She came forward now, a strange, shining creature. Her beauty was a breathless thing—ethereal, almost unreal. The cunningly-fashioned toga of silver cloth she wore matched the spun silver of her hair.
Yet her hair's silver could not have been that of age, for her skin still held the fresh glow of youth, though uniquely translucent and silvery itself—nearly as pale and clear as the bodies of Pluto's bloodless ice-things.
As if in studied contrast, her lips gleamed rich purple, more blue than red; and a hundred striking violet tints glinted in her eyes.
Even over the vocodor, her voice had a strange, alien lilt, as if her thoughts, her words, strained the unit's powers: "You ... you are the Earthman—the gar of the asteroids...."
She came close to Shane as she spoke; very close, till the fragrance of unknown flowers rose in his nostrils. Her pale hands touched his cheeks, and the violet eyes probed his.
They were strange eyes, as strange as the worlds had ever seen—young and clear as a girl's, yet somehow old, too ... old as the void itself; and the things that were in them sent queer tremors rippling through Shane like a chill. It was as if the woman were looking beyond the things that others saw—probing deeper, searching for some precious secret element that only she could grasp.
"You are strong, Earthman!" she said softly, and now her voice held a throaty urgency, an undertone that might have told of inner tension. "There is life in you ... much life. It flows hot in your veins...."
"He is not for you, Shi Kyrsis!" Reggar rasped harshly. "Our trap needs bait, and we cannot spare him!"
The hands drew away from Shane's cheeks. The woman turned, and her violet eyes grew big and dangerous. "You cannot—?" she asked, her voice even softer than before. "Who says you cannot, Reggar?"
"We cannot, Shi Kyrsis," Reggar answered. One webbed hand moved in an angry, incisive gesture. "We, the two of us, you and I. I cannot, because without him to serve as cover the Federation will sooner or later have my head. And you cannot, because without me there will be no slaves."
The woman's hands cupped, as if the long, purple-nailed fingers held some priceless goblet. "But life is a sacred thing!" she whispered. "It runs so strong within him...."
"It runs stronger than you know," Quos Reggar slashed back bitterly. "He is a legend, a madman who has carved his destiny across the void." He slapped the great Chonya belt that girded him. "Do you think that weakness won this belt? He is built of blood and iron! Even I confess it, though I hate him. But you cannot let yourself think of that now. For he must live, and he must raid, and he must be seen, if we are to break the power of the Federation and open up the void to slaving. Trust me, I know—"
Shane said: "I once knew a man who trusted Reggar. They were partners together in their dirty business, and as thick as thieves could get. When my blockade—"
"Shut up!" roared Reggar.
"When my blockade drove the slavers out of the asteroids, these two were trapped off Juno—"
Reggar sprang at Shane—webbed hands clutching, great lobed eyes aflame.
But the silver woman, Kyrsis, came between them. Gently, she said, "I'll hear him out, Reggar."
Shane smiled thinly. "When I ordered the pair of them to surrender, Reggar, here, came to me secretly, and offered to send me the partner's head if I'd let him—Reggar—go on a promise that he'd never ramp ship in the asteroid belt again. I agreed, and he brought the head."
"You chitza!" screamed Reggar. With agility amazing for his size, he leaped past the woman called Kyrsis.
Shane tried to dodge, but the guards who flanked him seized him.
Reggar struck him across the mouth.
Shane slumped back. He would have fallen but for the guards.
Then the woman's voice came—sharp, icecold: "I would not do that again, Reggar, if I were you ... if I wished to live!" And then, to Shane: "Is there more?"
Blood trickled from Shane's mouth. He swayed, and a crooked grin twisted his swollen lips. "Only one thing, Shi Kyrsis," he mumbled. "The partner was Tas Reggar—this creature's brother!"
"He lies!" snarled Reggar. "He lies in his teeth like the chitza he is! I have no brother—"
"Perhaps not—now!" Shane baited. "How could you have? You sent me his head in a sack!"
A sound of incoherent fury bubbled in Reggar's throat. The great lobed eyes were flecked with red. Again he sprang at Shane.
But again the silver woman came between them. The violet eyes were probing, thoughtful. "The story has a ring to it, Reggar—a twist that somehow fits you."
The other's mottled face contorted. The webbed hands clenched into fists. "It is a lie!" he snarled thickly. And then, in a voice that still trembled with repression: "I have no brother. I had none. But even if the tale were true, what difference would it make? We are here, together—"
Shane said: "What difference? For one thing, it would let her know whose neck would stretch, whose blood would spurt, if the time again came for you to make a choice. You'd cut her throat and save your own—"
"Silence!" roared the giant mongrel. He pivoted to face the woman. "Can you not see this yodor Earthman's goal, Shi Kyrsis? Is it not plain enough that he seeks to brew distrust between us, in the hope that out of it he can snatch a chance to break us both, and save his hide and his beloved Chonyas?"
Slowly, the woman nodded. "Perhaps ... yes, probably."
"And is there anyone but me who'll bring you slaves by the thousands?" Reggar pressed on, relentless. "Where else can you find these lives you're seeking?"
The woman made no answer.
"But why?" Shane cut in fiercely. "Where is your home, that you still need slaves? Work is for machines, and power is free. Why throw away living beings upon it?"
The silver woman stared. "You mean—you do not know—?"
"No! Quiet!" choked Reggar. "Have you gone mad, Shi Kyrsis? This man would destroy us. He must not know."
The silver woman looked from the mongrel to Shane and back again. "Then ... how do you plan—?"
Quos Reggar shrugged. "The theol will make him ours. Three injections, spaced one Earth day apart, give the habit." He turned, leered at Shane. "Do you know about theol, great gar? Have you heard what it does—how it paralyzes the will of even the strongest?"
"I know," Shane answered bleakly. "Call it madness, not habit. It works on the brain a hundred times worse than wormwood—and a thousand times faster."
"You live for it," the mongrel nodded, chuckling. "Night and day, you dream of it, they say. You'll steal for it, fight for it, kill for it. With every dose, you need it more. And nowhere is there a cure."
Shane said nothing.
Reggar gestured to the guards.
They caught Shane's arms once more; held him rigid.
Reggar drew an injector from inside his tunic; then a bottle. Quickly, he filled the needle and inserted the gas ampule.
Still Shane stood silent, stoney-faced.
Kyrsis said: "Why must you have it this way, Earthman? Give your sworn word that you'll serve us, and Reggar will put away the theol."
"I'd rather take the theol," Shane answered tightly.
"But why, Earthman? Why?"
