up the cry, and soon the entire city was proclaiming Leona as their Sovereign. Hearing the shout, the Emperor and the Sovereign Mother order'd their forces to enter the city and march on the palace. The girl who had started the shout was wounded by a panic stricken eunuch, but lived to be made a patrician the next day.

"All of the eunuchs were demoralised. Most, regardless of what they had been before, declared for Leona. Others try'd either to hide in the palace, or to escape the city. Many of these surrender'd when faced with capture. Some fought to the death. A few took their own lives. In the days that follow'd Leona was to order thousands of them beheaded. Isidora's body, and those of her two last lovers, were taken outside the city walls and burnt with dung on a trash heap, as it was not thought proper to invite the Walptreina to feast on the flesh of the damn'd. Those of the eunuchs who refused the opportunity to confess their sins before being beheaded were likewise burnt on the dungheap. Finally Leona order'd that the body of Isidora IIII be taken from her tomb and likewise consign'd to the shit fire while the priests consign'd her soul to the fires of hell.

"Tomorrow I plan to tell you about the very good reign of Leona VI, and her various reforms, but for now I think it best that I stop and deal with any questions you may have."

This invitation brought no immediate response. As neither of them could follow a lecture in English, Olga had given Halka the benefit of her own very limited knowledge of the Isidorian period in the hissing, shushing, sputtering barbarism that had developt between them as a compromise between Ukrainian and Polish; and as this had not taken very long, they had both fallen asleep shortly after their return to the Regnalka's sitting room.

Karena understood more English than she let on, and was quite conversant with the subject matter, but she also knew (most of the time) that it was not her place to speak.

Harriet and Sarah might think of some questions after a snack and some more wine, but had come to prefer to give the men first crack at the initial questions, which would be expected to cover points of history.

Dupa did not want to hear any more about the Isidoras for the rest of his life.

George, the newcomer, was too overwhelm'd by the subject matter to accept it as any kind of real history, and although the wine had indeed fixt his attention on the naratrix, he had listen'd to her story as if to some rather lurid f‘rie tale whose ultimate meaning he could not comprehend, as it was, for him, totally without context.

Regis and Conrad, however, as historians, were beginning to formulate a few questions in their minds, and the impetus for the first of these came when Nikonor, who had been fascinated by the lecture, made nervous excuses for a rather hasty departure immediately it was ended.

"If I remember correctly," began Regis tactfully, "Nikonor, in his first lecture some weeks ago, mention'd a sort of... well, I suppose one might call it a `reliquary', which disappear'd from the possession of the Order of Preservers and which tradition held to have been stolen for the benefit of Isidora the Fat. Might we ask the Regnalka to comment on this?" he askt respectfully.

"I would like to take that question if I may," said Andrew, with a nod to the Regnalka, who gestured her willingness to defer to him. "There is, among the Katharinians and their subjects, a well known story to that effect, but it is a story rarely encounter'd in any other part of our world. The fact is that my Order has always been characterised by modesty and secrecy and an avoidance of any sort of publick spectacle, much less the frightfull publick self castration which marks this fancifull tale.

"I am glad that he is not here to hear this, but I must tell you that Nikonor's sensationalism is a fault peculiar to himself, and not at all typical of the members of our Order, though of course, being human, we all do have our faults. You are Nikonor's first pupils, and he is becoming a good instructor, but you must not let him get away with that sort of thing.

"To get back to the facts, however: The records of our Order do tell us that our Second Founders determined, after the fall of Timthrets, that they and their successors would have to become eunuchs to avoid the possibility of another Timthrets; but there is no record of how, or in what sense, they made eunuchs of themselves. We do know that they added sexual metamorphosis, of the same type that our novices undergo today, to the Initiatory process which Nikonor spoke of as the Great Dream for all subsequent novices, and it is far more likely that they themselves underwent the same or something similar, than that they cut off their own testicles as in that ridiculous story. In any case, you can be fairly certain that no such reliquary ever existed."

Harriet now felt that she had a question, and took pains to pose it as carefully as Regis might have done: "Regnalka," she began, "can you tell us what became of the unworthy Archbishop of Alexandretisten? Was he deposed?"

"Zachary, you mean," nodded the Regnalka, "No, he repented; and although he protested that he was indeed unworthy, both the Patriarch and the Sovereign Mother insisted that he remain in the position wherein it had pleased God to place him, as his penitence had proven that the Almighty had been pleased to work even through such a disgracefull agent as Isidora IIII. For the rest of his life he was known for his good works and for the great piety wherewith he discharged his duties."

"Regnalka," began Conrad, with another question,"as Your Highness did not speak of Isidora V as having any bastards of her own, I take it that she had none. Did she, however, attempt to make any provisions concerning the succession?"

"Considering that she follow'd her mother's ways, I can only assume that God, in His Mercy, had render'd her sterile. As to the future of the Order and of the State, she seems simply not to have cared," the Regnalka reply'd.

The Regnalka was taking a moment to quietly consider what more she might say on this enigmatick subject when the enormous Ukrainian awaken'd both her diminutive protégée and herself by laying a great, thundering fart. Apparently startled, Olga turn'd and stared at George, who was sitting on her left, with an open mouth'd expression of wounded accusation and incredulous dismay.

Dupa, who was not entirely comfortable with his little cousins new protector, began to laugh so hard that he fell over on his side. He was soon join'd in his mirth, first by Harriet and Sarah, and then even by Regis and Conrad.

George Kingslynn, however, did not see any humour in it at all. The shock, in fact, restored to him those faculties which the wine had suspended, and he was suddenly appall'd by the situation wherein he found himself. "What the hell kind of a purgatory is this?" he stammer'd, gesturing to Andrew. "Do I have to hear monstrous stories and be insulted by this...this thing?" he demanded, shaking his hand at Olga.

Andrew knew then that the game was up for George, and motion'd to his descendants to get him up and take him out. The four of them left together, with only hasty bows to their royal hostess. After helping to escort the incoherent Kingslynn to the Kingslynn suite, Andrew was not looking foreward to the rest of the evening.

The Regnalka, meanwhile, was giving Olga a rather sharp telling off, not only for falling asleep and for farting, but for presuming to blame George, even though the exact same thing had happen'd several times before, and everyone knew exactly who was to blame. The two very imposing women regarded each other with stony, don't-dare-laugh faces. Little Halka stood protectively by the side of her beshamed protectrix. The uncomfortable confrontation finally ended when the Regnalka caught Dupa gloating over Olga's disgrace, and announced that the session was over.

All then departed for their own rooms; but Harriet and Sarah soon went back down to visit Olga and Halka -- with whom they could now to an extent converse -- to cheer them up; and Dupa, who had anticipated a very lonely evening, was happy to find Nikonor and pass the time with him.

