Nemeth sat up sleepily and leaned his back against the not-blue Wall, rubbing his eyes before looking around him.

His eyes met and were caught by the glowing blue of Ierreth's, and he welcomed and returned the warm tide of love that swept through him.

– Hlammaeth is keeping the Blade safe for you until you return from the Hidden Valley, said Ierreth gently. He knew you would not mind.

– Did he, said Nemeth with a laugh. I'm not entirely sure that I agree with him on that.

Ierreth walked towards him and rubbed his soft-furred head against Nemeth's chin.

– little one, believe me it may be better this way. Some things are best delayed just a little, so that other things may happen.

– Very cryptic, said Nemeth, grinning and scratching gently behind the big cat's ears. Am I the last to wake?

– Yes. The others are breakfasting; I would not pass on to them what Hlammaeth also said until you woke. They are waiting.

– I'll be with them in a minute. Where are they?

– In the boathouse on the fourth level.

The welcome smell of bacon was the first thing to greet him as he opened the boathouse door; it was followed closely by the smaller Children.

– Ierreth's got something to tell us, but not until you were awake, said Thani. Are you properly awake, or are your eyes just open?

– Just about open, said Nemeth with a grin.

– The lamp is lit, but there's no-one in, said Farinka.

– Something like that, agreed Nemeth, laughing. Give me a drink and some food, someone, and I'll be decently alert.

He sat by Farinka, and ate and drank with his eyes shut, Aware of impatient Children surrounding him, and of Sherath's affectionate amusement.

– Something took more out of you than you care to admit, said Sherath quietly.

Nemeth opened one eye and looked at him. –Not a problem, he answered. Okay, Ierreth, what did Hlammaeth say?

– Firstly, he said that you are not to attempt the passage to the Hidden Valley through the waters on the Fourth Level. The predators in the water would take you.

– That's useful, said Sherath.

– There is another way, which Hlammaeth assures me that you can discover, continued Ierreth. This is what he said, in the way that he said it. Firstly: look in Mishka's Dream.

Secondly: "The numbers and their sequence remain the same; only the initiation changes."

Thirdly: with foreknowledge, the essence is in the interpretation.

Fourthly: not all of either message is relevant to this event, though all parts of both have relevance in their correct places.

Nemeth laughed again. –Yes. Very dragonesque. Why couldn't he just tell us the other way?

– I'm sure he could, but life is not always meant to be simple, said Ierreth. I will go now; good hunting, little ones.

Nemeth finished the last of his danchic, and looked over at Sherath.

– What do you make of that lot? he asked.

– The first bit's simple. Finding 'Mishka's Dream'. The transcript of it is in the Shethi archives. Looking in it might be more difficult – it's one of the things that I gave up trying to understand. If you think what Hlammaeth said was obscure, then Mishka's Dream will well and truly addle your brains.

– Was it a precog? asked Jevann thoughtfully.

– Very possible, said Sherath. It's certainly weird enough; fragmented, as all dreams. One of many transcripts which are all equally unclear. There are hundreds of them.

– "With foreknowledge, the essence is in the interpretation," said Jevann, half to himself.

– It probably had to be obscure, so that Mishka himself couldn't interpret it, said Louka. But Hlammaeth knows the precise content of that dream, and knows that the transcript is accurate.

– Maybe he was responsible for the dream, surmised Sherath. According to legend, it wouldn't be the first time that something vital has been deliberately, as opposed to accidentally, revealed only in a dream.

– With the possible use of the Teaching Word? asked Tarke.

– To ensure that the dream was recorded in the first place, and recorded accurately enough in the second place, almost certainly, said Sherath. And there's a Word of Holding on the record itself, to protect it still further. But sitting here talking is going to get us nowhere, he added. Let's go up to the Second Level.

***

Dinithu met them in the chamber outside the main Archive rooms.

– Well met, he said. The Shethis will not let the Littlest Ones in amongst the records. They will be quite content playing with me while you find what you are looking for.

