SYNOPSIS OF BOOK ONE The Many-Coloured Land The Great Intervention of 2013 opened humanity’s way to the stars, giving the people of Earth unlimited lebensraum, energy sufficiency, and membership in a benevolent civilization, the Galactic Milieu. Humanity became the sixth of the Coadunate Races, a commonwealth of planet colonizers who shared high technology and the capability of performing mental operations known as metafunctions. The latter – which include telepathy, psychokinesis, and many other powers – had lurked in the human gene pool from time immemorial, but only rarely were manifest. By 2110, when the action of the first volume in this saga began, a kind of Golden Age prevailed. More than 700 fresh planets had been colonized by exuberant Earthlings. Humans with overt metapsychic powers were slowly increasing in number; however, in the majority of the population, the mind-powers were either meager to the point of nullity, or else latent – that is, nearly unusable, because of psychological barriers or other factors. Even Golden Ages have their misfits, and the psychosocial structure of the Galactic Milieu had its share. A French physicist named Théo Guderian unwittingly provided these square pegs with a unique escape hatch when he discovered an apparently useless phenomenon: a one-way, fixed-focus time-warp opening into France’s Rhône River Valley as it existed during the Pliocene Epoch, six million years ago. Certain that a prehistoric Eden must exist on Pliocene Earth, an increasing number of misfits prevailed upon Guderian’s widow, Angélique, to let them pass through the time-portal into ‘Exile.’ From her husband’s death in 2041 until 2106, the rejuvenated Madame Guderian operated a peculiar establishment that the Galactic authorities reluctantly tolerated. Her French inn, l’Auberge du Portail, served as a front for transporting clients from Old Earth to a world six million years younger. After suffering qualms of conscience about the fate of the transportees, Madame herself ultimately passed through the one-way gate into Pliocene Exile. Operation of the time-warp was taken over by the Galactic Milieu, which had found it to be a convenient glory hole for dissidents. On 25 August 2110, eight persons, making up that week’s ‘Group Green,’ were transported to the Pliocene: Richard Voorhees, a grounded starship captain; Felice Landry, a disturbed young athlete whose violent temperament and latent mind-powers had made her an outcast; Claude Majewski, a 133-year-old paleontologist recently bereaved of his wife and colleague; Sister Amerie Roccaro, a physician and burnt-out priest who longed to become a hermit; Bryan Grenfell, an anthropologist in search of his lover, Mercy Lamballe, who had preceded him through the gate two months before; Elizabeth Orme, a Grand Master metapsychic operator deprived of her stupendous mental powers by a brain trauma; Stein Oleson, a misfit planet-crust driller, who dreamt of leading a Viking’s life in a simpler world; and Aiken Drum, an engaging young crook who, like Felice, possessed latent metapsychic powers. These eight people successfully made the jump six million years into Earth’s past – only to discover, as other time travelers had before them, that Pliocene Europe was under the control of a group of maverick humanoids from another galaxy. The exotics were also exiled, driven from their home because of their barbarous battle-religion. The dominant exotic faction, the Tanu, were tall and handsome. In spite of a thousand-year sojourn, there were still less than 20,000 of them on Earth because their reproduction was inhibited by solar radiation. Since their plasm was compatible with that of humanity, they had for nearly seventy years utilized the time-travelers in breeding, holding Pliocene humanity in benevolent serfdom. Antagonistic to the Tanu and outnumbering them by at least four to one were their ancient foes, the Firvulag. These exotics were mostly of short stature and reproduced quite well on Earth. Tanu and Firvulag actually constitute a dimorphic race – the tall ones metapsychically latent, the short ones possessed of limited operant metafunctions. The Tanu wear mind-amplifiers, collars called golden torcs, to bring their powers up to operancy. Firvulag do not require torcs, and most of them are weaker in mental power than the Tanu. For most of the thousand years that Tanu and Firvulag resided on Pliocene Earth (which they called the Many-Colored Land), they were fairly evenly matched in the ritual wars fought as part of their battle-religion. The greater finesse and more sophisticated technology of the Tanu tended to counterbalance the superior numbers of the cruder Firvulag. But the advent of