Finally he drew away. "That is love, Leeta—something that would bring a man willingly to your aspect."
Her small face was flushed, her liquid eyes shone. Then despair washed over her. "But if you don't—" She gestured helplessly. "Where would I find a man in whom there would be such a love?"
He looked at her intently, searchingly, then gestured at the globe. "Leeta, if I were willing to stay here with you, would you release this man?"
"For you—yes." In her was no guile, only an innocent directness. "I have thought of you from the first moment we met," she admitted. "I found qualities in you that were not present in any of the others—a strength, and yet a gentleness, a sadness. I could not forget ... and I know now that this was love. And if you will truly stay—" She broke off eagerly. "Watch!"
She extended the globe toward the pool. She did not lower it, but held it over the surface. Her slim body grew very still. She seemed to be concentrating ... communing.
And as he watched, Bryan saw the mists from the pool thicken around the globe. The supernal power that radiated from it took on an atmosphere of tension, strain. For an instant, even though he still saw her, he had the uncanny yet definite impression that the globe was—gone.
Abruptly, then, dismayingly, the scene dimmed, began fading, as it had done on his first visit. Panic swept him. He couldn't leave now—he didn't want to leave! He fought to keep the garden around him, summoning all the force of will of which he was capable.
The scene steadied—but remained oddly blurred. He saw now that Leeta had turned from the pool and was holding out the globe to him, smiling. The globe's mystic brightness was gone. Once more it was a cloudy gray, its core a faint rose, slowly pulsing.
"It is done," Leeta said. "He has been returned safely to the other aspect." Then her smile vanished. She stared at Bryan in swift concern. "Why, what is the matter? What has happened to you?"
Her questions seemed to come from a great distance. The scene was dissolving again—and this time he could not hold it together. Something was wrong, he knew, seriously wrong. He tried to send a last message to Leeta ... failed.