Sherath led the way through the triple doors into the Archive rooms, calling the werelights to wakefulness as he did so, and heading immediately for the far end section of the middle shelf.

– This is where most of the non-historical records are kept, he said, thumbing through them. He pulled out a thin record, two pages only, bound in dark hard leather, and brought it over to the table in the centre of the room so that everyone could look at it.

"Mishkaw Bzaek: Bzevej sojvw plehh da jip jecab ytij pla zagazajp vepaw soploj," Tarke read, laboriously, from the original.

Nemeth grinned at her. "I think this is one for Sherath," he said.

Sherath looked up, his eyes twinkling. "How do you want it? In the original, or translated? Not that it makes much difference, it makes no sense either way."

"What makes you think it won't make much difference?" asked Sienne softly, challenging Sherath with her dark bright eyes.

"Sienne, you could very well have a point there," said Sherath. "Remind me to remember it, if we get lost. But in the meantime – and I'm going to do a completely literal translation, word for word, this is what Mishka's Dream actually says. You can look through this copy of the translation of it," he said, handing it to Tarke. Jekavi selected a piece of parchment and a charcoal stick from the drawer in the end of the table.

"Read on. I'll make another copy that we can work with," he said.

Sherath leaned over the original decorated record, following the delicate script with one finger as he translated, and then sat back with a wry grin.

"Make sense of that one, if you can," he invited. "Finding the essence in that is going to be harder than looking for a nodule in a heatstack. I never could; there are too many bits, each of which might refer to something, but all together don't seem to refer to anything specific at all. With the possible exception of the last bit, which – "

"No," said Tarke. "Don't start with the last bit, start with the first bit, and work through. It's in here, somewhere."

"Dragon wings shall be not named upon the reverent gates within," said Jekavi, reading from the swift scribbled transcript that he had made. "The reverent gates within might mean something. After all, we're looking for a gateway."

"With no dragon wings named on it?" suggested Louka with a smile at him.

"I only suggested the possibility," said Jekavi.

"It's worth bearing in mind," commented Tarke. "What about the next four lines? 'Flying halo zenith spies, and awaits, swift and akin, the quiet hope, a fantasy of water weed and sleep and sin.'Anyone?"

"To me – but I may be wrong," said Farinka, "those four lines feel like something to do with the first ward and the end of the First Dawn. The bit about sleep and sin, particularly. Sherath? The long-winter-sleeping and the catastrophe that preceded it, possibly? It sort of struck me that way when we looked at it before."

"Possibly. Possibly. But what that has to do with an alternative way to the Hidden Valley, I don't know."

"Perhaps it had been recognised even then that what happened at the close of the First Dawn might have affected the normal way in," said Jevann. "It didn't, but the possibility would have to have been looked at."

Sherath looked over at him and nodded thoughtfully. "And the next four?"

"'Zany halo nings excite any melody or tune, a jesting power now believes, ever upwards span a rune.' Halo nings are rare, but we still have them. And they like music," said Louka.

"The 'jesting power' sounds like someone with a sense of humour," said Jekavi.

– Hlammaeth,said Nemeth. I'm sure this must appeal to his sense of humour.

"The last two lines of that one are obviously just a reference to the writer," said Farinka, peering at Jekavi's scribble.

"To whom is it obvious?" challenged Sherath gently. "Nothing about this is obvious."

"'He who in haven wrote in text fire by all legend ire spewn'," quoted Farinka. "The Western Cave system, if I'm not mistaken, is a haven for several things, including the records. And the person who transcribed the word-of-mouth records of the end of the First Dawn: 'fire by all legend ire spewn' – the anger-strewers – was Mishka. Who also transcribed this dream."

"Valid point," admitted Sherath. "The wording's a bit tortuous, though."

"Poetic licence," said Louka. "It rhymes, it scans. To do that, it must be cut to fit. Like a jacket. You don't take the sleeves from where the legs of the hide were."

"True," agreed Tarke. "But it doesn't make it any clearer."

