"Neither are your companions but they do not hesitate to give their views. Surely you, with your knowledge and experience of various worlds, have some ideas of your own?"

"I mentioned one."

"An active appendix. Nothing else?"

"A fighter would naturally think of a better fighter as superior," said Linda. "A lover someone with better abilities than his own." She ran the tip of her tongue over her lower lip. Pouting, it glistened with the applied moisture. "Which are you, Earl? A fighter? A lover? A blend of both?"

"He'd need to be a hero to take on a strumpet like you." Enrice Heva, smarting at her rejection, took a belated revenge. "Do what you like with your door, Linda, I'll gamble a thousand to one he'll not try to open it."

"Shut your mouth," she said with cold venom. "Insult me again and you'll regret it."

"Enough!" Charisse slammed her hand down hard on the table. "This bickering gains nothing. Now, Earl, give us your idea of the perfect being."

"For the answer to that all you need to do is talk to a monk."

"The Church?" He had surprised her. "What could those beggars know of life? They skulk and preach the doctrine of Universal Brotherhood and enjoy their privation. What do they know of life?"

"The bad side."

"Earl?"

"They've seen it all." Dumarest picked up his glass and tilted it so the ruby wine it contained trembled on the verge of spilling. "The pain and hunger and sacrifice," he said. "The frustration and thwarted desires and the desperation." A drop of wine fell from the glass to splash on the table. "And, the most terrible of all, the death of hope."

"And?"

"They would tell you to create a being who is kind. One who is gentle. A creature who has thought and concern for others. Something which has the imagination to realize the results of its actions. The shape is unimportant. The agility, the strength of body and bone, the stamina, the ability to run or swim or fly. All it would need is tolerance. It's most important organ a heart."

The woman in black said gently, "But Earl, how long would such a creature last?"

"In the jungles we have created? Not long." Dumarest sent more wine to follow the initial drop, a thin stream of metaphorical blood which splashed to run writhing streams. A theatrical gesture which held their attention, their eyes. "If we were created by some alien genetic engineer as you have speculated then, if it intended to fashion monsters, it has done well." The rest of the wine gushed to be spread by the falling glass. "Think of what you do," he said. "Of what you permit others to do. Then look into a mirror and see the shape of a beast."

You'll see intelligence and understanding take the essence of life and create monsters and freaks and cripples doomed to misery, they and their children after them in an endless dynasty of pain. In the wine he could see the dim shapes of the teleths-pathetic beings made for use as toys. The dogs, the thing he had fought, the things he had seen. Wine and shattered glass spattered from beneath the hand he slammed on the table.

"Earl!" Charisse had risen, was leaning toward him, one hand lifted to signal. "Earl-are you ill?"

"No." He took a deep, shuddering breath, followed it with another. The sudden rage subsided, the blackness edging his vision receding so he could see the startled faces of his fellow guests. "A momentary indisposition," he said, and twisted his lips into a smile. "If any are offended I apologize." He lightened his tone. "The wine is stronger than I thought."

A weak excuse but one they accepted. It had been a mistake not to have drunk the restorative. Whatever was in it must have neutralized the compounds they had been fed. Drugs to induce hostility, overt sexuality, vulgar humor. A game, he realized. Charisse was triggering emotions to the surface for her inspection. Why had she guided the talk to a superior man?

Linda said, "You've answered my question, Earl. A fighter without a doubt. I saw murder in your face just then."

"Does not every lover kill a little?" Astin was cynical. "Charisse, your entertainment grows stronger each time we meet. One day, perhaps, it will get too strong."

But not while she had guards at her call. Dumarest looked at his palm, the wine staining it, the shallow gash at the base of one finger. Small payment for a stupid act-he'd been luckier than he deserved.

Charisse said, "We have talked about a superior being and yet never have we mentioned how such a creature is to be tested. Do we all agree that, in the final essence, the ability to survive is all-important?"

Vayne said, "Can there be any doubt?"

"None, but I wanted you to admit it. As I want you now to know that I have created just such a creature." She stilled the storm of comment. "No, later you may see it, but not now. But I am in the mood for a wager. You will agree that I know my trade? That if I say the thing I have fashioned is as good as can be devised I can be trusted to know what I'm talking about?"

Astin said, "Your point, Charisse?"

"If you so agree you will not hesitate to back it to win. Agreed?"

"The terms?"

"If it wins I will supply copies at basic cost. If it fails I will take your cash. Two thousand each, I think, would be fair. Earl-"

He said flatly, "No."

"You refuse?"

"To fight, yes."

"A pity. Must I remind you that you are in my debt?"

"For the cost of a passage. I admit it."

"For your life, Earl." She paused then repeated. "For your life. A debt now to be cleared. Fight my creature and, if you win, you owe me nothing."

And he would gain no more than he had. If he was forced to entertain then he would demand his fee. She frowned as he told her what it was.

"The library? You want access to the library?"

"To that and to Armand's personal files. The material he collected in his investigation into the old legends." As she nodded he said sharply, "You agree?"

"Of course."

He felt himself relax, tension leaving him as if it were water pouring from an open faucet. All that remained now was to fight, to win, to gain the secret he had come to find and to be on his way.

Chapter Nine

The contest was to be at noon, held in an open space before one of the barrack-like buildings. An area of some hundred yards square, ringed by a high hedge of close-set thorns, their spines masked with a profusion of small, purple blooms.

"An exercise yard," explained Dino Sayer. "We use it to allow specimens to demonstrate their mobility."

Their agility, grace, aptitudes and, now, the ability to kill. Dumarest looked at the building, the door set in the side facing him, closed now, but soon to open. The roof was a hundred feet above the ground, the wall sheer, the expanse unbroken aside from the door. At points along the edge he saw rounded blobs which could have been the heads of watching men.

"I don't like this," said the old man. "Testing a new product is one thing, but we usually set them against other beasts or those of their own kind. This is nothing but murder."

"You think it will win?"

The man's silence was answer enough. Dumarest looked again at the building, the hedge, the ground on which he stood. Lush grass cropped short made a mantle over soft loam. The sun, at zenith, stared like a bloodshot eye from the sky.

"How long must we wait?" Enrice Heva was impatient. "Why the delay?"

"Does it matter?" Linda Ynya snapped her irritation. She looked worn, haggard, her face raddled beneath the paint. Like the others she stood in a gallery which ran along one side of the square; a raised platform set beyond the hedge and shielded by a canopy. She added, "Don't worry, Enrice, you'll have your fun. Earl can't escape."

That conviction was shared by them all. Astin turned as Charisse joined her guests. She wore a gown of glinting ruby; metal threads catching and reflecting the sunlight so that she stood as if wreathed in flame.