ght glossy blue-black hair, thick bracket-shaped eyebrows,
brown eyes, a straight nose and a prominent chin. And where his build
was superbly masculine, hers was magnificently feminine.

Nevertheless, this was not her reason for so speaking to him. She knew
the disgust the Land-walker had for the Amphib-changeling, and she
took a perverted delight in baiting him.

He was proud that he seldom allowed her to see that she annoyed him.
"_B'zhu, fam tey zafeep_," he said. "Good evening, woman of the
Amphibians."

Mockingly she said, "Have you been watching the Six Flying Stars,
Jean-Jacques?"

"_Vi._ I do so every time they come over."

"Why do you eat your heart out because you cannot fly up to them and
then voyage among the stars on one of them?"

He refused to give her the satisfaction of knowing his real reason.
He did not want her to realize how little he thought of Mankind and
its chances for surviving--as humanity--upon the face of this planet,
L'Bawpfey.

"I look at them because they remind me that Man was once captain of
his soul."

"Then you admit that the Land-walker is weak?"

"I think he is on the way to becoming non-human, which is to say that
he is weak, yes. But what I say about Landman goes for Seaman, too.
You Changelings are becoming more Amphibian every day and less Human.
Through the Skins the Amphibs are gradually changing you completely.
Soon you will be completely sea-people."

She laughed scornfully, exposing perfect white teeth as she did so.

"The Sea will win out against the Land. It launches itself against the
shore and shakes it with the crash of its body. It eats away the rock
and the dirt and absorbs it into its own self. It can't be worn away
nor caught and held in a net. It is elusive and all-powerful and
never-tiring."

Lusine paused for breath. He said, "That is a very pretty analogy, but
it doesn't apply. You Seafolk are as much flesh and blood as we
Landfolk. What hurts us hurts you."

She put a hand around one bar. The glow-light fell upon it in such a
way that it showed plainly the webbing of skin between her fingers. He
glanced at it with a faint repulsion under which was a counter-current
of attraction. This was the hand that had, indirectly, shed blood.

She glanced at him sidewise, challenged him in trembling tones. "You
are not one to throw stones, Jean-Jacques. I have heard that you eat
meat."

"Fish, not meat. That is part of my Philosophy of Violence," he
r