"You prove my point. Who but a race of stuffy fools would try to pass off a sleeping woman as a goddess? That is, unless they were knaves, instead, seeking some gain by their deception." "But these aliens would destroy us--" "And why not, if the best you can do is pray to me for succor? The blue one spoke true. Power is the only thing in all the void worth seeking--for without it, man and race alike are doomed!" * * * * * Kyla stood very still. But, watching her, Haral could see her lips begin to tremble. The color was draining from her face again. Her features had taken on a stiff, unnatural set. "Then ... Xaymar, queen of storms, deserts her faithful ones for aliens? She casts off my _Shamon_ people ... me, her priestess--?" Xaymar tossed her head. "I tire of this dreary prattle!" she cried, and gestured to a massive, tentacled Thorian at Sark's side. "You! Take this _Shamon_ drab away!" For the fraction of a second the Thorian's great saucer eyes rolled from Xaymar to Sark to Kyla. Then, wordless, he undulated towards the shrinking girl. And Haral, too, stared, still not quite believing that this incredible creature, be she woman or devil or goddess, could so take command even of Sark's own men. Then, again, he glimpsed the stiffness in Kyla's face, and a strange uneasiness gripped him. Perhaps it was the way she stood, almost as if waiting for the Thorian, with no thought of retreating. The Thorian whipped a tentacle towards her. But in the same instant Kyla, too, was moving. Her hair shimmered like quicksilver as she slid beneath the Thorian's snake-like member. Her hand darted beneath her filmy outer garment, then out again, jerking forth her ray-gun. Her body twisted as she stabbed the weapon close to the Thorian's monstrous bulk. Then she was blasting, at so short a range that the raider's flesh burst asunder under the impact of the beam. The Thorian's tentacles lashed out in frenzy. But already the girl was leaping back beyond his grasp. Now, she was turning; springing up onto the dais. Her voice rang with a fury born of outrage: "Die, traitor! Die for the _Shamon_ and for Ulna!" She blazed a ray straight for Xaymar's naked body. Haral threw himself forward, between the two women. Desperately, he tried to knock Kyla's ray-gun up with one hand while he swept Xaymar from her cot with the other. But his wound-stiffened shoulder caught. The ray-gun's energy bolt burst on his own chest-plate. Its impact smashed him down. For a split second he saw the crypt as a blazing kaleidoscope of action, a maelstrom swirling in on a pain-wracked vortex that was his brain. He caught the madness in Kyla's eyes; the sudden panic in the way that Xaymar fell. Beyond them, the space-raiders' faces merged in a weird blurred jumble. Then Sark was roaring, "Now! Now! Seize them--!" Frantically, Haral tried to tear clear of pain and shock and debris.