Chainer gave the leash a gentle mental tug. The creature took a single step forward and disappeared. Chainer opened his eyes, and the purple figure stood in the center of the room, steaming like a lobster fresh from the pot.

"Ambassador Laquatus." Chainer presented the featureless man with a grand wave of his golem hand. "Meet your new familiar. I call him Burke." Laquatus inspected the new arrival and was clearly unimpressed.

"Quickly. Call him by name," Chainer said. Laquatus put his hands on his hips, obviously skeptical of the entire affair.

"Now. He needs to imprint on you as his master, or we'll have to start all over."

"Burke." Laquatus shot the First a long-suffering look as he spat the name out. "Attend your master."

Burke responded to the sound of his name by facing Laquatus then dropping to one knee with his head bowed and his fists on the floor.

"At least he knows his place," Laquatus said. "But what else can he do?"

Chainer had expected this reaction from Laquatus, and he smiled patiently. "Well," he said, "you specified obedient, powerful, and amphibious. Burke is all those things. You can see how quickly he responds to your voice. And he doesn't need to breathe, so both land and sea are accessible to him."

"But what does he do?" Laquatus keened. "Obedient and amphibious do me no good if there's no power to back them up. He has to be my new jack, my champion in the pits. How does he fight?"

Chainer smiled again. "Perhaps a demonstration is in order." He scanned the room. "If you'll follow me to a room with a bit more space, ambassador, I'm sure Burke will satisfy your concerns."

"If I may," the First interrupted, "I will take my leave of you now. Chainer, let us return the Mirari to the vault, so you and Laquatus can test his new jack." Laquatus sulked some more as Chainer and the First left him to become acquainted with Burke while they put their treasure away.

"Has it worked, Master Chainer? Have you created exactly what we discussed?"

"Exactly, Pater."

"Outstanding. Convince the ambassador to accept his gift and send them both on their way. Come to my chambers when you are done. I would discuss your strategy for defending the lesser pits between now and the games."

"I will be along directly, Pater." They replaced the Mirari, sealed the vault, and the First went away, trailing his attendants behind him. When Chainer returned to the conference room, Laquatus was peering into Burke's blank face.

"Can I touch him? Is he at least caustic?" "Follow me, please. And no, Ambassador, I'm afraid not. Burke's entire body is composed of nothing more than a dense, inert gel." He led Laquatus down the hall toward one of the private pits, smaller versions of the main arena for private matches and demonstrations. "Inert? Do you mean it does nothing?"

"I mean it interacts with nothing. A drop of his body material on your skin or in your bloodstream wouldn't harm you any more than a drop of oil. The gel is extremely durable, however. The sharpest sword or dagger might pierce his hide, but the blade will snap before it goes any deeper. "I think you're missing the advantages of his body, Ambassador. He has no bones to break, no organs to rupture. He doesn't breathe, so he cannot be strangled. He has no eyes, so he cannot be blinded. No pores means no way for his skin to absorb irritants. No circulatory system means no way for diseases or poisons to spread inside his body. Virtually every attack he faces in the pits is going to fail, simply because his doesn't function like a normal living body. Burke's body is just a vessel for his mind, and his mind is a vessel for your commands." "Doesn't function normally," Laquatus echoed. "It doesn't seem to function at all! All you've given me is a defensive creature, a bodyguard. And I will repeat myself. I need a jack, a fighting champion." They came upon the closed door that led to a private pit, and Burke sprang forward to hold the door for them as they passed. "Thank you," Chainer said, and Laquatus grumbled.

"I sincerely hope, Master Chainer, that you don't expect me to be polite to this servant every time he attends me."

"No, Ambassador. The Cabal teaches us to be polite to all our guests, including their servants. And Burke is now very much yours."

"A greater treasure I have yet to receive," Laquatus said nastily. "And you haven't answered my question. How does he fight? And more to the point, how does he win?"

"Now that we're here," Chainer said, "I can answer your question. And believe me, you're going to love this."

"We shall see."

"Order him into the center of the room, please." As Laquatus repeated the order and Burke moved, Chainer continued. "He will only respond to you from now on. After a few weeks, you won't even need to talk. It'll be as if he hears your thoughts." Chainer watched Laquatus carefully, but the merman kept his expression neutral. "Won't that be an interesting sensation? To speak without moving your lips?"

"Imperial jesters have been doing that trick for a thousand years," Laquatus said. Chainer thought he saw the barest flicker of recognition, however.

"Of course. My apologies. I'm sure that the Mer learned to speak silently generations ago. Makes it easier to issue commands at the bottom of the sea." Laquatus was staring sharply at Chainer, as if he had just realized there was a deeper meaning to Chainer's casual banter. "You mentioned a demonstration, Master. I am waiting."

"By all means. For the purposes of the demonstration, I'm going to put Burke up against a mixed group of sea creatures and land crawlers."

"An excellent idea. But that is an offensive term to some mer-folk tribes."

"I meant no offense," Chainer said. "There are so many types of sea creatures in the sea that I sometimes have trouble keeping all their customs straight. It would be better for everyone if Mer could unite behind a single leader, don't you think?"

Laquatus looked intrigued, but his voice was suspicious. "I would welcome the chance to discuss the current situation in Mer with you. Later on. But right now… my demonstration?"

Chainer nodded, and with a wave cast four hostile monsters across the room at Burke. A twenty- foot sea serpent thrashed wildly, forcing a long-horned tiger to spring aside and stalk Burke from his left. A four-foot bat with eight spider's legs flapped and chittered madly around the ceiling, and a huge bipedal killer whale slowly moved closer to the gel man. Burke stood impassive with his feet planted firmly on the floor as the creatures all oriented on him and began their attack.

"Order him to kill them all," Chainer said. Laquatus shrugged.

"Burke," he intoned. "This is your master. Destroy your attackers."

The tiger pounced first, seven hundred pounds of snarling fangs, gleaming horns, and sharp claws. Burke stood frozen as the big cat descended on him, and then, in a motion so fast that not even Chainer could follow it, he ducked under the tiger's extended paws and sunk his arm up to the shoulder in the brute's belly. Burke wrapped his other arm around the top of the tiger's torso and slammed it head-first into the stone floor with a brutal combination of power and balance. The tiger's skull cracked, and it faded from the room.

Burke then turned his eyeless face up to the ceiling and extended his arm out toward the spider bat. The gel in his arm softened and stretched as he reached, doubling then tripling the length of the appendage until the bat was trapped in the upper comer of the room. Burke's hand dipped and weaved as the bat tried to avoid it, but he quickly caught the rabid creature by the throat. His arm snapped back to its normal size and shape in a heartbeat, leaving the bat to fall dead to the floor. Its head remained clenched in Burke's hand until both parts of the bat's body disappeared.