* * * * *

Dupa did not sleep well that night, as he was plagued by rather unpleasant second thoughts about having let his young cousin go into the Katherinian Order. The Regnalka was quite charming, but she could also be seen as a monster princess involved in a hideous perversion that ate away.... No, that was too apt and too awefull a metaphor; and besides, who was he to worry about perversions? Was there really anything worse, he askt himself, than being a Godcursed 'friend of Dorothy'? Maybe he should join the order himself as the Regnalka had suggested. -Have them off and be done with them. -Let the Regnalka have them. -Best thing for them. -A noble sacrifice -(Katharinians thought so)- and perhaps an end to the unclean passions that haunted him.

It would have been all too easy, among his former contemporaries, to dismiss any sense of sin from the vice that he had fallen into in his school days. It was certainly common enough -- but to his mind that was the most damnable thing about it. A vice that was common was to him all the more vulgar, and all the more hatefull. Spiritual pride? -Yes, he was aware of its dangers, but as long as one knelt before ones Creator it was not too very dangerous. Thaddæus Dupa was a very proud man, and he hated the idea that he was ensnared in a vice that was so disgustingly common that it could, in a democratick age, actually make a shameless bid for respectability. He would have none of that. Whatever his misgivings about the Katharinians, he knew that his soul was better off in a world that would see his sins for what they were, should they ever again become manifest, and thus pray'd that here at last his higher nature might be victorious over them.

He should, for the sake of his family, try to marry and beget descendants; and he could not, in any case, ever be comfortable within a matriarchy. He would go south with the Kingslynns when the time came, and he hoped that it would come soon. As for Halka, he felt sure that he had done the best that he could in asking God's guidance before giving her permission to join the Katharinian Order if she were so minded. If he had thus deluded himself through selfishness or folly, he would simply have to trust God to forgive him. It was all too much for the mind of a poor drunken Polak; so he lay back, blest himself, said his prayers in Latin, blest himself again, and let the wine carry him off to sleep.

* * * * *

The Regnalka was also troubled as she lay abed. She had never had cause to question her Order. It had been her life and she had always loved it. As a child she had known that she had but two possible destinies: She could either be a Regnalka; or she could try to bear one. She had chosen to be one; but she would have served the Order in either case. She would serve it still, without question, until she died. Certainly she would never question Philippa. She wonder'd what she would have done had she lived in the time of the Isidoras; but decided that she could only thank God that she had not been. She wonder'd what she would do if she herself were Sovereign Mother. She could not, having once deputised for Philippa as an orchidophage, wax fastidious and expect others to so deputise for her. She would have either to reaffirm the ancient rite by taking full part therein, or attempt to abolish it completely. It was not that she herself was beginning to find orchidophagism disturbing, it had always been part of the life of her Order, and therefore part of her life. She was, however, beginning to understand why it troubled outsiders so deeply.

She remember'd the very first words that she had spoken to her pupils the day she had been introduced to them, and thankt God again that she was so comfortably distant from the throne. It was not her place to consider either the morality or the expedience of her Order's traditions, but only to live them out, eating such things as she was given to eat with a gracefull, if not an innocent pleasure, and thanking her Maker that at least for her it was neither a gluttonous nor a prurient pleasure.

She rub'd her feet together in thanksgiving that they had been bare and free all her life. Then, having blest herself for the day's last time, let her hand rest on the golden gorgett that it was her pleasure to wear even to bed, and stept barefoot into a royal dreamscape of rolling hills and verdant meadows.

* * * * *

The Kingslynns had a predictably difficult time with George, and Andrew provided little help. In fact, as soon as they return'd to the Kingslynns' suite, he let himself out with the excuse that this was a time for the family to be alone together.

Facing with his uncle the task of explaining to his grandfather the state of a strange world from the point of view of two gentlemen who had had just over three weeks experience therein, Conrad drew on the experience of his own first night in the Embassy. He past along Andrew's suggestion that it were sometimes best to suspend judgement on the "Is-this-real-or-am-I-dreaming?"question.

At last they got drunk -- three generations together -- and caught up on being a family. It was a happy evening for the most part, except for the account of the elder Conrad's fail'd marriage. Young Conrad did not even look upon his mother as a relative, but only as an unpleasant product of XXth Century America who had once made a very poor attempt at becoming a Kingslynn. He would be a parent himself before he could even begin to forgive her.

George was not all that surprised, but he was sadden'd. He remember'd having seen those difficulties hanging like a dark cloud over the happiness of his last Christmass with his two Conrads. He was happy now, however, to see so much of his ancestors in his young descendant.

Andrew, after much thought, had decided to give George the suite across from Harriet's and Sarah's and next to his own. There were two problems with this: First of all it was not customary to assign rooms to any but members of the Order on the park side of the corridor. That rule could be set aside, but there was still the problem of the broken furniture and general rubbish wherewith Nikonor had been allow'd to fill this, as well as two other suites, in the pursuit of several messy hobbies, including furniture restoration. Cleaning even one bedroom for George had taken two porters a whole day, and they were still not finisht. Perhaps after another day George might have a clean bedroom, albeit a small one, and an useable toilet.

George spent his first night on the right hand day bed of the Kingslynns' suite. These beds were in fact quite as comfortable as those in the bedrooms and were in fact the preference of many. The fact that Pilár customarily occupy'd the other one was some comfort against the possibility that George might awaken in the night.

* * * * *

Harriet and Sarah invited Halka and Olga to a sort of 'pyjama party' in their room. Outsiders that they had always been, they had never been invited to such parties, and were now determined to host one themselves. When they met Karena in the corridor, they invited her as well.

On most occasions they would have wanted to have the Regnalka with them as well, but on this night that would have seem'd too much like having somebodies mother with them; and besides, the theme of the party was comforting Olga, and shewing her that they still loved her, even if she were a great cow and could not be taken anywhere. Karena was a bit reluctant at first about accepting, but as her mistress had obviously gone early to bed, at last saw no harm in it. They sent for a buffet, open'd some wine, and having all of them changed into night shifts, sat around and chatted and giggled and did each other's feet for half the night. Then all five of them fell asleep, huddled together like so many bitches on one of the day beds.

THE BAREFOOT GIRLS

Chapter Twelve

The girls all grin'd at each other as they enter'd the Regnalka's sitting room the next morning, as they thought fondly on the fun that they had had the night before; but Sarah was soon visited by a strange and troubling sadness. Watching George Kingslynn seat himself between his son and his grandson, she felt her red face flush a shade redder as the nameless feeling gave way to one she knew. It was hot, shamefull envy. She felt it surg over her in the unwelcome wake of an old hurt that once again past through her.