"How do you know?" challenged Sienne, in the process of making a fairer copy on her own parchment of what Jekavi had scribbled, and looking at it with a great deal of concentration. "Hides are cut different ways for different reasons. You wouldn't cut boots from rabbit-skin."

"Keep thinking, Sienne," said Sherath quietly. "And keep challenging, too."

"Shift over a minute," said Sienne to him. She laid her copy alongside the original, and fitted in the punctuation marks. Then stood frowning at it.

"Getting anything?" asked Jekavi.

"I don't know. I might be," she answered. "Sherath, we have an identical number of letters in both our transcript and the original."

"Yes. I noticed the patterns in the letters years ago; not from this record, but from translations of some of the others," agreed Sherath. "The Archivist has what she tells me is a story that our Common tongue was originally just an encrypted version of Old Common – used to hide written information from people whose eyes it was not intended for; and that because some people had to be fluent in that encryption, it survived as a new language, which then took over from the old."

"It's a heck of a lot easier to speak," said Tarke.

"Common's a heck of a lot easier to speak than anything, when you've been brought up with it," said Nemeth. "You'd have trouble with a lot of the sounds in Southern, which Common doesn't even have letters for," he added with a smile.

"Southern's very hard to speak," said Tarke.

"Rubbish," said Nemeth. "Thousands of Southerners spoke it fluently at the age of three – it can't be that hard. But Common can certainly be spoken."

"Because of the way it was encrypted," said Sherath. "Deliberately, I think, so that it could be spoken by people who needed to discuss secret things verbally where they might have been overheard; though people used to speaking Old Common might have had the same trouble with some of our sounds – and silent letters, which we have plenty of – as some of us might have with Southern. Each of our vowels, for instance, has a direct counterpart in Old Common which is also a vowel. And soft sounds are swapped with soft sounds, and hard ones with hard. T and P, and D and B, for example. The first pair are not vocalised, the second pair are. And, if you think about it, a lot of what we say isn't pronounced the way it's written. We say "bright", not "brig-ht"; and "enough" sounds neither like "cough" nor like "bough", but like "fluff"."

"We need to get off the subject of encryption and languages, and back to Mishka's Dream," Tarke nudged.

"Back to Mishka's Dream, certainly," agreed Sienne quietly, moving away from the original record and seating herself with her own copy of the transcript. "But why necessarily off the subject of encryption? Precog of all sorts is an encryption of a kind, after all."

"Nice one, Sienne," said Jevann. "Hlammaeth did say that the essence is in the interpretation."

"You said before, Sherath, that it might be something that ought to be read between the lines," Farinka reminded him.

"Yes, I did, didn't I? Keep thinking, Sienne. Okay; any thoughts on the next section?" asked Sherath. "' Happy Elven artists borrow winds of aching unjust sprites, catching chords and joyful harmony, glowing topaz, topaz lights; oracle awing in spring repels the evening zenith heights.'"

"These sprites with their harmony and glowing topaz lights sound pretty much like werelights to me," said Tarke, gesturing up at the amber and white werelights hovering close to them. "They do seem a bit less detached than usual about it."

"Yes," said Sherath. "They're like this every time I've looked at this record. The 'oracle awing in spring' sounds like a dragon. Farinka pointed that one out on the way South."

There was a murmur of agreement from the others.

"A justice over and beyond a year's flavour anywhen?" asked Jekavi.

"'Flavour' is interesting," said Louka. "It could well mean 'characteristics', rather than taste."

"Justice that is unchanged by time?" suggested Nemeth. "Ominously divining the 'unjust yen' of a 'zero'? Knowing the intentions of the Evil One?"

"You're all wrong, somewhere," said Sienne, still looking at her transcript. "I don't know why, but you're all wrong. Sherath, I know you're pretty fluent in Old Common, but how fluent, exactly?"

"I don't need to work it out; I can think in it," said Sherath.

"Thank you," said Sienne quietly, turning her paper sideways and then right round. "That might be more important than you think. Because of the way in which you're thinking." Sherath looked at her curiously.

