here his shirt fell open. "I have walked the stone path in that
valley, and there have been the whispers--"

"Whispers?"

Menlik twirled the wand. "Whispers which are too low for many ears to
distinguish. You can hear them as one hears the buzzing of an insect,
but never the words--no, never the words! But that is a place of great
power!"

"A place to explore!"

But Menlik watched only his wand. "That I wonder, Fox, truly do I
wonder. This is not our world. And here there may be that which does not
welcome us."

Tricks-in-trade of a shaman? Or was it true recognition of something
beyond human description? Travis could not be sure, but he knew that he
must return to the valley and see for himself.

"Listen," Menlik said, leaning closer, "I have heard your tale, that
you were on that first ship, the one which brought you unwilling along
the old star paths. Have you ever seen such a thing as this?"

He smoothed a space of soft earth and with the narrow tip of his wand
began to draw. Whatever role Menlik had played in the present before he
had been reconditioned into a shaman of the Horde, he had had the
ability of an artist, for with a minimum of lines he created a figure in
that sketch.

It was a man or at least a figure with general human outlines. But the
round, slightly oversized skull was bare, the clothing skintight to
reveal unnaturally thin limbs. There were large eyes, small nose and
mouth, rather crowded into the lower third of the head, giving an
impression of an over-expanded brain case above. And it was familiar.

Not the flying men of the other world, certainly not the nocturnal
ape-things. Yet for all its alien quality Travis was sure he had seen
its like before. He closed his eyes and tried to visualize it apart from
lines in the soil.

Such a head, white, almost like the bone of a skull laid bare, such a
head lying face down on a bone-thin arm clad in a blue-purple skintight
sleeve. Where had he seen it?

The Apache gave a sharp exclamation as he remembered fully. The derelict
spaceship as he had first found it--the dead alien officer had still
been seated at its controls! The alien who had set the tape which took
them out into that forgotten empire--he was the subject of Menlik's
drawing!

"Where? When did you see such a one?" The Apache bent down over the
Tatar.

Menlik looked troubled. "He came into my mind when I walked the valley.
I thought I could almost see such a face in one of th