Sensing her discomfort, Andrew put his arm around her in silence, and led her out of the room and down the corridor towards the Chapel.

Sarah at last found the courage to speak: "Andrew, I... Could you get me my mummy and daddy?" She bury'd her face in her hands and did just what she had been hoping that she would not do: She shook and cry'd like a little girl.

Andrew had known that this was coming, although he had not expected it to come so violently. He had come to love this flaw'd, forgetfull, fat little creature above all the rest -- almost as a daughter -- and he felt the hurt inside her almost as if it were his own.

"I can't do that Sarah. It just wouldn't work out," he said painfully, as his usual gift for words fail'd him, "but their is something we can do to make you feel better about your parents, and perhaps help you to understand. Come with me."

He took Sarah to a room adjacent to the Chapel which lookt as if it had once served, or perhaps on occasion might still serve as a sort of sacristy, and bad her sit down in one of a pair of very comfortable high backt chairs. Taking the other chair for himself, he began chanting prayers in the Changeless Speech until she fell into a deep trance.

The experience was so personal that it was some time before Sarah would say much of anything about it even to Harriet, for she had seen things that she would need a good deal of time to sort out for herself, and things not easily put into words in any case. Nevertheless, reluctant as she was to talk about it, the change that it had made in her was immediately obvious. She return'd to the Regnalka's suite serine and content. She would no more miss her parents, nor would she ever again fear death.

THE BAREFOOT GIRLS

Chapter Thirteen

When the Great Feast of the Resurrection finally came, they were all very imprest with the way it is kept in the Embassy chapel. In general, even the girls prefer'd to hear Mass in the Embassy rather than in the Palace, because as novices they were still outsiders, very much second class participants relegated to the balconies of the Palace Chapel and thus not able to receive in both kinds. This was not, however, a preference which they were permitted to exercise freely, as the Regnalka deem'd it necessary to the proper completion of their noviciate that they acquire a full experience of the prayer life of the Katharinian Order.

As it happen'd though, the girls were rather pleased that the Regnalka had brought them to the Palace Chapel on the following Sunday, as they had the chance to watch the Sovereign Mother herself file into the Chapel with the two highest ranking Regnalkána.

One might have expected that this rare view of their Liege Lady would have been the most memorable event of the day, but another chance sighting a short time later proved to be of much greater importance.

They happen'd to pass a group of perhaps a dozen lengna in one of the corridors, and Sarah was suddenly sure that she recognised one of them. As soon as they had past she told Harriet and the Regnalka; and the Regnalka, sensing the significance of the sighting, turn'd them around and led them back to the Embassy so that Andrew could be informed.

They found the men quickly enough in Andrew's sitting room. Andrew, as might have been expected, was wrapt in conversation with his fellow philologist, while the others chatted among themselves and pickt at the buffet.

Sarah went directly to Andrew and began, in a state of obvious excitement, to relate what she thought she had seen. Andrew had a bad feeling about what she was beginning to say, and might have prefer'd to hear it first privately; but deeming it neither expedient nor fair to put Sarah through repeated tellings of what he felt sure would be a long story, he quickly stopt her to call the others round. There was a definite advantage as well in having the whole group interact with Sarah, as no one could guess, given her unpredictable memory, what random question might spark some important revelation, or who might ask it.

Sarah pour'd herself a cup of coffee and arose to pace about for a minute as she began: "As you all know, I was an art student at Stephendale. That meant that I spent a good deal of time drawing and painting in classes with live models -- nudes in case any of you didn't know. By far the most frequent model was a girl that all of us took to be Prof. Royden's mistress. There were a number of very strange things about her. Her right hand had been cut off at the wrist. She wore an odd sort of bracelet -- or perhaps I had better say a 'cap' -- on the stump of her arm. It was made of gold and set with rubies, and the open end that went over her forearm was finisht in these rounded points, like a sort of little crown -- something like this:" Sarah paused to draw a quick sketch on Andrew's chalkboard. "She was never without this ornament, and it was all she ever wore. She never had a towel nor a dressing gown like the other models, but went about completely naked. When she was not working she could be seen strolling about the Art Building in the nude, with no more modesty than...."

"Than a læng?" suggested Harriet ominously.

"I'll get to that, but wait: It gets even stranger," Sarah continued. "The girl never spoke, and seem'd to have trouble understanding speech, unless Royden stood right in front of her and spoke very slowly. It was like she was some kind of deaf mute. Everyone always thought so anyway. She was almost like a fixture in the Art Building, but she was never seen outside it. Royden had rooms in the building, so it was assumed she lived with him. People talkt about it of course, but it was no big deal -- not at Stephendale."

Andrew bury'd his face in his hands. He would never have given the least thought to the Art Building.

"I'm just about sure I saw the very same girl in the Palace not an hour ago," continued Sarah, at last sitting down, "One of the lengna. she wasn't wearing the bracelet, though. She just had a plain stump where her hand had been cut off -- and she was definitely speaking to the other lengna who were with her. Maybe there were a dozen of them standing about in the corridor -- but it was the same girl! I've drawn or painted her dozens of times."

Noting that Sarah had now paused, Conrad put up a hand to make a few observations: "It would seem," he said, "that this bracelet, or whatever it was, might have been intended to draw attention away from the girl's face, so that she would be less recognisable, and I suppose one might say the same of her nakedness. I think such a trick might work against most of us, but not against an artist like Sarah. If Sarah says she's seen this girl before, then I would say she has. I do wonder about one thing, though. Wouldn't a læng have had the cross of St. Katharine imprinted on the sole of each foot?" he askt, looking first to the Regnalka, and then to Sarah, "and wouldn't a barefoot artist like Sarah, who takes such pride in her own feet, have noticed such a thing in many poses?"

"Oh, I noticed the models feet all right, but her soles, or at least the parts of them that would have toucht the ground when she walkt, and the pads of her toes as well, were always inkt, or dyed, a deep midnight blue. If they had been markt with St. Katharine's cross, it could not in any case have been seen," reply'd Sarah, embarrast that she had forgotten such a detail.

A flurry of speculations, some cautiously thought out, others so wild as to be assinine, flew about the room like litter in a storm. For some minutes Andrew neither join'd in nor reply'd to these, but bury'd his face in his hands once again in deep thought. Then at last he call'd for silence and spoke: "If we are going to be able to discuss the possibilities intelligently, we shall have to hear a good deal more about the lengna than I myself have ever been told. We must ask the Regnalka if she have any friends among the lengna that she can trust absolutely. What we need is a trustworthy læng to attend our next session."

