Samuel R. Delany - The Towers of Toron

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Yes, Antoine, I was writing another novel.

Author's Note

Revising one's old fiction because of one's new ideas suggests a confusion of art and journalism—at any

rate, a mistaken notion of the way art gains either effect or worth. Revising old fiction to clarify ideas

now past creative ferment is a tricky business at best. Writers better than I have tried both and botched

them.

Written between the end of 1961 and the beginning of 1964, each of the Towers' three books went into

production practically as it was finished; by the time I was nearing the end of book two, book one was in

type. But I had already made notes on changes I would have liked in volume one, particularly in the

prologue, several of the vignettes in chapter one, and the expository material of chapter six. And, in

chapter eight, I had invented a rather clumsy language for one of my subcultures which, by now, I

realized, admitted no development. Because, however, no changes could be made, some preposterous

robots were hauled on stage at the end of book two to explain (by exploding) some of the looser ends

from book one. And a few incomprehensible grunts were strewn though book three in deference to that

obstreperous tongue.

In 1966, for the British edition, I incorporated my notes, removed the robots, and from the rest excised

some clumsy sentences of exposition, now superfluous, and the language.

That, essentially, is the version here.

I do whittle when I re-read, lopping an adjective here, pruning a prepositional phrase there, adjusting a

bit of syntax elsewhere. Poets from Keats to Au-den, in this way, have practically wrecked some.of

their best poems. But the Towers is prose. And I would hazard that, save the changes mentioned, chapter

by chapter, paragraph by paragraph, sentence by sentence through ninety-eight percent of the work, the

substance is one with the original edition. And I suspect, with all its flaws and excesses, it is time to stop

whittling.

—SAMUEL R. DELANY s<m />««•/«•«, 1970

CHAPTER ONE

ENGRAVED on a four by five card in graceful letters that leaned like dancers:

To Her Grace the Duchess of Petra

You are invited to attend a ball at dawn

Given by His Royal Highness

King Uske to honour the patriotic efforts of

Tildon Aquariums "We have an Enemy beyond the Barrier"

Two things caught the eye about this invitation: first, "Tildon Aquariums" had been printed slightly

lopsided in a type face a fraction different from the rest. Second, there was a ten-inch coii of wire taped

to the lower righthand corner.

She tore loose the message coil, threaded it into the machine. On the screen dots of colour became the

face of a blond young man with unhealthy features. "Well, there you are, dear cousin," it spoke

THE TOWERS OF TORON

with languid insolence. "You see, I'm attaching this personal entreaty with your invitation. Do come

away from your little island to my big one. You were always my favourite, cousin, and life has been

passionately dull since you went into—what else can I call it—seclusion. Please, dearest Petra, come to

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my party and help us celebrate our coming victory. So much has happened— So much has happened—

So much has happened—"

The Duchess made a disgusted sound, banged the shut-off button, and the face disintegrated. "A nick in

the message wire," she said and looked up. "Is Tildon a subsidiary of your father's company, Jon?" "It's

one of the few left that isn't." "I wonder how much Tildon gave him. My poor cousin really thinks he

can seduce the money he needs to keep up the war by the promise of official parties given at the palace."

"Royal patronage still holds its magic, Petra. Your family has wielded power in Toromon for centuries,

but my great-great grandfathers—and Tildon's— were farmers ploughing by hand on the mainland, or

pulling their fish in over the edge of their rowboat. When the council decided that these parties should be

given, it knew what it was doing."

She ran her fingers across the mother-of-pearl inlay on the desk. "We're such a disparate land. There are

still people living like cavemen on the mainland; yet we have planes, scientists like your sister." She

shook her head. "Don't people like your father, Tildon, and the others, realize they have the real power

now? I have enough to live sumptuously here on this island, but I couldn't make more than a token gift

to the war effort compared with what these industrial families can—assuming I wouU want to

support the war in the first place."

Jon smiled. "Still, they want the Dukes and Barons to nod on them when they give. Not to mention the

King."

The Duchess looked at the invitation again. Suddenly her face twisted. "He prints these by the thousands

and just fills in the name of the next moneybag to be honoured, right on the dotted line. I'm afraid the

thing that still upsets me more than anything else is the vulgarity."

