Urich said, "More trouble? The engine-"

"No." Dumarest was brusque. "There are things I need to know."

"And so you came to me." Urich stretched, enjoying the moment, conscious of his position. "What took you so long?" Then, as Dumarest made no answer, he said, "Do you want to talk here or somewhere else?"

"My cabin," said Dumarest. "We'll talk in my cabin."

The cabin held the lingering trace of femininity, of perfume, of cosmetics, of the indefinable presence of a woman. Ysanne, now absent, was probably busy at her duties or conducting her own examination of the vessel. Urich sat as Dumarest poured them both wine. A gesture of hospitality which he did not mistake for friendship, but it set the mood and he had no reason to reject it.

"Your health!" Urich sipped the wine as he studied Dumarest over the rim of the glass. The face was harder, the lines more pronounced, the eyes more somber than he remembered. A long, hard journey attended by constant strain-the marks were unmistakable. "There is a story heard once," he said. "About a man who caught a tiger by the tail."

"So?"

"It seems appropriate." Urich took another sip of his wine. "Your crew is small; yourself, a woman, one old man, an engineer newly joined. You are carrying one hundred and seventeen of the Ypsheim-I do not include myself."

"Make your point."

"I should have thought it obvious. Should there be trouble you would stand little chance."

"There will be no trouble."

"Not while you are in space," agreed Urich. "But after you land? What then?"

"Nothing. Our contract will have been completed. They leave the ship and we move on."

"If you are able." Urich paused then said, abruptly, "I will be frank. I want to leave with you, together with Eunice, naturally. The two of us taken to another world. In return I will offer you my full support in any action you may choose to take. It is a matter of survival, you understand. Alone with the Ypsheim my life would be measured in days. Agree and-" He sighed his relief as Dumarest nodded. "Then be warned. The man I was playing chess with is building a store of promised labor. He was also most interested when I offered to show him how to make knives from flint. He is not unique. Others have been discussing the future and making plans. Some have realized the advantage of holding the ship. Echoes," he explained. "Whispers-these unaccustomed to space have no idea how sound can travel in a vessel. As I said, Earl-you are holding a tiger by the tail."

"The Ypsheim? Didn't you once call them cattle? Gutless cowards?"

"On Krantz they were all of that, but now they're free of the Quelen."

"And plotting rebellion?"

"You're thinking of habit," said Urich. "Of the centuries of obedience which must have instilled a reluctance to act against authority. Relying on it, perhaps, to give you time to get away. Normally you would be justified, but there is something you have yet to learn." He paused to empty his glass then said, quietly, "Did you tell any of them where we are headed?"

"No." Dumarest added dryly, "As you remember we had little time for discussion."

"And you had your own plans. Your own need to escape." Urich set down the glass. "Why do you think I agreed to repair your engine?"

"Tell me."

"You said you were bound for Earth. For Earth!" Urich smiled but the grimace held no humor and turned into a snarl. "Justice," he said. "Or revenge-the taste is as sweet. They'd robbed me of all I'd striven for on Krantz. In return I helped you take them to the last place any of them want to reach!"

Ysanne had left a beaded garment on the floor; a thing of leather slashed and ornamented, touched with daubs of brilliance, laced with writhing strands. A tunic which rose beneath the impact of Dumarest's boot to land against a far bulkhead. An unconscious venting of anger; he hadn't noticed the garment until it had interrupted his stride. Now he turned and paced back to where Urich sat.

A clever man as he had proved. A ruthless one also if he had told the truth about his early life. Certainly an ambitious one even if that ambition had made him vulnerable. But what else?

He was of the Ypsheim yet apart from them and they would regard him as a traitor to his own kind. An outcast, and Dumarest knew too well what that could mean.

He said, "Tell me of Earth."

"A world of promise. A paradise. The planet which can provide all things." If the abrupt question had startled him Urich hid it well. "Or so they will tell you in the taverns. Buy more wine and they will go into greater detail." His tone was ironic. "Of course there are other versions."

"The one held by the Ypsheim?" Dumarest snarled as the other remained silent. "I need answers, man!"

"Answers imply questions. What is it you want to know?"

"The scars." Dumarest gestured toward his forehead. "The ones carried by the Ypsheim. A caste mark?"

"A symbol of unity. All the young are marked shortly after birth. It constitutes a bond of recognition." Urich hesitated then added, "And of remembrance."

"Remembrance?" Dumarest frowned, thinking of the paint filling the quarters of the cruciform scar to form a crossed circle. A coincidence, perhaps, but if it was more? "Are you saying the Ypsheim know of Earth?" He closed the distance between them, one hand lifting, gripping, hearing the roar of blood in his ears, the sudden tension of nerves and stomach. "Answer me, damn you! Do they?"

Urich wheezed, his face purpling, and Dumarest saw he had gripped the man's tunic at the throat, had tightened it so as to cut off the air. A betrayal which Urich recognized and, as Dumarest eased his grip, letting his hand fall from the twisted fabric he said, "It means that much to you?"

More than he could realize, but the eyes had told their story, the hand, the face which had become a mask of savage determination. On this subject, at least, there could be no dalliance.

"Earth," said Urich. "Yes, the Ypsheim know of it, but to them it is a place of horror. A world populated with monsters and echoing with endless screams. Mountains of fire and rivers of acid and plains of empty grit and stinging sand. The skies weep venom and things lurk in every shadow. Creatures spawned in damnation and-" Urich broke off, thinking, remembering the whispered tales of his early youth when, as a child, he had squatted in shadowed dimness listening to secrets revealed in intricate patterns of verbosity designed to baffle the uninitiated. "Nightmares," he said, "Deliriums. Nothing you can imagine is too bad to be applied to Earth."

Dumarest said, "Tell me of your history."

"Blood." Urich looked at the bottle of wine and watched as Dumarest poured then took the glass and sat looking at the ruby fluid. "Blood," he said again. "It began with a change in the blood. Those affected were plagued by visions and tormented by dreams. It set them apart in forced isolation. United they found a new strength." His tone changed, took on a ritualistic chant. "And those were the days of tribulation when each man's hand was set against his fellows and only those of the blood found friends in the blood and great was the confusion. And there rose those among the people with the gems of understanding and in the shine they knew of the paths and so guided those of the blood and-"

He broke off and shook his head and gulped at the wine. For a moment he had been a child again listening to the hypnotic cadences, barely understanding, learning by rote and repetition.

"Legends," he said. "Myths. Chains to bind a people together."

Or stories containing the germ of truth. Dumarest refilled the Urich's glass and said patiently, "Just tell me what you know. In your own words. It began with blood, you say?"

A convenient term to describe the unseeable; a genetic mutation which had resulted in a limited psionic ability. The visions and dreams had been distorted glimpses of the future, terrifying to those unaware of clairvoyance. A trait which had earned the fear and hatred of normals; the times of tribulation and confusion. Villagers wrapped in ignorance-they would have had to be villagers; in a town their seed would have been diluted in a greater gene pool, their talent dismissed as mental aberration.