"The truth is," warn'd the Regnalka "that it is rather difficult even for a Katharinian to get to know a læng on a personal level; for the lengna always maintain a certain 'distance', as it were, that is very difficult to overcome. I think, however, that I know at least one læng whom I could call upon as a personal friend, and be fairly sure both that we could trust her and that she would be willing to help us. She and I were very close friends as small girls, long before either of us became novices. I have only spoken to her a few times since then. She is what you might call a physician -- a very good and caring physician from what I understand. Well...I might as well excuse myself now and go to look for her. I'll try to bring her back to the Embassy with me tomorrow." With that, she and Karena departed.

Andrew then very politely requested that everyone depart and leave him to meditate in seclusion.

Understanding his need for this, Harriet and Sarah invited the others to spend the rest of the day with them.

THE BAREFOOT GIRLS

Chapter Fourteen

When the group regather'd in the Regnalka's room the next morning, they were met not only by their royal hostess and her greenfooted orderly, but also by another guest, -- a tall, smiling, dark hair'd nude, whom the Regnalka introduced to them as Barbaræng, with the explanation that her friend's Christian name now fell into the same irregular declension as the word for what she was.

Barbaræng seem'd totally at ease as she sat among the Regnalka's guests over coffee and cakes. Having placed herself just behind Dupa, she began to work her well train'd fingers into his overtense back. As the morning went by she treated each of the others to a similar massage. This was the kind of healing that she prefer'd to practice, and giving them all a taste of it was a way of sharing herself with them. She wanted them to forget any misgivings about the fact that they were clothed and she was naked.

She brought some delicious wine with her which seem'd to give them the ability to converse with her with far more ease than their limited experience in the Changeless Speech might have otherwise permitted them. There were many curious questions and she answer'd them all with a candor as carefree as her nakedness:
-- She came from a patrician family, and her parents had known the Regnalka's well.
-- She had chosen to become a læng because she had wanted to learn to be a healer.
-- Yes, she was very content with her life.
-- Yes, it had felt strange the day she set aside the white tunic of her noviciate to begin a life of total nakedness, but when she thought about it now she felt very thankfull to have been set free from that peculiar shame that compel'd other humans to cover their bodies.

She had brought with her the black cloak and silver gorgett set with white quartz and a single sapphire that had been given her when she had taken her final vows, but which she had rarely worn since except on those Sundays when she could not avoid the main floor of the Chapel. She deign'd now to put them on very briefly, but quickly return'd to her accustom'd nakedness, explaining that she felt that even these threaten'd to reïnvolve her in the tensions of vanity and shame, modesty and seduction, from which her orders rule of nakedness had set its members so uniquely free.

Question'd about the intricate cruciform pattern of small red and blue dots on the back of her right hand, Barbaræng answer'd that these bare witness to both the rank that she held and the training that she had had. This led to the question of whether she knew of any læng whose right hand had been cut off. She reply'd that according to the unique code of law that bound the lengna, a læng who misused the knowledge that had been intrusted to her was typically order'd to have her right hand cut off at the wrist, but that in practice the offender almost always choose the alternative of being beheaded. It had been three or four years since any læng had actually chosen to lay her hand on the block rather than her head in such a case. Despite the fact that there were only about 5,000 lengna, hardly a day seem'd to pass without the beheading of one or two of them. Of these perhaps one in ten had been formally sentenced to have a hand cut off. Most of the rest who arrived for beheading had been sent to the block by their own consciences -- most typically for violations of an obscure code of sexual conduct quite peculiar to the Lenxin Order, which Barbaræng was unfortunately not at liberty to discuss. One could almost assume that most of the three or four hundred lenxin novices who removed their clothing each year fully expected the eventual removal of their heads. That was how the lengna dealt with their sins.

The questions turn'd then to the structure of the Lenxin Order. This, Barbaræng inform'd them, was something so complex and seemingly illogical as to be not easily explain'd to outsiders. There was a Chief Læng, always a Patrician, who, although otherwise as naked as any læng, always wore a silver gorgett set with amethysts. Under her were 12 of what one might call 'faculty heads', each in charge of training lengna in one of the functions which they perform'd, and assigning them to appropriate duties. These also had specially design'd gorgetts which they always wore, and in most cases they were also drawn from the Patrician class. There was another level below this of intermediate officers, such as Barbaræng herself was, but the exact pattern of organisation was different in each faculty. Most of the lengna came eventually to belong to more than one faculty, and disputes as to who had charge over whom, and was responsible for what were constant, although they occur'd at a level ordinarily invisible to outsiders. Worse yet, the order was replete with work shy skivers, drunks, and perverts, who, cloaking themselves in their nakedness, hid in inaccessible parts of the Palace and did as they pleased, pretending perhaps, on rare occasions, to be profitable servants. Despite the seeming chaos, however, the lengna had managed over the centuries to render a fairly high level of service within the larger Katharinian Order.

Most questions, however, eventually led to the final answer that Andrew fear'd he would get: The lengna did not coöperate well with outsiders -- even Katharinians -- when it came to anything touching their internal structure, and the only way that the sort of inquisition that he wanted to make could be carry'd out would be through the Sovereign Mother and the Chief Læng. To approach it in any other way would in all probability simply slam shut the very doors that he wanted to open.

It was not that Barbaræng herself was anything less than fully coöperative. For the Regnalka's friendship sake she was more than willing to tell them anything that they wanted to know -- as far as her own knowledge went -- and she seem'd to genuinely enjoy spending the entire day with the group. She warn'd them, however, that the lengna had their own ways whereof they were very protective. Although there were really very few subjects whereupon they were sworn to secrecy -- generally 'trade' secrets of the various faculties -- most of the lengna avoided talking to outsiders.

Barbaræng apologized for the fact that some of their simplest and most direct questions had no simple answers. Among these was the question of how the lenxin leaders were chosen, for some faculties apparently elected their leaders by various systems of balloting, while others prefer'd appointment, or designated succession, or choice by lot.

As to her order's mastery of magick, Barbaræng had only limited knowledge. She herself, like most of the lengna who provided such personal services as could not in propriety be performed upon the wakefull, was train'd in hypnosis. She had, with the help of adepts within her order, travel'd outside her body, but only to other parts of her own world and its higher realities. She had never heard of any læng ever having visited the Parent World, or indeed any other alternate world, either in or out of the body, but that was not to say that none ever had. She did have a feeling, though, that the more a læng might know about such things, the less she was likely to say, even to other lengna.

When it became clear to Andrew that he could learn nothing more of substance from Barbaræng, he excused himself to return to his own private meditations.

The rest of the group, willing to give the Regnalka and her old friend a chance to enjoy each other's company in private, again accepted an invitation from Harriet and Sarah to spend the evening in their suite.

