All too often combatants find an illusion so strange they feel it must be unreal. May I caution you, Mr. Marmorth, that is the quickest way to lose an Affair. Take everything you see at face value. It is real!"

He paused for a moment, wiping his forehead. He had begun to perspire freely. Marmorth wondered at this, but remained silent.

"Your handicap," the Duelmaster resumed, "is that when an illusion is formed from a larger segment of your opponent's imagination than from yours, he will be more familiar with it, and will be more able to get to you.

The same holds true for him, of course.

"The illusions will strengthen for the combatant who is dominating. In other words, if Krane's outlook is firmer than yours, he will have a more familiar illusion. If you begin to dominate him, the illusion will change to one more of your making.

"Do you understand?"

Marmorth had found himself listening more intently than he had thought he would. Now he had questions.

"Aren't there any weapons we begin with? I'd always thought we could choose our dueling weapons."

The Duelmaster shook his head. "No. There will be sufficient weapons in your illusions. Anything else would be superfluous."

"How can an illusion kill me?"

"You are in the Corridor's field. Through a process of--well, actually, Mr. Marmorth, that is a Company secret, and I doubt if it could be explained in lay terms so that you would know any more now than you did before.

Just accept that the Corridor converts your thought-impressions into tangibles."

"How long will we be in there?"

"Time is subjective in the Corridor. You may be there for an hour or a month or a year. Out here the time will seem as an instant. You will go in, both of you, then a moment later--one of you will come out."

Marmorth licked his lips again. "Have there been duels where a stalemate was reached; where both combatants came back?" He was nervous, and the question trembled as if it was made with metallic filaments.

"We've never had one that I can recall," answered the Duelmaster simply.

"Oh," said Marmorth quietly, looking down at his hands.

"Are you ready now?"

Marmorth nodded. He slipped out of the wraparound and laid it across the back of the chair. Together they walked toward the Silver Corridor. "Remember," said the Duelmaster, "the combatant who has the strongest convictions will win. This is a constant, and your only real weapon."

The Duelmaster stepped to the end of the Corridor, removing a thin tube from his pouch. A beam of light flashed thinly from the end, and he shone it at an aperture in the wall next to the Corridor's opening.

The light flashed twice, then he said, "I've signaled the Duelsman on the other side. Krane has been placed inside."

The Duelmaster slipped the variation-range card into a slot in the blank wall, then indicated Marmorth should step into the Corridor.

The middle-aged duelist stepped forward, smoothing the short breechclout against his thighs as he walked.

He took one step, two, three. The perfectly round mouth of the Silver Corridor gaped before him, black and impenetrable.

He stepped forward once more. His bare foot touched the edge of the metal, and he drew back hesitantly. He looked back over his shoulder at the Duelsman. "Couldn't I--"

"Step in, Mr. Marmorth," said the Duelmaster firmly. There was a granite tone in his voice.

Marmorth walked forward into the darkness. It closed over his head and seeped behind his eyes. He felt nothing! Marmorth...

...blinked twice. The first time he saw the throne room and the tier-mounted pages, long-stemmed trumpets at their sides. He saw the a.s.sembled n.o.bles bowing low before him, their ermine capes sweeping the floor. The floor was a rich, inlaid mosaic, the walls dripped color and rich tapestry, the ceiling was high-arched and studded with crystal chandeliers.

The second time he opened them, hoping his senses had cleared, he saw precisely the same thing. Then he saw Krane--High Lord Krane--in the front ranks.

The man's hair had been swept back to form a tight knot at the base of his skull. It was the knot of the triumphant warrior. The garb was different--tight suit of chain-mail in blued-steel, ornamental decorations across the breastplate, a ruby-hilted sword in a scabbard at his waist, full, flowing cape of blood-red velvet--but the face was no different from the one Marmorth had seen in the Council Chamber, before they had agreed to duel.The face was thin; a V that swept past a high, white forehead and thick, black brows, past the high cheekbones and needle-thin nose, down to the slash mouth and pointed black beard. A study in coal and chalk.

Marmorth's blood churned at sight of the despised Krane! If he hadn't challenged Marmorth's Theorem in the Council Chamber, with his duel-inciting slanders, neither of them would be here.

Here!

Marmorth stiffened. He sat more erect. The knowledge swept away his momentary forgetfulness; this was the Silver Corridor. This was illusion. They were dueling--now, at this instant! He had to kill Krane.

But whose illusion was this? His own, or the dark-bearded scoundrel's before him? It might be suicide to attempt killing Krane in his own illusion. He would have to wait a bit and gauge what the situation represented in his own mind.

Whatever it was, he seemed to be of higher rank than Krane, who bowed before him.

