"Why?" I asked. "Why?"

But she only clung to me and sobbed.

Finally, "I thought you had killed yourself."

"Maybe I would have," I said. "Why did you leave Tirellian? Andme?"

"Didn't M'Cwyie tell you? Didn't you guess?"

"I didn't guess, and M'Cwyie said she didn't know."

"Then she lied. She knows."

"What? What is it she knows?"

She shook all over, then was silent for a long time. I realizedsuddenly that she was wearing only her flimsy dancer's costume. Ipushed her from me, took off my jacket, and put it about hershoulders.

"Great Malann!" I cried. "You'll freeze to death!"

"No," she said, "I won't."

I was transferring the rose-case to my pocket.

"What is that?" she asked.

"A rose," I answered. "You can't make it out in the dark. I oncecompared you to one. Remember?"

"Yes--Yes. May I carry it?"

"Sure." I stuck it in the jacket pocket.

"Well? I'm still waiting for an explanation."

"You really do not know?" she asked.

"No!"

"When the Rains came," she said, "apparently only our men wereaffected, which was enough....Because I--wasn't--affected--apparently--"

"Oh," I said. "Oh."

We stood there, and I thought.

"Well, why did you run? What's wrong with being pregnant on Mars?Tamur was mistaken. Your people can live again."

She laughed, again that wild violin played by a Paginini gone mad.I stopped her before it went too far.

"How?" she finally asked, rubbing her cheek.

"Your people can live longer than ours. If our child is normal itwill mean our races can intermarry. There must still be other fertilewomen of your race. Why not?"

"You have read the Book of Locar," she said, "and yet you ask methat? Death was decided, voted upon, and passed, shortly after itappeared in this form. But long before, before the followers of Locarknew. They decided it long ago. `We have done all things,' theysaid, 'we have seen all things, we have heard and felt all things.The dance was good. Now let it end.'"

"You can't believe that."

"What I believe does not matter," she replied. "M'Cwyie and theMothers have decided we must die. Their very title is now a mockery,but their decisions will be upheld. There is only one prophecy left,and it is mistaken. We will die."

"No," I said.

"What, then?"

"Come back with me, to Earth."

"No."

"All right, then. Come with me now."

"Where?"

"Back to Tirellian. I'm going to talk to the Mothers."

"You can't! There is a Ceremony tonight!"

I laughed.

"A Ceremony for a god who knocks you down, and then kicks you inthe teeth?"

"He is still Malann," she answered. "We are still his people."

"You and my father would have gotten along fine," I snarled. "ButI am going, and you are coming with me, even if I have to carryyou--and I'm bigger than you are."

"But you are not bigger than Ontro."

"Who the hell is Ontro?"

"He will stop you, Gallinger. He is the Fist of Malann."

I scudded the jeepster to a halt in front of the only entrance I knew,M'Cwyie's. Braxa, who had seen the rose in a headlamp, now cradled itin her lap, like our child, and said nothing. There was a passive,lovely look on her face.

"Are they in the Temple now?" I wanted to know.

The Madonna-expression did not change. I repeated the question.She stirred.

"Yes," she said, from a distance, "but you cannot go in."

"We'll see."

I circled and helped her down.

I led her by the hand, and she moved as if in a trance. In thelight of the new-risen moon, her eyes looked as they had the day I hadmet her, when she had danced. I snapped my fingers. Nothinghappened.

So I pushed the door open and led her in. The room washalf-lighted.

And she screamed for the third time that evening:

"Do not harm him, Ontro! It is Gallinger!"

I had never seen a Martian man before, only women. So I had noway of knowing whether he was a freak, though I suspected it strongly.

I looked up at him.

His half-naked body was covered with moles and swellings. Glandtrouble, I guessed.

I had thought I was the tallest man on the planet, but he wasseven feet tall and overweight. Now I knew where my giant bed hadcome from!

"Go back," he said. "She may enter. You may not."

"I must get my books and things."

He raised a huge left arm. I followed it. All my belonging layneatly stacked in the corner.

"I must go in. I must talk with M'Cwyie and the Mothers."

"You may not."

"The lives of your people depend on it."

"Go back," he boomed. "Go home to your people, Gallinger.Leave us!"

My name sounded so different on his lips, like someone else's.How old was he? I wondered. Three hundred? Four? Had he been aTemple guardian all his life? Why? Who was there to guard against?I didn't like the way he moved. I had seen men who moved like thatbefore.

"Go back," he repeated.

If they had refined their martial arts as far as they had theirdances, or worse yet, if their fighting arts were a part of the dance,I was in for trouble.

"Go on in," I said to Braxa. "Give the rose to M'Cwyie. Tell herthat I sent it. Tell her I'll be there shortly."

"I will do as you ask. Remember me on Earth, Gallinger.Good-bye."

I did not answer her, and she walked past Ontro and into the nextroom, bearing her rose.

"Now will you leave?" he asked. "If you like, I will tell herthat we fought and you almost beat me, but I knocked you unconsciousand carried you back to your ship."

"No," I said, "either I go around you or go over you, but I amgoing through."

He dropped into a crouch, arms extended.

"It is a sin to lay hands on a holy man," he rumbled, "but I willstop you, Gallinger."

My memory was a fogged window, suddenly exposed to fresh air.Things cleared. I looked back six years.

I was a student of the Oriental Languages at the University ofTokyo. It was my twice-weekly night of recreation. I stood in athirty-foot circle in the Kodokan, the judogi lashed about my highhips by a brown belt. I was Ik-kyu, one notch below the lowestdegree of expert. A brown diamond above my right breast said"Jiu-Jitsu" in Japanese, and it meant atemiwaza, really, because ofthe one striking-technique I had worked out, found unbelievablysuitable to my size, and won matches with.

But I had never used it on a man, and it was five years since Ihad practiced. I was out of shape, I knew, but I tried hard to forcemy mind tsuki no kokoro, like the moon, reflecting the all of Ontro.

Somewhere, out of the past, a voice said "Hajime, let it begin."

I snapped into my neko-ashi-dachi cat-stance, and his eyesburned strangely. He hurried to correct his own position--and I threwit at him!

My one trick!

My long left leg lashed up like a broken spring. Seven feet offthe ground my foot connected with his jaw as he tried to leapbackward.

His head snapped back and he fell. A soft moan escaped his lips.That's all there is to it, I thought. Sorry, old fellow.

And as I stepped over him, somehow, groggily, he tripped me, and Ifell across his body. I couldn't believe he had strength enough toremain conscious after that blow, let alone move. I hated to punishhim any more.

But he found my throat and slipped a forearm across it before Irealized there was a purpose to his action.

No! Don't let it end like this!

It was a bar of steel across my windpipe, my carotids. Then Irealized that he was still unconscious, and that this was a reflexinstilled by countless years of training. I had seen it happen once,in shiai. The man had died because he had been choked unconsciousand still fought on, and his opponent thought he had not been applyingthe choke properly. He tried harder.