A quick tour of the interrogation chambers, the torture rooms, and the high-security cells also produced nothing. And Caola left those grim portions of the palace with a vast sense of relief.
A hunch took her to the apartments of Pangoy, the Queen’s confidant and chief advisor. To penetrate here she took extreme cautions not to be seen, for of all the inhabitants of the palace, she feared most the Witch Queen whose sadistic cruelties she had tasted ere now, and secondly the icy-hearted Pangoy, whose cold probing gaze terrified her.
In order to peruse his apartments she employed her intimate knowledge of the ancient structure. She had months ago found a secret passage which meandered between the thick walls of the old fortress. It prowled past many private apartments and contained a secret spy-eye wherethrough the rooms could be examined safely from a place of concealment.
She crept through the dark passage to Pangoy’s quarters and utilized the spy-eye. His bedroom was empty; so was his laboratory and sitting room.
But the inner chamber was occupied.
Caola caught her breath sharply. A man’s body lay on a metal table, covered by a white cloth. She could not see his face…
This room, she knew, was reserved for Pangoy’s strange experiments into the human brain. The Mind Wizard was possessed of certain odd powers, augmented by the telepathic amplifier helmet invented by the terrible savants of his dreaded home-world, Nex.
Here he worked his strange arts upon helpless captives. Here he sought to gain mastery over the minds of others, to bend and crush the wills of former enemies, to force men to become the willing slaves of himself and his mistress, the Witch Queen.
From her position, Caola could not see who lay on the metal table. A great white light blazed down on that table. Straps of pliable metal bound the seemingly unconscious, or dead, figure to the table.
She resolved that she must ascertain the identity of Pangoy’s latest victim. Her fingers fumbled along the inner wall of the secret passage, and tripped a catch. A concealed door swung open soundlessly. The girl stepped out into the room.
She went swiftly and silently over to the operating table and reached out for the edge of the cloth that covered the body. But before she could touch it a cold voice rang out harshly behind her—
“What are you doing in this room, girl?”
She turned and looked straight into the chill menace of Pangoy’s gaze.
8. THE MIND PROBE
Before Kirin could phrase his reply to Azeera’s offer, a diversion occurred.
“Beware of the Earthling, my lady! He means to betray you.”
The cold harsh voice rang out through the stillness of the vaulted room wherein the Space Mirror hung like a globe of mystery above the glistening floor.
Kirin turned to see the man who had entered the chamber unseen by either of them. He was tall and gaunt, with shaven skull. His saffron skin was stretched tightly over sharp cheekbones and jaw, and seamed with a thousand minute, almost invisible wrinkles. His eyes were suave, cool, dark, and appraising. They shone with a mingled amusement and scorn as they probed deep into Kirin’s gaze.
Kirin remembered having seen him at the feast, but he had been seated across the hall and they had exchanged no words. Who was the strange man in the purple robe, and—a chill struck through Kirin as the realization hit him—how did he know the direction of Kirin’s own inmost thoughts?
Azeera turned to observe the intruder.
“What do you here, Pangoy? Do you dare to spy upon your Queen?” she demanded wrathfully. Scorn flashed in his somber eyes as he shook his head.
“Not on you, my lady, but upon the Earthling, yes. I was determined to observe him during your conversation, while remaining unobserved myself. You know my abilities, hence believe me when I say the Earthling is not to be trusted. He means to acquiesce, but only seemingly. To go along with your plans only on the surface. Actually, he means to steal the Medusa and use it for his own ends.”
A cold wave of alarm passed through Kirin, but he fought to control his features and appear calm. “You know my abilities,” the gaunt man with cold, suave eyes had purred. Kirin looked him over speculatively. He had seen a man very much like this many years before. The same saffron skin, shaven pate, and cold merciless eyes.
The sense of alarm grew stronger suddenly. Kirin recalled that the other had been a Nexian. Only too well did he know the strange tales men whispered about the ominous and curious powers of the men of Nex. The Mind Wizards of Nex, he mentally corrected himself. This man was a natural telepath!
Cold eyes fastened on his own, Pangoy smiled a cool, enigmatic smile of ironic malice.
“Your musings are correct, dog of Tellus,” he purred. “I can indeed read the current of your unspoken thoughts.”
Kirin turned to the Witch Queen who surveyed him in silence, the gem-fires of her almond eyes flickering with chill and deadly inquiry. On impulse he blurted out, “He lies, my lady! I say he lies! I know not for what reason, whether to willingly deceive you, or simply because he mis-reads my thoughts, but I say he lies.”
His words hung there echoing in the silence of the room. For a time no one spoke. Pangoy stood aloof and disdainful across the chamber, cold mockery in his eyes, a small ironic smile upon his lips, hands tucked into the voluminous sleeves of his purple robe. The Queen stood between them, slender and regal, her jade arms and shoulders rising from the glittering silver sheath of her metallic gown.
“Perhaps,” she said softly. “Perhaps he does lie.”
A sudden dew glistened on the saffron brows of Pangoy. His smile slipped, faltered, fell. The sheen of perspiration daubed his polished brow.
“My lady, I swear by the thousand gods of space my words are true!”
“Don’t believe him, Azeera,” Kirin said levelly. “He is trying to deceive you for some unknown purpose of his own.”
Her eyes danced with mockery as they turned from Kirin to Pangoy and back again to the dark face of the tall Earthling.
“I am no Mind Wizard, and hence cannot read the inward thoughts of men,” she said. “Thus I cannot say which of you two speaks the truth and which utters a vile lie. But I have known Pangoy the longer of you both, and have trusted him ere now. However, I know that he hungers for my love, and is envious of you, Earthling. The jealousy of thwarted lust has often turned a true friend into a deceiving traitor.”
Fury writhed across Pangoy’s pale, drawn features.
“Never would I by word or deed betray you, my Queen!” he swore in a shaking voice. “I have not earned such scathing words of doubt as these!”
She raised one slim hand to silence him.
“Permit me to finish. I was about to propose a testing of the Earthling.” Her eyes glinted with malice and mockery as they burned into Kirin’s. “If he speaks the truth and Pangoy lies, we shall easily learn this. Place the Earthling under the Mind Probe!”
From nowhere appeared two of the metal colossi. Grim and expressionless metal masks glared down at him with eyes of red flame as they seized Kirin’s arms in their cold grasp and forced him out of the chamber. Pangoy and Azeera followed behind him.
Kirin tried to keep his face impassive, but dismay was in his heart. He had heard of the Mind Wizards of Nex and he knew how they could strip a man’s brain bare before the terror of the Probe. He had gambled all on a woman’s vanity, hoping to hurl suspicion on Pangoy through the sheer vehemence of his accusation, and because a woman as gorgeous as Azeera would have a natural tendency to believe such an accusation because flattery of her beauty was involved therein.