Shane's laugh was bitter, curt. "It is a thing you would not understand, Shi Kyrsis. On Earth, they call it conscience."
A shadow seemed to pass across the silver woman's pale, lovely face. The violet eyes were suddenly uncertain. "I—I do not know...."
"You never will," Shane answered. Coldly, contemptuously, he met her gaze. "But the time will come, I promise you, when you'll know that I did not lie about Reggar—that no matter what he says, you cannot trust him. Even now—here, today, this very minute—he is planning to betray you."
"But how—?"
"Why bother to tell you more? You would not believe me. But when the day arrives, say to yourself just once, 'I had my chance; the Earthman warned me'."
"Hold him tight!" Reggar warned the guards angrily. "The theol will put an end to his mumblings!"
He came close to Shane. A webbed hand twitched the Earthman's head. The injector poised close to the sun-tanned throat.
Shane went completely limp. Dead weight, he sagged loose in the guards' hands.
They swayed under the drag of him; shifted, trying to regain their balance.
Shane writhed in a savage, spasmodic effort to break free. He kicked hard at Reggar.
But the guards' hold held. Reggar twisted out of the way of the kick. He jerked Shane's head around by the hair.
"It ends here, chitza!"
Face contorted in ghoulish triumph, he drove the injector's plunger home.
The theol sprayed into Shane's throat....
CHAPTER VI
They were singing in the dungeons—a wild Chonya song that had echoed down through the reckless years since that fateful day when the first great raider ship blasted off from the asteroids across the void:
"My whole crew?" Shane asked tonelessly.
One of the Martian falas of the escort nodded.
"Then why bother with me? They can tell you as much about the ship as I."
The fala shrugged. But a Pervod snarled: "The fools will do nothing without your orders—not even tell us which are the technicians. We broke the captain's back, but still he refused to explain the mechanism."
Shane's blue eyes grew cold as the pits of Neptune. "He's dead, then?"
"Yes, and so will the rest of them be, unless you tell them to obey."
"I'll give them their orders," Shane answered curtly. The muscles were standing out along his jaws.
They moved on, into the dungeon's outer room, where crowding Chonyas shouted their hate and shook the bars.
A crewman with a bloody bandage about his head leaped onto a bench and, pointing, cried out, "Gar Shane!"
The singing died away.
"Your first trick is your last!" the guard in charge snarled in Shane's ear. Roughly, he shoved the Earthman forward.
Shane strode through the settling silence. Wordless, he looked about him—at the glittering, unbreachable, green telonium walls; at the lean, tough horde of Chonya crewmen, pressing hot-eyed and intense against the bars; at the guards who flanked and backed him, light-guns out and lance-prods ready.
He swung back till again he faced the Chonyas; took a step or two with a reckless swagger. His back was stiff, his head unbowed.
In a hard flat voice he said: "These slavers who hold us here want full technical data on the Abaquist meteor repellers on our ship. Already, they have broken your captain's back because he would not give it to them."
The silence echoed.
"We were brought here with our minds locked in the control of a Paulsini beam. Through it, these starbos can drag out our innermost thoughts—force us to do their will. They would use it on us now, if they could. But they have insulated this whole satellite against it, so it is useless so long as we are here."
Still there was no sound, save for the restless scrape of feet, the rustle of heavy breathing.
"We are their prisoners, utterly and completely. They have even taken away the belt your chieftains gave me—" Shane ran his hands along his waist, "the Chonya belt, the great iron belt of the asteroids."
The scraping and rustling grew louder. A low, guttural rumble ran through the crowd.
"They say they'll cut us down if we do not obey them, and they've smeared their hands in your captain's blood to prove it!"
From somewhere in the back of the crowd, a Chonya shouted, "Where do you stand, Gar Shane? What would you have us do?"
"I?" Shane swept them with his gaze. "I? What would you have me say? We are their prisoners, are we not? They have conquered us, even if by a trick. We have no choice but to do their will ... for now." He paused; laughed harshly, cynically. "Were I to tell you otherwise, I, too, would die within the moment—and we all know it."
The captive crew flung back his bitter laughter. The first flush of hate was washed from the fierce faces, replaced by narrowed eyes and calculating glances.
Shane called: "Repeller crew—forward!" And then, quickly: "Orshawn ... Dylar ... Hebza ... Tisban ... Korch—"
Men pressed through to the bars. Without waiting, Shane wheeled to the guards. "Here are your men—the repeller crew itself! They will give you everything."
A fala shoved him aside, against the bars of the cage. A Mercurian threw the lever that controlled the lock.
Barely audible, one of the Chonyas whispered, "Gar Shane! You know—?"
"—that the repeller is fully automatic? That there is no crew?" Shane bared his teeth in the caricature of a smile. His eyes were very hard and bright. "Yes, Chonya; I know."
Now the crewmen that Shane had named were out. The door of bars clanged shut again.
A Thorian caught the Earthman by the arm. "Get on! And if these dogs of the asteroids do not tell us all Quos Reggar wants to know, both you and they will die by inches!" He cuffed Shane towards the dungeon's entrance.
Shane reeled ahead, half falling, and the guards laughed at the sight of him; and one booted him from behind so that he nearly sprawled on the glistening green telonium floor. But he clutched the outer door and recovered, hanging by the edge of it as it swung on its hinges till he was almost into the corridor beyond.
Only two guards remained there, both Pervods.
The fire in Shane's cold blue eyes burst into wild, singing flame. Of a sudden the laxness left his face. The awkwardness fell from his stance.
"Now, Chonyas!" he shouted.
In the same instant he whirled and shoved the great door open with all his might.
The edge caught the first of the guards behind him, a fala, full in the face.
Shane leaped upon the creature as it staggered. He caught the barrel of the thing's light-pistol; wrested it away.
With a hoarse cry the guard sprang after him, clawing for the weapon.
Rock-steady, Shane triggered the exciter. The pistol's purple beam struck the fala full in the face. Still clawing—clawing in the agonies of death, now—the creature lurched backward.
Beyond it boiled a scene of strange, wild carnage. The Chonyas of Shane's mythical "repeller crew" had leaped upon the other guards—tearing away weapons, beating them down.
Now one wrenched the ray-key that activated the locking lever from the Mercurian and slammed it home. The bolt that held the door of bars lifted.
With a wild roar, the Chonyas inside the cage burst forth.
The Pervods in the corridor beyond the dungeons rushed to bar the great outer door.
Shane blasted the first before he had even crossed the threshold.
The second turned to flee.
