knowledge. So, as soon as she'd learned their techniques, she was
allowed to undertake experimental work of her own. I imagine she let
herself out on that; as soon as she'd mastered the standard Akor-Neb
methods of recovering memories of past reincarnations, she began
refining and developing them more than the local yokels had been able
to do in the past thousand years. I can't tell you just what she did,
because I don't know the subject, but she must have lit things up
properly. She got quite a lot of local publicity; not only scientific
journals, but general newscasts.

"Then, four days ago, she disappeared, and her disappearance seems to
have been coincident with an unsuccessful attempt on her life. We
don't know as much about this as we should; all we have is Zortan
Brend's account.

"It seems that on the evening of her disappearance, she had been
attending the voluntary discarnation feast--suicide party--of a
prominent nobleman named Garnon of Roxor. Evidently when the Akor-Neb
people get tired of their current reincarnation they invite in their
friends, throw a big party, and then do themselves in in an atmosphere
of general conviviality. Frequently they take poison or inhale lethal
gas; this fellow had his personal trigger man shoot him through the
head. Dalla was one of the guests of honor, along with this Harnosh of
Hosh. They'd made rather elaborate preparations, and after the shooting
they got a detailed and apparently authentic spirit-communication from
the late Garnon. The voluntary discarnation was just a routine social
event, it seems, but the communication caused quite an uproar, and rated
top place on the System-wide newscasts, and started a storm of
controversy.