Four soldiers came running around the end of the truck but made the fatal mistake of not blasting Blade on the spot. Like the men he had already taken out, they found him too close in before they could fire, and after that there was nothing they could do but flee or die. He butted the first one in the stomach, and the soldier screamed out all the breath in his body as he shot into the air and crashed against the man behind him. They went down together, and Blade leaped forward and crashed his bare foot down full force on the second man's chest. He saw a third soldier raise his beamer to firing position, threw himself backward under it, and swept the man off his feet and hard up against the sharp edge of the open truck door. The man fell forward tonelessly, but before he hit the ground Blade found himself suddenly staring into the muzzle of the fourth soldier's beamer.

There was no flashing of his life before his eyes, because the moment of staring at the beamer and knowing that it was about to chop him into charred pieces didn't last long enough. Then the soldier suddenly dropped his beamer into the dust, threw up his hands, and fell backward with a thud.

In the sudden silence that followed the soldier's collapse, Blade saw eyes in the mob turning from him to the double file of armed men, then on to the rest of the prisoners clustered behind him. Then one of the police-types snapped, «All right, you bastards! In the van! Now!» It was certainly a policeman's type of voice, and Blade could no more swallow that than he had swallowed the soldier's treatment. Not now. He lunged forward, and as he threw his arms to the left for a swinging blow at the nearest man's head, two more beyond that one had time to whip up their weapons and aim them at Blade. He felt a sudden fierce itching all over his body, as if every inch of it were covered with a blazing rash, then his knees would no longer hold him up. He knew he was falling forward, vaguely wondered if there was yet a part of his skin unbruised, felt himself hit and the gravel drive into his skin, then slipped on down into blackness.

This time, the first thing Blade became aware of was lying naked in a soft bed, his skin covered from head to toe with a soothing ointment, a faint hint of perfume in the air, and distant music in his ears. All together, it seemed so improbable that he decided he was not going to stay awake and try to orient himself, but would go back to sleep. He did so.

The second time he awoke the room was dark and both the perfume and the music were gone. So was the ointment. He looked at his skin where it had been smeared with the ointment, and saw that the bruises and scratches had faded as much as they would have normally in three or four days. However, he was still groggy-drugged? he asked himself-and so went back to sleep again.

The third time he awoke, he noticed that there was someone else in the room. At first glance this someone looked so much like Lord Leighton that for a moment Blade had the most disorienting sensation of all-that of having been snatched back to Home Dimension in his sleep. But a closer look showed him that the visitor was definitely not Lord Leighton. It was indeed possible he was not even human.

He was about five and a half feet tall, bandy-legged and squat as a chimpanzee, with appropriately long arms. His head was notably more cylindrical than the human norm, his eyes larger, and his ears far larger and more protruding. His hair was white and formed a fringe around a largely bald scalp. And that scalp, and every other inch of exposed skin, was a glowing sea blue.

«Well,» he said as he saw Blade stir and gape. «I see you are finally really awake. You need not be afraid. You are now among friends.»

Blade nodded slowly. Then, knowing it was an unoriginal and perhaps tactless thing to say:

«Who are you?»

«I? I am Stramod. I was one of the Ice Master's early experiments in genetics. I did not please him, because I was still too complex and too human, which of course has been very satisfactory to me. I grant you, I am somewhat odd to look at, but-«He broke off and grinned at the blank look Blade realized must be spreading across his face. «But indeed I am lacking in manners. I forget that you have not been given our discourse so you would not know the Ice Master from the Seven Sorcerers of Septhran Mountain.» He rose. «I will go and speak to Doctor Leyndt and she will come and perhaps together we can explain.» He strode out, moving with grace and even some dignity in spite of his simian appearance.

He returned a few minutes later with a companion, from her white tunic presumably Doctor Leyndt. She was decidedly human, and strikingly beautiful. No, perhaps handsome would be a better word. There was no hint of delicacy or softness in her face, body, or stance-all were perfectly balanced. But definitely attractive. The hair, even done up as it was, shone with a rich auburn sheen, the lips were full, the wide mouth made Blade want to see it smile, and the body under that tunic was most definitely that of a woman, a mature woman with all the curves ripened.

Her voice was measured, low, almost emotionless. As with her physical qualities, her voice was a perfect balance between too much and too little expression. So was her choice of words. «You must have realized that you are no longer destined for Treniga Arena, and are no longer in the hands of the Conciliators' soldiery. But I'm sure you want to know much more than that. Stramod and I will do our best to tell you.»

In fact, she explained, he had indeed been kept under sedation for more than four days, while the rest of the rescued Treduki were interrogated. Blade had appeared to be their leader, and a man of outstanding abilities, but they had to be sure he could be trusted before they tried to enlist him as an ally. So they had closely questioned all the others, to find out as much as possible of the way the others saw him, then gone to him directly. All the interrogation led to the conclusion that Blade was as able as he appeared, and trustworthy as far as this could be measured and judged for now. So they would answer any questions he might ask.

How had they known he had slain a Dragon Master? Oh, that was quite simple. Others had escaped from Irdna and reached Tengran even before Blade's party, talking of the destruction of the town and of the death of a Dragon Master at the hands of a huge man who yet moved like a striking snake. And in Tengran there were agents who reported such news to the headquarters of the movement in Treniga, the Graduk capital.

Yes, there was indeed a movement of those among the Graduki who would form an alliance with the Treduki and use the combined skills of the two peoples to beat back the Ice Dragons and perhaps even the glaciers. It was the movement's agents that secretly kept the area around Tengran's lake free of Dragons, driving them off with sonic blasts from the nerve-pistols that Blade himself had met.

It was obvious, however, that the Conciliators, the ruling oligarchy among the Graduki, also had agents in Tengran, who had picked up the same information and told their masters. And the Conciliators had responded with the raid that had gathered in Blade and his companions and also killed as many Tengrans as possible to remind them of Graduk weaponry and perhaps make them afraid to cooperate further with the movement's agents.

But it had been possible to foil the Conciliator's scheme, exploiting for this purpose the very prejudice against Treduki that the Conciliators gave as one of their main reasons for rejecting any notion of joint resistance. The mass of the people regarded Treduki as disease-ridden animals and their kidnapping for slavery or for the grand arenas an expensive luxury of the upper classes. There was an organized movement afoot to force the Council to end such raids. That movement had grown so strong that it had bribed officials of the Supreme Council to reveal the route along which the latest batch of Treduki were being smuggled into Treniga after being landed at a remote bay where none would see them. And since her movement, the Union for Cooperation, had infiltrated the other one, what was known to its leaders was soon known to the Union's.