t why. He took a step forward, up
another, and the feeling eased, if only slightly. He was as a shark
that could never sleep. Unless it kept moving, he would die.

He continued to climb, as the steps got steeper, which was very soon.
They were taller, progressing, and he labored on and it was harder and
harder to breathe. Finally the stairs were eight feet high and he
could go no further. He was almost weeping, feeling lost, when he went
to lean against the obstructing wall before him. But it was gone, and
he fell forward into grey mists.

He stumbled to the rocky ground---the rocks were red---and he found
himself in a deep chasm lit and shadowed by a pale sun in a purple sky.
Looking up he saw an ancient and abandoned stone fortress upon the
heights to his left, with tattered streams of white flying distended
circles about it and a sound like the wind wailing but there was no
wind. The air was thin and weak.

He suddenly felt exposed there, and sought shelter from the wraiths
above among the overhung shadows of the left-hand wall. He hunched to
a leaning sit and tried to think very carefully.

He understood. This was his past, and he knew what must be done. A
beautiful and wistful woman was imprisoned there, in that place, and he
would have her as his own at all costs. And for the first time he felt
his aggression not as a flaw, a defense against the void, but as a
rightness and a strength, because he knew she needed him. So he stayed
very still and waited for the darkness of night. Not that this would
blind their sight but because he felt safer in the dark, though not the
black. So as the sky lost red and reached its deepest blue, he set out.

He moved out from the overhang to a narrow vertical slit, a long scar
in the rockface. He climbed slowly and determinedly, sure of each step
and never making a sound. He reached and sweated and pulled, till he
was nearly halfway up.

Then suddenly the wraiths were aware of him and streaked down from the
high walls with a shrieking wail that was horrible to hear. They
reached him, swirled about him and gnashed their sharp teeth from
mouths that were like bats' mouths and screamed their terrible scream.
He reached with one arm to ward them off, nearly fell. He found his
grip and seized a stone and hurled it at the nearest. It went clean
through, and he nearly fell again.

But then, as he hung by one hand, vulnerable, the screaming increased
and they cam