"Here, try this on," said the moon trog, handing Shaun a suit of plate mail armour. "If the measurements are accurate, it should fit perfectly."

Shaun took the suit and was surprised at how light it was. Not light in terms of weight, as it would have weighed virtually nothing in Kronos's low gravity even if it had been made from plates of lead, but light in terms of being thin and flimsy, as if it were made of plates of eggshell. He examined it critically. It looked comfy enough, with a soft backing of finely woven cotton, but he couldn't believe it would stop a peashooter, let alone an fourteen inch war arrow with all the force of an Agglemonian crossbow behind it. The plates, each about the size of his thumbnail, were as thin as a sheet of paper and, he was shocked to find, slightly transparent.

"What's it made of?" he asked doubtfully.

"A kind of glass ceramic," replied Ban-Chin, coming forward to stand beside the tailor. "It was invented since we came up here, so I doubt there's anything like it back on Tharia."

"Glass!" exclaimed Shaun in outrage. "You expect me to wear plate mail made of glass?"

"Glass ceramic," corrected the moon trog with a smile. "Light and ultra strong." He laughed at the continuing look of disbelief on the human's face and produced a larger sheet, six inches square. "Here," he said, handing it over. "Try to break it."

Shaun turned it over and over in his hands, looking up at the moon trog's smiling face. He looked back down at the sheet and applied a little pressure with his fingers. He expected it to snap easily, like a sheet of ice, but it didn't. He applied a little more pressure, using both hands this time, then a bit more, increasing until he was straining with the effort but it still resisted him. He eventually gave up, his doubt replaced by a new respect. "By the Gods!" he said.

"Glasses are one of our specialities," said Ban-Chin. "We make kinds of glass so strong that they've replaced metal in some applications. We make kinds of glass with other exotic properties as well, for other purposes. It was our clan that first invented optical fibre thousands of years ago, although that secret soon leaked out. Virtually all trog clans know how to make it now." He gestured again at the suit of plate mail. "Try it on. We recommend you wear it against the skin. You can wear whatever you like on top of it."

Shaun handed the sheet of glass ceramic to Matthew and removed his new suit of clothes until he was floating in his underwear. Then he pulled the suit on, buttoning it up the front. With its long legs, long sleeves and hood, it protected virtually his entire body.

"How does it feel?" asked Diana.

"Really comfy," replied the soldier, looking at himself in a mirror. "Hardly feels like armour at all." He pulled on his other clothes again, also made for him by the tailor. With the hood carefully folded down around his neck, no part of the armour suit was visible and he looked like any ordinary citizen of any normal city on Tharia. Unfortunately, the citizens of Kronosia tended to dress lightly, the men in particular wearing open tunics that left their chests bare. They wouldn't be able to wear them in the moon city, not if they wanted to blend invisibly amongst the common people, but they would be perfect for the journey there. The perfect defence against cons and Konnen patrols.

"There's one for all of you," said the tailor, producing five more suits. They all took one, and the wizards found that theirs were armless, as they'd requested. The casting of most spells demanded very precise hand and arm movements and they'd been worried that armour on their arms might have restricted their movements too much. Having listened to Shaun praising his suit, though, they now suspected that they'd been overcautious, but it was too late to do anything about it now.

Diana and Lirenna swam off into an adjoining chamber to change, leaving the men to change where they were, and a few minutes later they were all wearing the new armour under their normal clothes.

"You're right," agreed Jerry as he did up the last few buttons. "Really comfortable."

"This is really good of you," said Diana to the moon trogs. "We're really grateful."

"It's the least we could do," replied Ban-Chin. "After all, you're about to risk your lives for our benefit. The least we can do is give you some proper protection."

Matthew was fingering the edge of the glass ceramic sheet with his thumb. "Could you make swords out of this stuff?" he asked. "If it's that hard, I bet you could put one hell of an edge on it."

"Not heavy enough," replied Shaun. "For some applications, you need weight."

"You could have an ordinary metal sword with a ceramic edge," suggested Matthew. "Get the best of both worlds."

"It might be possible," said Ban-Chin thoughtfully. "We do indeed use glass ceramic knives for fine work, but we lack the strength to wield brute force weapons so we've never had any use for the kind of sword you describe. It might be interesting to look into it, as a purely academic exercise."

