There were women wrestling naked in tubs of mud or copulating with men on stages. There were other dream places, with the drugs in liquid form rather than in smoking powders. There were strip shows, although Blade wondered how something so comparatively mild could compete with the more exotic amusements elsewhere on the street. There were bars and brothels, and inevitably there were wandering drunks and prowling whores.

Blade saw one of the drunks solicit one of the whores. When she pushed him away and he staggered over against the wall and sat down, his companion whipped out a razor-edged knife and slashed the girl's cheek open from hairline to jawline. Blade's control snapped then. He came up behind the knife-wielder and chopped him across the back of the neck, pulling the blow just enough to avoid leaving a corpse lying in the street. With luck the man would never know that a Candidate had hit him, but Blade at this point hardly cared.

He turned to look for the girl, but she darted whimpering away into an alley so black and forbidding that even Blade for a moment hesitated to follow her. Then he plunged into the darkness, guided by the sound of running feet ahead. He would not leave the girl to crawl off like an animal into some corner and heal herself-or die of an infected wound-even if this was the custom of the pirates. He shuddered again at the thought of a civilized community fallen into the hands of the Neralers.

Suddenly he heard the footsteps ahead of him change direction, first bearing off to the right and then beginning to climb. He heard echoes, and knew the passage must lead into one of the tunnels that honeycombed the slope. The girl had turned into the tunnel. Should he follow? Before he could decide, he heard a rumble and felt a vibration in the cobble-stoned floor of the alley under his feet. And before he could react to that, the cobblestones dropped out from under him and he plunged down into a blackness even more complete than that of the alley.

The fall was enough to knock the wind out of him, but a thick layer of quilts and cushions broke most of the impact. He sat up instantly, drawing his dagger. As he did so, a pale light suddenly flooded the chamber.

He was sitting in the bottom of a shaft some twenty feet deep and eight feet in diameter at the bottom. The cushions and quilts were made of a uniform dark green cloth glimmering with little sparkles in the light, which Blade saw came from a lantern behind a heavy glass panel set in the door of the shaft. The door itself was also green-old copper-and bare of ornament except for what first looked like a capital W in the middle. Then Blade saw that the W was made up of two pairs of black enameled serpents, their jewel-eyed heads together at the bottom. He felt a cold sinking in his stomach, remembering what Tuabir had said about Cayla's being a former Serpent Priestess of Mardha. And remembering that, he was not particularly surprised a moment later when the door slid noiselessly open and Cayla's voice said softly:

«Come to me, Blahyd.»

Blade stepped through the door with his dagger firmly held ready to strike, and found himself in a tunnel sloping downward. The walls and ceiling were rough-hewn slimy rock, but the floor was tiled in smooth green and black patterns through which stylized serpents writhed. Small lanterns in glass-fronted niches filled the tunnel with more of the same pallid light.

He stalked downward, prepared to follow the tunnel as far as it went, even into the foundations of the island. He was therefore a little surprised when it ended in a blank wall after less than fifty feet. Or at least it gave the appearance of a blank wall, because he had barely come to a stop before Cayla's voice came again, the same words in the same tone. The wall slid aside, and Blade stepped through, went down two shallow steps, and looked about him.

He was in a high-domed, circular chamber about fifty feet across, lit by more of the ubiquitous lanterns, these now hung from brackets set in the walls. The floor was the same uneasily familiar black and green serpent pattern. In the exact center of the chamber, on a dais raised some four feet off the floor, stood a stone altar in the form of a monstrous coiled serpent. Its head was toward Blade, and inside its gaping maw a small fire burned, sending coils of pungent green smoke up between the stabbing gilded fangs. Blade sniffed at the smoke, which hazed the chamber. It was not the same drug as the House of Dreams had offered. He had no time to wonder whether this was good or bad, because Cayla stepped out from behind the altar, uncoiling herself with a grace as sinuous as though she herself was a serpent.

She wore a green robe which covered her completely except for hands and face, a necklace of black stones, and a tiara of more black stones set in silver. Her face-and it was a strong and well-formed face, seen from close range-was totally expressionless.

«So you came, Blahyd?» Her voice, too, was almost expressionless, except for a slightly mocking note of inquiry.

He could not help asking in reply, «Did I have a choice?»

«You could have refused to follow that girl. But I knew you would not. Just as I know you are planning to desert us as soon as you can.»

Blade would have found it convenient at that moment to sink through the floor. He was as close as he had ever been to giving way to raw panic. He wondered if he were facing a telepath and suspected that coping with one would prove beyond him.

When he could get his tongue and lips into motion again, he could only say, «Why do you say that?»

«I am adept at reading the subtle messages of voice and face and stance, Master Blahyd. It is an art that can be acquired by proper training, just as the swordsmanship of which you seem so rightly proud.»

Blade, after a moment of indulging his relief that nothing paranormal was working here, looked about the chamber again. «This is not the work of the pirates.»

«No, nor of any man living. These swinish animals who crawl over the surface of the island and think they are burrowing deep into it know nothing of what lies inside. No more than lice know what lies inside a man.»

«Indeed.» It again seemed a useful enough word, when one absolutely had to say something.

«You fear me, Blahyd.»

«I do. You are the unknown.»

«Am I, Blahyd?» She stepped forward and he caught her musky scent. He was conscious that it was beginning to arouse him. «Are women unknown to you?»

«I have known many women.»

«And you shall know one more.» She reached back to undo the clasp of the necklace and laid it gently on the stone floor. She took the tiara off and laid it beside the necklace. Blade's arousal was now well past the beginning stage. She noticed it, and Blade could not help being gratified as her eyes wandered over him and widened noticeably. Then she stepped forward until she grasped his hands and lifted them to the collar of her robe. He found the small black metal catch there, fumbled for a moment, then undid it.

The robe fell away like the veil falling from a statue. As he had expected, she was nude under it. And she was superbly built, better than he had expected: without Alixa's grace, but trim, compact, well muscled. He lifted his hands to her small, firm breasts and stroked the pink nipples with his thumbs, feeling the nipples bud and swell and hearing her gasp. Her own hands drifted lightly over his chest, playing with the hair, then down across his belly to flick gently his swollen phallus. His hands left her breasts and crept downward to play finger games in her blonde bush-a darker blonde than her gleaming, close-trimmed head and curly where the other grew straight. Again she gasped. Her hands rose to his shoulders, pressed down. She gave a little leap upwards and her supple legs wrapped themselves serpentlike (the idea gave Blade a momentary chill) around his massive torso. As her arms and legs pulled her against him, he drove into her and felt her shudder almost at once. It had been a long time since this one had had a man. He was determined to make sure that it would be a long time before she needed one again. It was the only way he could see to take away that maddening coolness and contempt and perhaps make her willing or able to tell more about her plans.