"This next bit is right up your street," he said. "A dragon-Elven puzzle's seven character adjust and pen."

"That's numbers games, not word games," said Sienne, looking up at him with a grin.

"You call this a game?" said Jekavi with a laugh.

Sienne laughed back at him. "Isn't the whole of life like a game?"

"Why is it numbers games?" asked Farinka, intrigued.

Sienne sat back and flexed her shoulder muscles. "I used to play a lot of number games with Dinithu, when I was little," she said. "The dragon-Elven puzzles were the ones that needed most working out, because we count differently. Dragons don't recognise the numbers from seven to ten; if you're a dragon, once you hit six you start over again. Their symbol for seven is the same as ours for ten, for the same reasons. Though the other symbols are different. Here, let me show you," she said, drawing rapidly on the margins of the scrap of parchment.

"One is just like our one, a vertical line. One forelimb. Two is an inverted V – both forelimbs. Three is a triangle – three legs, and four a square. Five is a square with one line at an angle on the top – all four legs and one wing; six is a square with a V on top – all four legs and both wings. Everything is in sets of sevens, seven units equals one-zero, seven sets of seven units each equals one-zero-zero. Or forty-nine, if you're counting our way. Seven of those is one-zero-zero-zero – or three hundred and forty-three. Seven of those is –"

"Aargh!" said Nemeth, dropping his forehead into his hands with a laugh. "Half my brain just quit."

"Sienne is the only one of us that Dinithu ever took down to play the doors on the sixth level," Sherath told Farinka. "For the simple reason that, of us all, only Sienne can actually think in base seven in the same way that I can think in Old Common. Sienne can think like a dragon or a Great Worm, when it comes to numbers."

"The doors unlock with symbols, which you draw onto them with your finger, and what you draw are the answers to puzzles carved on those doors," said Sienne. "To get into a room, you have to write the correct answer in – and if you get it wrong, the door zaps you. Not hard, but it does zap. Once you're in, the door automatically locks and you have to work out another puzzle, on the inside of the door, to get out. And to make it even more fun, that second puzzle has a time limit on it, after which the door zaps you anyway, before giving you the same length of time again to answer the question."

"Terrific fun," said Jekavi.

Sienne cuffed him affectionately across the head. "Yes, and your idea of terrific fun is working for hours building boats or painting on walls."

'If a man does not keep pace with his companions, perhaps it is because he hears a different drummer. Let him step to the music he hears, however measured or far away,' quoted Farinka softly.

– Yes, said Sherath, smiling at her. "So all the dragon-Elven number puzzles have to be adjusted back to sets of sevens. I wonder if Mishka ever played the doors?"

"Perhaps," said Farinka thoughtfully. "What about this last section; 'Here again is a harmony extant; joining a Power's wishes, run inside Blade's ring; Elf's Blade, Elf's might; gives of self within. In care is a joining of minds to unite in ever-upward-searching Justice-Power.' It's completely different, it doesn't rhyme or scan in any way. I think you were right when you said before that it looks like a direct reference to Nemeth's Sword."

– Thank you, Domina, said Nemeth, his eyes meeting hers with intense warmth. "Elf's Blade. And a joining of minds – by the Bondmaker. Which is possibly what the Blade's ring is about. And it's certainly about Power, and in my hands will be about justice. Sherath, there's a particular flavour to the phrase 'Justice-Power', and it's capitalised."

"'Justice-Power' is the Power of understanding that all truths are part of the whole truth, and that the whole truth is the sum of all its parts, not just some of them," said Sherath.

"Describing the Wall," said Farinka.

Sherath smiled across at her. "Yes."

"So where do we go from here?" asked Jekavi.

"Hlammaeth said one other thing, which sounded very much like a numbers game," said Farinka. "'The numbers and their sequence remains the same; only the initiation changes'. Does that mean anything to you, Sienne?"

