Stuart glanced around at the ardent, fanatical faces, and something in him took a slow fire from the fire in theirs. A deep and vital purpose, as old as humanity—how many times before in Earth’s history had men of Earth gathered in hidden rooms and sworn vows against tyranny and oppression? How many times before had Earthmen dedicated themselves and their son’s sons, if need be, to the old, old dream that though men may die, mankind must in the end be free?
Here in this crowded room the torch of freedom still burned, despite the hell of slavery under which the worlds toiled now.
He hesitated.
“It won’t be easy, Stuart,” the man warned. “A sword—blade must be hammered on the anvil, heated in flame, before it’s tempered. The Protectors will test you—so that your mind may be toughened to resist the attacks of the Aesir later. You will suffer. …”
He had suffered. Those agonizing, nightmare dreams in the forest, the phantoms that had tortured him—other trials he did not want to remember. But there had been no flaw in the blade. In the end—the Protectors had been satisfied, and had entered his mind—maintaining the contact that still held, though thinly now.
And the voices he heard still whispering within him were the voices of his mentors. …
“We took your memories from you. So that the Aesir could not read too much in your mind, and be forewarned. Now that does not matter, and you will be stronger with your memory restored. But when you let the girl clasp the cloak about you—that was failure.”
“If I could move,” Stuart thought. “If I could rip it off—”
“It is part of you. We do not know how it can be removed. And while you wear it, we cannot give you our power.”
Stuart said bitterly. “If you’d given me that power in the first place—”
“We did. How do you think you survived the first testing by the Aesir? And it is dangerous. We must gauge it carefully, so that we do not transmit too much of our mental energy to you. You are merely human—if we let you draw on a tenth of our power, that would burn you out like a melting wire under a strong current.”
“So—what now?”
“We have lost again. You have lost, and we are sorry. All we can do is give you an easy death. We possess you now, mentally; if we should withdraw from your brain, you would die instantly. We will do that whenever you ask. For the Aesir will kill you anyhow now, and not pleasantly.”
“I’m not committing suicide. As long as I live, I can still fight.”
“We also. This has happened before. We have chosen and possessed other champions, and they have failed. We withdrew from their minds before the Aesir … killed … so that we could survive to try again. To wage another battle. Some day we will win. Some day we shall destroy the Aesir. But we dare not cling to our broken swords, lest we too be broken.”
“So when the going gets tough you step out!”
Stuart sensed pity in the strange twin voice. “We must. We fight for the race of man. And the greatest gift we can give you now is quick death.”
“I don’t want it,” Stuart thought furiously. “I’m going to keep on fighting! Maybe that’s why you’ve always failed before—you were too ready to give up. So I’ll die if you step out of my mind? Well—it’s a lousy bargain!”
There was no anger, only a stronger overtone of pity in the still voice.
“What is it you want, Stuart?”
“Nothing from you! Just let me go on living. I’ll do my own fighting. There’ll be time enough to take a powder when the axe falls. I’m asking you simply this—keep me alive until I’ve had another crack at the Aesir!”
A pause. “It is dangerous. Dangerous for us. But—”
“Well?”
“We will take the risk. But understand—we must leave you if the peril grows too great. And will—inevitably.”
“Thanks,” Stuart said, and meant it. “One thing. What about Kari? Who is she?”
“A hundred years ago she was human. Then she was brought here, and the Aesir possessed her—as we possess you. She has grown less human in that time, as the alien grows stronger within her. She has only faint memories of her former life now, and they will vanish soon. Contact with the Aesir is like an infection—she will grow more and more like them. Perhaps, eventually, become one of them.”
Stuart grimaced. “If the Aesir should withdraw from her—”
“She would die, yes. Her own life-force has been sapped too far. You and she are kept alive only as long as the bond of possession holds.”
Nice, Stuart thought. If the Aesir were destroyed, Kari would die with him. And if he faced doom, he too would die, as the Protectors withdrew to avoid sharing his fate.
Hell—what did he care whether Kari lived or died? It was only the glamor of half-alienage that had drawn him to the girl. A dagger in her throat—
Besides, he was certainly facing doom now.
“All I can do—” he said—and stopped abruptly. He was speaking aloud. Patiently the twin voice in his brain waited for him to continue.
Slowly he flexed his arms. He tilted back his head, staring up at the rim of the pit fifty feet above him. He could see the titan pillars rising toward the roof of that mighty tower, incredibly far above. But there was no sign of life.
“I can move,” he said. “I—”
Struck by a new thought, he gripped the folds of the cloak. It was nauseously warm and vibrant. It seemed to move under his hands. He jerked at it, and felt a twinge of agonizing pain along his spine and about
