Page:Weird Tales volume 38 number 03 CAN.djvu/16

 ANANAN'S traitorous followers had been few, and whatever their powers he had not felt that so few could represent real danger to Earth. But these dark hordes of whom Lugh spoke, armed with inhuman powers and sciences, pouring through into an Earth already battered by war—

"Then the only means of averting that disaster is to get Fand away from Tethra's grasp before he can secure her secret!" he argued.

Lugh looked at him steadily. "You love Fand, do you not? It is why you returned to this world against my decree?"

Cullan answered boldly. "I do love her, and it is why I returned. You can kill me, I know, but I'll not go back again to Earth!"

Dagda, the giant, uttered booming appreciation. "This outworlder has courage, Lugh! Let him stay, we can use him in this fight."

Lugh was looking strangely at Cullan. "Yes, we can use him," he said slowly. "Fate itself has brought him back to use against Tethra. But let him not complain later when he learns all the tricks of fate."

To Brian Cullan there seemed something hidden, something ominous, in Lugh's words. But he was past caring for premonitions now.

"I'll complain at no risk or danger, if a [sic] can stay and fight my way to Fand!" he cried.

"We are going to Fand now," Lugh said unexpectedly. "In a few minutes you shall see and speak to her again, aye and to Tethra too in his castle in dark Mruun."

Cullan was astounded. "In a few minutes? But Goben says that Mruun lies far in the cold mists of the north?"

"We shall not go by ordinary means, this time," Lugh said. "You go with me, for I have a reason. But first, put on Tuathan mail."

Mystified, Brian Cullan discarded his clothes and donned the silver mail and helmet that were ready. When he had done so, he glimpsed himself in a mirror. His helmeted, dark head and mailed figure looked strangely different to him, from his former self.

"It is well," muttered Lugh, eyeing him. "You are indeed exact counterpart of your ancestor Cuchulain."

He led Cullan toward a looming device in a corner, a hollow copper tube atop which were mounted queer, shielded instruments.

Cullan began to understand. "Then only our images are to go? As you and Dagda came to Ethne?"

Lugh nodded. "Yes, we go by the shape-sending. This machine can fling a simulacrum of our physical bodies far and fast across any distance, and so we shall enter Mruun. And then—we shall see."

Cullan sensed again that hidden purpose in the Tuathan king's words, that mysterious purpose that somehow concerned himself. But he was too desperately anxious to see Fand again to question.

He followed Lugh inside the hollow copper tube. The Tuathan king touched and turned a gnurled [sic] knob upon the wall. Then from walls and floor and roof of the cube, blinding light seemed to explode upon them.

Brian Cullan reeled. He no longer felt the floor under his feet, but felt as though he were being hurled headlong through