The Hitts struck them. They came yelling from the ledges and behind the pillars and in the semigloom and confusion it was soon over. Blade and Thane fought back to back and slew a dozen Hitts before rope nets were tossed over them and they went down. They were trussed up and lashed to poles and carried off. The Hitts cut off the heads of Blade's men and stuck them on lances. There was no sign of Sariah.

Blade went now to his fire and poked it up. He added more wood. The Hitts fed him well and kept him well supplied with wood and all other things for which he asked. That Bloodax had plans for him Blade did not doubt, though what those plans were he could not begin to guess. In the meantime he was treated well and his wishes indulged. He regarded the pile of skins he was fashioning into a balloon and the rawhide tube that would conduct the smoke into it. Blade smiled. It was simple enough. The Hitts could not dream of a balloon any more than an ordinary person in Home Dimension could dream of Dimension X. They might puzzle at Blade's demands and think him a bit mad, but they would never guess at what he was making. Until the moment came to use it. That would be risky. He had not forgotten the leather-men. They would be after him.

He sat cross-legged and began to sew, and thoughts of Thane came back. The big man had been recognized and condemned immediately to die as a traitor, as a Hitt who had deserted to the Zirnians. Blade, held in isolation in a bee-hive hut, had been told nothing but that Thane was to die a traitor's death. And that he must watch it.

Blade put away his needle. He had tears in his eyes and he was not ashamed of them. His fault. All his fault. Thane had been a drunk and a hard man to handle, but he had been loyal. At engineering he had been a genius by Zirnian standards. But most of all he had been Blade's friend.

Blade had watched. They took him to the place of execution in a valley. Loth Bloodax was there and the man called Galligantus, though Blade was not permitted near them. He near forgot Bloodax, for he so longed to be at the throat of Galligantus, a lean and sinewy man with a mean, pinched face and eyes like dull diamonds. Galligantus who was victor in the end.

Thane died well. He spat in the face of Galligantus. Blade shouted in fury and frustration and was gagged. He willed himself not to watch it and failed. He looked. He had to look.

It was explained to him. The punishment for traitors was the Death of Five Strokes. Galligantus had begged to be executioner and his wish had been granted.

Thane's left hand was struck off. Then his left foot. Then his right hand and right foot. He was left to grovel in the dirt, his face twisting in agony. He did not scream and he tried as best he could, scrabbling on bloody stubs, to get to Galligantus. At the very last he spat again.

Galligantus stepped near and cut off his head.

The head of Thane was stuck on a pole and brought to Blade, and he was made to look at it for an hour. His mind turned at the end of the time and he thought he saw Thane grin and ask for wine. After that he became dizzy and sick and only half aware of what went on. When he came to himself again he was in the hut on his plateau prison. He lay ill for a week, sometimes raving, only dimly sensing that people came and went and that he was being cared for. He was sure he dreamt, and then not so sure, that a girl tended him. Once, in a moment of lucidity, she called herself Lisma and said that she was daughter of Loth Bloodax. Another time, though of this he was never positive, he thought she made love to him, that she aroused him and had her fill of him and he half conscious.

Blade heard the trapdoor rise and clatter and put his needle away. He pushed the pile of skins back into a corner. He had not dreamt it all-her name was Lisma and she was daughter to Bloodax and she had made love to him then. And many times since. Lisma came to him three times a week. Her purpose, as she explained without guile, was to become pregnant. It was Hitt logic, Dimension-X fantasy, and Blade could not fault it. It was pleasant enough and it killed the time. He did not like her, nor trust her, and it did not matter. No doubt she felt the same way about him. She was, Lisma explained, only being dutiful to her father's wishes when she came to him.

Now, as he watched her fit the trapdoor back into place and start toward the hut, Blade determined to force the issue. He must have an audience with Loth Bloodax. So far he had been denied this, for Bloodax showed little interest in his prisoner, and with every day Blade grew more frustrated and enraged. How could he cozen Bloodax, or win him over, if he could not come to see him!

He stepped away from the door and bowed as Lisma entered. She bore her usual grave and unsmiling look. She was a small girl, fragile in bone, with a tiny waist and slim legs and large breasts that belied the rest of her. She brushed past Blade and went directly to a chair and perched on the edge of it like a wary bird.

Lisma Bloodax was in her early twenties, at his guess. She had the blue eyes and flaxen hair of her race. Her teeth were good and she wore her hair long to her waist, caught up behind with a band of beaded leather. The Hitt women, at least some of them, covered their breasts. Lisma wore a bandeau of soft worked leather. Her midriff was bare and she wore tight breeches to her knees. On her feet were high-laced buskins with long, curling toes.

Lisma put her chin in her hand and stared at Blade. «You are well? You wish for anything?»

He smiled. Every visit began with the same inquiry.

«I am well and I want for nothing-save for an audience with your father. How much longer am I to be kept in solitary on this crag, Lisma? I find it most strange. Does your father not want to see his prisoner? I would have thought he would-if only to take his revenge at first hand. I am not a common soldier, you know. It was I who defeated him and smashed his army. Has he no curiosity about such a man?»

Lisma said, «My father's greatest curiosity is that I am not yet pregnant. He begins to think that your seed is poor. Galligantus swears it so and also swears that you are no god. He took the girl Sariah to wife but three short weeks ago and already her monthly blood does not flow. Galligantus asks every day that he be allowed to kill you.»

Sariah had married Galligantus. She was a Hitt to the core and had led them into the trap.

Blade went to crouch by the fire and eye Lisma. «And what does your father say?»

Lisma shrugged. «Every day he says no. He still believes you a god-for how else could you have defeated him? — and he wants me pregnant by you. If it is a son, it will be at least half a god and bring the Hitts luck in everything-war and peace, crops, rain when we need it, strong children and bold leaders. He bids Galligantus hold his peace-at times they come near to quarrel over it. But we are wasting time, Blade. I have not all day for this. Put your man weapon in me and have done.»

It struck Blade that he had been missing a bet. He had not been thinking right. He put thought into action at once. He went to her and, as she would have moved to the pallet to lie for him, he caught her to him and kissed her hard. He had never kissed her before.

At first she struggled. He crushed her to him and sought her lips and kissed her until she went limp in his arms. Her tongue crept into his mouth and began to respond.

«I will show you something of loving,» Blade muttered. He carried her to the pallet. She was a simple little thing, a savage, and if he could not get around her he had no business in Dimension X. Why had he not thought of it before?

When he had done with Lisma she lay limp and gasping, her eyes soft as she caressed his face. Blade thought briefly of the Princess Hirga, whom he could never satisfy or dominate. Something wrong there-something he meant to discover, if and when he ever got back to Zir.