"Let go of me!" Gordus cried out in immaterial indignity. Hammen released him. Completely. Gordus screamed soundlessly as he retreated toward infinity. "Shall I catch you?" Hammen asked. The scream changed in pitch. The Witch brought him back. "You stayed," Gordus said. "Somehow you stayed. That dog. Somehow you've got your damned Familiar with you, haven't you, Witch?" "No," Hammen lied fluently. "Only feeble minds like yours require a contact. Shall I tell you something about Witches? The Familiars are a deception. We don't need them at all. We are lone wolves." "Wolves, are you? So now I know what your grandmother before you was." Hammen laughed. And sobered. "What did you take, Gordus?" he demanded. "What do you know about her?" asked Gordus. "Her name is Isodel." "Isodel Van Der Lies." "I've heard of her. Somewhere," Hammen said hesitantly. * * * * * "A great theoretician," the coordinator explained sullenly. "Probably the first authentic female genius of the race of man. On a par with Plato, Shakespeare, Newton, Einstein." "What theory of hers were you after?" Hammen pursued. "A method of destroying the Mindsnake." "You want to take the credit from her." "I want only to take the theory from her, Hammen." "You mean you don't want the Mindsnake to be destroyed. You are afraid its destruction would mean the end of the Companion Corps which you head." "Not at all. I only want the theory so I can reverse it. Once you know how to destroy the Mindsnake, you also know how to create one. You see, I intend to become another Mindsnake, one who knows too much of destruction to ever be destroyed." "Listen carefully, Gordus," Hammen said with infinite care. "You're ill. You don't know what you're talking about. It can't be done." "The ultimate dream--ultimate power." "That's pure psychosis, Gordus!" "Is it? Watch how easily I begin to grow. I have the woman's mind now." It was true. The poor, mad genius woman was gone. "Stop it, Coordinator. You don't know what you're doing!" Hammen tried to reach him. "That's it, that's it. Come ahead, my boy. I'm becoming a Mindsnake. Now I am a Mindsnake. Come ahead. Let me swallow you next." "You fool," Hammen broadcast. "You are _the_ Mindsnake now. Don't you think anyone's ever wanted power before? Won't you let yourself remember how it was when you were a Companion? This is how it _always_ happens. You've let yourself be swallowed by the Snake. You ran right into its jaws." "No." Gordus thought furiously. "I--" And the Snake digested the tiny egg in its gullet and "I" blurred and was washed over by "All." Hammen struck at it in anger and humiliation and terror and it retreated with frictionless speed. The Snake took something with it. It took Gordus, and it left that part of the woman, Isodel, that he had been able to capture. But the part of Isodel matched by Gordus' mind was jerked free. She was freed of hate, anger, lust....