about an hour;
putting us well out of your system, if we're hyperdriving--moving in
what you term R-Space."

"Then--"

"Apparently no help of any kind arrived in time, Lieutenant."

Mason remembered, then. Judith.... Somehow she hadn't made it. Or
hadn't made them believe her. This trip, he was strictly on his own.
Not just a space weary Scout Lieutenant any more.

"What'll they do with us?"

"Pump us for information, probably. Kill me afterward. You should be
safe enough in that respect. You're an alien, not a part of our
conflict. Their labor planetoid for you, I would imagine. It is a
jungle covered sphere at the edge of their planetary ring; our scouts
have sighted it on numerous occasions. A handful of men in each of its
camps, mining, probably, for the ore used in Thrayxite engines. But it
will be better than death."

"What are our chances, Kriijorl?" Mason felt the familiar nervousness
returning to his wiry body, yet this time it was in some way
different. Not the kind that ate your insides out from too much Space,
for too long.

"Of escape, you mean?" Mason nodded. "There is no reason for you to
risk--"

"Sure as hell is, friend. First because I believe you're my friend.
Second, there were a couple of things you said awhile back that got me
thinking. And third, I got myself shanghaied, and I don't think I'll
like where I'm going!" Cain, Mason thought to himself, wasn't the only
guy in the universe with a muscle!

The Ihelian grinned. "We'll watch for a chance of some kind, then. But
I will not let you risk your life. We of Ihelos obey the Book, even
if our enemy sees fit occasionally to violate the spirit in which it
was conceived."

"Tell me something," Mason said. "This feud of yours. What's it all
about? You mentioned that Book business once before, and it seems a
people with your apparent piety and maturity and general advancement
would certainly find a way to arbitrate such a dispute. What are you
fighting about?"

Kriijorl's answering smile was thin, and there was a puzzled look in
his craggy features.

"We fight because the Book of the Saints says we must!" he answered at
length. "And further than that--"

"Yes?"

"Further than that, I'm afraid we do not know!"

Mason felt his features twisting into an incredulous expression
despite his efforts to realize and appreciate the wide gap of cultural
differences between them.

"Don't _know_! But you can't fight a war without knowing why