"Yes; and we're back to dragon-Elven puzzles and sevens again – but in a different way. If you divide one hundred by seven, you get 14.2857142857 and so on, the numbers just keep on going on for ever. The same numbers, in the same sequence. If you have two sevenths of a hundred, you have 28.5714285714. Again, going on for ever. Three sevenths is 42.8571428571. Four sevenths is 57.1428571428, and so on. It's always exactly the same numbers, in exactly the same sequence, but you start the sequence in a different place.

"Seven is the only number that divides it down like that; two, four, five and eight bring you to a finite number, three and nine bring you to a single recurring number, and six gives you a one and then a six repeated an infinite number of times. The only one that gives you .....Hah! hang on a moment," she said with a sudden grin. "This isn't a word game at all, it is a numbers game, and it has to be in the original. Not the transcript. I knew that was important, too. It does make a difference. Move, Sherath."

He grinned, and moved, letting Sienne monopolise the original document.

"Well?" asked Jekavi, his eyes on her. "Have you got it?"

"Yes. I have it," she said, jotting down letters on the reverse side of her own copy. " I knew it was cut to fit in more than one way." She looked up. "Too simple for words. You were half way right about reading between the lines, Sherath. But it's not the lines, it's the letters. You read between the letters. It's every seventh letter."

– Words within words. Your own phrase, Sherath, said Farinka.

"Yes," said Sienne. "Which is why thinking in Old Common will get you nowhere. And I knew that made a difference, too. And it's Old Elvish, when you write them out." She heaved a sigh, and read from her piece of parchment. "Septak Porte, sexte petra, quint satelli, quatte domNomine, trist Tarani, due Unicorne argente e une Syak-Kali omnipotent."

Sherath picked her up and hugged her. "You wonderful girl," he said. "The Seventh Door, six stones, five moons – or, thinking about the First Dawn, possibly five months," he suggested, looking over quickly at Farinka, "four Names, three Taranis – in the hilt of Nemeth's Sword – two silver unicorns and one all-Powerful Syak-Kali."

"What is Syak-Kali?" asked Jevann.

"I don't know," said Sherath, setting Sienne down again. "But we're going to find out – though I don't think it's anything to do with the Hidden Valley. As most of the first message wasn't relevant – only every seventh letter – most of this second message is also not relevant. As Hlammaeth said. I think what we're looking for is the Seventh Door."

– But how much else have we found in the process? asked Nemeth softly.

***

Hlammaeth was waiting for them, back on the Fourth Level.

– Well, Little Sister? he asked Sienne.

– Yes. It was a good one. She hugged the big dragon's neck, and he looked over at Sherath with friendly amusement lighting his eyes.

– To solve a puzzle set by a dragon, it is sometimes necessary to think like a dragon, he said softly.

Sherath walked over to him. –A few questions, he said.

– You want more from me?

– Yes, Big One.

The dragon laughed, and extended one massive forelimb, stretching the toes of it wide.

Sherath took a deep breath, smiled, and stretched his fingers to interlock with those massive toes.

– In proportion to that which I gave you before, said Hlammaeth.

– I am honoured by your offer.

– And I by your acceptance of it.The dragon released Sherath's fingers.

– What is Syak-Kali? asked Sherath, his Awareness probing gently.

Hlammaeth reached forwards towards Sherath's neck with one sharp claw, and ran the tip of it down from Sherath's chin, just letting him feel the sharpness of it.

– Curiosity can be dangerous, he whispered. Sherath smiled. Hlammaeth's claw caught in the Turgel chain, and he lifted it.

– This is Syak-Kali. Not many would have the strength to hide it from the Evil One. It is the compassion with which you sheathe that strength which makes it possible.

Sherath's smile deepened. –What of the six stones?

– Everything within the hidden message has a counterpart in the Dream itself. Some of them you have already discovered. Others may be for you to discover – or they may not. The patterns are still unclear. You may have four answers, therefore you may have three more questions.

– May I have one? asked Nemeth.

– Of the three? Yes.

– Is the death of Miirshekaar's Beastmaster recorded?

– It is not. But neither is his birth. Two questions.

– To whom do the four Names belong? asked Farinka.