"But your family is the standard of good taste, Petra. That's what the rest of us have been taught all our

lives." There was slight mockery in his voice.

She accepted it. "Yes," and put down the card. "We have been taught the same thing. But there must be

some standards—even during a war."

"Why? They're learning, Petra; my father and the others, they're beginning to learn just how much power

they do have. After all, the war is being fought for them. As long as their products are used in the war, as

long as those malcontent with life and Toromon can be funnelled into the war, everyone will stay happy

and in his place. If the war stops, then the royal family—you topple."

Petra spoke back shortly. "As long as they are blind enough to seek royalty's favour, they are not fit to

guide something as complex as Toromon. That's why I spirited off Prince Let to the mainland, so there

would be someone with a sense of the scope of this country who would be safe to govern after these

intrigues, working around us now, come full circle."

Jon's face lost some of its cynicism. "With the set up of the council and the government, Petra, the King

can still hide much of his power. While it is hidden, no one can judge what it is. Is he a madman?

THE TOWERS OF TORON

Or is he very, very clever?"

"He is my cousin. You were his schoolmate. What do you think?"

"There are great secrets involved in this war. But great secrets have kept the royal family in power since

it established itself and set itself at the head of this chaotic fragment of the world."

The Duchess touched her fingers together, nodding. "My great-great-how-many-greats grandfathers with

their ships looted the coasts, Jon Koshar, pillaged their neighbours on these islands, using the

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fragmentary remains of the technology that survived the Great Fire. The radiation on the mainland

stopped their expansion inland and the hot currents out from shore did the same. But when they were

stopped, they decided that organized government could accomplish more efficiently what piracy had

accomplished up till then. There's great variation over the land of Toromon, but it's bounded. They

learned not to exhaust what lay within those boundaries, and became a line of Kings and Queens. Now

the power is about to shift; but these others must learn the same thing."

"However your ancesters learned it, Petra, today people like Tildon and my father will pay exhorbi-

tantly for your approval. Perhaps because they suspect what you know." Now Jon picked up the card.

"Or perhaps because they are vain and ignorant. My father," he repeated, turning the card over. "His

greatest disgrace was that I should offend the King and go to the penal mines for it. His greatest triumph

was that the King himself should honour my sister when she came from the university with his royal

presence at her ball. As long as these are the limits of his happiness, the King can get money for his war,

and fill in the names on the dotted line."

"I wish I could allow myself such intellectual clumsiness." She lowered her chin to her finger tips.

Jon looked surprised.

"You call your hysterical murder merely an offence."

Jon clamped his jaw.

'* And you have not spoken to your father since the 'offence' to find out exactly what he feels."

Jon's jaw undamped and words started in his throat.

"And it is too easy for you to call your father, who was astute enough to build a fortune through brilliant,

if unscrupulous, economic exploitation, a puppet of these petty vanities.No, attacking the problem this

way leaves too many questions—"

"Petra!"

The Duchess looked up, surprised. She brushed her hand across the sunrise copper hair pulled back by a

burnished cluster of gold sea-serpents, "I'm sorry, Jon," and her hand went out and took his. "We have

all been here together too long. But when I see how my family, how my people can fool themselves, it

hurts. There is a sense of decency that's like a barometer to a man's or a country's health. I don't know.

Perhaps I'm too much in love with some idea of the aristocracy: I was born into it. I turned away from it

when I was young. Now I find myself back in it again. I think we shall accept that invitation, Jon

Koshar."

"I see," Jon said. "With Arkor as well?" "Yes. The three of us will be needed again." She hesitated. "You

were contacted by ... them also, weren't you? The Lord of the Flames,.."

Jon pushed his black hair back from his forehead.

"Yes." They turned at a sound behind them. Doors shaped

THE TOWERS OF TORON

like double mollusk shells fanned apart. In the doorway stood the giant seven feet and a handful of

inches tall. On the left side of his face three scars jagged down his cheek and neck, darker parallel welts

in dark skin. "When will we leave?" Arkor asked. The triplex of scars was the brand with which the

frequent telepaths among the tall, mainland forest people were marked.

"Tonight," Petra said.

"You're going to take Tel and Alter," said Arkor. It was a statement, not a question.

Jon frowned. "Are you, Petra?"

