sit helplessly on our fat rumps wringing our hands while we watch civilization build up to its own total destruction by lithium-tritiide bombs? Look at the slope of that curve—ultimate catastrophe is only one hundred eighty seven years away!"

"But the Council would not permit it. Nor would the School."

"I know that, too. That is why I am not going to ask them. Instead, I am asking you. We two know more of time than any others. Over the years I have found your judgment good. With your approval I will act now. Without it, we will continue our futile testing—number eight hundred eleven is running now, I believe?—and our aimless drifting."

"You are throwing the entire weight of such a decision on me?"

"In one sense, yes. In another, only half, since I have already decided."

"Go ahead."

"So be it."

"Tedric, awaken!"

The Lomarrian ironmaster woke up; not gradually and partially, like one of our soft modern urbanites, but instantaneously and completely, as does the mountain wild-cat. At one instant he lay, completely relaxed, sound asleep; at the next he had sprung out of bed, seized his sword and leaped half-way across the room. Head thrown back, hard blue eyes keenly alert, sword-arm rock-steady he stood there, poised and ready. Beautifully poised, upon the balls of both feet; supremely ready to throw into action every inch of his six-feet-four, every pound of his two-hundred-plus of hard meat, gristle, and bone. So standing, the smith stared motionlessly at the shimmering, almost invisible thing hanging motionless in the air of his room, and at its equally tenuous occupant.

"I approve of you, Tedric." The thing—apparition—whatever it was—did not speak, and the Lomarrian did not hear; the words formed themselves in the innermost depths of his brain. "While you perhaps are a little frightened, you are and have been completely in control. Any other man of your nation—yes, of your world—would have been scared out of what few wits he has."

"You are not one of ours, Lord." Tedric went to one knee. He knew, of course, that gods and 

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