Zenaor lay there, sleeping. Yet even at rest, the lean, high-boned face showed no trace of slackness. The muscled hands still curled to fists. "My knife!" Vydys whispered again, close to Craig's ear. "You promised me his head, Earthman!" Craig stared down at her. The dark eyes glowed like twin coals now, and the skin of her face seemed suddenly to have stretched tighter, replacing curves with planes and hollows. The fingers that strained towards the dagger trembled with a naked urgency, somehow obscene, as if in the blood-lust of this moment the woman's very soul were spread out to the viewer, dark and evil. Craig turned away ... looked again at the sleeping Zenaor. "Curse you, Earthman--!" Vydys panted. She clawed for the knife. For an instant their bodies strained together in silent struggle. Then, suddenly, Vydys ceased to writhe and twist. Her body pulsed against Craig's. His heart pounded. He clutched the woman to him. A voice said, "If you move, you die!" Craig froze. Ever so slowly, he brought his head round. Narla stood framed against a drape-shrouded door to his right. She gripped a fire-gun in her hand. She raised her voice before he could speak. "Father!" Zenaor came awake with a twist, a jerk of covers. The coal-black eyes gleamed beneath the heavy brows. "So--visitors!" And then, to Narla: "My daughter...." "It's nothing. They spoke too loudly. I heard them." The fire-gun in her hand stayed very steady. "You'll not regret it." Zenaor groped a weapon of his own from a stand by his sleeping-couch. His lips set in a thin, mirthless smile. "Welcome, Vydys. You come in strange company." "He ... forced me...." "He forced you!" Mockery rang in Zenaor's harsh laughter. And then, the mirth dying: "Woman, you go back to your chambers. Under open guard, this time, with every man ordered to kill you if you so much as smile at him." Vydys' lovely face flushed. "Zenaor, you dare not!" "Because if I do you'll kill me?" Of a sudden Zenaor's voice echoed flat menace. "You'll try, you mean, you bitch--just as you tried here, tonight. And you'll fail again. Only perhaps by then I'll have less need to let you live for the sake of Kukzubas unity, and I can watch you writhe and die instead, as you should die now!" There was silence, then--a taut, hate-surging silence. Eyes smouldering, white to the lips, Vydys smoothed her gown, her hair. * * * * * Zenaor turned to Craig Nesom. "You, Earthman--now you, too, shall join ranks with your fellows who died in the starship." Craig shrugged. In this time, this place, words were wasted. "But slowly," the chief of barons continued. "There are many things I would ask you--things best brought out under torture: how you got here, into my chambers; the plans of the Baemae; your relations with Vydys. So, you die--but by inches." Craig shrugged again.