That link ... in an instant it grew to a searing, surging flame, hotter even than these creatures' own hell-fire brew. Spasmodically, Jarl twisted round. The primitive with the blazing brand still stood statue-like at the corner of the great stone slab. Black-Mask snarled another order. His henchmen jerked Jarl back--lifting him, swinging him upward, till he hung suspended above the altar. By instinct, Jarl wrenched against them; felt them, too, stiffen in the face of his resistance. But if he could not fight them, perhaps there was another way.... Before they could lower him to the slab, he let himself go limp, loose-limbed and unresisting as any corpse. It broke their balance. He hit the stone with a sodden thud ... lay there unmoving, head lolled back. For the fraction of a second their grip relaxed. * * * * * It was Jarl's moment.... Savagely, then, he lashed out with all his might, in a violent spasm of arms and legs and torso. His feet smashed the metal mask into one primitive's face. His elbow sank fist-deep in another's midriff. The restraining hands fell from him. Desperately, he threw himself across the altar, toward the torch-bearer. Before the creature could recoil, Jarl was upon him--smashing him down with fists and knees and shoulders; snatching the flaming brand out of his hands. Falling over each other in their haste, the others lunged to seize Jarl. But instead of fleeing, he leaped back onto the altar. There was a prayer in his heart--his heart in his mouth. With a wild curse, he hurled the torch straight for the vat of hell-broth. It struck the open lid, then plunged on down into the liquid. But even as it fell, the fumes were flaring. Flame and smoke leaped up in a roaring column. A cloudburst of liquid fire sprayed out in all directions. The cries of the primitives exploded into one great scream of pain and terror. As Jarl threw himself flat, with the altar-stone between him and the tank, he glimpsed the reeling, flame-cased figure of his jet-masked tormentor--stumbling, falling. Then the black smoke billowed out in nauseous, all-obscuring murk that swallowed even the thundering holocaust that still roared around what had been the tank of liquid. Jarl rolled from the wheeled platform on which the altar rested. Bent double, he raced through the choking haze for the bulkhead. In seconds, he was fumbling his way along it to the nearest doorway ... slipping through and ramming the heavy bolt home behind him. Ahead, a shaft and spiral stairway loomed. Panting, he sprinted upward, past level after level. The stairway ended against another metal door. The outlined figure of one of the mighty warrior robots was blazoned on it. Jarl's heart pounded harder. Shoving open the hatch, he half-fell inside and locked it, too, behind him.