A Private Cosmos

And then as he was about to topple the body of the Beller into the gate, Anana appeared. And she did not vanish again.

Kickaha was so delighted that he almost forgot to watch the doorway. "Luck's holding out!" he cried and then, realizing that he might be heard outside the room, said softly, 'The chances for the circuit stopping while you were here were almost nothing! I..."

"It wasn't chance," she said. She stepped out of the gate and put her arms around him and kissed him. He would have been delighted at any other time. Now he said, "Later, Anana. The Sellers!"

She stepped away and said, "Nimstowl will be here in a second. Don't shoot."

The little man was there all of a sudden. He held a beamer in one hand and a beamer in his belt. He also wore a knife and carried a rope coiled around one shoulder. Kickaha had turned his beamer away from the door and held it on Nimstowl. The Lord said, "No need for that. I'm your ally."

"Until... ?" Kickaha said.

"All I want to do is to get back to my own world," Nimstowl said. "I've had more than enough of this killing and almost being killed. In the name of Shambarimen, isn't one world enough for one man?"

Kickaha did not believe him, but he decided that Nimstowl could be trusted until the last of the Sellers was dead. He said, "I don't know what's going on out there. I had expected an attack, but it would have been launched before now. They had a large beamer out there; they could have shot it in here by now and cooked us out."

He asked Anana what had happened, though he could guess part of it. She replied that Nimstowl had come into the cave to find his partner dead, caught by the one he had trapped. Nimstowl had decided that he was tired of hiding out in this cave. He wanted a chance to get back to his own world and, oCcourse, as every Lord should, to wipe out the Sellers. He had turned the resonating device off when Anana had appeared again. It had taken only a few seconds after that to set the resonator so it would deliver two people, at safe intervals, into the palace where Anana had seen Kickaha.

He said, "What do you mean? I had to jump out! I got out but lost the skin off my_heel."

"Of course, you had no way of knowing," she said. "But if you had not jumped, you could have stepped out quite safely a moment later."

"Anyway, you came after me," he said. "That's what counts."

She was looking at him with concern. He was burned and bleeding, still dripping blood on the floor. But she said nothing. There was nothing to do for him until they found some aid. And that could be close enough, if they could get out of this room.

Somebody had to stick his head out of the room. Nimstowl wasn't going to volunteer and Kickaha did not want Anana to do it. So he looked out. Instead of the beam he expected, he saw a deserted corridor. He motioned for them to come after him and led the way to a room about a quarter of a mile down the corridor. Here he sterilized his wounds and burns, put pseudoflesh over them, and drank potions to unshock him and to accelerate blood replenishment. They also ate and drank while they discussed what to do.

There wasn't much to talk about. The only thing to do was to explore until they found out what was going on.

XXIII NOT UNTIL they came to the great staircase which led up to the floor of the control room did they find anything. There was a dead Beller, his legs almost entirely burned off. And behind a charred divan lay another Beller. This one was burned on the side, but the degree of burn indicated that the beam's energy had been partially absorbed before striking him. He was still alive.

Kickaha approached him cautiously and, after making sure he wasn't playing possum, Kickaha knelt down by him. He intended to use rough methods to bring him to consciousness so he could question him. But the Beller opened his eyes when his head was raised.

"Luvah!" Anana cried. "It's Luvah! My brother! One of my brothers! But what's he doing here? How... ?"

She was holding an object which she must have picked up from behind the divan or some other piece of furniture. It was about two and a half feet long, was of some silvery material, and was curved and shaped much like the horn of an African buffalo. It did flare out widely at the mouth, however, and the tip was fitted with a mouthpiece of some soft golden material. Seven little buttons sat on top of the horn in a row.

He recognized the Horn of Shambarimen. Hope lifted him to his feet with a surge. He said, "Wolff is back!"

"Wolff?" Anana said. "Oh, Jadawin! Yes, perhaps. But what is Luvah doing here?"

Luvah had a face that, under normal circumstances, would have been appealing. He was a Lord, but he could easily have passed for a certain type of Irishman with his snub nose and broad upper lip.and freckles and pale blue eyes.

Kickaha said, "You talk to him. Maybe he'll..."

She got to her knees by Luvah and spoke to him. He seemed to recognize her, but his expression could have meant anything. She said, "He may not remember me in his condition. Or he may be frightened. He could think I'm going to kill him. I am a Lord, remember."

Kickaha ran down the hall and into a room where he could get water. He brought a pitcher of it back and Luvah drank eagerly. Luvah then whispered his story to Anana. She rose a few minutes later and said, "He was caught in a trap set by Urizen, our father. Or so he thought at the time, though actually it was Vala,.our sister. He and Jadawin—Wolff—became friends. Wolffand his woman Chryseis were trapped with others, another brother and some cousins. He says it's too long a story to tell now. * But only Luvah and Wolff and Chryseis survived. They returned by using the

*The Gates of Creation, Philip Jose Farmer, ACE.

Horn; it can match the resonance of any gate, you know, unless that gate is set for intermittent resonance at random.

"They were gated back into a secret compartment of the control room. Wolffthen took a look into the control room via a monitor. No one was in it. He tapped in on other videos and saw a number of dead men and taloses. Of course, he didn't know that the men were Black Sellers, at first; then he saw the caskets. He still didn't get the co

"Wolffs cagey," said Kickaha. He had wondered why Wolff didn't see the live Bellers, but remembered that the palace was so huge that Wolff could have spent days looking into every room. He was probably so eager to get some rest after his undoubtedly harrowing adventures and so glad to be home that he had rushed things somewhat. Besides, the control room and the surrounding area were unoccupied.

"Luvah said he came up the staircase and was going to enter the control room to tell Wolff all was clear. At that very moment, two men appeared in an especially big gate that had been set up by the dead men. By the Bellers, of course. There were pieces of a diassembled craft with them and a big projector."

"Von lurbat and von Swindebarn!" Kickaha said.

"It must have been," Anana said. "They knew something was wrong, what with your appearance and disappearance in the gate on the moon and then mine. They gave up their search, and—"

"Tell me the rest while I'm carrying Luvah," he said. "We'll get him to a room where we can treat his burns."

With Nimstowl covering their rear and Anana their front, he lugged the unconscious Lord to the room where he had treated himself a short while ago. Here he applied antishock medicines, blood replenishes, and pseudoflesh to Luvah.

Anana meanwhile finished Luvah's story. The two chief Bellers, it seemed, had expected trouble and were ready. They fired their big projector and forced Wolff and Chryseis to take refuge among the many titanic consoles and machines. Luvah had dived for cover behind a console near the doorway. The two Bellers had kept up a covering fire while a number of troops came through. And with them was a creature that seemed strange to Luvah but Anana recognized the description as that of Podarge. From the glimpse Luvah got of her, she seemed to be unconscious. She was being carried by several soldiers.