Somewhere on the Time Ellipse Mike Kenscott became Adric; and the only way to return to his own identity was to find the Keep of the Dreamer, and loose the terrible FALCONS of NARABEDLA By Marion Zimmer Bradley [Transcriber's Note: This etext was produced from Other Worlds May 1957. Extensive research did not uncover any evidence that the U.S. copyright on this publication was renewed.] CHAPTER ONE Voltage--from Nowhere! Somewhere on the crags above us I heard a big bird scream. I turned to Andy, knee-deep in the icy stream beside me. "There's your eagle. Probably smells that cougar I shot yesterday." I started to reel in my line, knowing what my brother's next move would be. "Get the camera, and we'll try for a picture." We crouched together in the underbrush, watching, as the big bird of prey wheeled down in a slow spiral toward the dead cougar. Andy was trembling with excitement, the camera poised against his chest, his eyes glued in the image-finder. "Golly--" he whispered, almost prayerfully, "six foot wing spread--maybe more--" The bird screamed again, warily, head cocked into the wind. We were to leeward; the scent of the carrion masked our enemy smell from him. The eagle failed to scent or to see us, swooping down and dropping on the cougar's head. Andy's camera clicked twice. The eagle thrust in its beak-- A red-hot wire flared in my brain. The bird--the bird--I leaped out of cover, running swiftly across the ten-foot clearing that separated us from the attacking eagle, my hand tugging automatically at the hunting knife in my belt. Andy's shout of surprised anger was a faraway noise in my ears as the eagle started away with flapping, angry wings--then, in fury, swept down at me, pinions beating around my head. I heard and felt the wicked beak dart in, and thrust blindly upward with the knife, ripped, slashing, hearing the bird's scream of pain and the flapping of wide wings. A red haze spun around me-- Then the screaming eagle was gone and Andy's angry grip was on my shoulder, shaking me roughly. His voice, furious and frightened, was hardly recognizable. "Mike! Mike, you darned idiot, are you all right? You must be crazy!" I blinked, rubbing my hand across my eyes. The hand came away wet. I was standing in the clearing, the knife in my hand red with blood. Bird blood. I heard myself ask, stupidly, "What happened?" My brother's face came clear out of the thickness in my mind, scowling wrathfully. "You tell _me_ what happened! Mike, what in the devil were you thinking about? You told me yourself that an eagle will attack a man if he's bothered. I had him square in the camera when you jumped out of there like a bat out of a belfry and went for the eagle with your knife! You must be clean crazy!"