Having suggested that Karena join this party as well, the Regnalka sent for a tray of sweets such as she knew Barbaræng would like, and prepared for an evening alone with her. She lockt the main door and inform'd her departing orderly that she did not wish to be disturb'd for the rest of the night.

Sitting on the cushions with the snacks between them, they were girls together once more: M'g'rita and Baba. Then they began to talk about the very different turns that their lives had taken. The Regnalka let the læng choose the wine. M'g'rita agreed to remove her clothing, but suggested to her normally nude friend that they both wear their gorgetts, in token of the vows that they shared. They giggled about this compromise, which they felt equally odd about. The Regnalka had never before try'd going barebreasted under her gorgett, but she now understood why so many girls, Karena included, so enjoy'd doing so in warm weather, so long as they had their mantles to shield them from the sun. The gold chain fringe felt cool and sensuous sliding over her bare breasts. Lenxin gorgetts had no such fringe, and M'g'rita might have wisht that she were free to suggest that they exchange gorgetts for just a moment so that Baba could feel what hers was like; but the Regnalka knew that that were improper.

Barbaræng, however, had an even more sensuous suggestion that was well within the bounds of Katharinian propriety: She would sing and dance for her friend.

The Regnalka was delighted. Many lengna had sung and danced for her in the past but this would be special.

Barbaræng sang in the uniquely lilting dialect of the lengna, but the wine made it perfectly clear to the Regnalka, who was soon wrapt in a delightfull dream.

Barbaræng wove the removal of both their gorgetts into the dance, and then, gently reposing her girlhood friend upon the day bed, made love to her in all the ways that the rules of her order permitted.

It was not a hot, grinding, passionate love. Barbaræng was not like that. Her love, which she would indeed give freely to any Katharinian of whatever sex under the permitted conditions, was a truly personal giving of herself; but it was highly stylised and choreographt, and she took a professional pride as well as a personal joy in it. It was meant to refresh, to relax, and if need be to heal. In the course of it she would indeed bring the subject to orgasm in order to relieve sexual tensions; but she would also examine and service every joint and muscle in the subjects body. The subject was always in a deep trance, and experienced the service as a very pleasant dream, whose content she would control by her singing to provide the most fulfilling pleasure possible. To do this she had been taught to explore the mind as well as the body.

She now moved slowly through her long, deliberate dance of love, and when she finally placed herself prone at the far end of the extra long bed to stir up the final raging sea of pleasure that the Regnalka would cross in her royal dream, she took the greatest pleasure in silently singing her spell into the depths of her majestick body.

It would not be the first time that she had tasted a Bhozetsa. She had in fact once had the honour of serving the Sovereign Mother herself in the same way. Margarita Bhozetsa, however, had been her closest girlhood friend.

She wonder'd now as she drank the royal nectar what it would be like to really love her, with both of them fully awake to each other. Would it be glorious, or shamefull? Glorious -- at least at first. How would she feel about having her head cut off the next morning. How many times had she watcht a young læng quite happily lay her head on the block in fair atonement for such a night of love.

No, not for her. Her knowledge and skill were far too precious to waste so selfishly. Some members of her order, vain, frivolous nudes, prefer'd indeed to end their lives before time stampt the signatures of their sins upon their luscious bodies; Barbaræng, however, lookt foreward to honing her skills as she grew old gracefully -- like the 86 year old læng who had long been head of her faculty, and who wore her softly wrinkled nakedness with a proud dignity, and complemented it with snow white hair that hung down to her soft bare feet.

Having at last honour'd the Regnalka's body with a dozen gentle kisses, she replaced her gorgett, drew a coverlet over her, and snuggled up to her warm, naked body in the darkness, caressing the harden'd feet with carpet soft ones.

THE BAREFOOT GIRLS

Chapter Fifteen

After an hour of discussion, the proud and stately nude promist her full coöperation; and having prostrated herself before her Sovereign, left with the assertion that a full investigation into the matter of the one-handed læng would be made, and that a written report would be provided.

True to her promise, the Chief Læng sent Barbaræng back with the report on the following Monday. As on the previous Monday, Barbaræng was prepared to spend the day with them.

The report, which Andrew translated into English, had been prepared by a member of the Lenxin Judicial Council. It began with an account of an incident, now almost 4 years in the past, whereof Andrew indeed had some memory.

The principle subject of the report was a young læng who had enter'd the order as a novice about a decade before at the age of 14. There was nothing very special about her background. Her father had been a cloth merchant who drank heavily and was hardly ever home, and her mother had more or less forced her into the Katharinian noviciate, as she was a troublesome daughter for whom no respectable marriage could be made. She elected at last to shed her clothing and become a læng. Known thereafter as Priscillæng, she further chose to apprentice herself into the faculty of gelders. She was qualify'd very quickly, and at first shew'd a great deal of promise. By the time she was 18, she had already been gelding for two years, and was given charge of a team.

Then, however, her career took a bad turn, and she became involved in a rather questionable relationship with a member of the Order of Preservers who had recently been transfer'd to the Embassy at Katharintisten. Named in the Ambassadors deposition as 'Davidex', a 28 year old native of Iohanetisten, he was apparently kill'd in a riding accident while in her company. That, at least, was Priscillinx' version of what had happen'd. The Ambassador, however, demanded an inquest; and the Lenxin Judicial Council was moved to put Priscillæng on trial.

Andrew indeed remember'd this young Preserver. He had, in fact, been a very promising student of English, and had actually been assign'd to the Embassy so that Andrew himself might work with him. Andrew, however, had been unusually busy that year, particularly at Stephendale; and although he had spoken briefly with David, he had not been able to give any time to tutoring him in the way he would have liked.

Nikonor had got to know David a bit better, and been very imprest, and, if the truth must be told, a bit envious of his quite prodigious accomplishments.

The most impressive of these had been his demonstration of the ability to visit the Parent World at will without assistance. For this he had needed special permission to begin at the age of only 24 a course of study which was not normally open to members of his order until the age of 40.

Andrew exchanged uncomfortable glances with Nikonor. "Well, perhaps we need look no further for our Prometheus," he concluded sadly. "Poor David, may God forgive him. If only I hadn't been so terribly busy that year...."

The report continued with an account of Priscillinx' trial by the Lenxin Judicial Council. There had been no way to prove whether she had had a hand in David's untimely death, but the Council was quite convinced that her relationship with him had been most improper, and that in any case she had, by her own admission, violated the lenxin rule of inclosure without dispensation. Having found her guilty of misusing her skills to seduce the young Preserver, the judges order'd her to have her hand cut off, fully expecting her to have herself beheaded within the week.