They thanked the tailor again for his help and then left, swimming back out into the tunnel corridor. "When will you be leaving?" asked Ban-Chin.

"In the morning, I expect," replied Diana. "I mean, after our next sleep period. I keep forgetting not to use Tharian words like night and day."

The moon trog laughed. "It must be very convenient, night falling when you're ready to sleep and morning coming when you wake up again. Much better than the way we do things."

"Well, you can't slow down Kronos's orbit around Tharia, so there's not much you can do about it," said Thomas.

"It'll be funny not having you around," said Ban-Chin. "I've sort of gotten used to you."

"And us to you," agreed the cleric, putting a hand on the wrinkled skin of his shoulder.

"Still, I expect we'll be seeing each other from time to time," continued the moon trog. "After all, Kronos is a small place, and maybe one day things'll be better between us and the Kronosians, allowing us to visit each other."

"Who knows?" agreed Diana, smiling uncomfortably.

The others glanced at each other in concern, but fortunately the moon trog seemed unable to read human expressions. Either that or he knew the truth very well and was collaborating with the deception.

They arrived back at the cavern containing their temporary living quarters and the moon trog waved goodbye to them before continuing along the tunnel, heading for his own home. The Tharians were by now becoming quite adept at moving in zero gravity and, kicking off from the cavern entrance, they sailed across the fifty foot gap to the entrance to their living quarters with almost flawless accuracy, grabbing hold of the iron rings set into the wall around the door to stop themselves bouncing off again. A crowd of young moon trogs, floating in a crowd nearby to watch the strange groundlubbers, cheered and clapped with all four hands, having watched with great amusement as they'd failed the same manoeuvre many times during the previous few days, and the Tharians gave them a bow and a wave before disappearing through the door.

"I hate lying to him," said Diana as soon as the door was closed.

"We've got no choice," replied Shaun. "How would he react if he found out we're hoping to return to Tharia, carrying news of the moon trogs with us?"

"He wouldn't report us," the cleric insisted. "He's our friend."

"He's our friend so long as he thinks we're being totally open and honest with him," her brother replied. "We have to assume that his first loyalty is to his own people, though. I'm pretty sure that, if he knew the truth, he'd report us to the Dallak. They'd keep us imprisoned for the rest of our lives. In comfort, perhaps, but in prison nonetheless."
"And even if he did keep quiet," added Thomas, "there's the risk that they might find out anyway and then he'd be in trouble. I don't want to make problems for him when he's been so kind to us. Best to keep lying to him and save him from having to make the terrible choice."

Diana nodded unhappily, and they made preparations to settle down for the 'night'.

Ten hours later, well rested and refreshed, they were met at the door by a troop of guardsmen armed with tranquillising blowdarts who escorted them back up to one of the large tunnel streets near the surface where a member of the Dallak was waiting to see them off. He hadn't spoken during their meeting with the Dallak some days earlier, and gave the impression of being a rather junior member of the moon trogs' ruling body. He was probably there more to make sure they were really leaving than to honour their brief visit. As Ban-Chin had said when they'd first met, before they'd become friends, there was no place for humans (or shaes or nomes) in moon trog society.

Supplies of food and water had been left there for them, and the moon trog advised them to take a drink from the large, two gallon water tanks at regular intervals, whether they were thirsty or not. "You don't want to come down with dehydration again," he said. "Weightlessness is a completely foreign environment to you, and you can't rely on your bodies' normal warning systems to tell you when you're drying out." They promised him that they would take his advice.

He then gave them a map of the major tunnels and caverns between their present position and Kronosia, drawn in immaculately fine detail on a folded sheet of fine, high quality paper. "It's colour coded," he explained. "The darker the shade of red, the further below the surface it is. It probably wouldn't matter if it fell into Konnen hands, as they've already mapped it out pretty thoroughly themselves, but if you could destroy it anyway as soon as you get there, just in case..."

"We will, we promise," replied Shaun, taking the map.

"Just follow the route we've marked and you'll get there okay," said the moon trog. "That'll take you away from known con encampments and tiger hunting grounds."