– You have already met three of them, and Called one, replied Hlammaeth. One question.

Tarke's Awareness silenced the others; almost Command. She stepped forwards and took Hlammaeth's muzzle in her hands, as Nemeth had done before. Laughter rippled through the big dragon's Awareness as his eyes met hers.

– Where is the Seventh Door? she asked.

– It is after the first six, said Hlammaeth softly, smiling.

Nemeth laughed and slapped Hlammaeth's shoulder. –You're very good at that, aren't you?

– It takes years of practice, said Hlammaeth. When you return from the Valley, we will disport with your new plaything.

– I will hold you to that, said Nemeth, grinning.

Hlammaeth backed gently away from them before spreading his wings and flying away.

– Sherath, asked Farinka.

– Yes, Domina?

– What is the significance of the handlock?

– It's very complex. It's the Dwarvish Seal. At its lightest level, it's used to seal a trading agreement – to fix a price for an item or a service. The Seal is not set or the handlock broken until both parties are happy with the deal, after which point neither has any comeback. The deal, once agreed, cannot be broken. The majority of trading agreements are made without Seal.

In its deepest significance, it's used by Dwarves in all sorts of weightier matters; arbitration, the resolving of conflict, and in their Courts of Justice. In any kind of arbitration, it is absolutely vital that you don't offer Sealing unless you're prepared to stay handlocked for as long as it takes to set the Seal. In those weightier matters, the Seal is an offer of a complete resolution of conflict, and offering the Seal is a physical sign of both your intention to understand the other party's point of view fully, and also to accept the validity of that point of view and its justice as having at least equal weight with your own. The tradition in the Dwarvish Courts of Justice is that the injured party first has to understand and accept the validity of the offender's point of view; and hear the offer that the offender makes for compensation.

Secondly, the offender then has to understand the injured party's point of view, both prior to the offence, and the subsequent effects that the offence has, before hearing the offer that the injured party proposes. Then the offers, if they are compatible, are accepted by the traditional formula, and recorded in the Books, and, once recorded, the Seal is set and the parties may break the handlock.

If the offers are so widely divergent that they cannot be made compatible, then both parties have to agree to work together for a space of ten years to attempt to come to a full understanding of each other; that is then taken as the offer of both parties, it is recorded, and the Seal on that offer is set. After ten years, they handlock again, and come to a resolution. Which is usually total forgiveness on both sides. However, if there is a further offence of any kind which is brought to the Courts by either party against the other during those ten years, the penalty is Death-without-Seal, as it is if the offender commits an identical offence against any other party during those ten years.

Once the final Seal – either at the first Hearing or the second – is set, then a Death-without-Seal penalty is incurred on any identical offence, by which they mean any offence which is identical in its effect, by that offender against that injured party if the matter is brought before the Courts. However trivial the original offence was – it applies to everything from slander to murder. Arbitration can be done with or without Seal, but the Dwarvish Courts of Justice operate exclusively under Seal. Unsurprisingly, Dwarves seldom offend against one another, Sherath added with a smile.

– A very law-abiding people, replied Farinka with a smile.

– Dwarves don't have 'laws', as such Domina. Basically, they have Dwarvish principles, and just one law, which states quite simply that any Dwarf of any age can bring any matter of principle to the Courts if he or she chooses.

– Yo, scary!

– Quite, said Sherath.The most famous one was when a ten-year-old child brought his parents to the Courts, and both parents incurred the Death-without-Seal penalty within six weeks. That ten-year-old was Tyach, who grew up to be possibly the most respected Stonemaster in Dwarvish history. The first offence was that his parents had forbidden him to go down into the Anster Sumares mines to watch the Stonemasters at work. The second was that they locked him in his room for a week for some minor triviality – but their doing so also prevented him from going down the mine. They died. That second offence was brought to the Courts by the senior Stonemaster of that time, who then adopted Tyach and brought him up as his own son.

So it doesn't even have to be the injured party who brings it to the Courts?

