nt moment, the
Heads have maintained their lives by draining blood from the veins of
thousands of Apexans yearly!"

The Americans' faces whitened. "What do you mean?" breathed Ward.

"I mean that the artificial blood pumped by mechanical hearts through
the brains of the Heads--yes, and that is now being pumped through my
own!" cried Spiro bitterly--"is manufactured from human blood. Human
blood is the basis of it. And to get that blood every Apexan must
yield his quota in the temple. Slowly but surely this practice is
sapping the vitality of the race. But though the Apexans realized this
they were afraid to speak against the custom. For the Heads were
worshipped as gods; and when the gods spoke, blasphemers
died--horribly."

* * * * *

Miles and Ward shuddered.

"Even I," went on Spiro, "denounced blasphemers and thought it holy
that each should yield a little of his blood to the Almighty Ones.
Then I woke from darkness to find myself--a Head. At first I could not
understand, for I was in love with Ah-eeda--and can a machine mate?
But it is true that love is largely desire, and desire of the body.
With the death of the body, desire died; and it may be that pride and
ambition took its place. But, for all that, there were moments when I
remembered my lost manhood and dreamed of Ah-eeda. Yes, though the
laboratory of the Heads revealed wonders of which I had never dreamed,
though I looked into your world and studied its languages and history,
though I was worshipped as a god and endless life stretched ahead of
me--nevertheless, I could see that the strength of my race was being
sapped, its virility lost!"

His voice broke. "In the face of such knowledge what were immortality
and power? Could they compensate for one hour of life and love as
humanity lived it? So I brooded. Then one day in the temple I looked
into the face of a girl about to be bled and recognized Ah-eeda. In
that moment, hatred of the fiends posing as gods and draining the
vitality of deluded worshippers, crystallized and drove me to action.
So it was I who denounced the Heads, aroused the people!" Spiro's
voice broke; died. Miles and Ward stared at him, horrified; and after
a while Miles exclaimed, "We never suspected! We would never have
fought to maintain such a thing had we known!"

"Nonetheless," said Spiro inflexibly, "you fought for it, and many
people died and more are afraid. Superstition is a hard thing to k