"Yes." Neeshan turned to the Free'l, who were sharing the dyla melons out around their circle. "You see? _That's_ how it ought to be. You cast a spell. You're careful with it. And it works. Right away." "When you do it, it works," Rhn answered. "Magic works when _anybody_ does it. But you have to do it right." Rhn raised his mud-plastered shoulders in a shrug. "It's such a lot of dreeze, doing it that way. Magic ought to be fun." He walked away, munching on a slice of the melon the demon had brought. Neeshan stared after him, his eyes hot. "Dreeze" was a Free'l word that referred originally to the nasal drip that accompanied that race's virulent head colds. It had been extended to mean almost anything annoying. The Free'l, who spent much of their time sitting in the rain, had a lot of colds in the head. Wasn't there anything to be done with these people? Even the simplest spell was too dreezish for them to bother with. He was getting a headache. He'd better perform a headache-removing spell. He retired to the hut the Free'l had assigned to him. The spell worked, of course, but it left him feeling soggy and dispirited. He was still standing in the hut, wondering what he should do next, when his big black-and-gold tooter in the corner gave a faint "woof." That meant headquarters wanted to communicate with him. Neeshan carefully aligned the tooter, which is basically a sort of lens for focusing neural force, with the rising double suns. He moved his couch out into a parallel position and lay down on it. In a minute or two he was deep in a cataleptic trance. The message from headquarters was long, circuitous, and couched in the elaborate, ego-caressing ceremonial of high magic, but its gist was clear enough. "Your report received," it boiled down to. "We are glad to hear that you are keeping on with the Free'l. We do not expect you to succeed with them--none of the other magical missionaries we have sent out ever has. But if you _should_ succeed, by any chance, you would get your senior warlock's rating immediately. It would be no exaggeration, in fact, to say that the highest offices in the Brotherhood would be open to you." * * * * * Neeshan came out of his trance. His eyes were round with wonder and cupidity. His senior warlock's rating--why, he wasn't due to get that for nearly four more six hundred-and-five-day years. And the highest offices in the Brotherhood--that could mean anything. Anything! He hadn't realized the Brotherhood set such store on converting the Free'l. Well, now, a reward like that was worth going to some trouble for. Neeshan sat down on his couch, his elbows on his knees, his fists pressed against his forehead, and tried to think.