Chapter IV

He was aware of low chanting rhythms, the blood heating throb of unknown instruments. He stirred and found himself wallowing in a bed of incredible depth and softness. Heady scents that twisted his soul with sweet pain floated across his face, and his wild barbarian heart was instinctively repelled by the suggestion of sensual, soft decadence.

When he opened his eyes, oscillating lights bathed him in sense-drunkening sweetness that sickened even as it lured. He turned his head. A boudoir out of the abyss of a drug dream. Black drapes littered with flashing jewels. A black floor that seemed to undulate with sentient life, mosaicked in red veins. Weirdly-plumaged birds with serpent's heads hissed in a golden cage.

And Alhone stood by his couch and sang to him.

When she spoke, her voice had been unpleasantly whiny and shrill. But now, singing the dissonant cries of some alien song, it was high and piercingly sweet like a violin's cry. Small furred breasts rose and fell gently as she sang. Lithe hips swayed. Her cat's eyes searched his with a cruel dreaminess, and, for him, there was no malice there.

Small, delicate, fine-limbed monster from an alien hell. At her command thousands had died horribly during the Red Moon Games. Trampled, drained of blood, shredded by talons, poisoned by fangs, tortured, flayed and inflicted with unspeakable indignities worse than pain. Yet she possessed the sadist's love of beauty, of decadent riches, luxury, sensual surroundings, and love.

He arose with one fluid motion and faced her. His body had been bathed and scented with perfumed oils. His trappings were new, the grey leather of the Anghorians. A long sword swung at his side.

"The Mistmen are yours," he said. "And this has all been a trap to get me here?"

"Yes. You are mine now, as are all the others. We have ways here to control the heart and the mind of those who are not quite willing to accept me. I have employed these methods often."

He inhaled deeply. His chest swelled. And a wave of almost overpowering ecstasy swept him in a surging tide of passion. How many years he had waited for this one supreme, delectable moment of revenge!

And now he was alone with her. And there was nothing to stand in his way. Or was there? She was no fool. She must have protection. He could see nothing.

His eyes clouded as he looked at her. That haughty body would soon writhe and scream under his hands. And before she died she would know the full meaning of torture.

But first he would learn the nature of this mystery. "Where is Mahra?" he said. "And what is the seventh plain?"

"Our scientists call them plains," she ignored the first question. "But they are really worlds coexistent with this one. We have explored six of these worlds. This, Venus, is the sixth. I and my kind came here from the second."

Moljar blinked. His barbarian mind was quick to accept the strange and the marvelous. It was not at all unbelievable that these Anghorians had come not only from another world, but from another dimension of existence. A coexistent world. It was only unexpected.

"All matter and all chronosophy are one and concomitant," she said. She swayed toward him. "Our scientists perfected the Matrix which can synthesize matter to any of these various worlds or plains. It changes the consistency of the atom, much as a lens magnifies objects to fit the perspective of your eye."

No longer able to control himself, Moljar stepped to meet her, flexing his hands and trembling violently. She must not get suspicious until it was too late. Until he had her between his hands.

"And why do you stay on Venus? Why do you kill us, and ravish this world?"

"My world was drab, colorless, uninteresting. It was so dull there. Our civilization destroyed the past which was lawless and exciting. I came here. And from the Red Moon Games I have gathered about me here at Anghore all the greatest warriors in the System. It was wise of me, do you not think so, Moljar? The planets themselves helped me. Terra and Mars weeded out the best by isolating the half-breeds and mutants. Then out of these, I select the very best, by a process of elimination during the Red Moon Games. From the best among the survivors of the Games I choose the Mistmen. And from the Mistmen I choose you, Moljar, to rule by my side. The Mistmen can conquer the Universe."

"Many have dreamed of such a conquest," said Moljar.

"This is no dream. We have inexhaustible power on our side. Weapons we can unleash that would stun the System into passive madness. Defense they have no conception of. And, if we had to, we could fight from the vantage of other plains of being, of which the dullards of the Solar Worlds have no concept, though these countless worlds flourish all about them. Work by my side, Moljar."

"Why me?" said the half-breed. "I am not of your kind."

"No Anghorian could stand against you with equal weapons, Moljar. The best of two worlds flows in your veins. Your heart is metal fibre, and your brain has never known fear. Nor could it ever understand defeat. There is no other who could stand by your side. And when I tire of the empire we shall build, and move on to other plains of entertainment, you may stay and rule. You can be King of a Universe, Moljar."

"None of which is so important as keeping my pledge," said Moljar. He clutched at her slim, throbbing throat, but again he had forgotten the extra-system origin of these non-humans. Her body was an unspringing coil. She landed lightly ten feet away. A high piercing shriek of frenzied rage and frustration sputtered from her pink, snarling face.

"Savage!" she finally said as he came toward her. "You have gone too far!"

"Not far enough yet," said Moljar. He leaped after her. She eluded him as he dodged after her doggedly. She sprang this way and that like a forest cat. And finally she stopped and her fingers briefly touched the wall. Panels slid noiselessly apart.

"You asked about the girl," she spat. "Look!"

Moljar froze. There was a square there revealed. A mass of electronic equipment. Parts were vaguely familiar, but over-all arrangement completely beyond the grasp of his barbaric desert mind. Within a column of light, stood Mahra, looking at him. Fine glowing filaments imprisoned her.

Somehow, through the weirdly glowing strands that would send her into some hellish land only Alhone could name, she managed a wan smile. Beyond the glowing filaments, grey-furred catmen moved dials and studied gauges and charts.

"Wait!" cried Alhone's grotesque mewing face. "Turn off the matrix power. Do not send the girl yet. Moljar wishes to accompany her to hell!"