"Thank you very much," said Diana gratefully. "You and your people have been real friends to us. We won't forget you."

The other Tharians repeated the sentiment, and the moon trog then gave a short farewell speech, which the Tharians listened to politely even though it was obvious that his heart wasn't in it. He was just pleased to see them go. Fortunately he kept it short, and as soon as he'd finished the Tharians swung the large water bottles onto their backs and left, waving goodbye until they rounded a bend in the tunnel and passed out of sight.

"Well, they were friendly enough," said Jerry as they settled down to the journey back to the city. "Nice to know not everyone in this ball of rock is as crazy as a demented troll."

The others grinned in reply, but sobered at the thought that they would soon be among the demented trolls again. The chances were that they'd soon be wishing they'd begged for permanent sanctuary among the moon trogs. Well, they'd made their decision. Now they just had to live with it.

They sighed with resignation, therefore, and pushed their way off from the wall to float gently along the dark, circular tunnel.

☆☆☆

The Tharians' journey from Kronosia to the moon trogs had taken several days, as they'd been wandering lost and going around in circles for much of the time, but now that they had a map to follow they expected to be able to make the return journey, a distance of slightly less than ten miles, in just a few hours. They didn't expect any trouble, so long as they stayed on the route Ban-Chin had marked on the map, but they were prepared for an unexpected surprise anyway, and it was just as well because it came less than an hour after leaving the moon trogs.

Andricus Coroman was having a bite to eat in a small side tunnel when he saw the dim, red light of Thomas's glowbottle passing by fifty yards away, illuminating the figures of the six Tharians. He gave a gasp of surprise, as the Konnens had all but given up any hope of finding their quarry after so long, and launched himself back towards their campsite to give Rakkus the news. He cursed loudly to himself as he went. Ever since the huge head guard had started showing an interest in him he'd been trying to keep as low a profile as possible in the hope that his interest would drift elsewhere, but delivering this news would put him squarely back into the forefront of his attention, and that was a bad place for a handsome, and not terribly brave, young man to be. For a moment he considered saying nothing, just forgetting he'd seen the Tharians, but if Rakkus found out he'd flay the flesh from his bones. The alternative, awful though it would be, was just barely preferable, and anyway the head guard's interest rarely stayed in the same place for long.

"I've seen them," he announced therefore when he arrived at the tunnel junction where the others were camped, hidden and protected by airlocks in each of the three corridors that converged there. "In the big tunnel."

Rakkus leapt to his feet, sending a cloud of broken stalks of moss flying in all directions. "You're sure?" he demanded.

"Yes sir. No mistake this time, it's them all right. They're heading back to the city."

"Good man!" said the head guard, putting a hand on the young man's upper arm. Andricus tensed up with anxiety and disgust as the other man left his hand there for just a little too long, but he didn't dare complain.

"Come on, let's get 'em," Rakkus added. He launched himself out through the airlock, barely touching the sides as he went, and the others hurried after him, not wanting to be left behind.

"We'll go this way," said Rakkus, taking a small tunnel branching off to the right. "If they are heading back to the city, we can cut them off in spindle cave. Remember that three of them are wizards, they can shoot bolts of fire at you, deadly as arrows. The double thickness armour we're wearing should protect us, they'll find us harder targets than the Traldians, but watch out all the same."

"Those bloody firebolts burned right through the Traldians' breastplates like they were made of paper," said Barnatt, his eyes wide with fear. "They just pointed their fingers and Traldians fell dead, screaming."

"That's why we're wearing the new armour," sneered Rakkus. "Lord Basil cares for you. He anticipated that we might end up fighting them and ordered the new armour made to protect you. Anyway, if we catch them by surprise we won't have to find out. Take out the wizards first. They can shoot their firebolts at the demons of the Pit."

"Why would they be heading back to the city?" asked one of the other men curiously. "They only just got away last time."

"Maybe they think it's the last place we'd look," suggested another.

"Shut up!" growled Rakkus. "They'll hear you."

He was right, Andricus knew. Sounds could carry a long way in the strange acoustics of the tunnels, so they kept quiet from then on as they hurried to ambush the Tharians.