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"We're all going to pay my cousin the King a visit," she told them. "We've received warning. The Lord

of the Flames is loose somewhere on earth once more."

"We drove him across the universe three years ago," Jon said.

"We may have to do it again."

Across the evening salmon-coloured clouds strung out like floating hair. Red light caught on the

polished brass that ran around the yacht deck. Water flopped at the side of the boat. "Everyone's

aboard," Jon told the Duchess.

"Then we can start." She turned and issued an order. Engines rang out like plucked cords on a musical

instrument. The ship mounted, then plunged forward towards the night. As blackness washed the sky

and stars stuck diamond-tipped pins into evening, Jon and Petra lingered at the rail. "Somewhere out

there is the war. In which direction?" she asked.

"Who knows?" Jon motioned towards the horizon. "Somewhere beyond the radiation barrier, somewhere

out in the mist of our planet*"

One of the motormen cried out from the yacht bridge. "Toron ahead!"

"We're nearly there," said Petra. They looked over the prow of the ship, across the water.

Imagine a black gloved hand, ringed with myriad diamonds, amethysts by the score, turquoises, rubies.

Now imagine this glittering hand rising slowly above the midnight horizon, each jewel with its internal

flame. Thus the island of Toron thrust over the edge of the sea.

The windows of the Grand Ballroom in the royal palace of Toron rose coffin-shaped two stories towards

the ceiling. As the panes lightened, the musicians blew windy music from their tuned sea-shells, and

above the marine chords, the weaving voice of a theremin dipped and climbed. Emerald and coral gauze

swirled from the women's arms, purple and crimson on the jackets of the men.

Through the wide windows, against the ending night, the dark band of the transit-ribbon leapt away from

the laboratory tower of the palace and disappeared among the other towers of the City till at last it soared

over the sea, over the mainland beach, over the forest of lush titan-palms and descendants of the oak

trees of an earth five hundred years in the past, across the penal mines where men and women prisoners

toiled the metal tetron from shafts sunk in the twisted rock, across groved plains where only in the past

three years had vegetation dared creep, and at last into the mainland city of Telphar. Telphar!—in the

past three years it had been converted into the strongest military establishment earth had ever seen, or so

her generals boasted.

"A ball in the morning!" the young girl in the ruby

8 THE TOWERS OF TORON

silk exclaimed. The shoulder of her dress was fastened with a copper lobster whose beaten tail curved to

cover her right breast. "Don't you think this is a wonderful idea, to have a ball at dawn?"

The elderly woman beside her pulled her thin lips tighter. "How ridiculous," she said softly. "I remember

when balls were affairs of taste and breeding." A caterer passed them offering hors d'oeuvres. "Just

look," the woman continued. On her head she wore a silver wig coiled through with rope pearls. 4 'Just

look at that!" Strips of fillet were wound about the toasted circlets. "That fish came from the aquariums!

Fish from the aquariums served at an affair of state! Why I remember when no one would think of

serving anything but imported goods from the mainland. Aquarium grown fish! Why, the idea. What has

the world come to?"

"I never could tell the difference between one and the other anyway," the girl in the ruby dress replied,

munching into a pate of fish-roe and chopped seal-lion.

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The woman with the silver wig humphed.

Jon Koshar moved away and wandered through the hall, over the polished white stone that shimmered

with the reflections of fabulous gowns. Isolated on one side of the room and swathed in fur were two

representatives of the forest guards, the lonely giants of Toromon's great forest on the mainland. A few

feet away stood three squat ambassadors from the neo-neanderthal tribes. They wore bronze wrist bands

and leather skirts. Across the floor people clustered around the honoured representatives of Titdon's

aquarium. Yes, three years ago it would have been different. But now—

Someone screamed. %

THE TOWERS OF TORON 9

Jon whirled round as the scream again crossed the ballroom. Heads turned, people crowded forward oh

one another, then pushed back. Jon was shoved sideways and someone put an elbow in his chest. More

people screamed, backing away from what staggered over the ballroom floor.

Something inside that had always made him go against crowds took him forward, and suddenly he was

at the edge of the clearing. An elderly man in a bright red suit was lurching across the floor, his hands

against his eyes. Behind him a scarlet cape billowed, sagged about his ankles, then billowed once more

as he fell forward.

