h a grin, Kirby took Naida's hand and led her down the steps,
unbolting each bronze gate but the last.

"What do you want?" he asked in a cool voice a moment later, when he
stopped on the final step and faced the Duca from behind the protection
of the final gate.

Clearly the parley was going to be a blunt one.

"I want you to leave our world," the Duca rumbled promptly.

He was drawn up in a posture intended to display dignity. But his left
cheek, where Kirby had hammered him, was pulpy and discolored, and
somehow he seemed to Kirby more than ever merely human.

"Under what conditions am I to leave?"

"If you will vacate my tower at once," the Duca said with a flush of
eagerness which he could not conceal, "I will permit Naida and one of my
caciques to escort you back to the Valley of the Geyser. I will also
give you directions by which you may travel in safety from there to the
outer world."

Kirby, wanting more details, made himself seem thoughtful.

"And what will happen to me, and to the girls, if I decline?"

Encouraged, the Duca made an impressive gesture.

"You will be left in the tower to die of starvation. Mine is not a
complicated offer. It should require no complicated decision. What is
your answer?"

Kirby dropped his carefully assumed mask of thought.

"My answer is this," he lashed out. "I will not leave! The tower is
ours, and we will hold it until you have accepted Naida's peace terms on
your priestly oath!"

"But if you stay in the tower you will starve!" thundered the Duca.

"No, we won't starve! We won't starve because we eat the food of
Ducas!"

* * * * *

In silence, Kirby took from his pocket a strip of the sacred Peyote and
bit off one end of it. Suddenly the hush in the amphitheatre became
complete. As he watched Kirby chewing, the Duca gasped and choked.

"Moreover," Kirby announced with slow emphasis, "I have taken possession
of the weapons which you took from men of the upper world, and which
have already sent men of your race to their death. I have no wish to
kill either you or your caciques, but if you do not presently discuss
peace with me, you will certainly find yourself embroiled in a struggle
more bitter than the mild one of this morning."

With that said, he swung on his heel, and taking Naida's hand again,
started with her up the steps.

"I have nothing more to say," he called over his shoulder to a Duca
whose white haired majest