"Hey," said Urson. "I'm not a bear."

"Your name means bear," Geo said. Then to the lady, "You see, I have been well trained."

"I'm afraid I have not," she replied. "Poetry and rituals were a hobby of a year's passing interest when I was younger. But that was all." Now she looked down at the boy whom Urson still held. "You two look alike. Dark eyes, dark hair." She laughed. "Are there other things in common between poets and thieves?"

"Well," complained Urson with a jerk of his chin, "this one here won't spare a few silvers for a drink of good wine to wet his best friend's throat, and that's a sort of thievery, if you ask me."

"I did not ask," said the woman, quietly.

Urson huffed.

"Little thief," the woman said. "Little four arms. What is your name?"

Silence, and the dark eyes narrowed.

"I can make you tell me," and she raised her hand to her throat again.

Now the eyes opened wide, and the boy pushed back against Urson's belly.

Geo reached toward the boy's neck where a ceramic disk hung from a leather thong. Glazed on the white enamel was a wriggle of black with a small dot of green for an eye at one end. "This will do for a name," Geo said. "No need to harm him. Snake is his symbol; Snake shall be his name."

"Little Snake," she said, dropping her threatening hand, "how good a thief are you?" She looked at Urson. "Let him go."

"And miss thrashing his backside?" objected Urson.

"He will not run away."

Urson released him, and four hands came from behind the boy's back and began massaging one another's wrists. But the dark eyes watched her until she repeated, "How good a thief are you?"

With only a second's indecision, he reached into his clout and drew out what seemed another leather thong similar to the one around his neck. He held up the fist from which it dangled, and the fingers opened slowly to a cage.

"What is it?" Urson 

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