Sticky crimson bubbled between his fingers and dribbled down the backs of his hands staining his

scarlet cuffs darker. He cried out again, and suddenly the scream turned into liquid gurgling.

The man went down on one knee. When he came up, there was a smear over the stone and the knee of

the trouser leg had deepened to maroon.

Another figure had detached himself from the crowd, slim, blond, dressed in white. Jon recognized the

King.

The scarlet figure splattered to the floor at His Majesty's feet and rolled over, his grasping hands falling

from his face.

Now more people cried out and even Jon gasped in a breath and bit down on it like metal.

Blood puddled from both cluffs and trouser legs. Red jelly slipped away from what had been a face.

Suddenly the barrel chest collapsed and the red cloth that had covered flesh now sagged down till it

draped no more than the spikes of meatless ribs. One hand raised two inches from where it lay on the

bloody cape, then fell back, tarsals and metatarsals separat-

THE TOWERS OF TORON

ing, a scattering of tiny bones, as the radial tendon dissolved. At the same time, the skull rolled away

from the neck: cheek bone, nasal cartilege, and chin chuckled over the floor.

Through the crowd across from him Jon saw the red-headed figure of the Duchess moving towards the

arched ballroom entrance. Immediately Jon turned, made his way to the edge of the room, and in three

minutes had skirted the floor to the entrance where the Duchess was waiting. She seized his shoulder.

"Jon," she whispered, "do you know who that was? Do you know?"

"I know how it was done,'1 he volunteered. "But not who."

"That was Prime Minister Chargill, the headof the Council." She took a breath. "All right. Now you tell

me how."

"When I was in prison at the mines," Jon said, "a not too close friend of mine was an expert toxologist,

and sometimes he used to shoot off his mouth. That was terenide. It's an enzyme action cellular tran-

quilizer."

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* 'You mean the body cells get so tranquil they can't even hold on to one another?"

"That's about it," Jon said. "The results are what you saw happen to Chargill."

The music, which had stopped, suddenly resumed, and above the twining melodies a casual voice

sounded over a loud-speaker system: "Ladies and gentlemen, I am so sorry that this unpleasantry has

interrupted my morning party, so terribly sorry. I must request you all, however, to repair to your homes.

Our orchestra will now play for us the Victory Anthem of Toromon." The melody on the theremin halted

abruptly, then plunged into the-^oar-

THE TOWERS OF TORON

ing theme of the Victory Anthem.

"Come up to my suite immediately," whispered the Duchess to Jon. "There's something I wanted you to

see before this. Now it's imperative."

Across the room, the first light strained the panes in the immense coffin-shaped windows. Like violet

blades, light slanted through the room, over the heads of the scurrying guests avoiding the scarlet horror

drying on the dancing floor.

Jon and Petra hurried through the arched doorway.

The Duchess Petra had secured a family suite among the personal chambers of the palace. A few

minutes after they left the ballroom, she ushered Jon through the triple door into the softly lit, purple

carpeted room. "Jon," she said as they stepped inside, * 'this Rolth Catham. Rolth Catham, this Jon

Koshar, whom I told you about."

Jon had stopped at the door, his hand half extended, looking at the ... the man in the chair. He wanted to

close his eyes and rub them, but what he saw was not going to go away. Half of Catham's face was

transparent. Part of his skull had been replaced with a plastic case. Through it Jon could see blood

boiling along the net of artificial capillaries; metal teeth studded a plastic jaw bone, and above that an

eyeball hovered before the ghostly grey convolutions of brain, half hidden by a web of vessels.

Jon's mind thawed from the first surprise, and he said out loud, "Catham. Catham of Catham's Revised

History of Toromon." He jumped at the first familiar thought in his mind, turning it into a pleasantry to

battle the surprise. "We used your book in school."

THE TOWERS OF TORON

The three-quarters of Catham's mouth that was flesh smiled. "And your name is Koshar? Is there any

connection between you and Koshar Aquariums or Koshar Hydroponics? Or for that matter with Dr.

Koshar who discovered the inverse subtrigono-metric functions and applied them to the random system

of spacial co-ordinates—which is more or less the technological reason behind the present conflict in

which Toromon has got itself engaged?"

"Koshar Aquariums and Hydroponics are my father. Dr. Koshar is my sister."

