monial knife across the exposed and palpitating
throat of the Amphib King.

This in itself was enough to freeze the onlookers. But the sight of
Lusine running up the stairway towards the rulers added to their
paralysis. She had a knife in her hand and was holding it high as she
ran toward her foster-father, the Amphib King.

Mapfarity groaned, but Rastignac said, "It doesn't matter that she has
escaped. We'll go ahead with our original plan."

They began unloading the chests while Rastignac kept an eye on
Lusine. He saw her run up, stop, say a few words to the Amphib King,
then kneel and stab him, burying the knife in his jugular vein. Then,
before anybody could stop her she had applied her mouth to the cut in
his neck.

The Human-King kicked her in the ribs and sent her rolling down the
steps. Rastignac saw correctly that it was not her murderous deed that
caused his reaction. It was because she had dared to commit it without
his permission and had also drunk the royal blood first.

He further noted with grim satisfaction that when Lusine recovered
from the blow and ran back up to talk to the King, he ignored her. She
pointed at the group around the wagon but he dismissed her with a wave
of his hand. He was too busy gloating over his vanquished rival lying
at his feet.

The plotters hoisted the two chests and staggered up the steps. The
King passed them as he went down with no more than a curious glance.
Gifts had been coming up those steps all day for the King, so he
undoubtedly thought of them only as more gifts. So Rastignac and his
men walked past the knives of the guards as if they had nothing to
fear.

Lusine stood alone at the top of the steps. She was in a half-crouch,
knife ready. "I'll kill the King and I'll drink from his throat!" she
cried hoarsely. "No man kicks me except for love. Has he forgotten
that I am the foster-daughter of the Amphib King?"

Rastignac felt revulsion but he had learned by now that those who deal
in violence and rebellion must march with strange steppers.

"Bear a hand here," he said, ignoring her threat.

Meekly she grabbed hold of a chest's corner. To his further
questioning, she replied that the Earthman who had landed in the ship
was held in a suite of rooms in the west wing. Their trip thereafter
was fast and direct. Unopposed, they carted the chests to the huge
room where the Master Skin was kept.

There they found ten frantic bio-technicians excitedly trying to