Winters said, "I don't understand. What has Shanga to do with Mars?" "You'll see." She turned on him suddenly. "You challenged Shanga, Earthman, just as your people have challenged Mars. We'll find out which is the stronger!" She motioned to the officer of the guard, who went away. Then she said to Winters, "You wanted your girl back. You were willing to go through the fire of Shanga for her, though you abhorred it. You were willing to risk your identity through the changes of the ray--_which after a while, Earthman, never go away_. And all for Jill Leland. Do you still want her back?" "Yes." "You're sure of that." "Yes." "Very well." Fand glanced over his shoulder and nodded. "There she is." For a long moment, Burk Winters did not turn around. Fand moved away a little, watching, with a cruel, amused interest. Winters' back stiffened. He turned. She was there, standing in the sunlight, bewildered, frightened, a wild and shining creature out of the dawn of the world, with a rope around her neck. The guards were laughing. Winters thought desperately, _She has not changed too much. Back to the primitive, but not yet to the ape. There is a soul still in her eyes, and the light of reason._ _Jill, Jill! How could you have done this thing?_ But he understood now how she could have done it. He remembered how bitterly he had quarreled with her over Shanga. He had thought it a stupid and childish thing, far beneath her intelligence and as degrading as any other drug. But he had not understood. He did now. And he was filled with a deadly fear, because he understood so well. Because he himself was now numbered among the beasts of Shanga. And beneath his horror as he looked at the creature that was Jill and yet not Jill, he was aware that in some unholy way he found her more beautiful and more alluring than he ever had before. Stripped of all the shams and the studied unconventions of society, freed of all complexity, her body strong and fleet as a doe's quivering with sensitive life.... _It would take two of a kind. Dawn-woman, dawn-man. Strong sinew, strong passion, the guts that cities stole away...._ Fand said, "She can still be saved, if you can find a way to do it." Then she added shrewdly, "Unless you now need someone to save _you_, Captain Winters!" A strong shock of revulsion rocked him, but his eyes still held a strange light. * * * * * The silver she was coming toward him. Her gaze was fixed upon him. He saw that she was drawn to him, and struggling to understand why. She did not speak, and somehow Winters' throat closed on an aching lump, so that he too was dumb. The guard who held her rope let her move as she would. She came close to Winters, hesitantly, as an animal does. Then she stopped and looked up into his face. Tears gathered in her wide dark eyes. Presently she whimpered, very softly, and went down on her knees at his feet.