time-traveling humanity tipped the scales in favor of the tall exotics. Not only did Tanu-human hybrids turn out to have unusual physical and mental strength, but humans also enhanced the rather decadent science establishment of the Tanu by injecting the expertise of the Galactic Milieu. The seventy years of time-traveling had seen nearly 100,000 humans transported to Pliocene Europe; their assimilation gave the Tanu almost complete ascendency over the Firvulag foe (who never mated with humanity and generally despised them). The lot of humankind under the Tanu overlords is by no means grim; people who cooperate are treated very well. All rough work is done by ramapithecines, small apes who wear simple torcs that compel obedience. (Ironically, these ‘ramas’ are part of the direct hominid line that climaxed in Homo sapiens six million years later.) Humans occupying positions of trust or engaged in vital occupations under the Tanu usually wear gray torcs. These do not amplify the mind, but do allow telepathic communication between humans and exotics; the devices also incorporate pleasure-pain circuits, through which the Tanu reward or punish their minions. The torcs are not easily made, requiring a rare barium component in their manufacture, and so they are not used on the majority of ‘normal’ (that is, metapsychically nonlatent) humans, who are coerced into obedience by other means. If Tanu testing shows that an arriving time-traveler has significant latent metafunctions, the lucky person is given a silver torc. This is a genuine amplifier similar to the gold collars worn by the Tanu – but with control circuits. Silver-torc humans enjoy a privileged position; rarely, they may even be granted golden torcs and full freedom as citizens of the Many-Colored Land. The eight members of Group Green, like all new arrivals, were taken for mind-testing to a Tanu fortress, Castle Gateway. Almost at once, the Group proved to be anything but typical. The starship captain, Richard, temporarily escaped and had a terrifying encounter with a Tanu slave-mistress, Epone, who administered the tests for latent metafunctions. Elizabeth, the former farsensor and metapsychic teacher, discovered that passage through the time-warp had triggered restoration of the awesome mental powers she feared had been lost forever. Her discovery was noted with excitement by another Tanu, Creyn, who promised Elizabeth that a ‘wonderful life’ lay ahead of her in the Many-Colored Land. Stein Oleson, the huge driller, was driven temporarily insane by the trip back through time. Smashing the door of his detention cell, he was subdued only after killing a number of gray-torc bondsmen. To insure Stein’s future docility, he was fitted with a gray torc of his own. His heroic physique made him a candidate for the Tanu-Firvulag ritual war, the Grand Combat. Still unconscious from his recapture, he was readied for a trip south to the Tanu capital city of Muriah. Also torced – but with silver – was the trickster youth, Aiken Drum. The exotic testers had detected strong metapsychic latencies in him, which would be brought up to the operant level as he became accustomed to wearing the amplifier. The anthropologist, Bryan Grenfell, possessed no significant mental latencies. But his professional talents seemed strangely valuable to the Tanu, with the result that Bryan was able to bargain his cooperation in return for Tanu help in finding Mercy – and a torcless status. The old bone digger, Claude Majewski, showed no hidden mind-powers. With some disdain, minions of the Tanu informed him that he would be sent north to the city of Finiah, together with most of the week’s bag of time-travelers, and put to work. He found himself incarcerated in Castle Gateway’s ‘people pen,’ together with more than thirty other ordinary humans, awaiting the departure of the northern caravan. In the prison dormitory lay Richard, comatose from mental abuse by Epone. The last members of Group Green to be tested by the exotic slave-mistress were sister Amerie and Felice Landry. The nun had no important latencies. Faced with being tested next, Felice seemed seized by hysterical fear; her agitation made an accurate calibration impossible. Epone gave up on the girl, since she could be tested later in Finiah. Then, in an offhanded way, Epone informed the two of the Tanu custom of using human women for brood stock, dismissing their indignant protests with the promise that they would eventually accept the role and even be happy with their new life in Finiah. When the exotic woman left them, Felice’s feigned hysteria vanished. She had succeeded in concealing her strong latent metafunctions from Epone, escaping the torc at least