"Naztehr. I've been looking through your work. Beautiful!"

"Thank you."

"I wonder if we could prevail upon you for a special favor?"

"I am at your service, Sectuib."

"The Tarinalar Collection. If we could have just one real sketch from that... say the Martesa..."

"Well, I suppose so. Why not? It's your time, isn't it?"

Nashmar beamed, making his dark skin and shockingly blond hair all the more striking. "No other artist could possibly do the Martesa! I'll see that you get a copy of the catalog and full credit in print." He raised his voice, "Renita, pose the Martesa. Neztehr Hugh is going to do the Martesa for the cover!"

Valleroy struggled not to groan as the girls in the studio squealed with exquisite joy. He just couldn't see anything so exciting about another outlandish costume, but he resolved to do the best he could.

The ensuing bustle made the mad rush of the last few days seem like a leisurely vacation. Streams of lighting technicians with their lenses and mirrors, mountains of backdrop material, flushed models, half-clothed, dashing about as if preparing for a royal visit... all these boiled around Valleroy as be stood mutely in the center of the main salon while they turned one of the studios into an imperial coronation scene.

When Valleroy was finally allowed to enter, Nashmar was posing two new models on the heavily draped dias. Not only were the models new to Valleroy, but both were men. One of them reclined on a cushioned couch that was oddly contoured to accommodate the one seated beside him. Nashmar was supervising the joining of their hands, tentacles twined in the transfer position.

As Valleroy approached, Nashmar was saying, "Are you certain you can hold the gradient steady, Zinter?"

"I'd better be able to if I'm going to Zeor!"

"If you get tired, take a break."

"Yes, Sectuib. But Enam will tire before I do."

Nashmar turned to the reclining figure... hardly more than a boy really. "Enam, don't over-reach yourself."

"Yes, Sectuib," he replied without taking his eyes from Zinter's.

"Naztehr Hugh, what do you think?" asked Nashmar taking Valleroy aside.

"A work of art, Sectuib. I'll do my very best with it."

"Be sure you get the lateral position exactly right. This will be the first cover we've ever used depicting a Sime-Sime transfer, and it must be technically accurate."

"Do you think it wise, Sectuib," asked Valleroy hesitantly, "to show such an act on the cover when the content of the catalog is so different?"

"Zeor's brand of conservativism can be practiced by lesser Householdings, you know. People respect Imil as the leading fashion house, but they've learned to forget what we are. It's time to remind them. And you are the artist to do it. Your work speaks on a deeper level than any mere photograph, a level deep enough to express our message as only a Companion could understand it."

Valleroy swallowed hard. He was no Companion. But Nashmar didn't give him a chance to temporize. "I don't mean to insult you, Naztehr, but it is my duty to remind you that you are above mid-field with respect to Enam. Although Zinter is unusually adept, he is young and well beneath your level of accomplishment while Enam is struggling with disjunction. Of course, Enam could never injure a Companion..."

"Of course not," agreed Valleroy weakly. "It's just that you wouldn't want me to disturb him unduly."

"I knew you'd understand." Nashmar laid a reassuring hand on Valleroy's shoulder. "Zeor's reputation is safe with you."

Nashmar swept out of the room, his entourage trailing.

Seating himself at the drafting board, Valleroy found all his customary materials neatly laid out. The table was positioned to view the scene from the perfect angle. And, he had to admit that the two models had been well chosen. Not only were the classical, angular planes of their faces perfect for their costumes, but their body masses were balanced with a subtle line harmony that made Valleroy's heart sing. The loose robes they wore had been arranged to accentuate that harmony.

The artist in Valleroy came to grips with the problem. It was the most stimulating challenge he'd been handed in Imil. It drew forth his need to express himself as had the portrait of Hrel and Klyd.

He positioned the figures on his page, carefully measuring and balancing the perspective; a touch of color here and a shadow there; a carefully placed highlight; a gossamer blurring at the edges gradually converging on an almost painfully sharp focus around those twined tentacles.

He drew the robes with photographic accuracy, emphasizing how they were designed for freedom while lending grace and a certain elegance to the act being performed. -At last, he came to the detail work on the tentacles. Taking a sketch pad, he approached the pair for a closer view.

The empty tentacle sheath's formed striated lines from elbow to wrist. The loose skin of the empty sheaths revealed a slight bulge that appeared to be a gland about halfway down. From the wrist openings, the channel's tentacles extended to meet the Sime's. Valleroy noted carefully just how much smaller were the moist, pink-gray laterals compared to the strong, dry-skinned dorsals and ventrals.

In his mind, he could see the lines resolved into a force-diagram as delicately balanced as it was intricate. The dorsal and ventral handling tentacles gripped and immobilized, protecting the exposed laterals from sudden disengagement. Valleroy could appreciate how vulnerable a Sime must feel with those nerve-rich laterals unsheathed. He could see it in the almost imperceptible trembling of the soft pink flesh. And yet, these organs were the most deadly survival equipment possessed by any species on the face of the earth.

Therein lay a contrast that sent Valleroy back to his board in a fever of insight. The very source if the Sime's strength was his greatest weakness. That was the message those twined tentacles had to convey!

He worked with a rising excitement. Every few moments, he rose to circle the models, peering, measuring, and studying. Heedless of the destruction he wrought, he clambered over the backdrop to get a new angle and rushed back to his board to add the precise nuance he'd discovered. He did this over and over again, unaware of the passage of time, oblivious to the fatigue of the models, unmindful of his own exhaustion.

At length, almost satisfied he'd achieved all that could be done, he climbed wearily over the tangled drapes to check those exposed laterals one last time.

Without warning, Klyd's voice called from the studio door, "Hugh!"

Startled, Valleroy jerked erect. His foot caught in a fold of drapery tugging him off balance. He stumbled, arms flailing!

With surrealistic slowness, he plowed into the model. A moist lateral grazed his face leaving a tingling trail across his forehead. Then his head struck the edge of the contoured couch. He blacked out momentarily. When his vision cleared, he was lying on his back, Zinter's legs were sailing over his head, and Enam's face was zooming toward him twisted by a feral grimace!

Sime tentacles lashed about his wrists, steely bands biting deep into his Sesh with a peculiar intensity he'd never felt before. The moist laterals slithered around his arms, sensitizing his skin in hot streaks. Just as he realized this was the attack of a killer, another pair of Sime arms intervened!

The attacker was lifted away bodily. Valleroy shook his throbbing head once more to clear his vision. It was Klyd who had rescued him. Zinter lay in a dazed heap as if thrown there by Enam. Now, Klyd stood facing Enam, engaging his tentacles in a secure, protective hold. "I will serve you gladly, Enam, but I must reserve my Companion to myself. Without him, I cannot function."

Struggling feebly against the channel's hold, Enam gritted, "Without the kill, I cannot function! I cannot live!"

"You can't kill a Companion. Surely you know that by now."

"Let me at him. I'll show you..."

"I can't do that."

Sullen resentment burned out of dark eyes. "You keep all the Gens to yourselves! Without them, I'd rather be dead!"

"If Zelerod is correct, we all will be dead very soon."

"I must kill." Enam had surrendered to a deeper instinct, one that could not be repressed.

"You must not. Believe me, Enam, you would obtain little more satisfaction from attacking a trained Companion than from attacking me. A Companion doesn't panic in transfer; you can't harm him; and such a transfer can't give you the egobliss of the Choice Kill."

"I had him, Sectuib. I know it!"

"Fantasy, Naztehr," Klyd asserted firmly. "Pure... wish-fulfillment fantasy."

"Better than nothing."