The Earthman's light-beam caught him in the middle of his first step.
A Chonya came running, a bloody lance-prod in his hands, eyes blazing with excitement. "Gar Shane! What now? The ship—?"
"You know where it is?"
"Yes. Close by here—"
"No matter. Get the men aboard and man the guns. Blast all the corridors but one. I'll need that to get back to you."
"But where—?"
"There's a job to do before we leave, if we're not to be dragged back here as we were before."
"The Paulsini—!"
"Right!" Shane laughed harshly. The sheer joy of battle shone in his face. "They'll expect us to blast off the instant the crew's aboard."
The Chonya's eyes gleamed fiercely. "You'll need help—"
"Three men, and a guard to guide us—"
The Chonya laughed aloud. "Two others and a guard, Gar Shane! I am the first!" he cried, exulting.
Commands crackled, then, and other crewmen crowded forward; and in brief seconds Shane and the Chonyas and a bloody-headed, bewildered Uranian were roaring down the echoing dimness of the corridor in a guard-car.
Then, on the Uranian's order, they changed direction, and now they were hurtling through vast, high-ceilinged chambers where giant machines stood row on row in countless thousands. No living being was anywhere evident ... only the machines, churning endlessly at their task with cold efficiency.
"Converters!" Shane muttered, half beneath his breath. "Power converters.... A different kind, one I've never seen before."
"Nor I," a Chonya technician at his side echoed grimly. "Who needs such power today, Gar Shane? And the source—where is it? It would take whole seas of energy to feed these monsters. There are too many!"
"Too many," Shane nodded. For a long moment he peered through the vision slot in silence, then backed away again. "A slaver is a slaver, Dylar. Some are small, and some are big. But this is too big for any slaver. The whole surface of this moon is covered with a rabbit-warren such as this, twelve levels deep. We find power converters by the million—more than a major planet could use, even in the days before the Federation began to broadcast free power to all."
Another of the Chonyas broke in now: "The Uranian says the Paulsini lies just beyond the next stop, Gar Shane—and his fear runs too high for him to lie."
Shane studied the great, hairy beast through narrowed eyes. "Is there a guard?" he clipped.
The Uranian shook his head jerkily.
"Get ready, then!" the Earthman rapped. Again his eyes sought out the Uranian, and after a moment he gestured towards him. "Shove him off first, and then land running."
The guard-car slowed.
Shane shaded his eyes and studied the dim spaces ahead through the vision port, the light-pistol ready in his hand.
Then the car was swaying, grinding to a stop. Two of the Chonyas pushed the Uranian towards the door.
But before they reached it their prisoner suddenly sprang aside. He caught one of the crewmen and hurled him bodily through the doorway by brute strength.
Outside, the corridor was suddenly laced with lances of purple light. A scream of anguish choked off in the Chonya's throat.
"A trap!" the technician, Dylar, cried. He jerked back levers on the control panel, and the car lurched forward again.
The Uranian lunged for him.
But Shane was already pivoting. He fired as he moved, and the great beast slammed to the floor, its four mighty arms flailing in a death-spasm.
"Stop the car!" Shane shouted.
Dylar threw a switch. The vehicle's mechanism shuddered and went dead.
"This way!" the Earthman snapped. He leaped to the corridor and ran back towards the Paulsini station. The Chonyas followed, close on his heels.
More of Reggar's men were there, clustered about the body of the fallen crewman. Then the sound of running feet reached them. They whirled.
Not even breaking stride, Shane blasted at them. Hastily, they fell back into a doorway, the same doorway from which they had loosed their barrage at the guard-car.
The Earthman moved in close to the left wall, out of their range of vision, and crept closer.
Abruptly, a purple beam lanced past his head, so close he could feel the searing heat of it. He jerked back against the crewman behind him.
"It's a stalemate till we can think of something," he clipped savagely. "They can't move, but neither can we."
The Chonya laughed. "Dylar will take care of that!" he chortled gleefully.
Like an echo, the now distant guard-car roared to life again. The next instant it was racing towards them.
Shane and the Chonya pressed back against the wall.
The car hurtled past them. A light-beam slashed from it as it came abreast the doorway where the guards were huddled.
There was a flurry of motion; hoarse shouts of panic.
Shane and the other Chonya moved in.
The last of Reggar's men sought to flee. But the technician, Dylar, cut them down.
Then Shane was bursting into the place where the great Paulsini mind-control projector was housed.
It was an awesome sight, a shaft that seemed to stretch away to infinity overhead. And in its center stood the incredible Paulsini tube, that infinitely delicate electronic unit that was the heart of the projector, core of the whole weird device that so deftly changed the frequencies of the waves within men's brains. A gigantic tube, almost unbelievable, so large that it staggered the imagination.
Even Shane stood half-incredulous as he stared up at it.
"It must be a hundred feet tall!" he said numbly. "No wonder they can reach out into space—"
Dylar nodded. "Yes. The whole center floor of the shaft is a huge lift, a hydratomic elevator to push the tube up into the air above this structure that covers the surface." He pointed a quivering finger. "See! There is a great lid capping off the shaft! No doubt it is linked to the lift mechanism so that it opens as the tube rises—"
Behind them, the other Chonya suddenly slammed shut the corridor door. "Guard-cars!" he called tensely. "A whole line of them, headed this way!"
It broke the spell of Shane's fascination.
"Our only hope for getting away from this moon alive is to smash this projector," he clipped tightly.
"And that means—smash this tube," Dylar answered. "Any other thing that we might do could be repaired."
Shane strode to the tube; hammered savagely at the transparent silicon with his light-gun's butt.
"It is no use," the Chonya technician told him grimly. "A tube as incredibly huge as this one will stand up against anything smaller than a proton cannon. It has been designed for strength—to handle power ... temperature changes ... shock and impact ... the sheer weight of its own structure." He shook his head. "I fear we've come here for nothing, Gar Shane. No efforts of ours can hope to smash this."
Bleakly, Shane stared at the monster tube ... at the glittering metal of the lift on which it stood ... at the great shaft, rising high above them to the cap of the dome.
The Chonya at the door said: "They're unloading here by hundreds, and they've brought enough equipment for a siege! When they start moving in, there'll be no stopping them."
Dylar's eyes flicked swiftly about the shaft. "There may be another way out—"
"No!" Shane snapped. His jaw was hard. He brought up a clenched fist; shook it grimly. "We came here to smash this thing. We're going to do it." He turned on his heel and ran to the nearest door. "Come on! We've got to find the control room!"
"The control room—?"
