Phylomon looked at the floor reflectively, "I am an enemy to Craal and all its minions, even those who think themselves to be good people. Do you remember the woman your father sold into slavery, Javan Tech?"

Wisteria shook her head.

"She remembers you," Phylomon said. "She worked cleaning in the palace of Lord Thanafir at Greenstone. She was not old, but she was starling thin, a drudge who scrubbed beer and dog piss from the floors in the Lord's dining hall. Her left breast had been removed, as are the breasts of all women slaves in Craal once the Lords have tired of using them for toys. She coughed frequently when she spoke, sometimes spitting blood, claiming fumes from the lye she used to clean had eaten her throat raw, and she told me of her home in Smilodon Bay. She remembered this place as heaven. She said, 'It's such a beautiful place, with redwoods and the mountains and the sea.' She said, 'Beremon, when he took me as a slave, he treated me kind. Didn't beat me bad, or anything. He even let his little girl bring me food and water.'"

Wisteria's eyes widened, and she stepped back, as if afraid Phylomon would draw his sword and deliver a killing blow, but the blue man continued, "I won't kill you for what your parents made you do. Javan said your father was the best master she ever had. She loved this town, wanted to return with all her heart. But even if I had freed her, she was too ill to make the voyage home." Phylomon watched Wisteria a moment. "You hear only rumors of the evil of the Slave Lords in Craal, but I've seen the evil done to that woman. I didn't kill your parents just because they sold her into slavery—I killed them because of the greater crimes committed to Javan afterward."

Phylomon fell silent. For a moment no one spoke. He continued. "You say you want to get out of this town, but you must think me a fool. You would not seek the company of your father's executioner!"

"I can endure your company," Wisteria said. "As long as I can be with the man I love. I have no home here—you made sure of that—, nothing left but him."

Scandal broke in with a bit of trepidation. "Sir, you tell a good story, but I believe you were duped," he told Phylomon. "It doesn't settle right."

"What do you mean?" Phylomon asked.

"Well, it's easier to hammer an octopus 'til it's tender than to put it into words, but, as I told you earlier, that Javan Tech was the Queen Bitch of the town. I think she played upon your sympathies to get you to exact vengeance—and vengeance isn't always the same as justice." Scandal shook his head. "That Javan—she clung to Elyssa like a tick on a sheep. Elyssa just couldn't shake her. I've been sitting here all day thinking about it. You know, Elyssa borrowed some nails from Javan—the copper kind, from Damis—and when Elyssa paid her back, Javan threw a fit. She claimed the bag was light and the nails were inferior quality, and she stumped up and down the street telling everyone, as if she were trying to convince folks that they ought to just take Beremon and Elyssa out in a boat and dump them into the bay.

"Well, Elyssa tried to make it up to Javan. She got several witnesses, me included, and we went to Javan's door, and Elyssa apologized, saying, 'Look, Javan, I've always valued our friendship. I would never cheat you—not on purpose, not on accident. Here's fifty pounds of nails, all copper ones from Damis, in five different sizes. I want you to have them with my apologies.'

"But you know how some people like to nurse their wrath. Javan threw the nails at Elyssa's feet and shouted, 'I know what you're up to! You're trying to put it all on me! You're trying to blame it on me. Well, you're a cheapskate and a thief and everyone will know it!"

Phylomon weighed the innkeeper's tale against his own. Both of them were probably accurate, yet he couldn't quite see all of the truth from where he sat. It was as if the the heart of the matter became obscured the more one examined the stories.

"Hunh," Phylomon snorted. "It seems I've stumbled into a tale."

"Ayaah," Scandal mused. "You see, it went deeper than the nails. When Javan was young, she had her eye on Beremon. And when Elyssa married him, Javan sulked for awhile before she finally seemed to snap out of it. But I think down inside she never really got over him, especially when he started making it rich. Javan always felt that Elyssa had stolen Beremon from her."

Phylomon looked up at Wisteria, and there was a strange glow in the girl's eyes, as if she was just learning the truth. She'd never known of the love triangle, and Phylomon could see that the whole affair was finally making sense to the girl.

"Anyway, after that incident with the nails, Javan stumped up and down the streets all day long, talking to her friends, gossiping, trying to turn folks away from Elyssa. For months I hardly saw Elyssa with a dry eye. I think Beremon and Elyssa did what they did out of desperation and never considered the consequences."

"It wasn't both of them—it was my father!" Wisteria cried. "Mother wanted him to let her go, but daddy refused to listen."

Phylomon considered a long moment, and realized that he may have executed Elyssa unfairly. She had done great evil, but that didn't mean that she was completely corrupt.

