The flesh in the furnace

Belina explained, indicating the wickedly beautiful, dark-haired and sloe-eyed villainess.
        "But she., wants you dead I" Sebastian blurted, amazed at the blonde puppet's concern for an evil woman lie this.
        "Only in the script," Belina said.
        "It hurts so," Wissa explained. "It hurts with the sword in my neck, because I don't die very fast. And every time I'm created, it's all just waiting until I die:"
        "We are people," Belina said. Her pretty face was not as pretty as it usually was, he noticed. "We're made on a pattern designed according to human gene structure. We're complete, with brains and emotions-'
        "Oh, hell, he's retarded," the prince said. "What are you all standing around talking to an idiot for?"
        Sebastian wanted to squash the prince. He could have, too. One swift kick against the wall, a heel brought down hard
        Belina stamped her feet, spat on the floorboards, leaving a little spot of glistening saliva there, a dew drop. "We'll put it to Godelhausser tonight. Wissa, it will be the last time. That old bastard isn't going to keep sacrificing you for showmanshipl"
        "He'll refuse to change it," Wissa Said. "Some patrons like the blood in the end. He's said so before."
        "Then we won't perform!" Belina snapped.
        "Yeah?" the prince asked. "And how do you plan to refuse him when he is four times taller than you, when you can't run more than a thousand yards, and when he can refuse you food or water and let you dehydrate until you're too weak to resist?"
        "Or," one of the three suitors offered, "if we push him too hard on it, perhaps he'll just stow us back in the Furnace, return us to plasm, and never use our story again. And that's as good as a permanent death. At least Wissa is always reborn."
        Listening, Sebastian was horror-stricken at such a possibility, and he felt his bladder weakening as he anticipated never seeing Bitty Belina again, never hearing that whispered voice in another show.
        "We could kill the old bastard 1" Belina growled, her face furiously red now, her hands fisted on her hips.
        The prince slid his hands around her, from the back, cupping her pert little breasts, chewing on her neck. "Calm, Belina. Don't louse up all we have and give us nothing in return."
        "I suppose," she said, pouting her lips.
        One of his hands slid between the buttons of her blouse, and the rounded mound of one breast was partially visible.
        Sebastian wanted to squash him, though he felt terribly guilty about harboring such desires. And, too, while he hated the prince and the way the prince touched Belina (and hated, even more, the way she reacted, cooing, giggling, enjoying it), chiefly because he could not understand what they were doing, he was not of a mind to take any action because of the bigger fear: that Pertos would deposit them in the Furnace and never bring them out again.
        They would be dead. Forever. Liquid flesh without feature.
        Dead and forever and no more blond hair and bright eyes.
        Because all this upset him so much, he had had an "accident" and he felt miserable. He wanted to change clothes, but he knew he shouldn't leave the stage until the curtain went up and he knew that there were no last-minute hitches.
        By now the puppets had seen what had happened, were pointing and laughing at the dark wet streaks down his pantleg. He saw that even Bitty Belina was laughing, and he was even more upset at this until he decided that, after all, it was funny, his standing there like that, all wet and embarrassed. So he laughed too.
        He didn't want to laugh, really. It was just that not laughing would have made things so much worse. Not laughing would have made him different and made him outside their fun. And he wanted to be inside more than anything else in the world. He always had, but he had never often succeeded in acting right.
        Now he was. They all laughed together.
        Fortunately, the curtain went up as Pertos operated the controls from the lightman's perch, and the play began. He could stop laughing when he didn't want to, and there was no longer any need for him to remain in the wings. Pertos said he should stay there as a communications link before a curtain rose, but Pertos had never called him in five years. He went to his room and changed trousers, which made him feel better. He came back to watch the