osives?"

"Not long," the girl admitted. "But long enough. I have the key at last.
Stand back."

* * * * *

Something formless and faintly radiant hovered indescribably in space.
Suspended above the worn flooring, without visible support or tangible
outline--it existed. Something like weird emptiness, a void appearing in
the air itself.

"This is the portal," Songeen told him calmly. "Choose now. I will take
you with me if I can without permission. But do not come with me,
unwarned. There is grave peril, beyond anything I can describe to you.
Beyond your experience or imagination. I will try to get you safely
back, somehow. But I can promise nothing. And if you stay too long,
there is no coming back. You must remain there; even if the terror of
your surroundings kills you."

She stood beside the mysterious doorway, waiting. Newlin made a start to
follow her, then balked.

"Wait!" he ordered roughly, as she was about to lead the way. "I can't
go with you--not like this."

"Afraid?"

"Yes, but not of you or your world. I trust you. But you say everyone
here is crazy. That it's infectious. Won't I carry the contagion into
your world?"

Songeen hesitated. Shadows deepened inside her eyes. "You would, yes.
But you will have contact with no one but me. Perhaps with the
Masters--if I can take you to them. They may help us, but they are
strange, unpredictable. Remember, I promise nothing and you come at your
own risk. But your disease will harm no one--I'm inoculated, and the
Masters are immune. If you overstay the limit and cannot return, you
will be decontaminated just as we must be when we return to our own
people.

"Here, in this room, is the place where the people of our colony on
Venus were decontaminated before they could be allowed to enter the
place of refuge the Masters had prepared for them. It is a cruel and
harrowing experience. I know. There may be a way to get you safely back,
without that. But your mind could never stand the shock. Understand
that, before you choose."

"If it won't harm you, I'll go along," Newlin decided. "Almost any world
would be an improvement on this."

"Don't be too sure," she warned. "At worst, the terror here is familiar.
Come, then. Hold my hand, stay close, and try not to be frightened. It
will be bad enough. And try not to change too much, or I will have
difficulty returning you alive."

The portal swallowed her, and Newlin felt himsel