Catham's mobile eyebrow raised.

"I told both of you before that I would have surprises for you," the Duchess said. "Professor Catham,

we're going to exchange stories this evening. Just a moment. Arkor!" the Duchess called.

In the silence following, Professor Catham caught Jon staring at his glittering visage. The three-quarter

smile came again. "I usually announce right off when I meet someone for the first time that I was in an

accident fifteen years ago, a freak explosion out at University Island. I'm one of General Medical's more

successful, if a trifle bizarre experiments."

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"I assumed it was something like that," Jon said. "I was just remembering once when I was in the prison

mines. There was an accident and a buddy of mine got one side of his face smashed in. Only General

Medical was far away, and the medical facilities out there were never particularly famous anyway. He

died."

"I see," said Professor Catham. "That must have been the mine disaster of '79. Did they do anything

about the safety conditions after that?"

"Not while I was there," Jon said. "I went into prison when I was eighteen and the tetron explosion

THE TOWERS OF TORON

was in my first year. Five years . . . later, when I got out, they hadn't even changed the faulty cutter

machinery."

Just then a door in the side of the room opened and Arkor came in.

At the sight of the triple scars that branded the giant's neck, the historian's eyebrow raised once more.

"Do you always keep a telepath in your service, Your Grace?"

"Arkor is not in my service," the Dutchess said. "Nor are we in his. Professor, this is very important. Not

twenty minutes ago Prime Minister Chargill was assassinated. I'd like you to go over what you told me

when I spoke to you earlier."

"Chargill... ?" began the historian. The eyebrow drew down where the other would have met it in a

frown. "Assassinated?" Then the half-face relaxed again. "Well, it's either the malis who are responsible,

or perhaps the council itself wanted him out of the way . . ."

"Please, Professor," said the Duchess. "Will you repeat what you told me before. Then we'll add what we

can."

"Oh, yes," Catham said. "Oh, yes. Well, I was telling Her Grace when she first called me at the

•University, or rather ferreted me out of ... Well, anyway." He looked from Jon to Arkor, to Petra, and

back. "Anyway," he went on. "Toromon is perhaps the strangest empire in the history of Earth. You

have lived in it all your lives so its unique properties do not strike you, but to one who has studied the

development of the world before the Great Fire, five hundred years ago, its uniqueness becomes

apparent. Toromon's empire consists of the island of Toron, the handful of islands scattered near

THE TOWERS OF TORON

it, and the fifteen hundred or so square miles of mainland opposite the islands, that of a strip of beach,

followed by meadow lands, followed by forests, followed by an uninhabitable rocky crescent that more

or less cuts off this fifteen hundred square miles from the rest of the mainland continent, which is still

hopelessly radioactive. After the Great Fire, this area I've outlined was completely isolated from the rest

of the world by radioactive land and radioactive currents in the sea. Until recently, we never thought that

there was anything left on earth to be cut off from. There were several good technical libraries that

survived, and some of our ancestors fortunately were literate, educated people, so we have a fairly good

picture of what the world was like before the Great Fire. And although there was economic and social

back-sliding at first, when a balance was finally achieved, technology began to progess once more and

within a comparatively short time, it had equalled that of before the Great Fire, and in many non-

destructive areas, surpassed it. Very early in our history, we discovered the metal tetron as a source of

power, the one major factor that our pre-Great Fire ancestors seemed entirely ignorant of, from the

records we have.

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"Now what is unique about Toron is this. No empire that we know of before the Great Fire ever survived

for over a hundred years in complete isolation from any disruptive force. Nor did any empire, country,

or even tribe that was in isolation ever develop once it had been isolated.

"Yet through the strange set of circumstances I have outlined—the surviving libraries, the intelligence of

our ancestors, the geographical diversity of our land allowing for interchange between rungl and

THE TOWERS OF TORON 15

urban cultural patterns—Toromon has existed for half a thousand years alone while still managing to

preserve a constantly developing technology. The details of this process are fascinating, and I have

devoted most of my life to their study, but that is not what I want to explore now.

