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 moment, in Fidelia's mind as Alice was in his. Once before—at least once, she had told him—Fidelia had been in danger when she had thought of Water and the Wind as personal forces opposing her. Who had been with her on the side against the Water and the Wind as he was with her now? It struck him as strange that, although he had wondered about that danger frequently, he had always imagined her alone in it until now.

"You were alone that other time?" he asked her, suddenly.

"When?" she said; but he knew that she recognized what time he meant, and without his explaining, she told him, "No."

"Who was with you?"

She didn't reply.

His heart was thumping. "Hers is," he thought. He put his hand on her and clasped her forearm. He felt a pulse pounding but, if it was hers, it was beating simultaneously with the throb in his fingers.

He thought: "Why is she here with me? Everywhere men must have been crazy for her. That's why she's been a changer, of course."

He altered his question aloud, since she had not answered the other. "You both got out?" he said.

"Yes."

"Where's he?"

She waited again and her throbbing quickened with his. He thought she was not to reply but she did: "He's dead."

"Oh!" said Dave. "Oh!" Yet he had to ask more. "But not as a result of that?"