temporarily; and now she resolved in cold fury to ‘take’ the entire Tanu race. That evening, two caravans left Castle Gateway, traveling along the Pliocene River Rhône in opposite directions. In the northern group, bound for Finiah on the Proto-Rhine at the edge of the Black Forest, were the partially recovered Richard, Claude, Amerie, Felice, and the majority of other human prisoners. They were escorted by Epone and a squad of gray-torc human troops. In the southern cavalcade, led by Creyn, were Elizabeth, Bryan, Aiken Drum, the wounded Stein, and two other silver-torc humans: a former juvenile officer from a colonial satellite, Sukey Davies, and a glum Finno-Canadian forester, Raimo Hakkinen. At first the northern train made peaceful progress. Suffering from having to ride a huge Pliocene mount called a chaliko, Amerie searched her soul and began to understand the neurotic pressures that had led her to abandon her ministry. Richard, recuperating with the help of Claude, stewed in helpless rage when his position became clear. He was dubious, but subconsciously receptive, when Felice proposed a scheme for escape. Two days out of Castle Gateway, Felice’s plan was activated. She had three weapons: preternatural strength in a deceptively slight body, the ability to mind-control animals (an aspect of her metapsychic latency she had used during her athletic career), and a small knife that had escaped detection. Felice broke the chains holding her Group Green friends and those of four other prisoners. Then Richard, disguised in Amerie’s religious robes, was able to stab the officer of the guard to death. Meanwhile, Felice mentally coerced the caravan’s ferocious bear-dog escort, forcing the animals to attack the other soldiers and Epone. A wild fracas ensued, in which the freed prisoners, together with the mind-controlled bear-dogs, killed not only the rest of the soldiers, but the Tanu Epone as well. In the moment of triumph, Felice sought to take Epone’s golden torc, knowing it would release the latent metafunctions heretofore imprisoned within her brain. But a half-crazed time-traveler threw the device into a lake, where it sank in deep water. Felice was prevented from murdering the interfering man only when Amerie administered a powerful sedative from her medical kit, causing the little athlete to fall unconscious. Bewildered and frightened, the ex-prisoners realized that telepathic news of the attack must have been flashed by the dying Epone. Most of the escapees elected to follow a mountain-climbing Oxford don, Basil Wimborne, who proposed to lead them in small boats across the prehistoric Lac de Bresse to safety in the high Jura. Claude, wilderness-wise from expeditions on wild planets of the Galactic Milieu, demurred. He advised taking to the forests of the adjacent Vosges Mountains, where it would be difficult for gray-torcs, on chalikoback to pursue them. Only Richard and Amerie agreed to follow him, taking the still-unconscious Felice along. From a high ridge, the four members of Group Green saw gray-torc boats in pursuit of their former companions. That evening, Amerie felt herself strangely attracted by Felice’s violent behavior, which seemed to reflect some dark shadow within her own conventional spirituality. While crossing a torrent on the following day, Amerie fell and broke her arm. The others made camp and tried to decide what to do. Felice seemed to take for granted that they would all lead a guerilla existence, harassing other caravans in the hope of getting another golden torc. Richard received this notion with scorn. The only sensible thing was to make for the sea, away from the regions that the Tanu were known to inhabit. Claude, knowing that Richard was right, but troubled at leaving the impetuous girl behind on her own, went off into the quiet woods to think. After burying his late wife’s ashes, he fell asleep, waking at evening to find that a tiny Pliocene cat with illusions of domesticity insisted upon accompanying him back to camp. The cat, Claude felt, would be a valuable distraction for Amerie, who was becoming morbidly preoccupied with Felice. Man and pet returned to camp to find that all trace of the others had vanished. Fearfully, Claude went up the riverside path. The time-travelers had been warned of the terrible Firvulag who inhabited the Vosges forest. Now it seemed that Richard, Felice, and Amerie must have been abducted by the shape-shifting little exotics – or else recaptured by minions of the Tanu. Hearing voices, then compelled against his will to reveal himself, Claude came upon the very desperados who had seized his friends. They were not exotics but human beings – free humans who had escaped from exotic bondage