"Have any arisen?"

"No."

"Then?" she raised an eyebrow in question, once again looking down at the straps that held her to the chair.

"Ah. Just part of procedure, my child. They will be removed when the questioning is completed."

"I see. Questioning." Myali gave the bishop a cool, appraising look, a slightly mocking smile playing about her lips. She appeared relaxed, completely in command of both herself and the situation.

Behind the facade of external calm, however, her mind raced furiously. More "questioning." What would it be like this time, she wondered. The last time had taught her that these people had unexpectedly powerful resources at their command when it came to dealing with the mind. Thinking back, she remembered the "questioning" she had undergone immediately following her arrival on the ship.

She'd still been feigning unconsciousness, so they'd strapped her to a gurney and hurried her through dim corridors to a small room. There they'd hooked her up to a strange machine unlike anything she'd ever seen before. Not knowing quite what to expect, she'd been astonished to discover that the machine could enter her mind.

Her first impulse had been to resist. She'd quickly realized the futility of that, however. The machine had vastly more power than she did, and simply pushed her aside when she tried to stand in its way.

Playing it cautious, she'd backed off and watched pa.s.sively for a while as it b.u.mbled about, stirring up memories, copying them, and then relaying them out of her mind. For the life of her, she couldn't figure out the purpose behind the machine's actions. It didn't seem to have any particular sense of discrimination or ability to evaluate the relative importance of the material it copied. It just grabbed whatever came to hand and then moved on in an apparently random pattern.

Moving very gently, she'd tried an experiment. Rather than attempting to stop the machine, she'd tried deflecting it. The principle was simple, basic physics. The amount of force needed to shift the power of the machine a few molecules left or right was significantly less than that required to meet it head on. In a very short time she'd found she could steer it, giving it access to certain memories, keeping it away from others.

The problem was, she still didn't know what the machine's purpose was in copying her memories.

And until she knew, it was impossible to know which information would be harmless to yield and which critical to withhold.

There was only one way to find out. Carefully pushing the machine into what she remembered of arithmetic, she'd gone exploring, probing back into the machine itself. It wasn't particularly difficult. The machine used organic neurotransmitters in its circuits instead of electrons, so moving along them was much like moving through her own mind. The circuitry was relatively simple and not very interesting. But what she discovered at the other end of the machine was both fascinating and frightening.

It was what was left of a human mind. An utter shambles, it had been twisted, torn, turned inside out, scrambled, and emptied of most of its contents. Still, it was a mind, and enough remained of the man who had once inhabited it to give her a fairly accurate reading of his general character. She'd even stumbled across his name, half buried amid the detritus scattered along his neural pathways. Dunn.She'd paused for a moment, wondering what to do. It was plain the machine was feeding the information gleaned from her own mind into Dunn's. There had to be a purpose behind the transfer, though she couldn't imagine what it could be. Nevertheless, she was fairly certain that whatever the reason, it was meant to be used against Kensho. She couldn't stop it from happening, that much was clear. But just possibly she might be able to turn it to advantage. Dunn appeared to be a decent sort, even if he was one of them. And there was more than a hint, both in what was left of his mind and in the fact that someone had tried to destroy it, that suggested the man did not get along well with his own people. Perhaps, just perhaps, there was a chance that ...

She decided. Working feverishly, she a.s.sembled the bits and pieces of Dunn that were still left. Then she retreated back into her own mind and carefully fed Dunn the information she thought might help him reconstruct his sense of self. Exhausted by her efforts, she'd barely been able to keep pace with the machine. When it finally withdrew, she'd collapsed.

Even then, she'd come back to consciousness long before the bishop realized. Myali had awoken to find herself strapped into a sort of chair. The air was filled with a very low, almost imperceptible humming sound that grated on her nerves. She'd listened for a moment to familiarize herself with the sound in order to make it perceptually neutral.

For perhaps a quarter of an hour she'd watched the man seated behind the table in front of her.

Through eyes barely open she was able to scrutinize his face and observe his every move as he pored over some sheets of paper spread across the top of his table.

His character wasn't hard to read. Intelligence virtually shone from his eyes. The strength of his will was equally evident. Here was a man who knew what he wanted and how to get it. And did get it. That was also plain. A sense of power radiated from his every move, the way he held his head, the firm motions of his hands. When this man gave an order, it was followed, immediately and without question.