No. Anyone can bring it to the Courts. That's the law. There are only three possible outcomes: total forgiveness, binding agreement, or death. At which point, of course, everything is referred to a Higher Court whose justice cannot be questioned – which is why the Dwarves do it. They believe – as we do – that there is life beyond this one. They simply 'refer the matter to a Higher Court'. Sherath grinned. And which is the only Court of Appeal recognised by the Dwarves. Interestingly, the old Elf-Courts – which were open to Men, Dwarves, and Elves, can refer offenders to the Dwarf Court for sentence-under-Seal at their own discretion.

Why were they so harsh on the parents, though? asked Farinka. Just for restricting the child to his room?

It wasn't what they did, Domina – it was why it was done. Dwarves are a jealous people, but there are forms of jealousy which are wholly aberrant and abominable to Dwarves. The child was a genius – even at ten years old – and the father was not. The father – on the first offence – violated one of the most basic Dwarvish principles, which is that genius or talent is to be honoured, nurtured, cherished and supported, because it reflects well on the whole community. Genius belongs to all Dwarves, not just one. Genius is not to be suppressed or discouraged or forbidden, Sherath answered.

The father was so jealous of the child's genius that he wanted to prevent the child from learning more, or from using what he already knew? asked Farinka.

Yes, Domina, said Sherath. That was the real crime – the unforgivable crime. And the mother was similar – she resented the fact that the child made his father appear a 'lesser being'. One advantage of the death penalty for aberrant jealousy is – from the Dwarves' point of view – that it stops the aberrants breeding more aberrants. Which is quite possibly why there are so few. Any more questions?  He grinned.

One. How do the Dwarves execute their aberrants?

As humanely as they can. They use a ceremonial stone chisel – very sharp – and drive it from the nape of the neck up under the base of the skull. It's done by an expert, very fast. The offender is dead before he can feel the pain. Nothing, however, can prevent him – or her – from knowing what is going to happen.

Okay, said Farinka. Tell me more about the Elf Courts.

The advantage of being tried by the Elf-Courts was that nothing whatsoever can be hidden. The minds of the alleged offenders, the alleged victims, and the supposed witnesses, could be made open to everybody through Awareness and the Word of Teaching – and made open after they have made statements by word or in writing. Any writing was checked by Awareness to be their own and not made by force.

– Scary in itself, commented Farinka. Who would want everybody to know everything that was in their minds? No secrets of any kind, at all?

– What was made known was always filtered by whoever was sitting in Power at the time. Only that which had direct relevance was made known. And 'direct relevance' meant anything that the person who had the thought realised had direct relevance. If the Elf-Courts found that anybody had lied in their statements, they could refer that person for sentence-under-Seal direct to the Dwarf Courts for bearing false witness. And Dwarves really don't like people who bear false witness against someone – because of the death-without-Seal possibility. It can't be undone. They would sometimes call an Elf-Hearer in to their own Courts if they had doubts about somebody's word.

Lies never got past the Elf-Courts. Anyone taking their case to the Elf-Courts had to be made aware that it could, though not necessarily 'must', be referred to the Dwarvish Courts for sentence-under-Seal. And if one person in a case wanted to take it to the Elf-Courts, the Elf-Courts would hear that person – and anybody else who cared to turn up. The Elf-Courts looked at what was in people's minds – not just at what they might appear to have done. And they looked into everyone's mind who was associated in any way or could have been – not just the minds of conveniently-chosen "witnesses" such as the Human courts use. There were no twistings and distortions in the Elf-Courts – just simple truths. You can't fool an Elf, Domina! If a witness was saying something untrue, but believing it to be true, Elves would know something was wrong, and be able to find out where the untruth came from. Domina, there's something in the Shethi Archives about a First Door, he added with a smile. Shall we go?

Sienne brushed Sherath's shoulder lightly with the tips of her fingers. –Jekavi and I will stay with the little ones. This time, she said.

– Shrewd, said Sherath with a smile, and for her ears only. My respect for you grows by the second, Sienne.

She smiled back.