he lap of
water--this sea? And another small point fell into place to furnish the
beginning of a pattern. "I was asleep on the raft when I dreamed about
that skullmountain," he said slowly, wondering if he were making sense.

Thorvald's head came up with the alert stance of Taggi on a strong game
scent.

"Yes, on the raft you dreamed of a skull-rock. And I of a cavern with a
green veil. Both of us were on water--water which had an eventual
connection with the sea. Could water be a conductor? I wonder...." Once
again his hand went into his blouse. He crossed the strip of gravel
beach and dipped fingers into the water, letting the drops fall on the
carved disk he now held in his other hand.

"What are you doing?" Shann could see no purpose in that.

Thorvald did not answer. He had pressed wet hand to dry now, palm to
palm, the coin cupped tightly between them. He turned a quarter circle,
to face the still distant open sea.

"That way." He spoke with a new odd tonelessness.

Shann stared into the other's face. All the eager alertness of only a
moment earlier had been wiped away. Thorvald was no longer the man he
had known, but in some frightening way a husk, holding a quite different
personality. The younger Terran answered his fear with an attack from
the old days of rough in-fighting in the Dumps of Tyr. He brought his
right hand down hard in a sharp chop across the officer's wrists. The
bone coin spun to the sand and Thorvald stumbled, staggering forward a
step or two. Before he could recover balance Shann had stamped on the
medallion.

Thorvald whirled, his stunner drawn with a speed for which Shann gave
him high marks. But the younger man's own weapon was already out and
ready. And he talked--fast.

"That thing's dangerous! What did you do--what did it do to you?"

His demand got through to a Thorvald who was himself again.

"What was _I_ doing?" came a counter demand.

"You were acting like a mind-controlled."

Thorvald stared at him incredulously, then with a growing spark of
interest.

"The minute you dripped water on that thing you changed," Shann
continued.

Thorvald reholstered his stunner. "Yes," he mused, "why _did_ I want to
drip water on it? Something prompted me ..." He ran his still damp hand
up the angle of his jaw, across his forehead as if to relieve some pain
there. "What else did I do?"

"Faced to the sea and said 'that way,'" Shann replied promptly.

"And why did you move in to s