"The effect of this situation, however, is like a thermite reaction going on inside a sealed bottle. It

doesn't matter how long it takes, eventually the bottle will explode. And the longer the bottle remains

sealed, the further the fragments will fly. And, that explosion has taken place." Catham leaned forward

in his chair now and brought his fingers meshing together like the tines of fork. "Sixty-five years ago

Toromon's scientists conducted the first experiments in matter transmission. The transit-ribbon was built

between Telphar, our one city on the mainland, and Toron, our island Capitol. Then Telphar was cut off

from us by an increase in the radiation barrier— almost as if the area of Toromon's empire were being

diminished to hasten the final explosion. Three years ago we learned that a group of forest people,

probably controlled by the enemy had managed to increase the radiation artificially, using some

equipment from Telphar itself." Catham turned to Jon now. "Three years ago, as well, your sister, Dr.

Clea Koshar, discovered the inverse subtrigonometric functions and their application to the random

system of special co-ordinates. In six months the old transit-ribbon was turned into an antenna that could

beam matter wherever we wished, and Telphar, inhabitable again, became a military establishment to

send men by the thousand to any place on the globe." Catham raised one hand to his transparent cheek.

"And the war continues. Why a war? Why not peace? Toromon has

THE TOWERS OF TORON

been too long held in. That's all I know."

"I thought you would mention what I saw as the most obvious thing about all of this," the Duchess said.

"Dr. Catham, do you remember the incident that caused war to be declared three years ago?"

"Yes. The King's younger brother, Prince Let, was kidnapped. That must have been done by some early

group of malcontents. The malis go back quite a way, but they were never as strong as they are now. All

they actually accomplish is stirring up trouble. Some people think they are connected with the enemy.

And no one, so I hear, will even walk through the Devil's Pot after dark."

"It was never a particularly savoury area of the City," replied the Duchess. "But Professor Catham, now

I'm going to tell you my story. It's a lot briefer than yours, and more incredible. But it's true. Toro-mon

has had access to matter-transmission on a large scale for three years. There are at least two other races

in the universe that have had access to it for billions. They use it to travel among the stars. These races

aren't even composed of individuals, but are rather collective consciousnesses. Their method of

interstellar travel is more psychic than physical. One seems to be a sort of amoral experimentor. The

other, much older, race is benevolent and composed of three centres of consciousness, rather than one,

which seem to check and balance one another. We call it'the Triple Being.

"You spoke of Toromon's uniqueness, its combination of isolation and development. The experimentor,

whom we call the Lord of the Flames, was aware of Toromon uniqueness, and from the outside he began

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to meddle in order to keep it isolated as long as possible. You wonder where the rebels goj: the

THE TOWERS OF TORON

equipment and knowledge to close the radiation barrier? It was from the Lord of the Flames.

"Myself, Jon, and Arkor here were contacted by the Triple Being three years ago. With their help we

rooted out the agent of the Lord of the Flames, though too late to stop the major explosion. But he's back

again, Professor Catham. What the results of his presence will be this time we don't know. The

kidnapping of Prince Let was our doing. For the past three years he's been safely with the forest guards

on the mainland. We hope that eventually this hysterical war will end, and then Prince Let can come

back and perhaps straighten out whatever's left of Toromon, if there is anything. While he was in the

palace with his mother and brother, his very life and sanity were in danger. It was all we could do."

"I see," said Catham. "And you're going to prove aH this? Why tell me about it in the first place?"

"Because we need someone with a historical orientation to help us and advise. The Triple Being will

only help so much in order not to upset our culture by introducing extraneous upsetting elements. The

first advice we need is what to do with two youngsters who helped us in our first effort, a boy and a girl.

The boy, Tel, ran away from a small fishing village on the mainland to Toron when he got involved with

us. The girl is an acrobat. They were very helpful to us then, but we don't need them any more, and it

seems a shame to keep them away from society this long. But they have a tremendous amount of

information that might be dangerous, especially to themselves. And there's one more problem," She

turned to Arkor. "Bring the children in, will you?"

Arkor turned from the room. He came back followed by a boy of about seventeen with dark skin and

THE TOWERS OF TORQN

sea-green eyes. After the boy came a girl perhaps a year older and nearly an inch taller. Her skin was

tanned the same as the boy's, but her hair was the colour and texture of bleached silk. Both looked

surprised at the apparition that was Catham, but they were silent.

"The special problem is this," the Duchess told him, and reached for a button on the arm of her chair. At

her touch, the lights in the room dimmed to half their original brightness.