Almost magically, before he realized the words were emerging from his mouth, he heard himself saying, "Lord Krane, rise!"

Krane stood up, and the other n.o.bles followed suit, the precedent having been set. By choosing Krane to rise first, Marmorth the King had chosen whom he wanted to speak first in the Star Chamber.

"May it please your Ill.u.s.triousness," boomed Krane, extending his arms in salute, "I have a disposition on the prisoners from Quorth. I should beg your Eminence's verdict on my proposal."

He bowed his head and waited Marmorth's reply.

Had there been a tone of mockery in the man's voice? Marmorth could not be sure. But he now knew that it was his own illusion. If Krane was coming to him for disposition, then he must be in the ascendant in this creation.

"What is your proposal, High Lord Krane?" asked Marmorth.

Krane took a step forward, bringing him to the bottom of the dais upon which Marmorth's throne rested.

"These things are of a totally alien culture, Your Highness," began Krane. "How can we, as humans, even tolerate their existence in our way of life? The very sight of them makes the gorge rise! They are evil-smelling and accursedly-formed! They must all be destroyed, Your Highness! We must ignore the guileful offers of a prisoner-for- prisoner exchange! We will have our fleet in Quorth City within months, then we can rescue our own captured without submitting to the demands of foul monsters! In the meantime, why feed these beasts of another world?

"I say, destroy them! Launch all-out attack now! Rescue our people from the alien's slave camps on Quorth and Fetsa!"

He had been speaking smoothly and forcefully. The nods of a.s.sent and agreement from the a.s.sembled n.o.bles made Marmorth wary. A complete knowledge of the Quorth-Human war was in his mind, and the plan of Krane sounded clear and fine. Yet superimposed over it, was his knowledge that this was all merely illusion and that somewhere in the illusion was a c.h.i.n.k in which his errors might lodge. The plan sounded good, but...

"No, Krane!" he decided, thinking quietly. "This would be what the aliens want! They want us to destroy our prisoners. That would whip their people at home into such a frenzy of patriotism--we would be engulfed in a month!

"We will consider the alien proposal of prisoner-for-prisoner exchange." The rumbles from the ma.s.sed n.o.bles rose into the cavern of the Star Chamber. There was unrest here.

He had to demonstrate that he was right. "Let them bring in the chain of aliens!" he commanded, clapping his hands. A page went out to summon them.

While the hall waited, Marmorth thought quickly: had he made the proper decision? There seemed to be a correlation between Krane's challenging of his Theorem of Government in the Council--back in the world outside the Corridor--and this proposal he had just defeated.

There was a correlation! He saw it suddenly!

Both his proposal of the Theorem in the Council and his decision here in the illusion had been based on his personal concept of government. Krane's refutation out there and his proposal here were the opposite. Once again they had clashed.

And this time Marmorth had won!

But had he?

Even as he let the thought After, the chained aliens were dragged between the ma.s.sed n.o.bles and cast on their triple-jointed knees before Marmorth's dais. "Here are the loathsome beings!" cried Krane, flinging his arms high and apart.

It had been a grandstand gesture, and the frog-faced, many-footed beings on the Star Chamber's floor realized it.

Suddenly, almost as though they were made of paper, the chains that had joined the aliens snapped, and they leaped on the n.o.bles.Marmorth caught the smile on Krane's lips. He had been behind this; probably had the chains weakened in the corridor outside by his loyal personal guard.

Hardly with thought, Marmorth was off his throne and down the stepped dais, his sword free from its scabbard, and arcing viciously.

A hideously warted alien face rose before him and he thrust with all his might! The blade pierced between the double-lidded eyes, and thick ochre blood spurted across his tunic. He yanked the blade free, kicking the dead but still quivering alien from its length. He leaped into the horde, howling a battlecry from his youth.

Even as he leaped, he saw Krane's slash-mouthed smile, and the Lord's sword swinging toward him!

So it hadn't been his illusion! It had been Krane's! He hadn't chosen the proper course. Krane's belief at the moment was stronger than his own.

He fended off a double-handed smash from the black-bearded n.o.ble and fell back. They parried and countered, thrust and slashed all around the dais. The other n.o.bles were too deeply involved fighting off the screaming aliens to witness this battle between their King and his Lord.

Krane beat Marmorth back, back!

Why did I choose as I did? Marmorth wailed mentally, berating himself.

Suddenly he slipped, toppling backward onto the steps. The sword flew from his hand as it cracked against the edge of a step. He saw Krane bearing down on him, the sword double-fisted as his opponent raised it like a stake above his head.

In desperation, Marmorth summed up all his belief. "]t was the right decision!" screamed Marmorth with the conviction of a man about to die. He saw the sword plunge toward his breast as...