and now lived an outlaw life. Their leader was a well-rejuvenated old woman wearing a golden torc: the widow of the time-gate’s discoverer and the ultimate author of Pliocene humanity’s degradation . . . Angélique Guderian. On the last day of August, the four members of Group Green, Madame Guderian and her band, and some 200 other ‘Lowlives’ (as the free humans proudly styled themselves) came to a hiding place in a giant hollow tree deep in the Vosges Mountains. The forest now swarmed with Tanu and their gray-torc henchmen, sent by Lord Velteyn of Finiah to search out the killers of his sister, Epone. Velteyn himself, proficient in the metafaculties of psychokinesis and creativity, was conducting personal sorties at the head of his Flying Hunt, a cadre of glorious Tanu knights in glass armor, made levitant by their lord’s mental power. Safe in their sanctuary, the Lowlives and Group Green engaged in mutual assessment. Madame told the newcomers of her grandiose plan to free all of Pliocene humanity from Tanu bondage, a task she had undertaken in expiation of her own guilt. She had engineered a fragile alliance between Lowlives and Firvulag against the common Tanu enemy; but the entente had been only minimally productive. The Tanu were oddly invulnerable to the vitredur glass and bronze weapons commonly used by all three races. Tanu might suffer injury, but after a recuperative course administered by redactors – metapsychic healers – even the worst wounds would be cured. Madame and her chief fighter, a Native American named Peopeo Moxmox Burke who had once been a judge, were keenly interested in how Group Green had managed to dispatch Epone. Until this time, no Lowlife had ever been able to kill a Tanu. Felice displayed her little steel knife, and a fact that Amerie had already suspected became confirmed: Iron was poisonous to the Tanu, perhaps acting in some way to destroy the linkage between the exotic brain and the golden torc. (Felice looked upon Madame’s own golden torc with some speculation at this point, but the intrepid old woman simply pricked herself with the blade to show that humans were made of tougher stuff.) At this point, a personage named Fitharn Pegleg arrived within the hollow tree. Resembling a short, sturdy human, he proved to be a Firvulag capable of assuming a monstrous shape, one of the Little People who had originally befriended Madame Guderian in the Pliocene. As she explained her plan to liberate enslaved humanity, Madame asked Fitharn to recite an ancient lay traditional among his people. It told of the original arrival of Tanu and Firvulag on Earth in a gigantic living spaceship that had as its spouse Brede, a woman from the exotic galaxy. In making the incredible journey across millions of light-years, the Ship was fatally strained. Tanu, Firvulag, and Brede escaped from the hulk in small flyers and watched the remains of the huge organism crash upon Pliocene Europe, forming a crater ‘too wide to see across.’ To consecrate the Ship’s Grave, a ritual battle was fought by two heroes – Sharn of the Firvulag and Lugonn of the Tanu – the former armed with a photonic weapon called the Sword, the latter using a similar laser-type projector called the Spear. Sharn was defeated. The victor, Lugonn the Shining One, had the honor of receiving a blast from his own Spear between his eyes. Laid out in his golden glass armor, Spear at his side, Lugonn was left at the Ship’s Grave to ‘captain it upon its final flight.’ After a thousand years had passed, the remote location of the Ship’s Grave had faded from the memory of Tanu and Firvulag alike. But the legend had sparked hope in Madame Guderian. The Sword of Sharn was now in Tanu hands, serving as a trophy awarded to the winner of the annual Grand Combat religious war. But the Spear of Lugonn must still be there beside the crater lake, together with the gravo-magnetically powered flying machines that had carried the exotics from their dying Ship. If the Lowlives could secure the photon weapon or a flying machine – or both – they would gain an unprecedented advantage over the metapsychic barbarians who constituted the Tanu chivalry. Lowlives and friendly Firvulag had searched in vain for the Ship’s Grave. But now Claude, knowledgeable in future geology, told them where it must be. Only one astrobleme in Europe fit the description, a crater called the Ries that lay some 300 kilometers to the east, on the northern shore of the Danube River. Jubilation greeted this intelligence, and it was decided to mount an expedition at once. With luck, the searchers might return before the end of the month. Then Firvulag would join Lowlife humanity in an attack against Finiah – provided that the