Rolth Catham started forward in his seat. He was sitting alone in the purple carpeted room—with five

empty, but animated suits of clothes, a woman's sitting in the Duchess's chair, two men's standing beside

it, and the scant garb of the two youngsters hovering by the door. But though the lights were dim, they

were still bright enough to see that the bodies inhabiting them had disappeared.

From the chair the Duchess's voice, natural and unruffled, continued. "During the time we were first

involved in this affair, the Triple Being went as far as to make us immune to certain frequencies of

radiation by re-structuring our crystallization matrix. The side effect, however, was that the index of

refraction of our bodies' substance took a nose dive. Which means that when the light gets below a

certain intensity, we disappear . . ." The light went up, and the five people were back in the room. "So

you see the problem. That demonstration, incidentally, is our only real proof."

"I'm impressed," Catham said. "No, I don't believe you. But I will take it on as a theoretical problem,

which might be fun to work on. You want to know what to do with the youngsters? Spray them with

pigmented viva-foam, General Mwiical

THE TOWERS OF TORON 19

developed it for me—but I'm not vain enough to wear it. Turn them out on the world, and leave them to

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their own devices. The remaining three of you concentrate on the Lord of the Flames." Catham rose.

"You can contact me back at the University. I must say it's all very interesting. But I seriously don't

believe it's anything more than a psychotic fantasy on your part." He smiled his three-quarter smile.

"And that's a shame, Your Grace, because you have a terribly vivid imagination. But I will advise you to

the best of my ability, however I can." He stopped. "Consider this before I go. You say you're

responsible for the kidnapping of Prince Let three years ago? The government finally decided it was

malis. Malis probably are responsible for Chargill's death—if he is dead. In your fantasy world, aren't

you perhaps responsible for that?" Catham went to the door, opened it, seemed surprised to find it not

locked, and went out.

Arkor, Jon, and the Duchess looked at one another.

"Well," said Arkor. "He is serious about advising us, but he doesn't believe it."

"That's better than nothing," Jon said.

"Arkor find out what in the world viva-foam is, and get hold of some as soon as possible," the Duchess

said.

CHAPTER TWO

FIFTEEN COPPER centi-units, on top of an empty cardboard crate, had been arranged into a square—

minus one corner.

A hairy fist whammed the surface, the coins leapt, and the three men who had been kneeling around the

box fell backwards spluttering. "What's the idea?" demanded one with curly brown hair.

"Hey! Hey, you look at me!" A grin slashed the wide face of the interrupter. Squat, barrel-broad, with no

neck and little chin, he had hair and eyebrows the colour of unravelled hemp. "Look at me!" he bellowed

again, threw back his head, and laughed.

"Aw, cut it out," whined the green-eyed, heavily freckled kid they called Shrimp. "Why don't you pick

on someone your own size?"

Lug's squat torso rolled back on his pelvis and his brachydactylic hands slapped at his low, heavy

stomach. "I pick on..." He turned to the third man. ". . . you!"

Waggon, the third around the crate, had the*same

THE TOWERS OF TORON

thick physique, only his hair was wiry and black and his forehead even lower.

"Aw, leave Waggon alone," Shrimp complained. "We're trying to teach him to play a game."

"He's my size," grunted Lug, giving Waggon a playful whack on the shoulder.

Waggon, who had been concentrating on the coins, looked up surprised, his wide eyes blinking. Very

little white showed around his pupils.

"Leave him alone, Lug," Shrimp said again.

A second time Lug belted Waggon's shoulder. Suddenly Waggon rolled to his feet, ropes of muscle

knotting along his shoulders and thighs. He leapt, and they tumbled to the floor. The other recruits

looked up from their bunks or where they sat reading military pamphlets. One seven foot forest guard

who had been leaning by the double-decker bed peeled himself from the olive drab wall, and walked

towards the two scuffling neanderthals. Suddenly he reached for them. There was a howl, another howl,

and then Waggon and Lug were dangling by their collars from the forest guard's fists. "Why don't you

apes learn to do a passable imitation of human beings?" the guard asked in a resonable voice.

Big-pupiiled eyes blinked, fists folded like cats' paws, and the big toes sticking through the open-toed

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