She surprised everyone by arriving at the block two days later, accompanied by two other lengna, who informed the executioner that they were there not to have themselves beheaded, but to assist their companion, who had chosen to have her sentence carried out exactly as written. Without speaking a word herself, Priscillæng then placed her hand upon the block, and nodded to the executioner to strike it off. When this had been done, the taller of her two attendants pickt up the sever'd hand and placed it in a box that they had brought, while the other bound Priscillinx' wrist. Then the three disappear'd back into the Palace.

Sarah cringed visibly, as if she had not only heard, but somehow tasted something abominable. "What the hell would they want it for?" she demanded in a voice that waver'd between a curse and a whimper.

"I don't know," reply'd Andrew with equal discomfort. "I don't know that I want to know. It appears, however, that the dreadfull thing has been found in its box -- in a hidden room with 4 lengna. It seems they've been placed under guard, and I've been invited to interrogate them myself. Here, let me translate for you:"

The report continued to relate how Priscillæng had at first indicated an intention to return to gelding, although after her amputation she would only be able to function as a menial assistant refer'd to among the lengna by a word that ordinarily meant a 'pot'. This shew of penitence did not last long, however, for she soon disappear'd, and it was assumed that she had join'd the '13th Faculty', of drunks, skivers, lesbians, and layabouts. She had been thereafter seen so rarely by any respectable lengna that the compilers of the report had found it noteworthy that others had seen her about the time that Sarah had. Five days of diligent searching had fail'd to produce Priscillæng herself, but the sever'd hand in the hidden room had definitely been hers, and the executioner had identify'd one of those taken into custody as the læng who had carry'd it from the block.

Having once translated the report that Barbaræng had brought him, Andrew felt compel'd to comply without delay with the Sovereign Mother's request that he come to take charge of the interrogation of the captured lengna; and so, bidding the others follow, he call'd upon their naked visitor to lead them through the underground passages to the appropriate part of the Palace.

Unfortunately, before they arrived at the dungeon wherein the four lengna were held, one of them had managed to hang herself. This in fact had been the læng who had carry'd off the hand. Andrew examin'd the dead body so intently that he seem'd almost to sniff about it like a dog. Then, authorised as he had been to dispose of the prisoners as he would, he gave orders that it be taken away and burnt according to the Katharinian protocol of the damn'd.

He then askt to see the hand. It was in a black wooden box with silver mountings -- the same box wherein KShena, the executioner, who had also been call'd to be present so that Andrew might question her as he would, now reäffirm'd that she had seen it placed as soon as it was severed.

When the box was open'd, Sarah had all she could do to keep from crying out. The hand, so perfectly preserved that the identifying tattoo was still clearly visible, lay on a black velvet cushion, its wrist fitted with a golden cap -- exactly like the one Sarah had seen Royden's model wearing!

Dupa took a brief look and then turn'd away in disgust; but the others could not so easily break the hold of this wicked object that was once a human hand. There was some dreadfull secret about this hand, some wicked echo of the perverse pleasure Priscillæng had taken in having it cut off, some threatening, seductive evil, some black purpose that had demanded its sacrifice in exchange for...what? Why did she have her hand cut off. Why had this grim and lifeless thing been accorded the honour of a sumptuous reliquary? Why had these lengna been guarding it? What use was now made of it?

"To call her home!" spoke Sarah, shaking in fear at the knowledge that had somehow come to her. "That's why she cut it off -- so it could call her home from other worlds."

"She's right," affirmed Andrew. "Regnalka, you must send for a priest -- now!" He quickly closed the box.

Karena's bare feet fairly flew down the corridor as she ran to fetch Father Philip. They were both panting when she return'd with him, and all were surprised at their speed. Both were young, however, and both devoted to the Regnalka.

Father Philip had no sooner regain'd his composure after having been shewn the hand in the box than his own hand was seised by one of the three remaining prisoners who drag'd him over to an old beheading block in a dark corner. Kneeling before it, she sang her way through a confessional formula, admitted to treason against the Sovereign Mother, and at last lay down her head and cry'd for KShena to come and cut it off. "Skej! Skej!" she demanded fearfully, begging the executioner to strike.

Andrew was very displeased, but as it seem'd most unlikely that they wold be able to get any more out of her, he allow'd that it was her right as a læng to die now as she chose, and motion'd to KShena to comply with her request.

Gripping the rough stone floor with her toes, the powerfull woman raised her great sword, and bringing it down with the full weight of her well train'd body, struck off the head of the frighten'd creature whose trembling hand Father Philip held all the while. Perfectly sever'd, it roll'd face up and seem'd to smile at her with relief.

Andrew, upon calling for the gaolers to carry out this second body, order'd that it be dealt with as that of one who had died in a state of grace.

The two remaining nudes, terrify'd by what they had seen, and not being prepared to go to their deaths that day, fell on their knees before the Regnalka and began nervously to fabricate such apologies as would diminish their own guilt to a minimum. Neither the Regnalka nor Andrew was prepared to believe that their part in the cult of the sever'd hand had been nearly so modest as they were trying to say that it had been; and the Regnalka while bidding them rise, told them to their faces what she thought of their stories.

The Regnalka realised that the remaining two lengna, unable as they had been to communicate with each other since their capture, were in a state of panic and confusion. It was indeed probable that they had been drawn only into the outer fringes of whatever conspiracy was being uncovered here, although not so probable that they were as innocent as their instincts told them to pretend to be. If they were not treated carefully however, it was all to likely that they also would hasten to have themselves beheaded without revealing very much that she and Andrew would find usefull. She call'd her party out for a tactical conference.

Dupa remarkt that the beheading that they had just witnest had been "rather a nasty business".

George Kingslynn was taking the whole business rather badly. He kept pacing about and mumbling to himself.

Father Philip was troubled as well. He had never before had any dealings with the lengna, and his career plans had not included any such dealings. Still, he had a strong sense of duty to both the Church and the Katharinian Order, and if the Regnalka needed his help, she would have it.

Reëntering the large dungeon room wherein they were held, the Regnalka stood before the trembling naked girls and addrest them, in the full panoply of her royal magnificence, as the representative of their Sovereign Mother. Their respect for her was instinctive, and they cast their eyes down to her magnificently armour'd though proudly baresoled purple feet. She inform'd them that it was her will, and therefore the will of the Sovereign Mother, and therefore the will of God, that they should not be beheaded, but rather demonstrate their repentance, not only of the sin which the prophet Samuel had liken'd to witchcraft, but to actual witchcraft as well, by coöperating fully with the inquest and answering all questions put to them truthfully.