"Here! This is the place!" It was a windowless cubicle, but with a second door set opposite the one by which Shane stood. He scanned the massive control panels, the complicated dials and instruments. "Quick! How do you start the lift?"
Outside, the other Chonya called: "They're coming! I'll try to hold them—!" His voice was a trifle ragged.
"The lift—?" Dylar stared at the Earthman. "But why—?"
"Forget 'why'!" Shane slashed fiercely. "Quick! Show me!"
The technician scanned the maze of instruments. "This must be it! See! Here is the linking mechanism that couples it to the shaft cap, so that the top opens as the tube rises—"
Out beyond the shaft, something crashed. "They're trying to smash in the door!" the crewman there shouted. "There—! I got him!"
Shane whipped up his light-pistol. Face etched with strain, he focussed the beam on the linking mechanism. Wires gave way.
Dylar stared.
Gears twisted under the heat of the beam. A shaft snapped.
"Start the lift!" Shane clipped between clenched teeth.
"Of course!" cried Dylar. He threw switches.
"Here they come!" the Chonya outside shouted.
The next instant, his voice bubbled off in a scream. Shane leaped to the doorway, lanced a beam of light as a tentacled Thorian came into view. The creature slid back out of range.
The Earthman shot a glance at the Paulsini tube.
Smoothly, silently, it was rising, climbing swiftly towards the top of the shaft.
A fala hurled a lance-prod at Shane. It grazed his ribs. The sting of it hurt. Cursing, he dropped to one knee and triggered a beam at the Martian.
"It's almost there!" Dylar cried.
Shane risked another glance.
Even as he looked, the end of the tube reached the dome. For an instant it seemed to hesitate there. Then, with a faint groaning as of machinery under strain, it thrust on again ... harder ... harder ... harder....
The machinery of the lift groaned louder.
"Watch out!" shouted Dylar.
Shane leaped back in the same fraction of a second that the great tube burst. The noise was like a thunder-clap. It was as if the tube had exploded in mid-air. Shane glimpsed a Uranian racing towards him, and knew that he had waited too long, that he could never bring his pistol up in time; then saw the hairy thing reduced to bloody pulp by a great shard of blast-driven silicon.
It broke the paralysis that gripped him. He caught Dylar's arm. "Come on! Quick! To the ship!"
"Through that horde in the corridor?" The technician shook his head. "No, Gar Shane. You have performed a miracle—but not even you can travel that road."
A woman's voice said: "Then come this way."
Shane and the Chonya whirled.
She stood in the shadows of the control room's second doorway—a slim, shining figure in a toga of silver cloth.
Shane said: "Kyrsis—!"
"Yes, Shane." Her voice still had its strange, alien lilt. The rich purple lips parted in a smile, and she reached for his hand. "Come quickly. I shall take you to your ship."
"To the ship—?" Shane stared at her blankly. "But why—?"
"Why?" She laughed softly, and now there was mockery in the violet eyes. "Why not, Shane? It is the only way you can hope to escape this moon of madness. And the reason I help you to escape is—I want you to take me with you!"
CHAPTER VII
Now they were hurtling through the utter blackness that was space, away from the bleak moon that had been their prison. To port, Jupiter loomed monstrous, overwhelming, its great Red Spot weirdly aglow with seas of flaming hydrogen that seethed and boiled amid gigantic ice-cliffs carved from frozen gases. On the other side, Ganymede and Callisto swung slowly in their orbits; and beyond them, dwarfed by them, tiny Jupiter IX raced through the sky in the counter direction.
A navigator said: "The place they held us is Jupiter V—the satellite closest to the planet. The manuals say it is abandoned now. But it was built up as a power station by the Jupiterian entente in the days before the Federation began to broadcast energy."
"And now Quos Reggar holds it," the mate echoed. "What is your command, Gar Shane? Shall we ramp at Europa and report it?"
Bleakly, Shane stared into the visiscreen. Gadar, the dark star, hurled across the void into the solar system a thousand years ago, was coming into view now, the faint silver gleam of its profile barely visible.
"Or we could try Callisto," the mate went on. "They would notify the Federation unit stationed at Europa—send out patrols—"
"No," Shane said. "No. We'll go on to Federation headquarters, the Martian meeting. The things we have to tell will mean more there."
Abruptly, he turned and left the pilot room, and made his way to Kyrsis' quarters.
She came to his knock, and a glow of pleasure suffused her pale, silvery face at the sight of him. "Enter Shane...." The cool fingers touched his hand, drew him in. The violet eyes clung to his, as if in the sharing of some precious secret.
He closed the door behind him; breathed in deeply. "Why did you choose to come with me, Kyrsis?"
The rich purple lips curved and parted. As always, her eyes seemed to mock him. "How many times have you asked me, Shane?"
"How many times—?" he echoed, and now his voice had a bitter ring. "I wish I knew. But still I have no answer." He strode to the visiscreen across the room and snapped it on with an angry flick. Stared broodingly into it.
Gadar was almost to the screen's center now.
Shane said: "You're like that dark star, Kyrsis. What men can see is beautiful—but beneath the surface you're both all mystery. Where did you come from? Where are you going? And why? I always come back to that one question: why, why, why?"
She came very close to him, then, and what might have been sorrow was in her face, her eyes. "I've told you, Shane. To me, life is a sacred thing ... more sacred than you can ever dream. To see it wasted as yours would have been is the sin above all sin. And there was Reggar. After you'd told me the things you did, how could I believe him? How could I trust him? I had to get away from him, and quickly. If I could do it and save you, too, would I not have been a fool to throw away the chance?"
He turned on her. "But where is your home—your moon, your planet? Why do your people need slaves—?"
She shook her head sadly. "I am sorry, Shane, truly sorry. But those secrets are not mine to tell ... unless—"
"Unless what—?"
"Unless you are willing to travel with me ... to take the road Quos Reggar took." Again her hand was on his arm, her silvery body close to his. A note of tension crept into her voice. "Because we need slaves, Shane! You cannot know how desperately we need them! Nor is it hard. They do not suffer...."
For a moment the Earthman stood there with her, and her hand left his arm and came up to caress his cheek. "If you would but learn to understand us ... there is so much to learn."
Shane swayed a little. His blue eyes dulled, and his breathing was shallow, uneven.
The woman's eyes mirrored indefinable things, things old beyond all measure.
Shane stood rigid. Then, jerkily, he pulled away.
"I don't care why you need slaves," he said thickly. "It doesn't matter how you treat them—"
The silver woman spread her hands. "You see—?"
