sorcerer would be to you, but much, much
different. You could not understand unless you were raised among us.
When men are tired of life, they go to a Zoorph. It is not nice to speak
of, what they are and what they do. To us, it is like death, only worse.
Yet we have them, as ants have pets, as dogs have lice, as your people
have disease. It is a custom. It is a kind of escape from life and
life's dullness--but it is escape into madness, for the Zoorph has an
art that is utter degradation, and few realize how bad they are for us.
You must never go near her again!"

Days passed into weeks, and every day I learned a few words of the Zerv
language, every day I picked up a little more insight into their utterly
different ways and customs and standards--their scale of values. It was
a process replete with surprises, with revelations, with new
understanding of nature itself as seen through the alien eyes.

I remained as a kind of semi-prisoner, tolerated because of Nokomee's
position and her affection for me. Nokomee, I learned, was "of the
blood," though there were few surviving of her family to carry on the
power and prestige she would have inherited. Yet, she was "of the blood"
and entitled to all the respect and obedience the Zervs gave even to
their old ruler.

He was an attenuated skeleton of a man, with weary eyes and trembling
hands, and I grew more and more sure that the inactivity against their
usurpers visible in the valley beneath was due more to his age and
timorous nature than to any inability to turn the tables. They seemed to
hold the "Schrees" in contempt, yet never took any action against them,
so that I wondered if the contempt were justified or was an inherited,
sublimated hatred.

The supplies, rifles and ammunition which had been left on our horses
when we entered the cavern of the golden image, had been brought to
Nokomee's cavern and locked in a small chamber before my eyes. It was
all there. As the time dragged on, I chafed at the inactivity, fought
against the barriers of language and alien custom that separated me from
these people, struggled to overcome their indifference and their, to me,
impossible waiting for _what_ I did not understand.

Finally I could wait no longer. In the night, I burst the lock of the
closet with a bar, took out a rifle and .45 and two belts of cartridges.
I slid over the lip of the ledge that hid us from the city's eyes. I was
going to see for myself what we were h