Not wishing these last two lengna to be in any way confused by the very exceptional compassion which had been shewn, perhaps mistakenly, by both priest and executioner, to their obviously hysterical sister moments before, the Regnalka reminded them (as Father Philip nodded his assent) that whereas private sins might appropriately be dealt with through private confession, no absolution could be given in a case involving conspiracy against the living icon of God's majesty unless a full and open confession be made not only to a representative of the Church, but to representatives of the Sovereign Mother herself as well. Father Philip added to this the warning that while the Regnalka, as the Sovereign Mother's Plenipotentiary, might indeed give an assurance that the Sovereign Mother would not require their lives, he himself was not empower'd to give any similar assurance binding on the Almighty, for only in the matter of granting or withholding absolution was he God's plenipotentiary.

The two lengna may have cared little for their heads, but fearing for their souls, they confest what they knew: They themselves had been recruited into the conspiracy, they supposed, because they took an interest in magick, although they really knew little about it. They did not know how wide their circle was. Between them they could actually name only 17 other lengna whom they knew to be part of it, although they reckon'd that at various times they must have seen at least as many others whose names they did not know. Priscillæng was their undisputed leader, and their goal, as far as they had supposed, was to gain a greater share of influence and power for the lengna by developing their skill at magick. They venerated the sever'd hand as a symbol of what Priscillæng had suffer'd for all the lengna.

Priscillæng herself had not been seen among them since that same Sunday mention'd in the report and agreeing as well with Sarah's sighting of her. She had then simply appear'd beside the box that held her sever'd hand, and, after spending but a few hours elsewhere in the Palace on some business unknown to these junior conspirators, return'd to the room wherein it was kept and disappear'd again in the same way. She was, as far as they knew, now in the Parent World. These two knew little else themselves, or so they maintain'd, but they were sure that their two dead sisters had known a good deal more.

Neither Andrew nor the Regnalka felt that it would be productive to press their interrogation of the two lengna any further at present. After examining for themselves the room wherein they had decided to return both the lengna and the sever'd hand, they instructed the guards to instantly behead anyone attempting any kind of unauthorised entry.

Wending their way back through the basement corridors, Andrew and his companions discust what they had seen and heard, and the question of whether Priscillæng herself now knew that her hand and her coven had been found. They soon decided that it were safest to assume so. Conrad and Dupa became involved in a discussion of how many levels of the series --"We know that they know that we know that they know..."-- might be significant. Andrew, however, could not now be distracted by such a conundrum, for he was more deeply troubled than he could ever remember being in all his 126 years. The worst part was that he could not separate his anxiety over the threat that Priscillæng now posed, from his anxiety over what he felt had been his own incompetence. How could a læng, a nude lang with her hand cut off, have managed to operate for years right under his nose in Stephendale. She might have come and gone scores of times and completely hidden herself from all his senses. Had her skills been any better, he might not even have known about her aquisition of Freeman.

Dr. Andrew Gregory had, in the whole of his ten years at Stephendale, only once visited the Art Building. The occasion had been a reception to celebrate the arrival, only a little more than a year after his own, of the recently famous Alex Royden, who had been askt to leave his post as a lecturer at Cambridge on account of a scandalous affair that had resulted both in his own divorce and the suicide of a female student. Members of the Art Community, who had previously given him little or no recognition, had lionised him overnight as a man of great vision shamefully victimised by Victorian prejudice. This had been enough to convince Dr. Timothy Little, Stephendale's recently elected dean and Andrew's own unwitting benefactor, that Royden was the best man to chair the Faculty of Fine Arts. All that Andrew had remember'd was his dislike for the Art Building, the sort of work exhibited there, and the sort of people it attracted. He had only attended to please Little, as he had only recently made his own way to Stephendale by impressing this self important and rather eclectick reformer with a handfull of bogus degrees from a number of impressive universities, now all conveniently located behind the Iron Curtain. Little's budget had not had room for much expansion in the area of linguistics, and indeed Greek had long been dropt and Latin was on the verge of being, but Andrew had needed only a token stipend as an emeritus professor.

Andrew's career in Stephendale had begun, from his point of view, at about the same time as his career in Katharintisten. In that decade he had only once before attempted the daunting task of adjusting acquisitions from the Parent World to the totally alien structure of the Katharinian realm. Sylvia and Anthony were a pair of inseparable misfits who had attracted Andrew's attention during the second year of his Stephendale appointment. Although they became the most devoted Katharinians, Andrew had more or less disowned them when he became aware of the patently sexual relationship which continued to develop between them even after Sylvia cut off Anthony's testicles. He had stubbornly refused even to consider the Regnalka's suggestion that his latest acquisitions be introduced to this pair of perverts.

He thought now of Sarah and how valuable she now seem'd to be, despite the fact that her acquisition had been only an happy accident of her friendship with the girl who had originally attracted his attention. He knew that a Greater Hand must have been guiding his own, and he pray'd that that Hand would continue to be with him.

He inform'd his pupils that he would have to return to Stephendale again without delay, and that this time he would have to visit the art building and find out all he could about what went on there.

Harriet suggested that he try to return a few days earlier in order to prevent Priscillæng, but he had to explain that any such attempt would pose dangers to both worlds beyond her understanding, not to mention the fact that if he made any error that riskt his 'encountering himself' he might endanger his own life. What he had done in visiting the Parent World 11 years out of the time frame that he had previously establisht for himself in order to rescue George Kingslynn had in fact caused him great physical distress which he could only describe as a combination of acute anxiety and nausea. It had, in fact, been worse than expected, but he had no English speaking colleague working in the Parent World in that time frame. To try to come any closer to the time frame wherein he normally operated without actually being synchronous with it would have caused him even worse distress. This was a way whereby the fabrick of time protected itself, and even if a pair of adepts working together could get around this defense, the fundamental dangers would still remain. Thus he would have to play by the rules, and survey the situation in Stephendale in his own proper part of 1968.

Having at last taken leave of his companions, Andrew completed the meditations necessary to calm his raging thoughts, and thus allow him to depart his sitting room in the Embassy, and enter his office in Stephendale.

THE BAREFOOT GIRLS

Chapter Sixteen

Alex Royden was dead, apparently murder'd, apparently on the afternoon of the very Sunday which for Andrew, and presumably for Priscillæng also, corresponded to the Sunday of Sarah's sighting of the one-handed læng in the Palace.