Myali shuddered inwardly. Despite his small size and gray hair, this one was dangerous.

But there were weaknesses as well. He was incredibly proud and egotistical. The set of his mouth betrayed a stubborn arrogance that knew no bounds. And the light in his eyes came from more than just intelligence. There was a gleam of fanaticism there and perhaps even a glimmer of madness.

One more thing completed her picture of him. At Josh's insistence, she had carried Mind Brothers with her in hopes of being able to use them to communicate with home. It seemed a slim hope, but now the creatures proved valuable in another, unexpected way. They were highly sensitive to the darker side of human nature and, attracted by something they detected in the man she was studying, they began to stir. Carefully she loosened her hold on them, allowing them to reach out and touch his mind.

The result was instant and shocking. A vast, seething turmoil broke over her: Hatred. Deep, violent disgust and aversion toward almost everyone and everything in the universe. This was not the tiny kernel of blackness that all men carried at their center, this was a darkness as wide and deep as the mind it filled almost to overflowing. She gasped and grabbed her Mind Brothers, struggling to hold them back.

He despises everyone he's ever met, she realized, and is predisposed to despise anyone he ever will meet! People are less than nothing to him, pathetic creatures to be used and destroyed as he sees fit. He keeps these secret feelings under tight constraint, but I sense that they leak through constantly, and control his conscious mind almost as much as his conscious mind controls them. That was why the Mind Brothers had been able to detect them so easily.

The force of his hatred momentarily stunned and confused her. The man was obviously a leader. Yet how could he be if he despised everyone, including his followers? A leader should love his people. Why else would they follow?

Fear. As soon as she asked the question, the answer streaked across her consciousness. They followed out of fear, fear of the power the leader wielded. Although together they were far stronger than the leader could ever be, the fear divided them against each other, isolated them, made them weak. His power came from their fear and their fear came from his power. It was a vicious circle and once started it would be difficult indeed to break out of it.

A great sadness welled up in her, bringing a lump to her throat. How unhappy these mighty men of Earth must be! How dreadful and bleak their lives! And this one, this gray-haired little man seated at thetable in front of her was the most pitiful of all. In the midst of all his power, all his intelligence, all his pride, was an emptiness that made everything futile and worthless.

The sadness pa.s.sed and she saw him clearly again for what he was...the enemy of herself, her people, and her planet. And she knew how to deal with him. Without waiting any longer, she'd stirred and "woken up."

Myali watched him now as he rose from the table and came toward her. It was about to begin. Oh, G.o.ds, she wondered, am I really strong enough? A momentary sense of panic was replaced by a vision of Fattier Kadir's kind face, then by the strong, determined lines of Mother Ilia's. Whatever I am, she realized, weak or strong, I am the one, and I can only try.

The bishop stopped and spoke to the air. "Equipment." The small column rose from the floor, carrying its load of syringes. Thwait picked one up and held it out so the bound young woman could see it clearly. "Do you know what this is, my child?"

"It's a syringe, used to inject liquids subcutaneously."

He nodded. Her answer was one more proof that there had been no collapse of culture on this planet. Yet if that was true, came the nagging question, why was there no evidence of an industrial-technical civilization? It was a critical piece of information he had to find out.

He replaced the syringe on the column top. She didn't appear to be afraid of it. Perhaps he would save the threat of using it until later when she had learned to fear him.

"I wonder what else you know. Does 'laser' mean anything to you?" She nodded. "Quantum mechanics?" Another nod. "Sarfatti-Aspect drive?" And another.

Musing, the bishop walked back and forth in front of his prisoner. "Hmmmmmm. Indeed. You seem remarkably well informed. Do your people have any lasers? No? Yet you know of them. Most strange.

Most contradictory.

"How about weapons, my child? Surely you have weapons."

"Yes, we have weapons."

"Ah?" He gave her a questioning look, encouraging her to continue.

"The sword, of course, The staff. Spears. The bladed staff Jerome created. Knives. Most recently, the bow for ritual practice and meditation."

His eyebrows rose. "And?"

"That's all, aside from our hands and feet."

"No firearms?"

"None."

"No lasers?"

"None."

"Surely you don't expect me to believe you, my child?"

She shrugged as best she could in the restraining straps. "What you choose to believe is your business. I merely answer your questions to the best of my ability."

