"'Tis the men ... the cleaning ... They ... We, I mean ..." Sciro of Old Lomarr would not pass the buck. "The bodies--the priests, you know, and so on--were easy enough; and we did manage to handle most of the pieces of the god. But the ... the heart, and so on, you know ... we know not where you want them taken ... and besides, we fear ... wilt stand by and ward, Lord Tedric, while I pick them up?" "'Tis my business, Captain Sciro; mine alone. I crave pardon for not attending to it sooner. Hast a bag?" "Yea." The highly relieved officer held out a duffle-bag of fine, soft leather. Tedric took it, strode across to the place where Sarpedion's image had stood, and--not without a few qualms of his own, now that the frenzy of battle had evaporated--picked up Sarpedion's heart, liver, and brain and deposited them, neither too carefully nor too carelessly, in the sack. Then, swinging the burden up over his shoulder-- "I go to fetch the others," he explained to his king. "Then we hold sacrifice to end all human sacrifice." "Hold, Tedric!" Phagon ordered. "One thing--or two or three, methinks. 'Tis not seemly to conduct a thing so; lacking order and organization and plan. Where dost propose to hold such an affair? Not in your ironworks, surely?" "Certainly not, sire." Tedric halted, almost in midstride. He hadn't got around yet to thinking about the operation as a whole, but he began to do so then. "And certainly not on this temple or Sarpedion's own. Lord Llosir is clean: all our temples are foul in every stone and timber...." He paused. Then, suddenly: "I have it, sire--the amphitheater!" "The amphitheater? 'Tis well. 'Tis of little enough use, and a shrine will not interfere with what little use it has." "Wilt give orders to build...?" "The Lord of the Marches issues his own orders. Hola, Schillan, to me!" the monarch shouted, and the Chamberlain of the Realm came on the run. "Lord Tedric speaks with my voice." "I hear, sire. Lord Tedric, I listen." "Have built, at speed, midway along the front of the amphitheater, on the very edge of the cliff, a table of clean, new-quarried stone; ten feet square and three feet high. On it mount Lord Llosir so firmly that he will stand upright forever against whatever may come of wind or storm." The chamberlain hurried away. So did Tedric, with his bag of spoils. First to his shop, where his armor was removed and where he scratched himself vigorously and delightfully as it came off. Thence to the Temple of Sarpedion, where he collected the other, somewhat-lesser-hallowed trio of the Great One's vital organs. Then, and belatedly, to home and to bed. A little later, while the new-made Lord of the Marches was sleeping soundly, the king's messengers rode furiously abroad, spreading the word that ten days hence, at the fourth period after noon, in Lompoar's Amphitheater, Great Sarpedion would be sacrificed to Llosir, Lomarr's new and Ultra-powerful god. * * * * *