...he gathered the light about him, sweeping his hands through the dripping colors, making them shift and flow for him. He saw the figure of Krane, standing haughtily in the bank of yellow, and he gathered the blue to himself in a coruscating ball.

Fearsomely he bellowed his challenge, "This is my illusion, Krane, and watch as I kill you!"

He balled the blue in his hand and sent it flying, dripping spark and color as it shot toward the black- bearded man.

They both stood tall and spraddle-legged in the immensity of they knew-not-where. The colors dripped from the air, making weird patterns as they mixed and ran.

The blue ball struck in front of Krane and exploded, cascading a rich flood of chromatic brilliance into the air. Krane laughed at the failure.

He gathered the black to him, wadding it in strong and supple fingers. He wound up, almost as though it was a sport, and flung the wadded black at Marmorth.

The older man knew he had not enough belief yet built to withstand this onslaught. Marmorth knew if the black enfolded him he would die in the never-ending limbo of nothingness.

He thrust hands up before his face to stop the onrush of the black, but it struck him and he fell, clutching feebly at a washy stringer of white.

He fell into the black as it surrounded him, and in a moment knew he was in the limbo.

This was not his illusion! It could not be, for he was vanquished! Yet he was not dead, as he had felt sure he would be. He lay there, thinking.

He remembered all the effort he had put in on the Political Theorem. The Theorem he had proposed in the Council. It had represented years of work--the culmination of all his adult thought and effort; and, he had to admit it, the Theorem was soundly based on his own view of the Universe.

Then the presumptuous Krane had offended him by restating the Theorem. Before the very faces of the Council!

Krane had, of course, twisted it to his own evil and malicious ends--basing it anew on his conception of the All.

Oh, there had been a verbal battle. There had been the accusations, the clanging of the electric gavel, the remonstrances of the Compjudge, the shocked expressions of the other Councilors! Till finally Marmorth had been goaded by the younger man into the Duel. Then into the Silver Corridor.

From which only one of them would emerge. The one who did would force his Theorem on the Council.

To be accepted, of course. The Theorem was so basic, the view would be recognized and accepted.

It all revolved, then, around whose view of the Universe, whose Theorem, was the right one. It could be either Krane's or Marmorth's.

Marmorth struck out at the black! Mine, mine, mine! He shouted soundlessly. He lashed into the nothingness. My Theorem is the proper one! I believe it! I do!Then he saw the stringer of white in his hand. So this was Krane in the ascendant, was it! Now came the moment of retaliation.

He whipped the stringer around his invisible head, swaying as he was, there in the depthless black. The stringer thickened. He cupped it to him, washing it with his hands, strengthening it, shaping and molding it.

In a moment it had grown. In a moment more the white had burst forth like a ripe blossom and flooded all.

Revealing Krane standing there, in his breechclout, ma.s.saging the plae pink between his fingers.

"Mine, Krane, mine!" he screamed, flinging the orange-green!

Krane blanched and tried to duck. The orange-green came on like a sliver of Forever, streaking and burning as it rode currents that did not exist. Then the light shattered, and fired, and spat. As Marmorth realized they had nullified each other again, that the illusion was dissolving around them, he heard Krane bellow, even as loud as he had, "Mine, Marmorth, mine!"

Then the colors ran. They flowed, they merged, they sucked at his body, while he...

...shrank up against the gla.s.s wall next to Krane. They both stared in fascinated horror as the huge, ichor- dripping spider-thing advanced on them, mandibles clicking.

"My G.o.d in Heaven!" Marmorth heard Krane bellow. "What is it?" Krane scrabbled at the gla.s.s wall behind them, trying to get out. They were trapped.

The gla.s.s walls circled them, wide; just the spider-thing and each other, trapped in the tiny tomb!

Marmorth was petrified. He could neither move nor speak --he could hardly sense anything but terror.

Spiders were his personal fear. He found his legs were quivering at the knees, though he had not sensed it a moment before. The very sight of the hairy beasts had always sent shudders through him. Now he knew this was his illusion.

He was in the ascendant!

But how hideously in the ascendant.

The spider-thing advanced on them, the soft plush pads of its hundred feet leaving dampness where it stopped.

Krane fell to his knees, moaning and scratching at the gla.s.s floor. "Out, out, out, out..," he mumbled, froth dripping from his lips.

Marmorth knew this was his chance. This fear was a product of his own mind; he had lived with it all his life. He knew it more familiarly than Krane--he could not cancel it, certainly, but he could utilize it more easily than the other.

Here was where he killed Krane. He pulled himself tightly to the wall, sweating palms flat to the gla.s.s, the valley of his backbone against the cool surface. "I'm right! The Theorem as I stated it i-is c-correct!" He said it triumphantly, though the note of terror quavered undisguised in his voice.