fighting took place before the start of the Grand Combat Truce beginning at dawn on October first. The expedition would consist of Fithan, Madame Guderian, Chief Burke, a dynamic-field engineer named Martha, a former gravomag repair technician named Stefanko, and three members of Group Green. Claude would guide them to the spot. Richard (over his protests) would pilot a flyer if one could be made operational. Felice insisted she would be useful fending off wild beasts with her special talent, as well as doing chores such as hunting for food. (She had to go; around the neck of Lugonn’s skeleton was a golden torc.) Fitharn proposed that the expedition receive official sanction from the Firvulag monarch, Yeochee IV. Before leaving the tree, Madame gave secret orders to a Lowlife metalsmith, Khalid Khan, to take a group of men to a site designated by Claude, where iron ore might easily be found. They were to smelt as much of the ‘blood-metal’ as possible and bring it back to the principal Lowlife settlement of Hidden Springs as soon as the Tanu search parties withdrew. The iron was to be kept a secret from the Firvulag, since their loyalty was strongly tinged with expedience, and no Lowlife knew how long the shaky alliance might last. Amerie would go to Hidden Springs and reside in Madame’s own house. There her arm could heal and she could minister to the outlaw humans, who had lived for years with neither a physician nor a priest. Meanwhile, messengers would go to other Lowlife settlements thinly scattered about Europe, attempting to attract volunteers for the Finiah attack – now tentatively scheduled for the last week in September. In the Firvulag stronghold of High Vrazel, the little expedition met with a skeptical King Yeochee, who warned that the regions east of the Black Forest were full of Howlers, deformed mutant Firvulag only nominally under his authority. He presented Madame with a royal order commanding the cooperation of Sugoll, reputed to rule the Howlers in the regions around the Danube headwaters. On the fifth day after leaving High Vrazel, in the Vosges Mountains, the expedition arrived at the Rhine – and encountered disaster in the shape of a pig the size of an ox. This creature attacked from ambush, killing Stefanko and badly wounding Chief Burke. Fitharn urged that they turn back; but the humans feared that if they delayed, the Firvulag might seek out the Ship’s Grave themselves. Frail Martha, who had been forced to give birth to four children in quick succession as a Tanu slave, began to hemorrhage. Nevertheless, she was firm in demanding that they press on – and so five of them did, with the dauntless Felice carrying Martha until she was well enough to resume hiking. Slowly, the expedition made its way up the great escarpment on the eastern Rhine shore, into the eerie zone they named the Fungus Forest, which crowned the highland where the modern Schwarzwald lies. It was not until September eighteenth that they reached the Feldberg, home of the Howler lord, Sugoll. This individual, wearing a handsome illusory body to screen hideous deformities, toyed with the humans while his horde of goblinesque subjects projected hatred and fear of the interlopers, demanding their death. Claude brought about a reprieve when he explained the cause of the Howler mutation to Sugoll: The population had split away from their western brethren hundreds of years earlier, and had inadvertently settled in a region rich in radioactive minerals. These, combined with the exotic sensitivity to radiation, had caused the terrible birth defects. There was hope for the Howlers, Claude said, if they would move out of this area and, using their powers of shape-shifting to assume a more attractive aspect, resume mating with normal Firvulag. The Howlers might further be helped by the skills of a genetic engineer from the Galactic Milieu; but unfortunately, such a skilled scientist would surely have been enslaved by the Tanu for their own purposes. To express his gratitude, Sugoll assisted the expedition. The subterranean source of the Danube rose only a short distance away. A single day’s travel on this would bring boaters to the open river, which flowed so swiftly and smoothly that they might hope to reach the Ries Crater in only a few days more. Once again the five people set off. Richard’s navigating skill told them when they had reached the approximate longitude of the Ship’s Grave. On September twenty-second, they arrived at the crater, around the rim of which stood forty-three exotic flying machines, layered in dust and lichen. A cursory inspection convinced Richard and Martha that the exotic craft were indeed gravo-magnetically powered, quite similar to the