Oskold laughed. His hand, covered with a glove reinforced across the knuckles with metal strips, swung up to strike Maelen full in the face. She crumpled, down.

So it was Oskold who gave us our signal. The raging fury which now boiled out of the dark, and the tree shadows leaped, tore, screamed, growled, shrieked in that moment after Maelen went down. I heard the cries of men, the tumult of the beasts, but I headed for Maelen.

I was no swordsman and my sword-knife was a poor weapon, but I reverted to Jorth's rage in those moments when flames became a red curtain in my mind, drowning thought, leaving me only one purpose in mind. This was as it had been when I had gone after Osokun and his men—

She was under my hand—still—no life in her, her face up to the sky, the red ruin that blow had wrought on flesh and bone made plain. And I crouched above her, snarling as any of the furred ones who fought about me.

As it had been with the outlaws who had killed Malec and taken our camp, so it was now with these. For there is a kind of horror in such warfare which the minds of men find impossible to comprehend. To have waves of animals break about them unnerved some from the start, fighting men though they were. Others rallied, killed, some standing their ground; others fought a rear-guard action to withdraw, always harassed, pulled down, overrun.

For me there was but one in that enemy company. And knife in hand, I made for him. In spite of the surprise of our attack, at least one of his guards had come to Oskold's side, fending off with his shield two rushes from a pair of venzese who sprang to snap and bounced back to wait another chance.

I tripped over a body and sprawled forward, almost into the heart of the fire. Then my hands, bracing me up again, closed on a beamer– something I had not expected to find there, but which fitted into my palm as familiarly as a long-worn glove. I did not even try to get to my knees; I lay and pressed the firing button of a weapon which had no right to be there.

The ray it threw was a thrust of eye-searing fire. No shield could stand against that, no, nor man either! I had wanted to let Oskold feel my hands upon him as he went down, but I took the means fate sent me and used the off-world arm. Once, twice– Oskold might be on the ground now but there were others of his following—There was a sputter and the ray died, its charge exhausted. I hurled it from me into the fire and crawled back to Maelen.

Above that fearful wound her eyes were now open and she saw me, knew me—of that I was sure. I caught her up and went back into the dark, to that rock where Merlay had been. I staggered a little when I reached that poor shred of cover, so I had to lean against the chill stone. Merlay was still there, but she did not touch what I held, only laid her hand upon my shoulder. A flow of strength was channeled so from her to me.

This was a battle, and it was fought, and men died and animals died, but for me it was a nightmare which I can not well remember. Only at last there was quiet, and we came once more to the fire. For it seems ours was the victory. Yet it might well be that it was also defeat—

I laid Maelen down on the robes Merlay spread to receive her. Still she looked at me and at Merlay, and at the animals who came to her, and last of all to the feline Mathan, who staggered into the fire shine with a wound in his side. But her thoughts did not come to me. Only her eyes told me she still lived.

Suddenly I could not look into them any longer, but got up and walked blindly away, stumbling among the dead. One followed me and sprang to catch my dangling hand between sharp teeth. I glanced down at Borba. A split ear dripped blood, but undaunted eyes met mine.

"Come."

Because nothing mattered now, I went as he wished and we thread among bushes until we came to where there was a line of picketed kasi. Someone moved ahead of me there, slowly, so slowly I thought he might be wounded. Borba hissed and pulled at my hand, urging me on. The figure, fumbling with a lead rein, swung around to face me. In this lack of light I could not see his face, but that he was a fugitive from the camp, I knew. I leaped for him. Under my weight he collapsed, though he struggled feebly. I struck an off-world blow, felt my slender Thassa hand go numb. But the one under me was still. I hooked fingers into his collar and pulled him with me into the firelit open.

"Krip Vorlund!"

It was not recognition but summons. I left my prisoner lying and went to the three who waited on me. Mathan lay with his head resting on Merlay's knee, and Maelen—I could not bring myself to look upon her.

But it was her mind-call which had brought me. I went down on my knees and took her two hands into mine. They gave me back no pressure, no sign that more than her eyes lived. Beside her something moved with a whine. Vors—was it Vors or another of the same breed crouched there?

Merlay stirred, Mathan raised his head. There was firelight here, but over us hung the moon. And that Third Ring which had been so bright, so sharply defined when this whole mad venture began, was now only a misty haze, soon to disappear.

"Moon!" A thought—a whisper of a whisper– "Mathan—moon!"

Her hands were very cold in mine, there was nothing which could ever warm them now. Suddenly the glassia beside her cried out, a kind of keening.

Mathan's head rose higher. There was a rumble from his throat, but it was no beast growl. Rather it was singing, a singing which entered my head, my blood, traveled through me. Then I heard Merlay take up that song, which she could not initiate, but which she could second. And Maelen's eyes held mine, searched into me, somehow touched a part of the body I wore which had never been open to Krip Vorlund. So I believe I sang, too, though I am not sure. We sat there in the fine haze of the fading moon Ring and helped sing Maelen out of death into a new life.

When I again looked with full consciousness around me, the hands I held were those of a husk which the spirit had deserted. And resting on my arm, warm and living, was a small furred head. I dropped the hands of death to gather close warmth and life.

The prisoner I had taken by the kasi lines looked at me when we brought back his senses to him, but did not know me. I knew him well, though, for there was little change in him since that afternoon when he had suggested my meeting with Maelen. Gaul Slafid.

He tried to make a bargain with those of us he believed to be Thassa. Such stupidity I did not understand, unless being made prisoner in such a fashion muddled his wits for a time. Then he mouthed threats, telling us what would happen to all the Thassa unless we instantly set him free and made abject terms with those behind him. And here, too, perhaps fears prompted his ravings. But we heard enough so that I might guess the rest.

Alcey had hit upon the beginnings of it. Yiktor had been closely studied for years by men who needed, as part of their plans, a primitive planet as a base and supply depot. And, playing politics, the Korburg Combine had waded into waters so deep they must aid these exploiters or drown.

The Thassa had been thought to constitute a threat, so a grand crusade against them had been planned. It had been planned to unite the lords under one leader into an army which could later be directed as the exploiters saw fit. But the ancient feuds and rivalries had not made this smooth working, and they chose to use Maelen's involvement with Osokun to whip up that crusade.

What would come of it all, who knew? But at this moment Gauk Slafid was one piece removed from the game board. And I believe the realization of that ate into him acidly, so he mumbled on and on, refusing to face the wreck of his own ambitions.

We took him back with us into that strange dead-lake valley in the hills. And there was all stood before the Old Ones. Slafid they wasted little time upon, giving him to me to take to the port to face the judgment of his own species, saying he was of my blood and mine the responsibility for him.