"That's no disease," I said. "You just naturally get old and die."
"The human mind is a magnificent instrument," Foster said, "not meant to wither quickly."
"I'll have to chew that one over," I said. "Why didn't you catch this disease?"
"All Vallonians are innoculated against it."
"I'd like a shot of that," I said. "But let's get back to you."
Foster turned the pages of the journal. "I ruled many peoples, under many names," he said. "I traveled in many lands, seeking for skilled metal-workers, glass-blowers, wise men. But always I returned to the landing-ring."
"It must have been tough," I said, "exiled on a strange world, living out your life in a wilderness, century after century...."
"My life was not without interest," Foster said. "I watched my savage people put aside their animal hides and learn the ways of civilization. I taught them how to build, and keep herds, and till the land. I built a great city, and I tried—foolishly—to teach their noble caste the code of chivalry of the Two Worlds. But although they sat at a round table like the great Ring-board at Okk-Hamiloth, they never really understood. And then they grew too wise, and wondered at their king, who never aged. I left them, and tried again to build a long-signaller. The Hunters sensed it, and swarmed to me. I drove them off with fires, and then I grew curious, and followed them back to their nest——"
"I know," I said. "'——and it was a place you knew of old: no hive but a Pit built by men.'"
"They overwhelmed me; I barely escaped with my life. Starvation had made the Hunters vicious. They would have drained my body of its life-energy."