"But your people could work out a better way—"
"No." The word rang final. "For us there is—can be—no better way."
Shane's lips twisted. The dullness was gone from his eyes now. "Then, Kyrsis, we can never meet. You have picked your people's road, and I have taken the Chonya way."
"But then—"
"There can be nothing more. But you saved my life, and I must buy it back. So I'll land you at Horla, on Mars, and set you free, and you can go your way."
He turned to go.
Then the woman said: "Your throat, Gar Shane!"
The Earthman pivoted, face hard. "Yes?"
"There are flecks of green beneath the jaw—a slight eruption of the skin."
"I saw it in a mirror a while ago," Shane answered tightly. "It goes with theol."
"The first injection," the silver woman nodded, and now her smile was lazy, taunting. "With the second, the welts grow darker. After the third there are ... more obvious symptoms."
"You saved my life," Shane said, thin-lipped. "I'll see you safe to Mars."
He wheeled and left the room.
The committee on the interterrestrial slave trade was listening to a speaker from Titan when Shane reached the Federation chambers.
"Slavers? I can give you two names for slavers!" the Titanian cried out in a frenzy. "One is Chonya and the other is Malya! And those are the names for 'pirate,' too, and 'cutthroat' and 'thief and 'hypocrite'!"
Grim-faced, Shane started forward.
A basilisk-eyed Mercurian with a sly and smirking air barred his way. "Your credentials, please. You cannot enter the chamber without credentials."
"I left my credentials with a mongrel outlaw named Quos Reggar," Shane clipped tightly. "He ambushed my ship on the way. The chairman, the delegates—any of them can identify me."
"My deepest regrets, but identification is not enough." The Mercurian was openly grinning now. "My orders are specific: regardless of excuse, there will be no admission without credentials."
"The Chonyas and Malyas have made the asteroid belt a space ship graveyard!" the Titanian ranted shrilly.
"Get me the chairman!" Shane rapped.
"My orders are specific," the Mercurian repeated, smirking. "The issue of your attendance has already been discussed, Earthman, and you are barred—"
Shane raised his hand, tried to flag attention.
The chairman looked quickly away. Committee members turned till their backs were to him, or else openly ignored him.
"They have looted the void for a thousand years!" the Titanian screamed. "When we finally put that down, they grew clever, and now they wail of raids, even while they re-energize their proton cannon and hose the blood from their hatches—"
A sudden, mirthless grin twisted Shane's face.
"You lie in your teeth!" he shouted. Slamming the Mercurian to one side, he strode forward.
The Titanian cut off in mid-breath, great blue-green wattles shaking. Committee members spun about.
"Order!" bellowed the chairman, hammering on his desk. "Order in the chamber!"
"To hell with your order!" Shane shouted back savagely, eyes blazing. "I said he lied. I'll back it!"
"The Chonya delegate must wait his turn. He must clear his credentials—"
"Let someone wait who has yet to count his dead! I'm here to see that the Chonyas get justice and an end to slavery, not words! I'll stay till action's taken!"
A rubbery, flat-faced Europan leaped up. "And why were you not here before? Where have you been? What have you been doing?"
"Yes!" roared a delegate from Ganymede. "Eye-witnesses already have told us that the Chonyas are raiding for slaves again—and there are those who say that you, gar of the Chonyas, raid with them—that a raid is what kept you absent here—"
"My crew will tell you—"
"Your crew?" rasped a Venusian Vansta. "Your Chonya crew? Who ever heard of a Chonya with a mote of truth within him?"
A wave of raucous laughter swept through the chamber.
Then the delegate from Earth was on his feet, a tall, heavy man with thinning hair. "Silence!" he thundered. "Silence!"
The laughter, the shouts, died away.
The Earth delegate addressed Shane: "There is a woman called Kyrsis, of an unknown race, who is known to have been buying slaves. Do you know her?"
"Yes, but—"
"And is it true that when you landed at the Horla spaceport, less than an hour ago, this woman was with you?"
"Yes—"
"That you knew her to have been buying slaves, yet you let her go free, instead of turning her over to the constituted authorities?"
"But she—"
"Answer yes or no: is it true?"
"Yes, but—"
"'Buts' have no place in this committee, Shane!" The Earth delegate swung about. "My fellow-members. I am ashamed to confess that this renegade came from Earth. Now, as Earth delegate, the least I can do to atone is to demand, in the name of Earth, that he be placed under arrest as a slaver; and that the Chonyas whom he leads be expelled from the Federation, placed outside the protection of its laws, and subjected to an immediate punitive campaign by the Federation fleet to destroy their sovereignty and reduce them to the status of wards of the Federation!"
For the fraction of a second, silence echoed. Then the great room exploded into a cacophony of hate, a tumult of affirmation: "Yes, yes—!" "Seize him!" "Jail him!" "Burn him down!"
Two uniformed Fantays and the Mercurian from the door rushed towards Shane.
The Earthman stood as if frozen in his tracks. Then, explosively, he leaped backward, twisting, and of a sudden the light-pistol that had swung at his hip was in his hand.
"Who dares to seize me?"
The Fantays, the Mercurian, stopped short.
Blue eyes contemptuous, cold as death, Shane looked from them to the delegates ... the chairman. "I'm going out now," he said.
No answer came ... no comment or sound save that of the crowd's loud, nervous breathing.
"I'm going," he repeated savagely. "I'm going because the Federation holds knaves and fools enough that decent men no longer dare feel safe within it. The truth finds a graveyard here, and justice hangs in chains. Better to fight you and the slavers both than count on your weak-kneed aid. From this moment on, the Chonyas will carve their own way."
Not one of them would meet his eyes.
"No comments, no arguments?" The Earthman laughed sourly; he brought up the light-gun in a gesture that held at once both menace and defiance. "Then I'll leave you now. You may follow me—if you dare!"
Boldly, not even glancing back, he strode out of the room.
CHAPTER VIII
"This is the place," the Chonya said. "This is where the silver woman came."
Shane studied the structure. It was a house—a sort of fortress-dwelling in the ancient Fantay style, set a hundred feet from its nearest neighbor. Even in the semi-darkness of the early Martian night it looked old, mouldering old. Light from Phobos and Deimos, the tiny moons that raced across the sky overhead, glinted on the bosses that studded the great iridium-alloy door, and the weathered walls of lyndyse stone rose sheer and blank and forbidding to the second floor. Even there, the windows showed as narrow streaks of yellow light, criss-crossed with heavy bars.
