Once more he saw the giant crag that towered amid the mountains. The dark tower lifted from its summit. Elak was drawn forward; iron gates opened in the base of the pinnacle. They closed as he passed through. The high whining had ceased. It was cimmerian dark. But in the gloom a Presence moved and stirred and was conscious of Elak. The Pallid One sprang into view. He felt a sense of whirling disorientation; his thoughts grew inchoate and confused. They were slipping away, spinning into the empty dark. In their place something crept and grew; a weird mental invasion took place. Power of Karkora surged through Elak's brain, forcing back the man's consciousness and soul, thrusting them out and back into the void. A dreamlike sense of unreality oppressed Elak. Silently he called upon Dalan. Dimly a golden flame flickered up, far away. Elak heard the Druid's voice whispering faintly, out of the abyss. "_Mider--aid him, Mider--_" Fires of Mider vanished. Elak felt again the sense of swift movement. He was lifted-- The darkness was gone. Gray light bathed him. He was, seemingly, in the tower on the summit of the crag--the citadel of Karkora. But the place was unearthly! The planes and angles of the room in which Elak stood were warped and twisted insanely. Laws of matter and geometry seemed to have gone mad. Crawling curves swept obscenely in strange motion; there was no sense of perspective. The gray light was alive. It crept and shimmered. And the white shadow of Karkora blazed forth with chill and dreadful radiance. Elak remembered the words of Mayana, the sea-witch, as she spoke of her monstrous son Karkora. "_He walks in other worlds, beyond unlit seas, across the nighted voids beyond earth._" Through the whirling chaos a face swam, inhuman, mad, and terrible. A man's face, indefinably bestialized and degraded, with a sparse white beard and glaring eyes. Again Elak recalled Mayana's mention of Erykion, the wizard who had created the Pallid One. "Perhaps he dwells in his citadel yet, with Karkora. Not for years have I seen the sorcerer." If this were Erykion, then he had fallen victim to his own creation. The warlock was insane. Froth dribbled on the straggling beard; the mind and soul had been drained from him. He was swept back and vanished in the grinding maelstrom of the frightful lawless geometrical chaos. Elak's eyes ached as he stared, unable to stir a muscle. The shadow of the Pallid One gleamed whitely before him. The planes and angles changed; pits and abysses opened before Elak. He looked through strange gateways. He saw other worlds, and with his flesh shrinking in cold horror he stared into the depths of the Nine Hells. Frightful life swayed into motion before his eyes. Things of inhuman shape rose up out of nighted depths. A charnel wind choked him. The sense of mental assault grew stronger; Elak felt his mind slipping away under the dread impact of alien power. Unmoving, deadly, Karkora watched--