Thwait controlled his anger and stalked over to a panel of instruments on the left wall. When he reached it, he grabbed a dial and turned it all the way up. The subsonics were on fun blast now, to the point where even he, with all his training, began to feel their effects. He turned back to watch their effect on the girl.

She was smiling. "It doesn't bother me anywhere near as badly as it does you. For your own comfort, you really should lower the volume."

Disregarding her comment, he walked back to the chair and stood glaring down at her. "You are clever. But you are lying." He waved his hand to indicate the room and the instruments within it. "I can tear your mind apart. I can strip you of every memory, every idea, every emotion. I can turn you into a drained, empty sh.e.l.l. And then, at my leisure, I can poke and probe into what I have ripped out until I get my answers."

"Like you did to Dunn," she declared softly.

Thwait was stunned to silence. His mouth opened several times before he could form his words.

"Dunn?" he finally managed to say. "How in the name of Kuvaz do you know about Dunn?""I gave him my memories, or had you forgotten?"

The bishop spun around and walked back to the table. He sat down and stared at Myali for several moments. "Who the h.e.l.l are you?" he finally asked, his voice heavy with menace.

"Myali w.a.n.g," came the calm reply.

"Who are you really?" came the demand.

She smiled and was silent.

"I can tear it out of you!" he screamed, jumping to his feet and knocking the chair backward to crash on the floor.

"I think you should turn that dial down again. The low tones are disturbing you."

"d.a.m.n you, I can force you to tell me who you really are!"

"I doubt that," she responded almost wistfully, "since I don't know the answer to that question myself.

And I've been seeking the answer for a long time."

Thwait was about to yell at her again when he got control of himself. He looked down and saw that his hands were shaking. What's wrong with me? he wondered. I'm letting this little slip of a woman affect me more strongly than anyone ever has in my life! He turned to look at the panel to his left. The dial was all the way to the right. The subsonics. That must be it. The level is absurdly high. It must be affecting my judgement. He walked over and shut it off completely.

There. That was better. It was like suddenly releasing a pressure that had been building inside his mind. Yes, it had to be the subsonics.

Picking up the chair, he sat down behind the table again and stared at the young woman. No, he admitted, it isn't entirely the subsonics. It is at least partially this ... this creature. She annoyed him more completely than any person he had ever met. Why? Was she doing it on purpose?

Andrew considered the data he'd gathered up to this point. In review, there was a surprising amount.

And a great deal of it was totally unexpected. First, she answered any question he asked her. He glanced over at the readouts on the machines that monitored her through the chair. So far she had told the truth or at least had not lied. Second, she wasn't afraid. Her calm was as real as it was unnatural. The readouts showed that, too. Third, she was immune to the subsonics and somehow knew about Dunn. Impossible.

Yet there it was. And the answers about weapons! He shook his head. Something was very wrong here, very wrong. The data didn't correlate.

Reaching a decision, he rose slowly and walked over to look down at Myali once more. His face wore a brooding expression as he searched her for even the slightest signs of weakness or fear.

"I am afraid, my child, I have underestimated you and your people. There is more here than meets the eye. Much more. Dangerously much more. Hmmmmmm. Indeed. I have been using the wrong techniques. My own penchant for personal, oral questioning has led me in the wrong direction with you."

He sighed. "It is a much, much kinder technique since it leaves the mind intact. But in your case, I fear it will be inadequate." The bishop smiled and nodded. "Yes, in your case I must use a more thorough method. Harsher, more destructive, but undoubtedly more effective." He turned and picked one of the syringes from the column top. "This, now," he said, gazing in fond fascination at the orange-ish liquid in the tube, "is a very potent drug developed by the Power during the Readjustment. It is shockingly hard on the system, but it opens the mind up to the machine like a blossoming flower. Some say the holy Kuvaz himself created it. It was only used on the most stubborn and difficult of cases. Like the Zenists."

He moved behind her chair. "It must be injected in a very painful spot-just at the top of the spinal chord where it meets the lower part of the brain. That, you see, is the reason the needle is so long." With one hand he grabbed her hair and jerked her head forward, exposing the curve of the back of her neck.

Slightly licking his upper lip, his eyes hard with concentration, he slowly slid the needle home and emptied its contents. Pulling it out, he moved quickly around in front of Myali to catch the look on her face. She appeared calm, detached, unreachable.