"We are not the only ones drawn by this place, Gar Shane," the Chonya went on. "There was a Malya, a tough young buck with the walk of a fighting man. He stayed in the shadows, surveying the house from every angle, but not going near. After awhile, he went away. Then, later, a Europan came, a flat-faced chitza who looked this way and that, as if he were afraid he would be seen. He knocked at the door, and after they'd checked him through a peephole, they let him in. Later, there were three others, all shrouded in fala capes so I could not tell their race. They, too, went in."
"And none came out?"
"Only the Europan. He skulked away again in but a few moments."
"A Malya, a Europan, and three in fala cloaks," Shane repeated, half to himself. And then, speaking to the Chonya: "It's time we found out what black brew is cooking there, Nettar. Where are the hook and rope?"
"Here, Gar Shane," the other answered. He drew a coiled line and grappling iron from beneath his coat. "Which side shall it be?"
"To the left are fewer windows," said Shane. "Wait here for me, Nettar."
"No, Gar Shane! It is madness to go alone into such a death-trap—"
Shane's mirthless laugh rang through the darkness. "Worse madness for two. There'd be three times the noise."
"But Gar—"
"My mission holds less peril than you might think. But should trouble come—should I not return—I want you here, outside, to carry the word."
Silently, then, Shane ran to the building and left along it. He swung the grapnel in a tight arc ... sent it flying high into the air in an expert throw, over the roof of the house.
The hook landed with a flat thunk!
Shane hugged the shadows, listening tensely. But no sound came from within.
He tugged experimentally on the line.
The hook held.
Bracing his feet against the wall, leaning out from it, supported by the rope, the Earthman climbed swiftly upward. In half a minute he was over the coping and lying flat on his belly on the roof, drawing up the line.
The round dome of a typical Fantay solarium, glowing dimly with yellowish light from some point within but below Shane's line of vision, rose in the middle of the flat roof. Cat-like, the Earthman came to his feet and crossed to it, there to peer cautiously down through the crystal into the room below.
The solarium was empty, illuminated by only one dim lamp.
Quickly, Shane pried loose a crystal panel. Squeezing through the opening, he dropped to the floor.
A door stood half-open across the room. Noiselessly, Shane moved to it, paused and listened.
No sound came. The Earthman stepped outside, and found himself in a narrow hallway. Following it, he came to a stairway, descended cautiously.
Below, the lights were brighter, the air faintly redolent of age and cooking palorsch.
And, somewhere, a woman was singing softly.
Shane eased out his light-gun. Silently, he left the stairs and moved down another hallway. To the right, a door loomed. From the other side came a muffled mumble of voices.
But not the song. Cat-footed, Shane passed the portal.
The song came clearer now—a haunting, taunting melody in a tongue the Earthman did not know. The singer's voice held an alien lilt, a thread of silvery tone.
Kyrsis' voice.
It came from behind another door, and this one was open a crack.
Again Shane paused and listened. But there was no sound save the singing.
The Earthman stepped to the door's hinge side; threw a quick glance up and down the hall. It was still empty. Staying back of the jamb, out of sight from the room, he pressed his left hand against the door ever so gently and pushed it open—slowly, as if it were moving with a draft.
Still there was no sound but Kyrsis' voice. But after a moment it swelled a fraction, and the whisper of her footsteps crept through.
Then, of a sudden, her profile was framed between half-open door and jamb.
In two swift steps, Shane was inside—pushing her back, heeling shut the door.
The silver woman's great violet eyes went wide. She opened her mouth to scream. But before the sound could come, Shane's arm was about her. His hand clamped over her open mouth.
For an instant her body writhed against him. Her fists beat at his chest, her feet at his ankles.
He said: "If I break you, Kyrsis, the choice will be yours, not mine."
For a long moment her eyes probed his, her body still rigid, straining against him. Then, slowly, she relaxed.
Shane let her go.
Her pale, beautiful face held no expression now. With one last enigmatic glance, she turned from him and moved with perfect poise to a mirror that hung upon another door across the room. Her slender fingers smoothed her hair, rearranged her rumpled gown.
After a moment Shane followed her, stood close behind her, so that their eyes met in the mirror. Gently, he gripped her shoulders. "I came for a reason, Kyrsis," he said.
"A reason, Shane—?" She said it almost absently, her fingers still busy with her hair. "What reason?"
Shane's jaw was hard. "Perhaps you've heard that the Federation cast me out."
"Of course. It was expected." The rich purple lips curved in the faintest of mocking smiles. "Why else do you think I came to Horla with you, except to lay the ground?"
The lines in Shane's face deepened. "I don't know. That's why I took this chance to see you now."
"What, Shane—? I do not understand...."
"Once, on our way here, you asked me to try to understand you and your people. You said our paths might run together if I were to take the slavers' road."
"Shane—!" Of a sudden her body again was rigid. She twisted, stared up into Shane's eyes. "You mean—you would give up the Chonya way? You would raid for slaves as Quos Reggar raids?"
The Earthman's lips twisted. "I'd raid—on my own terms," he answered.
"On your terms—?"
"You might not care to meet them, Kyrsis."
"At least, tell me what they are."
"When the Chonya chieftains called me in, I took their way for mine. If I raid now, it will be because their ships are with me."
"But how—?"
Shane laughed harshly. "The Federation has turned us out, with the slaver brand upon us. If we must wear it, we'll earn it. Why should we stand by, helpless and hopeless, while both Reggar and the Federation fleet bleed us white? Better that we raid ourselves. At least, then, we'll get booty." His blue eyes gleamed. "We'll bring slaves to your people, Kyrsis—smug, fat slaves from the planets of the Federation. We'll drag them out by the thousands!"
A strange excitement seemed to seize the silver woman. "Yes, Shane, yes! We'll take your Chonyas—"
"There's more," Shane said.
"Yes—?"
"If you take us, you let Quos Reggar go."
She stared at him. "Are you mad, Shane?"
"No, Kyrsis; far from mad." He clenched his fist, and his face grew dark with anger. "Reggar is the dog who took away my belt. If he had his way, he'd see me with my brain rotted out with theol. So he is part of my price—the part that counts the most—"
"—the part that proves you are not so different from other men after all, Gar Shane." Kyrsis laughed softly. The things that showed in the violet eyes were very old. "For awhile I almost saw you as separate from the rest—a man apart, so hard and strong that nothing could sway you from what you saw as duty. But now ..."—she shrugged—"You seek to save your Chonyas, yes. But Reggar hurt your pride when he took your belt, so now, above all, you seek for vengeance."
