12 ROGER ZELAZNY
"How do you think he will take to wearing the flesh
again?" asked Tak.
"Go peel bananas with your feet!"
Tak chose to consider this a dismissal and departed
the chamber, leaving Yama to close down the machin-
ery. He made his way along a corridor and down a wide
flight of stairs. He reached the landing, and as he stood
there he heard the sound of voices and the shuffling of
sandals coming in his direction from out a side hall.
Without hesitating, he climbed the wall, using a
series of carved panthers and an opposing row of ele-
phants as handholds. Mounting a rafter, he drew back
into a well of shadow and waited, unmoving.
Two dark-robed monks entered through the arch-
way.
"So why can she not clear the sky for them?" said
the first.
The second, an older, more heavily built man,
shrugged. "I am no sage that I can answer such ques-
tions. That she is anxious is obvious, or she should
never have granted them this sanctuary, nor Yama this
usage. But who can mark the limits of night?"
"Or the moods of a woman," said the first. "I have
heard that even the priests did not know of her com-
ing."
"That may be. Whatever the case, it would seem a
good omen."
"So it would seem."
They passed through another archway, and Tak lis-
tened to the sounds of their going until there was only
silence.
Still, he did not leave his perch.
