The Ancient Enemy by Christopher Rowley

only a second surgeon?"
    His eyes came back to hers.
    "I will be under some drunken, worthless navy surgeon. Some oafish sot with a filthy surgery and a callous attitude toward the patients."
    He would be a nothing.
    "And what will we be?"
    They would be women, slammed shut in the claustrophobic world of the women's deck of a ship, at sea for many months.
    Lady Chiknulba took to her room, where she wept into her pillow all night, unconsolable.
    In her own room Simona stood out on the balcony and felt the warm wind blow across her skin. There was a grand view across to the Temple Plaza. The city glowed in the rays of the setting sun; the first lights were being lit. Cooking fires sent up a reek from the residential neighborhoods. The upper classes were bathing and being dressed for dinner. On the great avenues the coaches would soon be in motion carrying wealthy patrons to the theaters. Tomorrow would be the solstice festival. Even the women of the upper classes would be out tomorrow, crowding at the viewing galleries around the temple.
    A thousand hearts would be offered to the Great God, He Who Eats. Later the pinatas would be smashed in every household while wine was poured and musicians took up the wild, skirling tanburi music of ancient Shasht.
    All this color and excitement would become no more than a memory. Once they'd embarked on the expedition they would never be allowed to return. They would have to rebuild their lives in the new world, wherever it was.
    Her life with her tutors and her friends would be over. The leisured, intellectually stimulating life led by her mother and father would be replaced by a hard, plaincloth colonial existence, with lots of religious ceremonies to keep the faithful in line.
    The sophisticated parties, the music, the poetry, all the arts of great Shasht, would be forgotten. They'd have nothing to read except what they could take with them. For music they'd have military bands thundering away, nothing delicate, nothing beautiful for its own sake.
    And Shesh Zob?
    Simona broke down at last and felt the tears running furiously. She would be torn forever from her beloved forest on their country estate. All her freedoms would be gone. The walls of purdah would close around her with an iron grip.

PART TWO

CHAPTER NINE
    Two years after the famous battle on Mount Hex, Thru Gillo returned to Warkeen Village from Highnoth. He had grown tall for a mot, at least five and a half feet, and though he had filled out a little, he remained slim and hard-fleshed, but his young face had a somewhat stern cast to it, disfigured by the pale scars down the left side. It could be a little off-putting until one became used to him. At least his eyebrows had grown back, though they were never as bushy as before.
    Older folk marked him at once as the product of Highnoth. They recognized the inner strength behind his calm exterior.
    Young chooks ran from the tall stranger with the scarred face while giving squawks of alarm.
    "Hey, young chooks," cried their elders, "that's Thru the bat-mot, the striker of the white ball like no other. You'll see. He been to Highnoth, far far away, the place of the Ancient Ones. He has learned the secrets."
    There were other graduates of Highnoth in the village. Old Penki Inors was one, usually to be found sitting outside the tavern, white-furred with age, hands resting on his walking stick.
    "And how is Master Cutshamakim?" said Penki.
    "He sends his blessing, old Penki. And I would add my own. It is good to see you still in good health."
    "Glad to see you came back, young Thru Gillo. I heard all kinds of tales about you down in the Farblow Hills."
    "Oh, you don't want to be listening to wild tales, old Penki."
    "Not much else to do, now, young Thru Gillo. Unless you get back on the village team and liven them up. Shocking style of play they have right now. Very slack fielding. Haven't won in weeks."
    There was also Derai Hux, who was a little younger than Ware Gillo, and the