"And if I do?" Shane clipped. "Does it matter to you? I bring you the Chonyas—born raiders, a race that has carved its name in blood across the void. Beside them, what is Reggar?—A mongrel, a cross-bred chitza served by the scum of the spaceways." He broke off. "But you are the one who must decide. What is your answer?"
The smile left the silver woman's face. Turning, she walked thoughtfully across the room, not speaking.
After a moment, Shane followed.
Again Kyrsis turned, looked up at him. Her expression was unfathomable. "You are a bold and clever man, Shane," she said. "It is a pity you can never hope to be quite clever enough."
"You mean—?"
"She means you've failed again, you chitza!" cut in a harsh familiar voice from the mirrored door behind Shane.
The Earthman spun about.
His great carcass draped in a fala cloak, Quos Reggar stood in the doorway, light-gun in hand.
Shane froze. His mouth took on a bitter twist. "I should have known you'd follow her here. But the fala cape—"
"It fooled you?" Reggar laughed harshly. "I thought it would. And Kyrsis did well, too, leading you over to my door, where I was sure to hear you."
Shane said nothing.
"There's someone else here for you to see," leered Reggar. He raised his voice, "Talu!"
"Here, Sha Reggar."
Shane caught his breath at the sound of her voice. But that was all, for then she was coming through the doorway, slim and graceful, her waist-long blue-black hair aripple in the light, her dark Malya face as proudly lovely as before.
And as before, she bore a tray in her hand.
"Sha Shane...." Her voice, her face, told nothing; nor could Shane interpret the message that flickered, just for an instant, in her eyes.
Reggar said: "Once before I sent Talu to you with an injector, Earthman, and you nearly broke her arm. This time, it will be different."
Shane made no attempt to answer.
"The injector, Talu—"
Face wooden, the Malyalara stripped back the cloth and picked up the hypodermic from the tray. "It is ready, Sha Reggar."
"Theol was in that other injector, starbo, and this one holds theol now. It will be your second dose. Madness is just one more away."
Shane stood very still. He looked from Kyrsis, with her pale ethereal beauty and silver hair and translucent skin, to Talu, the slave girl—dark, tempestuous, all Malya; then back to Reggar again. Instinctively, his muscles tensed.
The mongrel said: "You'll take the dose, Earthman—because if you so much as move a hair, I'll burn your arms off!" The light-gun in his webbed hand was rock-steady.
"Talu—"
"Yes, Sha Reggar." Quickly, efficiently, she stepped to the Earthman's side. "Twist your neck, Sha Shane."
"Twist it!" echoed Reggar. His huge lobed eyes were flecked with red.
Teeth clenched, eyes hot with hate, Shane obeyed.
The Malyalara pressed the plunger.
Reggar let out a breath, stepped back. "Tomorrow, great gar, you get the last," he gloated. "Then, after that, you'll serve with my fleet ... serve gladly, happy to help us in every way, just for the sake of another shot of theol." He chuckled ghoulishly. "It will be a fitting fate—the more so after the way you've tried so many schemes to split Shi Kyrsis from me, so that you could dispose of each of us alone. In fact—"
Somewhere, some living creature screamed. There was horror in the sound—a hideous note, as if soul were being torn from body.
Reggar froze. "What—?"
From the hallway came the faintest whisper of footsteps.
The mongrel's light-gun prodded Shane. "You, chitza—open the door!"
Wordless, Shane crossed the room. He gripped the handle, pulled back the door. Outside, the hall had gone black, lights out.
Instantly, before he could so much as draw a breath, dark hands came out of nowhere; seized him, jerked him half into the hall. A knife-point pricked his belly.
"Move and die, Earthman!" a voice breathed in his ear—a man's voice, cold, and hard, and heavy with a Malya accent.
Shane stood as if carved from stone.
From the room behind him, now, came another fierce Malya voice: "The light-gun, Reggar!"
For an instant silence echoed. Then Reggar cursed, and there was the thud of the pistol hitting the floor.
Now the Malyas holding Shane shoved him back into the room. There, another Malya—a hard-bitten, swaggering little man—already had Reggar pressed back against the wall, penned there by a knife like the one digging into Shane's belly. Other dark, cold-eyed fighting men stood by the mirrored door to the huge hybrid's quarters.
Talu was with them, her face aglow with fierce joy. "Malyas, Malyas—!"
The silver woman, Kyrsis, stood silent and apart. But shadows of strain showed in the lines and hollows of her face.
"We have done our work well," the leader of the dark men said. "We have the Earthman, Shane. We have Reggar, the mongrel. We have the silver woman. There'll be joy and feasting at Amara when we ramp our ships."
"You are of Amara, Malya?" Shane asked.
The other's dark eyes gleamed. "We are of Amara, Earthman—and before you die, you'll wish you'd never heard of us or our asteroid! Other races may let the slavers raid and not strike back. But we claim blood for blood—"
Shane said: "I am gar of the Chonyas, not a slaver. Ask Talu, the slave girl. She is of your people—"
"Who takes the word of a captive woman?" The Malya laughed thinly. "We Malyas have raided for slaves ourselves, in our day. A woman's heart goes with her man, not her race."
"Check with others, then—"
"We have checked already. The word is out: you raid with Reggar. You came to Horla with the woman, Kyrsis. It is enough!" Fierce lights gleamed in the Malya's eyes. He grinned—a savage, death's-head grimace. "We've tracked you down across the void, you three, and now we'll see you pay for the Malya blood you've spilt—battling the zanths for your lives in Amara's great arena!"
CHAPTER IX
This was Amara's great arena. The oval pit was full twenty feet deep and floored with sand ... sand that here and there was churned and trodden, stained dark brown with men's life blood.
Above the pit, seats rose into the star-flecked night in steep-banked tiers.
Those seats were full, now—packed from pit to rim with the savage, dark-faced Malya breed, a blood-lusting horde whose cries for slaughter rose in great, swelling waves like the screams of primeval beasts.
In the forefront, ringing the rim of the pit, sat the Malya chieftain and his court—the old raiders, the men of power, the warriors and their women.
And there, too, sat another woman, a slim, lovely Malyalara, placed close beside the chief himself.
Talu.
Slave girl no longer, she now wore a gown of richest kalor. Jeweled clips held the rippling, blue-black hair, and a jewel-studded harness accented her shoulders' softness, her throat's clean curve, the bare breasts' proud, firm swell.
Ankle-deep in the sand of the pit, Shane surveyed them, one and all.
Now the Malya chief leaned forward across the rim, a long fighting knife in his hand. His deep-set eyes gleamed anticipation. "You are the first, Earthman ... you and this knife against a zanth!"