machines of the Galactic Milieu. Cleaned up, refueled with distilled water, with the exotic controls deciphered, one of those thousand-year-old birds might still fly. Felice found Lugonn – but the golden torc was not around the ancient hero’s neck. Years ago, a ramapithecine had invaded the parked flyer where Lugonn rested and had stolen the glittering bauble. Frustrated again in her quest, Felice reacted with great violence. Richard and Martha, who had become lovers during the long trek, set about to repair a single flyer and the photon-projecting Spear, which was found next to the skeleton in armor. Time was growing perilously short; but if even one day remained before the Truce on October first, the Firvulag would join the Lowlives in an attack upon the Rhineside city of Finiah, source of the vital element barium, without which no type of torc could be made. Richard tested the Syer successfully on the twenty-sixth. But Martha’s old affliction had returned, and she weakened from heavy loss of blood. In spite of this, she and Richard made plans to flee together immediately after he had assisted in the bombardment of Finiah. Three days later, at dusk on the twenty-ninth of September, the flyer landed at Hidden Springs with the Spear ready for use. Martha was in shock from the hemorrhaging, and Amerie could only rush her away for transfusions, praying for a miracle. Down on the western bank of the Rhine, a Lowlife army waited in a secret camp opposite Finiah. The city, gorgeously illuminated with twinkling lights, was still undisturbed at dawn on the thirtieth. Chief Burke was ready, together with several hundred free humans, many of them armed with iron. The Firvulag army under Sharn the Younger was also on alert – although still skeptical – poised to attack on two fronts should the promised aerial bombardment materialize. Richard piloted the flyer to a position above the Tanu citadel. Screened by Madame Guderian’s metapsychic power, the craft prepared to attack, with the photon weapon manned by the rock-cutting paleontologist. Claude fired twice and missed, but his third shot broke the Rhineside wall, allowing penetration by the Lowlives and a large unit of Firvulag. Changing targets, the old man demolished a wall on the other side of the city; Ayfa, general of the Warrior Ogresses, led in a second prong of attackers opposite the main strike. With power in the Spear running low, Claude knew that there only remained enough energy for a single great blast at the strategic barium mine in the heart of Finiah. But now there came streaming up from the city a train of glowing knights mounted on chaliko chargers. Velteyn and his flying Hunt had penetrated Madame’s illusion and identified the enemy. The psychocreative lord sent balls of lightning soaring into the open hatch of the aircraft. Dodging, Claude fired, striking the mine squarely. Before Richard could get them away, the globes of psychic energy did their work: Claude was seriously burned, Richard lost an eye, and Madame lay on the floor of the smoldering flight deck, surrounded by toxic fumes. Half mad with pain, Richard crash-landed the flyer at Hidden Springs. At the same time, a successful invasion of the Tanu city was being carried out by combined human and Firvulag forces. The battle of Finiah lasted twenty-four hours. At the end of that time the barium mine was destroyed, the city was in ruins, the Tanu population was slain or had fled, and the enslaved human inhabitants were faced with a choice that, for some, was oddly difficult: Live free or die. Richard awoke in Hidden Springs and discovered Martha’s body laid out in the Lowlife chapel. Remembering the promises they had made, he took her up and stumbled to the still-operational flyer. Madame and Claude were going to recover, and no doubt the old woman would press ahead with her scheme to free humanity. But not Richard. He had a plan of his own. Waving farewell to Amerie, he launched the gravo-magnetic craft into an orbit thousands of kilometers above Pliocene Earth and began to wait. Far below, Felice was trudging through the forest toward smoking Finiah. She was too late for the war, but somehow or other she would find a golden torc in the ruined city and fulfill her promise to take the Tanu. The other four members of Group Green encountered an utterly different face of the Many-Colored Land. Six weeks earlier, the Tanu overlord, Creyn, had mounted his chaliko and departed Castle Gateway. With a minimal escort of three soldiers, he had led Elizabeth, Bryan, Aiken Drum, Stein, Sukey Davies, and Raimo Hakkinen along the track toward the Rhône River. As they traveled, the Tanu man told these privileged prisoners something of the