indecision and torment was I that the thought seemed natural; later I questioned that assumption.
There were two evils, and I must make a decision. The decision was made for me, of course. I dare not allow myself to die. Delia — I would be of no use to Delia if I were dead and wandering like a wraith through the echoing vastnesses of Cottmer’s Caverns.
So I must live to fight another day and take my chances of ever returning to Kregen. Perhaps, I thought, maundering, raging with fever, delirious, out of my head — I remember it all in flashes and spurts and jolting savage impressions of pain and horror and urgency — perhaps it would be better for me just to die, after all, just to let slip rather than live out a thousand years of meaningless life on Earth.
But, as it was in the nature of the scorpion to sting the frog, so it is in my nature to struggle and never give in, however foolish that makes me. There had to be a way around this. I tried to grasp onto my whirling thoughts — confusion, a roaring in my head, a drugged empty feeling as though the evil concoctions of the black lotus-flowers of Hodan-Set wafted through my brain — desperately, near despair, I tried to think and reason this out, trying to act in the puffed-up character of the cunning old leem-hunter so many people credit me with being. I am just an ordinary man — oh, yes, I am blessed or cursed with a thousand years of life and I have seen and done much; but I am no superman. If I–I remember turning and rolling, slowly, agonizingly, over onto my stomach alongside the stone lip of the pool. First things first. If I — cautiously I plucked at the ghastly bundle that wrapped all that was left of my arm. If I–I did not want to disturb that mess. I may have a strong stomach; I do not think I could have withstood the impact of the horror of my own body that must have been revealed. Slowly, cautiously, I inched out over the water, and let the thing dangle down. The milky fluid closed around my arm. I felt — well, I wondered if I did feel anything through the bite of agony. Then the warm comforting sensation as of a soft mouth kissing me, a million tiny needles pricking my skin, rather, pricking the shreds of skin and fragments of bone. The rags would all be melted away. I waited, feeling the warm glowing sensation increase and expand. I managed to shift around so my shoulder dipped.
If I ventured any more I would fall in. Then it would be Earth for me. . Weird, to think I thus hung over a drop of four hundred light years. . Presently, in due time, I withdrew my arm.
The arm was whole.
I flexed the muscles. I gripped that iron hand of mine into a fist.
Well!
So I pushed out over the water, gripping the stone lip of the rim with two strong hands, and dipped my head. I dunked my head in and held my breath and all the pains of Kregen flowed and dissolved and washed away as the snows of the Heart Heights of Valka vanish when the full glory of the Suns of Scorpio pours upon them.
When I withdrew, a vast shape moving slowly in the milky waters drew back at the far end of the pool. Vanti. .
It was not bravado, not pride, not foolishness, that made me stand up and walk away without dipping my side. I knew enough of the powers of the milky liquid in the pool. My side, which was ripped and torn and poking crushed ribs through in a bloody crust, would heal of itself. Over at the far side the Guardian grew restless. A vast smooth bulk humped beneath the water. Waves of the liquid flowed outwards in smooth rolling rings to luminous reflections. I walked away, a whole man once again, and I will not attempt to speak of my feelings, for they poured in a hot jumbled tide, irrational, thanksgiving, angry, shamed, glorious. I had sinned grievously and I had been reprieved. Now, there was work to be done.
A voice whispered through the still air.
“Oh, unfortunate is the city-”
“You have no powers over me, Vanti!” I bellowed back. “Return to your hole, hide away from me -
for I warned you I would return.” Then, I added: “I return in friendship.”
The powers of the Guardian of the Pool could hurl me four hundred light years through space back to Earth. Had done so.
I must be an old vosk-skull, for I turned and cupped my hands and splashed the liquid over me, letting it run down over my body and legs.
Yes, an old onker — for as Zair is my witness, I knelt down and took a long swigging drink. Foolhardy? Of course! But then, that is me, Dray Prescot, Lord of Strombor, Krozair of Zy. . I stood up, tall and straight once more, a fighting man, ready to face what must come on the wild and beautiful, savage and horrendous world of Kregen.
I licked the last moisture from my lips.
“By Mother Zinzu the Blessed,” I said, wiping my mouth. “I needed that!”
Chapter Seventeen
The magnificent black zorca trotted along the path above the waterfall. Proud, high-tempered, a stallion, this zorca was a mount fit for a king. I had formed the impression that he had not been well treated by his Kataki owner. This is no novel thing. Some races on Kregen, as on Earth, care nothing for the suffering of animals, as other races care nothing for the suffering of women and children. For me, the stallion responded nobly, and I think he understood very quickly the difference in attitude between his old master and his new rider.
Mind you, Katakis have no feelings for the suffering of animals, women, children or men. They enslave them all.
Once again back to full health and strength, for my side healed with wonderful alacrity after I had taken the swigging, impudent drink, I jogged along on Shadow. I had decided to call this muscular and elegant steed Shadow because he moved like a ghosting shadow across the land. What lay ahead of me I did not know; but the broad outlines of what I had to do remained clear. What was I going to do. The light-headed exultant feeling persisted.
But, of course, Kregen would always come up with frustrations, and plans gang aft agley under Savage Scorpio.
The way opened out and I stared across a plain of brownish grasses studded by a few wilting trees here and there. My eye was caught by a scrap of white high in the firmament. I stared up, eyes narrowed against the glare, and cursed.
Certainly, surely, the white dove of the Savanti flew down and circled, eyeing my zorca with quick intelligence manifested in every movement, an intelligence far past that of any mortal bird. So, feeling truculent as well as foolish, I shook my fist at the white dove.
“What d’you want?” I bellowed up. “Sink me! I’m not going to the Swinging City, much as I’d like to. I have work to see to that will not wait.”
The Gdoinye, the gold and scarlet raptor of the Star Lords, had spoken to me before, as had the Scorpion — I wondered if the representative of the Savanti would deign to open his beak and speak in human terms using a human voice.
He did not. He swung about and then dipped away, going at right angles to my track. He flew on, with my watchful gaze on him, swung back with a beautiful lift of white wings, soared high again. Again he circled my head and flew off at right angles. Three times he did this before I understood he wanted me to follow him. I had never observed this conduct in the dove before. I pondered.
The plain remained bare. No purely human enemies threatened. If the Savanti wanted to take me they had powers to snatch me up no matter where I was — so I thought.
Gently easing Shadow around and jogging along after the bird we followed as he circled and rose and fell, pacing his eager flight to our more sedate progress. That after all these years on Kregen I had phlegmatically turned my back on Aphrasoe struck me not so much as odd as highly practical and a sensible course of action. Opaz knew what might happen in Aphrasoe. And Vallia called. I knew now where the island of Aphrasoe was situated. When my affairs in the Outer Oceans had been settled, why, then, it might be time to return to the Swinging City. I hoped I might return as a friend. So I followed the beckoning white dove. In for a zorca in for a vove, as my Clansmen say. Soon a little copse came into view half hidden in a field in the ground. The dove fluttered and settled
