The Man of Gold

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For upwards of half an hour now they had watched the runner on the road below the single watchtower of the monastery. Nothing at first but a tiny fleck of azure on the heat-shimmering horizon, he became a species of insect, all coppery brown legs beneath a carapace of brilliant blue, then a tiny mannikin moving with jerky puppet strides along the dusty, empty roadway. The younger of the two watchers on the parapet made the Pe Choi gesture-language symbol for “half” to his comrade.

The other man shook his shaven head and applied a box-like device to his eye. “Not so, Harsan, not this time. I make no more wagers. I still think he will take another Kiren to reach our gates, but I’ll not bet upon it. You have impoverished me already.”

The younger man hitched up his grey priestly kilt and carefully clambered back down from the dizzy height of the embrasured wall. “Let me look again through your invention, Zaren. I cannot imagine what an Imperial messenger desires here.”

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