That Royden's death was being investigated was publick knowledge; but to learn anything more, Andrew had had to resort to such stealth as might easily have criminalised him had he been less carefull. He learnt that the coroner had found that the Professor had been poison'd with Paris green, a pigment quite available, though lately rare, from the art suppliers with whom the Professor dealt (and one whereof lenxin apothecaries would also have some knowledge). The autopsy had also reveal'd something else: Royden had had his testicles removed. No medical record of any such surgery could be found, but the coroner had estimated that it had been done some three to five years before his death. The Police, however, had subsequently found a letter among Royden's papers which shed a good deal of light on this subject. It was written in very simple English in crude block letters and was undated. Andrew had managed to obtain a photocopy of this, and he now set it before the group:

ALEX -- LAST NIGHT AFTER YOU LOVED ME I CUT OFF YOUR TESTICLES AND ATE THEM. NOW I MUST CUT OFF MY HAND. WHEN I RETURN YOU MUST LOVE ONLY ME -- ONLY PRISCILLA.

Regis commented that the note appear'd to be the work of someone whose knowledge of English was limited, and who had learnt as much as she knew of it primarily as a written rather than a spoken language.

Andrew reply'd that the police had also noticed this and were working under the assumption that she was an illegal alien, quite possibly a dangerous foreign agent, who pretended to be an uneducated deaf mute in order to avoid drawing attention to her lack of familiarity with English. As to why she had chosen to pose as a nudest, or why she had apparently attracted even more attention to herself by cutting off her own right hand and capping her stump with a golden bracelet, they had no adequate theories; but needless to say the shameless nude who had previously been regarded as just another Stephendale oddity by those who had seen her was now the subject of a full scale search. Unfortunately, the last time any one whom they had interrogated had seen her had been several weeks before the murder, and they could find no clue to her present whereabouts.

The Regnalka noted that a train'd læng would be quite capable of providing a full range of very satisfying sexual services to an eunuch, and thus addicting him to pleasures only she could provide. "Priscillæng might virtually have enslaved Royden," she observ'd, "and then simply disposed of him, just as she had disposed of poor David once she had learnt all that she could from him."

"Well then, I suppose we know where she's been," affirm'd Conrad impatiently, "and hopefully the worst of what she's done. The question is: Where is she now, and what might she do next?"

"I'd say she's probably gone to wherever she's taken Freeman," ventured Regis.

"Mightn't she have made another bed for herself, as it were?" suggested Dupa, "either in Stephendale or elsewhere in the Parent World? She might still find it usefull to maintain some sort of contact there. If she did, I would imagine it might be female. A Lesbian relationship might attract less attention, and might even have been started without any jealousy or even awareness on the part of that fool of an art professor. It would have another advantage as well, in that it would gain her an accomplice to do her bidding outside the walls of this Art Building."

"What do you think about that, Sarah?" askt Andrew.

"I think Tat might be right," reply'd Sarah heavily. "I had heard it said that she 'came on' to girls. I mean... well... lookt at them that way... you know." Sarah felt a nasty hurt inside her. She felt as if she had misprised something, and she burnt with guilt. Priscillæng had come on to her -- she had seen the shameless nude staring at her -- but she could never tell the others that -- they might think that she were one herself!

Andrew and the Regnalka both saw this hurt, and felt sorry for Sarah; but Harriet pretended not to see it.

"Well," said Andrew, "that might explain how she could have got to know Freeman. The intermediary would almost have to have been female, and an art student. What about this Robin Hillman that you mention'd?" he askt Sarah.

"I really couldn't say," she reply'd. "It's possible."

"It's also possible" said Andrew grimly, "that she could have founded another whole coven in the Parent World." With that he decided to have another glass of wine as the Regnalka gave him an account of what had been happening in the Palace during his absence.

Although little had been learnt that had not been known, or at least supposed, already, these days had been far from uneventfull. News of the investigation into Priscillinx' activities had spread quickly among the lengna, as indeed the Regnalka had supposed that it would. Up until the discovery of the hand, the investigation had been conducted with the greatest discretion. The next stage, however, was virtually a purge of the entire Lenxin Order, beginning with the list of names glean'd from the two penitents. It seem'd to be the sudden pleasure of an unusual number of naked women to queue up outside the palace the next morning to be publicly relieved of the burden of their heads after being, they hoped, privately relieved of the burden of their sins.

The Sovereign Mother, however, was not about to allow any such thing, and order'd a moratorium on any and all lenxin beheadings until both Andrew, and the Regnalka Margarita, as her named agents, had had an opportunity to interrogate those confessing anything related to this present treason.

Between those so diverted from their journey to the block , and those who quite voluntarily placed themselves at the Regnalka's disposal, she had interview'd several dozen lengna whereof perhaps three dozen could be said to have actually been drawn, to greater or lesser degrees, into Priscillinx' web of treason.

Five of these had such a marginal involvement in the plot that the Regnalka thought it prudent to have them join the other two in the vigil over the hand. The others were placed under heavy guard in a dungeon, with the assurance that they would indeed be beheaded, but only after Andrew had had opportunity to interrogate them for himself.

The Regnalka thought it appropriate to explain (primarily for George's benefit) that the lengna, as sworn members (albeit ancillary) of a military order, were not entitled to the judicial rights of ordinary subjects, but were rather expected to live and die at the pleasure of their Sovereign Mother. It was enough that representatives both of the general Katharinian, and special Lenxin Judicial Councils had been call'd to witness the procedings.

Andrew thankt the Regnalka for her courtesy in holding them for him; but having spent less than half an afternoon in largely unproductive interrogation, advised that the executions be carried out without further delay.

The lengna actually applauded this pronouncement, and having quickly establisht amongst themselves the order of their departure, chatter'd away quite happily as they awaited their turns. Theatrical as they naturally were, they struck various poses as they strutted to the block, though none made any shew of fear, and all, to Fr. Philip's relief, accepted the final blessing with propriety.

KShena, the executioner, struck off their heads with a grace and perfection that gave pleasure even to her victims. Before each strike she bow'd her head and blest herself, and when she stood up tall again, she stood almost transfigured: The very angel of death, nothing more, and only barely less. She had never mist her mark, and never would.

She wore neither tunic, nor trousers, nor any clothing at all apart from a short leather skirt dyed a deep blood red. This skirt, her gorgett, and her sword were all that KShena permitted herself in summer; and in stark contrast to the typical preference of Katharinians, she carefully baked her magnificent body to such a dark tan that she might, if motionless, be taken for a bronze statue adorn'd with blue-green feet and golden hair. She explain'd, in response to questions from Harriet, that hers was the required working costume (and also, with the possible addition of greaves, the appropriate dress costume) of an executioner, and that, frown'd upon though it would be on an ordinary Katharinian, her tan, though not mandatory, was quite traditional for one in her profession. Executioners were regarded as a sort of suborder (somewhat comparable to a lenxin 'faculty') wherein a few dozen Katharinians held formal membership, although only a very few of these saw regular service at the block.

Harriet was rather obviously inspired by this awesome creature, and Sarah felt a most uncomfortable jealousy.

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