wonderful life that awaited them. They would take ship at the riverside city of Roniah, and after a journey of five or six days arrive in the Tanu capital, Muriah. There Stein would be healed of the injuries suffered in his escape attempt. Aiken and Raimo and Sukey would learn how to use the metafunctions made newly operant by their silver torcs. Bryan would assist in a cultural analysis project that had been initiated by the Tanu King himself. And Elizabeth . . . her destiny would be the most splendid of all. Never before had the time-gate admitted a genuinely operant human metapsychic to the Many-Colored Land. (It was prohibited by Galactic statute.) Elizabeth’s mind might be convalescent, but when she recovered, her farsensing and redactive abilities would far exceed those of any Tanu Great Ones. Creyn, himself a skilled redactor, was humbly aware that her probing and healing powers dwarfed his own. Elizabeth would not receive the common initiation. No, she would go to the Shipspouse who was the guide and guardian of both exotic races; she would go to Brede. The exotic healer’s promises only filled Elizabeth with fear and dismay. There was a good reason why the Galactic Milieu forbade operant metapsychics to pass through the time-gate. In the Milieu, all persons with great mental power – human and nonhuman – were bound in a benevolent Unity, incapable of any selfish action that would harm civilization. But bereft of the Unity . . . Elizabeth felt as though she were the only mature adult cast away in a world of children – and malicious children at that, who would seek to use her. This must not be permitted. Elizabeth was roused from her reverie of despair by the necessity of rescuing Sukey. This young woman, who also had redactive power, had gone snooping into the mind of unconscious Stein. Discovering his longstanding psychic hurts, Sukey tried inexpertly to drain them. Only Elizabeth’s intervention prevented the deeply traumatized Viking from crushing his would-be healer into imbecility. Temporarily postponing non involvement, Elizabeth began to teach Sukey proper techniques so that she would not harm herself or the man she was growing to love. Before the trip south concluded, Sukey was able to bring Stein genuine relief from mental dysfunctions that had plagued him from childhood. Stein in turn reached out and pledged himself to her. Their two minds, operating on the most intimate telepathic level of his gray, and her silver, torc, took each other for husband and wife. Such a union, Creyn had warned, was forbidden to silver-torc women on pain of death; but the lovers hid their secret well. No one knew the truth but Elizabeth. The madcap Aiken Drum’s reaction to his new mind-power and the dazzling splendor of the Many-Colored Land was profoundly different. He gloried in both. In Roniah, he was the star of a rowdy debauch and the darling of insatiable Tanu women. Later, he and his new crony, Raimo, assumed the illusory forms of butterflies and took an impromptu tour of the riverside city. This ended with the partial destruction of the Roniah dock as part of a metapsychic practical joke. Creyn programmed what he thought was a firm curb upon the trickster’s metafunctions. However, as the journey lengthened, it became evident that Aiken – self-confessed Connecticut Yankee in King Arthur’s court, mechanical genius, recidivist delinquent, charmer, wearer of a golden suit with a hundred pockets – was something far out of the ordinary run of latent metapsychic. The mental powers that had been chained in his skull for twenty-one years of misspent youth were of incredible potential. Elizabeth saw this clearly – and so, to a more limited extent, did Creyn. The boat carrying the travelers plunged over a torrential slope, la Glissade Formidable, into the prehistoric Mediterranean Basin. Sailing over shallow lagoons, it approached the Tanu capital, Muriah, which lay at the tip of the Balearic Peninsula. Most of the human passengers were increasingly anxious as the voyage neared its end; but not Aiken Drum. His silver torc, instead of merely freeing his metafunctions, had acted as a trigger to a psychic avalanche. Control circuits that had easily held normal human minds in thrall burned out before Aiken’s mental blaze; and his powers, unlike the gentle ones of Elizabeth, were fully oriented toward aggression. Behind the grinning face of the young man in the shining golden suit was a personality that might, in time, seek to dominate not only the exotic races of Pliocene Earth, but humanity as well. Now begin Volume 2, which follows Aiken, Elizabeth, Stein, and Bryan on the sixth day after their passage through the time-gate into the world of Pliocene Exile.