Disappointed, he turned and replaced the syringe. "Helmet," he commanded the air. It lowered smoothly from the ceiling to fit neatly over Myali's head. Working swiftly, Thwait attached the wires to the young woman's body, all the while stealing glances at her face and trying to pierce behind the unreadable surface of her expression. Gradually, he saw her face go slack and her eyes dull.Finishing, he stepped back. He rubbed his hands together as he returned to the table and sat down.

"Isolation," he ordered. The same shimmering circle of light that had surrounded Dunn sprang up, making Myali almost invisible. "Begin," the bishop said.

For several minutes, Andrew Thwait sat staring at the vague form twisting and straining against the straps that held it firmly in the chair. Then, bored, he got up and left the Room. "Inform me when the process is complete," he said just before the door closed.

"Nothing?" Thomas asked the blank screen. "Nothing at all?"

"Nothing that makes any sense," came the answer.

"Ha. Maybe Andrew's bitten off more than he can chew, eh?"

"He's turned the interrogation over to the machine."

"Really? Bit of a defeat for him, I'd say. Good. Well, he'll rip it out of her this way. Let me know what's discovered when the machine's through with her. Should be interesting. Swords and bows, indeed! Ha!"

The screen went dead. Admiral Yamada sat for some time, nursing his Scotch and thinking over what he'd just learned. Of course there was always the chance that Chandra was lying-he had to allow for that. But if not, one of two things had to be true: First, the planet was indeed helpless and he could blast them into easy submission. Or second, those Kens.h.i.tes were the most devious and dangerous enemies since Quarnon.

He couldn't decide which would suit him better. Or which would make it easier to destroy Andrew.

XII.

She was flung back, gasping and reeling at the violence of the attack. This was no random probing for memory like the first time, but an all-out a.s.sault bent on battering and utterly subjugating her. It came continually and from every direction with vicious, overwhelming strength.

There was no question of standing and fighting. Perhaps Father Kadir or Josh might have been able to, but she doubted even they would last for long against power such as this. Twisting and dodging, she began to retreat. She had to save something, some little part of herself, or the bishop would triumph. And Kensho would lose.

But how? How could she escape? There was no place to go but farther into her own mind. Even as she fled, deeper and deeper, she knew that the destroyer, the ravisher, was right on her heels. She remembered Dunn's mind. What the machine had done to him, it was doing to her. Desperation gave her strength and calmed her growing sense of panic. Cautiously and coolly, she began to fight the machine as she had been taught to fight. But she knew it was only a delaying tactic and that ultimately she would lose.

Yamada watched carefully as the bishop questioned the young technician in the brown robe. The man was clearly nervous and uncomfortable. He was just as obviously telling the truth.

"No, Worship. Not on any frequencies known to us. Or any others. We did a complete scan."

"What about moonlets, asteroids, and wandering junk?"

"Checked out by the probes, Worship. Thoroughly. Nothing larger than a few yards across could possibly have escaped our search."

Andrew stared gloomily at the man for a few seconds, then curtly dismissed him with a wave of his hand. As the door closed behind him, Thomas chuckled. "Not even a blessing, Andrew? My, aren't you a bit hard on the poor child? After all, he's just reporting what the data shows."

The overtones of malicious glee and hostility were easily detectable in the admiral's voice. Thwait looked sharply at him. He's up to something, he calculated. Ordinarily he's very careful to disguise his feelings of hatred and contempt for me and the Power. What could have happened to make him so sureof himself that he either forgets or feels he can afford to let his true emotions show? It can't merely be that the sensors and probes are proving him to be right in his estimate that the system is defenseless. No, that isn't enough, since that fact would redound as much to my credit as to his. It's something else. Could he know about the girl?

If he does know about Myali then he might very well force the issue and demand access to her, he calculated.

Which would ruin my advantage in having a source of data he is lacking. I can't allow that. Or can I?

What if I actually turn the girl over to him? After I've gotten what I want from her, of course. There wouldn't be much left to turn over, but what difference would that make? It all depends upon how soon I can destroy her defenses and gain access to her data. If necessary, I must use the full majesty and strength of the Power on the poor child. So be it.

"The data shows what it shows, Admiral. It is what it does not show that concerns me. We have a mission on-planet at this very moment. I stick to my original demand that we wait until the data is in from that mission before we take any action."