"Skanderbek led his people to these mountains in time to keep them from starving or being poisoned. He made fire come out of the rock. Everlasting fire. Over it he hung the fire stone you now see. He taught us to bow to the fire and serve it, so that when the fire gods stopped hating mankind, the ghosts of the dead flames would go away. The years passed, and there was always further range for our animals. Other people came, and then of course there was looting and war. "But Skanderbek talked with gods and devils, and so no one could drive us out of here. One day Skanderbek said, 'I am going back to the gods. Let such and such a one take my place; I have taught him what to do and what to say to the holy flame, so that fire will never again destroy the earth. And one day, wearing a new body, I will come back.' All this was a long time ago, long before your people came out of the sky with knives of steel, and with guns, to trade with us. "And now tell me about your gods, Verrill." There was very little to tell Falana, except that Science had become, had from the beginning been the god of Venus. He was quite too busy reflecting that Skanderbek, a man like himself, had undoubtedly used a Geiger counter and some imagination, and had as a result become a god. He was thinking also of Linda's letter. She had not been able to give him much gossip about Dawson's plans to oppose him, since Dawson had left without having done much talking. But he inferred from what she did write, and from stories Ardelan's tribesmen brought from the disputed frontier, that a Venusian was living with the neighboring tribe, giving them rifles to take the place of their trade muskets. This suggested that Dawson was taking the simple and direct approach: coaching his protectors in the art of more efficient fighting, so that as the climax of an eventual raid into Ardelan's almost inaccessible fortress, Dawson could seize the Fire of Skanderbek and make off with it in the confusion. Whatever Verrill intended to do, he would have to do it quickly. * * * * * He went to the shrine and asked, "Kwangtan, where is the grave of Skanderbek?" "Skanderbek," the priest said, contemptuous of ignorance, "is not buried. He went back to the gods. Now go, and stay away." "I have heard a story like _that_," Verrill retorted. "Among my own people, there are old books, ancient before Skanderbek was even dreamed of. And it is written always how one leader or another went back to the gods, not dying as other men died. But we know better. A man dies, and his bones remain." Kwangtan's eyes sharpened and changed. He seemed to be asking himself whether this might not be one of those times when the wise thing was to make an ally of an enemy. And Verrill was at the same time thinking, "_Lies are the foundation of all priestcraft, and I've got this one searching the foundations._"