Valli stroked the fuzz on his great head. «You are a little monster,» she said. «Stel was right about that. Already you've got the head of a grown man. Any other woman would call you ugly, but not me. Not Valli. I love you already and I am going to take care of you. I won't let them kill you, baby. But I will have to hide you somehow, keep you someplace where the guards can't find you. Ohh-honey, you mustn't bite Valli.»

Blade had not meant to bite her teat. But the milk was running out and he was still hungry. He eased up and sucked away and found, once his immediate hunger was appeased, that he was taking a very odd pleasure, what amounted to a physico-sexual sensation, in keeping her warm breast in his mouth. If he ever got out of this, he thought, he could tell old Dr. Spock a thing or two about babies. Not that anyone would believe him. Not that he could, in point of fact, tell anybody anything. Security was too tight for that.

Valli was carrying him close to her now, walking rapidly along paths leading through gardens and vast expanses of shrubbery and trees. She was almost running. They had met no one and he realized that her chief fear was that they would. His fear, too. The guards that had been mentioned, for instance. Blade did not like to think of that. For the moment he had only an infant's body, if a man's head and brain, but if they cut off that head he would be just as dead as if they had killed the adult Blade.

They passed what sounded like a fountain falling into a basin. These must be extensive gardens, harem gardens, and the position was bound to be a bit exposed. Blade sucked away and fondled that lovely breast and hoped and even prayed a little that Valli knew what she was doing and that she was lucky. He began to wish her on-hide me. Hide me quickly. Hurry. Hide me.

He needed time. How much time he did not know exactly, but some. He was beginning to grow. Not much, very slowly as yet, but he could feel the tingle and the surge in his small body. It was like a spreading itch and more an indication of growth to come than any actual physical change at the moment.