Could Javan really have duped Phylomon into executing her rival? It seemed unlikely. Javan had seemed humbled, so humble that she wished trouble on no one. But in fact Phylomon had hardly known the woman. He'd taken her testimony at face value.

Could she have manipulated him so coldly? Slavery does such odd things to people, fills them with rage.

"And my father," Wisteria said, "never sold anyone else. He just didn't know what to do with Javan"

"Does that justify his act in your mind?" Phylomon asked.

Wisteria clenched her teeth but held her tongue. Her face reddened, and her eyes misted with hurt and anger. She shook her head and began to cry.

"Perhaps not," Scandal considered. "He did a terrible thing. But I'm not sure that his guilt justifies your act, either. You come into town, and you know there are slavers. They may have committed the crime ten, twenty years ago. You say that Javan Tech had changed, but it seems to me that the people you executed could have changed, too. They might not be the same people who committed the crime at all."

Ah, Phylomon thought, so he has come up with a reason to simply sit idle, refusing to condemn the guilty.

That is the problem with the world—too many good men sitting idly by, while evil has its way. Thus moral laxity seems a virtue.

"I've been watching people for a thousand years," Phylomon said softly. "Most men don't really change much. Not ever, unless life hardens them in some way. I recall a man I met: He'd murdered a townsman when he was fifteen during a jealous fight over a woman, and the people in his town forgave him because of his youth. He established himself in the community, did well for himself over the years. When he was seventy-two, he found his wife kissing another man. He took an ax and killed them both.

"Now, I ask you, should they have forgiven his crimes the second time because of his antiquity? In his old age, is it possible that he'd become senile?

"One must wonder, had he ever really changed? Or did he only kill twice in his life because in all of his years, the right conjunction of motive and opportunity appeared only twice.

"Your father, Wisteria, would he have sold another woman into slavery under similar circumstances? Had he changed at all?"

"I . . . don't know," Wisteria answered.

Phylomon looked into her eyes and believed she did know. Yes, her father would have done it again. "What did he say about it?"

She answered, "He said, 'It was a fun idea.'"

Phylomon chuckled. "Your father had a cruel sense of humor. I'm not sorry that I killed him, child, but I am sorry that it hurt you. You're as much a victim of your father's callousness as Javan was. I am sorry."

Even his executioner hurts, Phylomon thought. It is not easy to be the hand that wields the blade.

Wisteria nodded, rested her elbows on the table, and held her face in her hands. Her shoulders sagged a bit, relaxing, and Phylomon realized that she had found some peace with the situation. It wasn't much peace, he knew, but he hoped that it would be the beginning of the healing process.

"Ayaah," Scandal said, "you may be right. Maybe you knew Beremon better than we did. You've had time to get to know people. Still, I remember this sculptor—Blin Getaway. He had a pupil once who was studying a model, had been for several hours, and hadn't put the chisel to the stone. Blin asked him what he was doing, and the student said he just felt he needed a little longer staring at the model so he could hold the woman in his mind, and then he would be ready to sculpt. Blin said, 'It isn't how long you look; it's how deeply you look!' Now, I know you've lived what, twenty times longer than me? But you haven't lived in my town, with my neighbors."

Phylomon laughed softly and shook his head, held up his hands. "I bow to greater wisdom. I'm afraid my own observations would count little against Blin's greater authority. After all, it's commonly accepted that artists know everything."

Scandal frowned, angered by the mocking tone in Phylomon's voice. "Look here, sir, I'll be blunt. I think if we took a poll, folks in our town would have voted for a little mercy on some of those people you slaughtered. Have you ever heard the word before, mercy?"

Phylomon said softly, "Mercy is a luxury affordable only to gods. When you forgive a criminal and let him go free, you place every man, woman, and child that exist in jeopardy, and you forever rob the victims of the opportunity to regain their peace of mind, their trust in their fellow men. No man has the right to forgive a serious crime and fail to exact a just penalty. You may forgive Beremon and Elyssa, but you do us all a disservice."

Wisteria swallowed. "This isn't about my parents. This is about me. If you don't trust me, then I won't go. I'll stay here. But I want to go. I want to be with Tull."

Phylomon looked at the girl. Good ploy, he thought. A very good move for a temporary.

"It is only the kwea of this town she fears," Tull said. "That is why she must leave. It happens that way even for humans, sometimes."

The other Neanderthals at Tull's back nodded in agreement, moved by the purely emotional argument.

"I vote that we let the girl come," Scandal said, giving her the nod.

Phylomon looked at Wisteria and smiled. "Then I welcome you," he said.

And his symbiote whispered, I taste your fear.