"You mean Eldon?" Margaret asked.

Sin sat up, tensely alert. "Did you say El-ve-don?" she demanded harshly.

"No. Eldon."

Sin relaxed slightly. "What is he like?"

Margaret allowed herself a superior smile. "Why do you ask?"

"What is he like?" Sin's voice crackled.

Margaret held out the little finger of one hand and made winding motions around it. Evidently Sin understood the reference, for she smiled and leaned back.

"Why are you interested in him?" Margaret insisted. "He's crippled and disfigured, ugly, an honest fool. And Wor said he's probably dead."

Sin frowned. "We—myself serving Great Sasso—have almost won Varda. But the resistance of the Rebels provides an annoying delay. And there is a certain prophecy among the Rebels, a stupid story about a creature called El-ve-don, and the name was sufficiently similar.... We understand each other, Earth Woman?"

Margaret nodded emphatically.

"Just what were your relations with this—this Eldon?"

Margaret explained.

"Oh, you have a monogamous society there," Sin commented.

"Theoretically, yes."

"We did here too, in the dark ages before the Faith. Stupid, isn't it? So restricting."

Sin had regained the poise Eldon's name had disturbed, and Margaret decided to press her advantage while she was in this friendly mood.

"I'd like to see Victor now, Highness. Wor said—"

Sin's eyes hardened instantly. "Sometimes Wor talks too much. No. I must see the Earthman first."

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