Boldly, Shane met the chieftain's stare. "And if I win—?"
For the fraction of a second a sort of dull, throbbing silence seemed to fall over the crowd. Then it broke in a gale of wild, tumultuous laughter, echoing and re-echoing upward to the stars.
"If you win—?" the Malya chieftain choked. "Have you stayed too long in the sun of Mercury, chitza? No man has ever come out of the pit over a zanth."
"What holds for other men is not for me. I asked: what if I win?"
Admiration showed in the Malya's dark face. "If you fight as boldly as you talk—small wonder that the Chonyas made you gar!" And then: "If you win, you'll live—but here, on Amara, forever a slave."
"I ask no more," Shane came back coldly. Again his blue eyes swept the crowd, the sparkling night of a thousand stars. For a moment his gaze lingered on Talu, catching the fever in her eyes, the tension carved in every line. The noise of the shouting horde above beat down upon him. The fetid stench of the zanth came to his nostrils from the tunnel-chute.
"Your weapon, Earthman!" cried the Malya chief, and threw it down. "Keeper, prepare to loose the zanth!"
In one swift motion, Shane swept up the knife. Then, quickly, he moved to the shadows along the wall of the pit, out of the smoky torches' flickering glare.
In the tunnel, the zanth roared thunderously. Shane caught a glimpse of the panic on Kyrsis' pale face, where she sat in the prisoners' cage; of the fear that crawled in Quos Reggar's great lobed eyes.
Overhead, the Malya chieftain cried, "Turn loose the zanth!"
The heavy-grilled gate at the tunnel mouth swung up. In the blackness beyond, the zanth's eyes burned like coals of fire. Again it roared, and then again. Then, slowly, it came forward, out into the pit, there to stand for a moment, blinking against the glare.
Shane sucked in air. This zanth was big, bigger than any he had ever seen ... well over twenty feet. The murderous, serrated tail alone measured at least seven, and the great jaws were of a size to snap a man in two in a single bite. Its scales were big as dinner plates, and as thick, horny with age. Spurs and claws gleamed in the torchlight like curved knives.
Then the great, ringed nostrils flared as the creature scented Shane. The spiked diamond head came round, twisting and turning on the monstrous, snake-like neck; darting and probing to the full five feet of its length. The stink of its breath swept over the Earthman in a nauseous wave.
Shane stood very still.
But already the zanth was turning. The bulging eyes gleamed redly, searching for him.
The knife-haft was slippery in Shane's hand. A rill of sweat crept down his spine.
The zanth paused now, the spiked head moving sinuously to and fro. The tail flicked the blood-stained sand. Its powerful, armor-scaled body seemed to draw together.
Shane forgot to breathe.
The zanth lunged.
Shane dived as the great spiked head lanced forward. The jaws snapped shut where he had been with a clacking like the sound of monstrous castanets.
After that, there was no time for anything but action.
For even before the Earthman hit the ground, the thing was whirling. The claws of its eight feet sprayed the sand like a windstorm. Again, it lunged.
Desperately, Shane rolled out of the way.
But now the serrated, seven-foot tail lashed out at him, with a force that would have smashed through a solid brick wall.
Again Shane rolled—in, towards the zanth's body.
One of the feet clawed for him. A six-inch talon raked a bloody path along his side.
Panting, the Earthman scrambled away—back to the shadows, the wall of the pit.
The zanth whirled; charged.
Taut-muscled, Shane waited till the diamond head hammered forward. Then, in the last instant, he leaped aside.
The zanth's head smashed against the wall of the pit. Savagely, Shane stabbed for the crevice where the jaw-plates met, trying for the creature's tiny brain.
But the tough cartilage turned away the blade. With a roar, the zanth struck at him.
Shane leaped high into the air, and the awful head passed beneath him. Twisting, he landed on the writhing, tree-thick neck; balanced there for a precarious moment.
The zanth reared back, clawing for him, and Shane sprang clear. Again he took up his stand against the wall.
This time, the zanth broke off its charge to flail at him with its tail. Barely in time, the Earthman got out of the way. He was breathing hard, now—his whole body shaking under the strain.
The zanth lunged.
Desperately, Shane snatched up a handful of sand, hurled it straight into the oncoming monster's glaring eyes.
The creature came up short, shaking its head.
Shane moved like a striking quirst. Again he snatched sand, hurled it.
The zanth raised its head high, to the full length of the five-foot neck. Clawing, it leaped at the Earthman. The awful talons shredded his clothes, tore at his flesh.
Shane threw himself sideways.
The head lanced towards him.
He slashed at the eyes with his knife, felt the steel bite in.
A wild roar burst from the creature's throat. It threw itself at Shane in a frenzy, clawing and snapping and threshing.
Once more, Shane sprang aside—then darted back before the creature could make the double turn. Leaping to its neck, he threw himself flat upon it, clinging to it with legs and one arm as to a writhing log, while with the other hand, the knife hand, he stabbed again and again at the bulging eyes.
The zanth roared its agony. Twisting and jerking, it struggled to unseat the Earthman. One clawed foot reached his leg; laid it open. But still Shane clung to his place, slashing and stabbing.
Blindly, the monster crashed against the pit's wall. It reared, then surged forward, clawing its way up the sheer face. The great spiked head rocked and swayed; beat against the stonework in a spasm of pain, less than three feet below the rim.
A fierce light flamed in Shane's eyes. Clutching the base of the spike, he suddenly let go the zanth's neck with his legs. His toes dug into the overlap between the scales, and all at once he was running upward—up the snake-neck, onto the diamond head itself.
And then, before the Malyas realized what was happening, he leaped from the head to the rim of the pit. The fighting knife flashed in a savage arc. A warrior's shout choked off in a rush of blood. The others about him scrambled back from the slashing blade.
Behind Shane, back in the pit, the zanth screamed and hurled itself upward. Its head came over the rim. With a mighty, surging leap, its forefeet followed. A terrible roar burst from its throat as it caught the scent of the Malya warrior's blood, and it clawed its way onward, upward, out of the pit and into the rising tiers of seats.
It was a nightmare, a world gone mad. Wildly, the screaming Malyas fled. But the zanth's great tail lashed out and a score of them fell, crushed or smashed into the pit. The knife-claws tore; the great jaws ran ruby-red with blood.
Forgotten, Shane followed the panicked mob.
Only then, somehow, a voice slashed through to him through the tumult: "Shane—Shane!"
He whirled.
Talu was running towards him, across the seats. "This way!"