"My world," she went on, oblivious to the turmoil in his mind, "my world is too different to offer you any shelter, though I suppose you could enter it for a little while, in that protective armor that Sanfel made. But not to stay. We spring from soil too alien to one another's worlds.... Even this communication is not easy. And there is no safety here in Zha either, now. Now that Sanfel has failed me." "I--I'd help you if I could." He said it with difficulty, trying to force the remembrance upon himself that this was a stranger.... "Tell me what's wrong." She shrugged with a poignantly familiar motion. "I have an Enemy. One of a lower race. And he--it--there is no word!--has cut me off from my people here in a part of Zha that is--well, dangerous--I can't describe to you the conditions here. We have no common terms to use in speaking of them. But there is great danger, and the Enemy is coming closer--and I am alone. If there were another of my people here to divide the peril I think I could destroy him. He has a weapon of his own, and it is stronger than my power, though not stronger than the power two of my race together can wield. It--it _pulls_. It destroys, in a way I can find no word to say. I had hoped from Sanfel something to divert him until he could be killed. I told him how to forge such a weapon, but--time would not let him do it. The teeth of time ground him into dust, as my Enemy's weapon will grind me soon." She shrugged again. "If I could get you a gun," Dantan said. "A force-ray--" "What are they?" He described the weapons of his day. But Quiana's smile was a little scornful when he finished. "We of Zha have passed beyond the use of missile weapons--even such missiles as bullets or rays. Nor could they touch my Enemy. No, we can destroy in ways that require no--no beams or explosives. No, Dantan, you speak in terms of your own universe. We have no common ground. It is a pity that time eddied between Sanfel and me, but eddy it did, and I am helpless now. And the Enemy will be upon me soon. Very soon." * * * * * She let her shoulders sag and resignation dimmed the remembered vividness of her face. Dantan looked up at her grimly, muscles riding his set jaw. It was almost intolerable, this facing her again in need, and again helpless, and himself without power to aid. It had been bad enough that first time, to learn long afterward that she had died at enemy hands while he was too far away to protect her. But to see it all take place again before his very eyes! "There must be a way," he said, and his hand gripped the lever marked "door" in the ancient tongue. "Wait!" Quiana's voice was urgent. "What would happen?" "The door would open. I could enter your world, and you mine." "Why can't you leave, then, and wait until it's safe to go back?"